Banded Stilt.
Photo: Purnell Collection © Australian Museum
Distribution map of Cladorhynchus leucocephalus
Map ©
Banded Stilt
Scientific name: Cladorhynchus leucocephalus
Family: Recurvirostridae
Order: Charadriiformes
- Featured Bird Groups
- Shore birds and waders
What does it look like?
Description
The Banded Stilt is a plump-bodied wader, with long orange or pink legs. Adult males and females are similar. The head and body is white with a broad chestnut band across the breast, extending down to the belly. This band fades or even disappears when the birds are not breeding. The wings are black with a conspicuous white trailing edge in flight. The eyes are brown and the black bill slender and straight. Immature stilts do not have black or chestnut on the underparts, the wings are brown and the legs are dull pink. Banded Stilts commonly gather in small parties or large flocks.This species may also be called the Bishop or Rottnest Stilt.
Similar species
Banded Stilts are similar in size to the Black-winged Stilt, Himantopus himantopus, but are bulkier, with shorter legs. The Red-necked Avocet, Recurvirostra novaehollandiae, has a long up-turned bill and reddish head.Where does it live?
Distribution
Banded Stilts are endemic to Australia, mainly in the south and inland.
Habitat
Banded Stilts are found mainly in saline and hypersaline (very salty) waters of the inland and coast, typically large, open and shallow.Seasonal movements
Banded Stilts are dispersive and movements are complex and often erratic in response to availability of feeding and breeding habitat across the range. Populations may move to the coast or nearby when the arid inland is dry, returning inland to breed after rain or flooding.
What does it do?
Feeding
Banded Stilts feed on crustaceans, molluscs, insects, vegetation, seeds and roots. They are diurnal (feeding by day), dependent on the availability of prey in ephemeral (appear only after flooding or rain) salt lakes. They forage by picking, probing and scything (swinging bill from side to side) on salt lakes, either by wading in shallow water or swimming often some distance from the shore.
Breeding
Banded Stilts breed only in the arid inland when wetlands appear after rain or flooding and not much is known about their breeding habits. They breed on small islands in lakes, occasionally on sand-pits, bare patches of sandy clay or stony soil. The nest is a scrape in the ground, saucer-shaped or like an inverted cone. The nest is occasionally lined with dry grass or stems of samphire.Living with us
Living with humans
An increase in populations of Silver Gulls, associated with human settlement, may be a cause for concern for Banded Stilts.
References
Marchant, S. and Higgins, P.J. (eds) 1993. Handbook of Australian New Zealand And Antartic Birds Vol. 2: (Raptors To Lapwings). Oxford University Press, Melbourne.
Schodde, R. and Tideman, S.C. (eds) 1990. Reader's Digest Complete Book of Australian Birds (2nd Edition). Reader's Digest (Australia) Pty Ltd, Sydney.