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8

Black-breasted Button-quail (Turnix melanogaster) Size: 16.5-19 cm (female larger than male) Weight: 50-85 g (male), 80-120 g (female)

Australia: Family Group 8 Family Group 8 Table Red-backed Button-quail Chestnut-backed Button-quail Little Button-quail Red-chested Button-quail Painted Button-quail Black-breasted Button-quail Ruddy Turnstone Latham's Snipe Swinhoe's Snipe Painted Snipe Asian Dowitcher Bar-tailed Godwit Black-tailed Godwit Whimbrel Little Curlew Eastern Curlew Eurasian Curlew Pectoral Sandpiper Sharp-tailed Sandpiper Curlew Sandpiper Ruff Red Knot Great Knot Wandering Tattler Grey-tailed Tattler Wood Sandpiper Terek Sandpiper Common Sandpiper Green Sandpiper Buff-breasted Sandpiper Common Greenshank Marsh Sandpiper Red-necked Stint Long-toed Stint Temminck's Stint Sanderling Broad-billed Sandpiper Thumbnails page Family group table Index of bird names Habitat pages Key plants Birds home page

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

Physical description Click here for a physical description Black-breasted Button-quails are small ground-dwelling birds. Their plumage is highly cryptic and dimorphic, i.e. males and females are different. Males have a black and white mottled head, with a brown and black mottled cap, and a more coarsely black and white mottled breast and belly. Females have an almost all-black head, with some minor white mottling and a brownish back of the head. The front is much more prominently black than the males', too, the centre being darkest, with more mottling towards the sides. The rest of the plumage of both sexes is roughly equal, with a boldly streaked black, white and brown back and mottled wing coverts. From a distance the general colour appears to be brownish-grey. The irises of both sexes are pale-grey. The slightly downcurved bill is grey, while legs and feet are yellow. Juveniles resemble males, but their wing coverts are streaked, not mottled.

Taxonomy, classification See Black-breasted Button-quail at Wikipedia . Click here for classification information Quail vs. Button-quail Although the two genera of the true quails, Coturnix, and the button-quails, Turnix, are outwardly very similar, and therefore often listed together, there are significant differences between them (which is the reason why they are in different family groups here). Genus Coturnix Turnix Common name True quails Button-quails Similar species Chicken-like Wader-like Toes 4 toes, one of which points backward 3 toes, all of which point forward Nesting habits Communal Non-communal Main incubator Female Male Incubation period ca. 21 days ca. 14 days No. of eggs 8-12 ≤ 4

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 Black-breasted Button-quail is available HERE . Black-breasted Button-quails are endemic to Australia. Their overall distribution is limited, from Hervey Bay, Inskip Point and Fraser Island in QLD southward to north-eastern NSW, to about Coffs Harbour. They live only on the eastern (seaward) side of the Great Dividing Range. The natural habitats of Black-breasted Button-quails are rainforest and lantana thickets. However, their prime habitat is partly destroyed and largely fragmented and they are now also found in man-made plantations.

Sightings Click here for sighting information B. Hensen reports first finding a Black-breasted Button-quail at Inskip Point, QLD, in January 2013. We have found characteristic platelets of Black-breasted Button-quails in Ravensbourne NP, near Esk, QLD, in March 2016. M. Eaton reports first spotting Black-breasted Button-quails at Cooloola NP, QLD, in December 2017. Platelets were found at Mungoberry Vine Forest Reserve, Dundowran Beach, Hervey Bay, QLD, in May 2018. A pair of Black-breasted Button-quails was found at D'Aguilar NP, near Brisbane, QLD, in January 2023.

Photos

ADULT

MALE

Frontal view of an adult male Black-breasted Button-quail; note the vermiculated sides of the head (photo courtesy of M. Eaton)
[D'Aguilar NP, near Brisbane, QLD, January 2023]

Lateral view of an adult male Black-breasted Button-quail (photo courtesy of M. Eaton)
[D'Aguilar NP, near Brisbane, QLD, January 2023]

Lateral view of an adult male Black-breasted Button-quail foraging in dark undergrowth (photo courtesy of M. Eaton)
[D'Aguilar NP, near Brisbane, QLD, January 2023]

FEMALE

Full-frontal view of a female Black-breasted Button-quail; note the characteristic black head (photo courtesy of M. Eaton)
[D'Aguilar NP, near Brisbane, QLD, January 2023]

Lateral view of a female Black-breasted Button-quail (photo courtesy of M. Eaton)
[D'Aguilar NP, near Brisbane, QLD, January 2023]

Lateral view of a female Black-breasted Button-quail (photo courtesy of M. Eaton)
[D'Aguilar NP, near Brisbane, QLD, January 2023]

Lateral view of a female Black-breasted Button-quail foraging in dark undergrowth (photo courtesy of M. Eaton)
[D'Aguilar NP, near Brisbane, QLD, January 2023]

Lateral view of a partly obscured adult female Black-breasted Button-quail; note the characteristic black head
(photo courtesy of B. Hensen)
[Inskip Point, QLD, January 2013]

Behaviour

Like other species of button-quails, Black-breasted Button-quails create "platelets". These are bare patches on the ground that are caused by the birds' scratching in mulch or leaf litter while turning around a point of interest in search of food.

Near-lateral view of a female Black-breasted Button-quail foraging in leaf litter (photo courtesy of M. Eaton)
[D'Aguilar NP, near Brisbane, QLD, January 2023]

Typical Black-breasted Button-quail platelet, i.e. a scrape mould foraging in dark undergrowth (photo courtesy of M. Eaton)
[D'Aguilar NP, near Brisbane, QLD, January 2023]

Black-breasted Button-quail platelet (photo courtesy of M. Eaton)
[Mungoberry Vine Forest Reserve, Dundowran Beach, Hervey Bay, QLD, May 2018]

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.

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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: Sat, 7 January 2023, 21:00 +00:00