Striated vs Brown Thornbills

When I began surveying for The New Atlas of Australian Birds I was astonished that ticking ‘thornbill species’ wasn’t an option. If I wasn’t sure which kind of raven I had spotted I could tick ‘corvid species’ but somehow I had to learn to distinguish thornbills, and I had to learn quickly.

Striated Thornbill (Acanthiza lineata)
1/1250, f/6.3, ISO 1600
Canon 5DsR, Canon 200-400L IS USM EXT

Little Brown Birds (LBBs or LBJs) flit around in dense foliage as they glean for insects; they move quickly, darting and diving through trees and shrubs like hyperactive acrobats. Sometimes they are in mixed flocks, just to keep us on our toes as we try to identify them. Once I learned some key identifiers it became ridiculously easy to identify striateds from browns.

I love the movement shown in the image above as the Striated Thornbill comes in to land. This pose shows the distinctive streaking on its ear coverts and the dark streaks on its underparts. It also shows its pale brown eye and the strong white streaks across its rufous-brown head.

Brown Thornbill (Acanthiza pusilla)
1/1250, f/6.3, ISO 1600
Canon 5DsR, Canon 200-400L IS USM

The Brown Thornbill, above has a red eye, it lacks the streaked ear coverts of the Striated and instead of a streaked head its feathers form neat little scallops. Both species have streaked underparts.

Brown Thornbill (Acanthiza pusilla)
1/800, f/5.6, ISO 1600
Canon 5DIII, Canon 200-400L IS USM

The upperparts of the Brown Thornbill are brown with a rufous-brown rump and a greyish-brown tail with a black band, parts of which can be seen in the image above. Both species are tiny, measuring about 10cm and weighing between 6-8g.

Striated Thornbill (Acanthiza lineata)
1/1250, f/6.3, ISO 1600
Canon 5DsR, Canon 200-400L IS USM EXT

Upperparts of the Striated Thornbill are olive-green, a beautiful colour which sits beautifully beside their yellowish flanks. The specific shades of colours changing subtly across the subspecies of these thornbills (four Striated and five Brown subspecies).

Learning to differentiate their calls can also help with identification. The Australian Bird Guide describes the call of the Striated Thornbill as a ‘thin insect-like call tsip, uttered singly or repeated in brisk string, eg tiziz-tiziz’ along with a springtime call that is a soft pleasant trill. The same field guide describes the call of the Brown Thornbill as including a ‘Pleasant trilled song, eg to-weet-et-wrrtt, often preceded by tzzt notes’. All of which is quite true but also hilarious and has left me wondering who on earth has the job of trying to put bird calls and songs into words.

Happy birding

Kim

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