Green Catbird.
Photo: Richard Major © Australian Museum
Green Catbird.
Photo: K Vang and W Dabrowka / Bird Explorers © K Vang and W Dabrowka / Bird Explorers
Green Catbird
Photo: SG Lane Collection © Australian Museum
Green Catbird, at nest.
Photo: Purnell Collection © Australian Museum
Green Catbird.
Photo: SG Lane Collection © Australian Museum
Distribution map of Ailuroedus crassirostris
Map © Birds Australia Birdata
Green Catbird
Scientific name: Ailuroedus crassirostris
Family: Ptilonorhynchidae
Order: Passeriformes
What does it look like?
Description
The Green Catbird is a large, stout green bird, spotted white, with a dusky crown, nape and face and a white bill. The eye is red. Juveniles are duller in colour.
Similar species
The Spotted Catbird, A. melanotis, is extremely similar, but widely separated in its range. It tends to be much brighter green and paler below and has black markings on the head. The Green Catbird can also resemble the immature or female Satin Bowerbird, which has a distinctly blue eye, a dark bill and a more scalloped patterning on the underbody, while the upper body is a more olive-green.
Where does it live?
Distribution
The Green Catbird is found along the east coast of Australia, from south-eastern Queensland to southern New South Wales.
Habitat
The Green Catbird is found in temperate and sub-tropical rainforest and paperbarks, and sometimes adjacent eucalypt forest.
Seasonal movements
Sedentary.
What does it do?
Feeding
The Green Catbird eats fruit, notably figs, flowers, and other plant material. It will also kill baby birds to feed its own young during breeding season and will eat small reptiles too. They usually feed in pairs or small groups, moiving from tree to tree in the mid to upper canopy.
Breeding
Male Green Catbirds do not build a bower. They pair monogamously with a female, helping her to defend an all-purpose territory and feeding her throughout the year. The nest is a bulky cup of twigs, leaves and vines, usually in a prickly shrub, treefork, tree fern or low tree.The nest has an unusual layer of wet, soft wood beneath the lining of fine twigs and leaves, making the nest very large and bulky. Both sexes feed and look after the young.
References
Morcombe, M. 2000. Field guide to Australian Birds. Steve Parish Publishing.
Simpson, K and Day, N. 1999. Field guide to the birds of Australia, 6th Edition. Penguin Books, Australia.