Eastern Yellow Robin

BIRD: linking the biodiversity community

Category: Birds

The Eastern Yellow Robin (Eopsaltria australis) is a common resident of coastal and sub-coastal eastern Australia, from the extreme south-east corner of South Australia through most of Victoria and the western half of New South Wales, and north as far as Cooktown, though tropical northern Queensland birds are mainly restricted to the cool heights of the Great Dividing Range.

It occupies a wide range of habitats: heaths, mallee, acacia scrub, woodlands and sclerophyll forests, but is most often found in damper places or near water.

At 15 to 16cm in length, the Eastern Yellow Robin is one of the larger Australasian robins, and one of the most easily observed.

Pairs and small family parties establish a territory — sometimes year-round, sometimes for a season — and seem little disturbed by human presence. They appear not to migrate any great distance, but will make local movements with the seasons, particularly to higher and lower ground.

Like most robins, the Eastern Yellow prefers fairly dark, shaded locations and is a perch and pounce hunter, typically from a tree trunk, wire, or low branch.

The diet is a wide range of small creatures, mostly insects. Breeding takes place in the spring and is often communal. The nest is a neat cup made of fine plant material and spider web, usually placed in a fork, and expertly disguised with lichen, moss, bark, or leaves.