…diamond bird, diamond sparrow, headache bird, widopwidop…
Spotted pardalote is the “proper” common name for Pardalotus punctatus – one of Australia’s tiniest, loveliest, shyest birds.
Although moderately common in all of the reasonably fertile parts of Australia (the east coast, the south-east, and the south-west corner) it is seldom seen closely enough to enable identification.
On the morning of 16 February 2025, I at last managed to take some halfway decent photos of one.
If you zoom in, you can see just how exquisite is its plumage.
The italicised quote is from this species’ (pretty good) Wikipedia entry.
Pardalotes’ preferred prey: lerps.
Lerps are tiny insects – sweet-tasting, sap-sucking, sometimes, tree-killing.
It is probable that pardalotes are a key to the continuing good health of some eucalypts.
Q: if one placed a one kilogram weight on a set of scales, how many adult spotted pardalotes would be required to “balance” those scales?
A: circa 165!
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