Spotted pardalote

The spotted pardalote was described by English naturalist George Shaw and drawn by Frederick Polydore Nodder in the 1792 work ''The Naturalist's Miscellany: Or, Coloured Figures Of Natural Objects; Drawn and Described Immediately From Nature. Calling it Pipra punctata, or speckled manakin, Shaw conceded that nothing had been reported of its habits in New Holland (Australia). Early settlers of New South Wales knew it as the Diamond Bird, on account of the spots on its plumage, and John Gould called it the spotted diamond-bird. Other early names include diamond sparrow, bank diamond and diamond dyke, the last two relating to its nest burrows in riverbanks. Indigenous people from lowlands and Perth districts of southern Western Australia knew it as widopwidop and bilyabit, though the terms were also used for the striated pardalote. Headache bird'' is a colloquial name given it because of the repetitive "sleep-may-be" call uttered in the breeding season. The species was placed in the new genus Pardalotus by Louis Pierre Vieillot in 1816, who also coined the word "pardalote". Within the genus, its closest relative is the forty-spotted pardalote (Pardalotus quadragintus) based on size and plumage similarities. Ramsay suspected that discussion of his description prompted McCoy to publish his own description; however, McCoy countered that they had been aware it was a separate species for some time. In any case, McCoy's description stood and Ramsay's was consigned to synonymy. In a 1983 paper, Lester Short and colleagues noted the similarity of plumage and calls between the two taxa and occurrence of hybrid specimens from Victoria where the two forms overlapped. John Woinarski found that around Bendigo (where both taxa occur), more pairs appeared to contain members of both forms than not. Western Australian ornithologist Julian Ford felt evidence of hybridization in Western Australia was lacking and also wondered whether land clearing and habitat alteration had promoted hybridization in southeastern Australia. In their 1999 Directory of Australian Birds, Richard Schodde and Ian Mason relegated the yellow-rumped pardalote to subspecies status on account of the intermediate characteristics of subspecies militaris and the widespread hybridization in southeastern Australia. They felt Ford's evidence for lack of interbreeding in Western and South Australia was not strong, but conceded fieldwork in Western Australia was needed. ==Description==

Weighing around , the spotted pardalote is long. The adult male of the nominate subspecies has grey-brown upperparts with numerous paler buff spots, a black crown, wings and tail all with white spots, white eyebrows and reddish rump. The yellow-rumped subspecies is larger overall with a relatively smaller bill. The adult male has finer, white spots on its back, a bright yellow rump, and a cream breast. The adult female has finer spots than the adult female of the nominate subspecies. The Wet Tropics subspecies is smaller with a relatively larger bill. The adult male has a reddish rump and pale- to cinnamon-buff underparts. ==Distribution and habitat==

George Caley reported that it was not common around Sydney even in early settlement days. but the species is not considered endangered at this time. ==Nesting==

Spotted pardalotes breed between August or September to December or January—generally earlier in the year in northern parts of their range and later in southern areas. The nest is an underground horizontal oval chamber lined with shredded bark, linked by a tunnel long to a hole in the side of a riverbank or slope in a shaded location. The eggs are incubated for 19 days until they hatch, with nestlings spending another 21 days in the nest. Pairs make soft, whistling wheet-wheet calls to one another throughout the day, which carry for quite a distance. One of the difficulties in locating a pardalote is that the contact call is in fact two calls: an initial call and an almost instant response, and thus can come from two different directions. ==Gallery==

File:Spotted Pardalote postmans.ogg | File:Spotted Pardalote armstrongck.ogv | File:Spotted Pardalotes burrowing.ogg | File:Pardalotus punctatus female with nesting material - Risdon Brook.jpg | ==References==