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24

Singing Bushlark (Mirafra javanica) Alternate name(s): "Horsfield's Bushlark", "Australasian Bushlark", "Cinnamon Bushlark", "Australian Skylark", "Croplark" Aboriginal name(s): "tirtiyn tjaRuk"/"turti tjaRuk" [tjapwurrung, eastern djadjawurrung] Size: 12-15 cm Weight: 18-25 g

Australia: Family Group 24 Family Group 24 Table Singing Bushlark Australian Pipit Eastern Yellow Wagtail Citrine Wagtail Grey Wagtail White Wagtail Zebra Finch Double-barred Finch Long-tailed Finch Black-throated Finch Masked Finch Crimson Finch Plum-headed Finch Pictorella Mannikin Chestnut-breasted Mannikin Yellow-rumped Mannikin Blue-faced Parrot-Finch Diamond Firetail Beautiful Firetail Red-eared Firetail Painted Finch Star Finch Red-browed Finch Gouldian Finch Thumbnails page Family group table Index of bird names Habitat pages Key plants Birds Australi home page

Similar species

Description     Classification     Distribution     Sightings     Photos     Breeding     Nest     Eggs     Behaviour     Food     Call/s

Physical description Click here for a physical description Singing Bushlarks are small Australian grassland larks. Their highly cryptic plumage has colour variations across different races. Red morphology birds have a reddish tinge throughout; dark morphology birds have predominantly brown colours. The crown is heavily striated a dark shade of brown. The ear coverts are also quite dark-brown, while the eyebrows and arcs encircling the end of the ear coverts are much lighter. The front is whitish to reddish-brown, with darker streaking on the breast. The back, including the upperwings, is heavily scalloped, mostly very dark (or reddish) brown, with lighter (brown to greyish-brown) edges to the feathers. The uppertail is dark (or reddish) brown, with lighter outer edges. The undertail is grey. The eyes have dark irises. The short, stout bill is almost triangular in shape, similar to the bills of finches, with a dark-grey upper mandible and a horn-coloured lower mandible. The legs and feet are pinkish-grey. Juvenile Singing Bushlarks are paler overall, most prominently on their front, where they do not have any striation yet. Twitcher's tip Compared with other Australian larks, Singing Bushlarks are smaller and have a much shorter, stouter bill that closely resembles bills of finches.

Taxonomy, classification See Singing Bushlark at Wikipedia . Click here for classification information Compared with other Australian larks, Singing Bushlarks are smaller and have a much shorter, stouter bill that closely resembles bills of finches. This is the reason why they appear here, in family group 24, rather than with the Australian larks, which are more closely related to the "old world warblers" (e.g. the Reed-Warblers of the genus Acrocephalus).

Range, habitat, finding this species Click here for information on habitat and range The overall distribution of this species can be assessed, and specific locations where birds have been spotted can be found, based on individual sighting reports submitted by birdwatchers to ebird.org . The global distribution of the Singing Bushlark is available HERE . The range of the Singing Bushlark encompasses parts of Thailand and Laos, the northern Philippines, parts of eastern Indonesia, Timor Leste, parts of New Guinea and Australia. In total there are nine races of Singing Bushlarks on the Australian continent; for details of their distribution see a field guide. Altogether they populate large parts of the North-West and the eastern half of Australia. They are found from Eyre peninsula in SA, via the Adelaide area and along the South coast, basically all through VIC, NSW and QLD, except the area of Coopracambra NP on the NSW/VIC border, parts of the Great Dividing Range between the Manning River in NSW and Charters Towers, QLD and Cape York peninsula. From western QLD their range extends into the eastern margin of the NT and along the Top End of the NT via the Kimberley to the Gascoyne in WA, up to about Carnarvon, WA. Nominate race "horsfieldii" resides in an area from Adelaide, SA, to the East, including most of VIC and NSW, southern central QLD and most of the (near-)coastal strip along the QLD East coast (except the tablelands around Cairns), to the base of Cape York peninsula. Race "soderbergi" populates the Top End of the NT (with the exception of Melville Island). Singing Bushlarks are usually found in open grassland and along dirt/gravel roadsides, but also in or around crops on farms.

Sightings Click here for sighting information Race "horsfieldii" So far we have seen only dark-morphology Singing Bushlarks, race "horsfieldii". A group of 7 birds was first spotted by us on a gravel road at Eulah Creek, 20 km East of Narrabri, NSW, in January 2011. Singing Bushlarks, race "horsfieldii", were next seen at Goran Lake, an ephemeral lake about 30 km South of Gunnedah, NSW, in October 2011. C. Hayne reports spotting Singing Bushlarks, race "horsfieldii", regularly in the area of Moree, NSW. Singing Bushlarks, race "horsfieldii", were also found by us in paddocks at Eulah Creek, NSW, in May 2014. A. Allnutt found a Singing Bushlark, race "horsfieldii", at Lake Cargelligo, NSW, in January 2019. M. Eaton reports spotting a Singing Bushlark, race "horsfieldii", near Oakey, QLD, in January 2019, and at Lake Samsonvale, QLD, in December 2019. They were also found at Horseshoe Lagoon, Hodel Road, Burdekin, QLD, in September 2020. reports finding Singing Bushlarks, race "horsfieldii", in wheat stubble near Narrabri, NSW, in November 2020. Race "soderbergi" B. Hensen reports spotting Singing Bushlarks, race "soderbergi", in Darwin, NT, in August 2013. B. Hensen and P. Brown again found a Singing Bushlark, race "soderbergi", at both Knuckey Lagoon and Leanyer Swamp, Darwin, NT, in November 2018. They were also found further inland, at Timber Creek airport, Timber Creek, NT, in November 2018. In January 2021 P. Brown again found a Singing Bushlark, race "soderbergi", this time at Oolloo Road, Douglas-Daly, NT.

Photos

Race "horsfieldii"

ADULT

Sex unknown

Frontal view of an adult Singing Bushlark on a gravel road
[Eulah Creek, NSW, January 2011]

Near-lateral view of a Singing Bushlark on the ground (photo courtesy of C. Hayne)

Lateral view of a Singing Bushlark looking at the observer
[Goran Lake, NSW, October 2011]

Close-up lateral view of a Singing Bushlark on a barbed wire fence (photo courtesy of V. Collins)
[Near Narrabri, NSW, November 2020]

Lateral view of a Singing Bushlark
[Goran Lake, NSW, October 2011]

Singing Bushlark seen at the very moment it launches itself into the air
[Goran Lake, NSW, October 2011]

Lateral view of s Singing Bushlark
[Eulah Creek, NSW, January 2011]

Lateral view of a Singing Bushlark (photo courtesy of M. Eaton)
[Near Oakey, QLD, January 2019]

Near-dorsal view of a Singing Bushlark (photo courtesy of M. Eaton)
[Lake Samsonvale, QLD, December 2019]

Near-dorsal view of a Singing Bushlark (photo courtesy of M. Eaton)
[Horseshoe Lagoon, Hodel Road, Burdekin, QLD, September 2020]

Near-dorsal view of a Singing Bushlark, now with its crest erect (photo courtesy of M. Eaton)
[Horseshoe Lagoon, Hodel Road, Burdekin, QLD, September 2020]

Dorsal view of a Singing Bushlark (photo courtesy of A. Allnutt)
[Lake Cargelligo, NSW, January 2019]

Race "soderbergi"

ADULT

Sex unknown

Frontal view of an adult Singing Bushlark with its crest raised (photo courtesy of B. Hensen)
[Leanyer Swamp, Darwin, NT, November 2018]

Near-frontal view of a Singing Bushlark (photo courtesy of B. Hensen)
[Leanyer Swamp, Darwin, NT, November 2018]

Near-frontal view of an adult Singing Bushlark issuing its call (photo courtesy of B. Hensen)
[Leanyer Swamp, Darwin, NT, November 2018]

Near-frontal view of a Singing Bushlark looking sideways (photo courtesy of B. Hensen)
[Leanyer Swamp, Darwin, NT, November 2018]

Near-lateral view of a Singing Bushlark, first looking left... (photo courtesy of P. Brown)
[Oolloo Road, Douglas-Daly, NT, January 2021]

Near-lateral view of a Singing Bushlark, now looking right (photo courtesy of P. Brown)
[Oolloo Road, Douglas-Daly, NT, January 2021]

Near-lateral view of a Singing Bushlark (photo courtesy of B. Hensen)
[Darwin, NT, August 2013]

Lateral view of a Singing Bushlark (photo courtesy of B. Hensen)
[Darwin, NT, August 2013]

Male Singing Bushlark marking its territory from a high perch; this is the bird whose calls were recorded on 11 November 2018 (photo courtesy of P. Brown)
[Knuckey Lagoon, Darwin, NT, November 2018]

Near-frontal view of a Singing Bushlark in flight (photo courtesy of B. Hensen)
[Darwin, NT, August 2013]

Behaviour

Social behaviour: Territorial

Mobility: Partly migratory

Elementary unit: Solitary/pair

"Find the bird!" - Singing Bushlark relying on its camouflage to stay hidden (photo courtesy of V. Collins)
[Near Narrabri, NSW, November 2020]

Call(s)/Song

For this species we have recorded the following call(s)/song. The interpretation of their meaning is our own; comments and suggestions for improvement are welcome.

singlrk_20220912.mp3	horsfieldii (NW NSW)	Territorial calls (male)	© MD
singlrk_20141121.mp3	horsfieldii (NW NSW)	Territorial calls (male display flight)	© MD
singlrk_20151219.m4a	horsfieldii (NW NSW)	Territorial calls (male)	© MD
singlrk_pb_20181111_2.m4a	soderbergi (Top End, NT)	Territorial calls (male)	© PB
singlrk_pb_20181111.m4a	soderbergi (Top End, NT)	Territorial calls (male) + mimicry (Jacky Winter)	© PB
singlrk_pb_20181111_3.m4a	soderbergi (Top End, NT)	Territorial calls (male) + mimicry (Jacky Winter)	© PB
singlrk_pb_20190920.m4a	soderbergi (Top End, NT)	Mimicry (Lemon-bellied Flycatcher)	© PB

More Singing Bushlark sound recordings are available at xeno-canto.org .

These pages are largely based on our own observations and those of our contributors. The structure of these bird pages is explained HERE. For more salient facts on any bird species please refer to a field guide.

Would you like to contribute photos or sound recordings to this site? If interested, please CLICK HERE. Credits to contributors are given HERE.

Disclaimer: Comments are always welcome. We give no guarantee that the information presented on these pages is always correct or up-to-date. External links are marked as such and we take no responsibility for the contents of external pages. All images on this site are protected by copyright & used by permission of the respective owners. If you wish to reproduce them or any of the material presented on this web site, please contact us: We hereby acknowledge the original custodians of the land which is described on these pages, including the Gomeroi/Gamilaraay people of the North-west Slopes and Plains of NSW, and the traditional owners of other lands and nations within this country. We acknowledge elders past, present and emerging. Sovereignty was never ceded.          Last updated: Tue, 18 April 2023, 5:56 +00:00