SOUTHERN EMU-WREN

543         SOUTHERN EMU-WREN            Stipiturus malachurus

Australia          (384)

Also known as Button-grass Wren and Stickball. 15-19 cm, incl. tail 9-12 cm. Found in heaths with 'grasstrees', banksias, hakes, rushes, sedges, scrubby thickets, lignum, montane gullies, subalpine grasslands, heathy woodlands; in Tas. button-grass plains, montane moors; in sw. WA dune-vegetation, sand plain-heaths, dry eucalypt, acacia-spinifex. Range: coastal WA from Shark Bay south to SA border; Eyre Pen. (SA) from Adelaide coastal to Vic. border; coastal Vic., NSW to above Brisbane in Q.; all Tas.

NOTE: Up to eleven subspecies have been described with seven being recognised. 

Subspecies westernensis photographed at Cheyenne's Beach, WA, November 2016

Subspecies littleri, photographed on South Coast Track, Tasmania February 2017