Red-capped Robin
Adult Female, anterior
Red-capped Robin
Adult Male, anterior
Animals
Plants
Info
| Red-capped Robin Adult Female, anterior | | Red-capped Robin Adult Male, anterior | | ||
Animals Plants Info |
 | Class: | Animals (Animalia) - Chordates (Chordata) - Birds (Aves) | ||||||||||||
| Order: | Perching Birds (Passeriformes) | |||||||||||||
| Family: | Australasian Robin (Petroicidae) iNaturalist Observation | |||||||||||||
| Species: | Red-capped Robin (Petroica goodenovii)| This Photo: | Adult Female, profile | Thank you (LeithallB) for confirming the id of this species for us General Species Information: Found on Ellura (in the Murray Mallee, SA) and elsewhere The Female is a pretty, petite bird without the red breast. It's cap varies in the intensity of red. The Male has a brilliant red cap and breast, black wings & back. The males throat is a mix of red & black; black near the back blending with black & red feathers to the breast. White under. Both have black wings with white streaks. It's easy to miss the red cap when it is turned slightly away. The females are so very similar to Jacky winters. From the front Female Red-caps have grey tones, where as Jacky Winters have brown tones. From the rear Jacky Winters are missing black on the wings; but this can be hard to differentiate in certain lighting situations. Like many birds, juvenile males have similar appearance to adult females. We saw one specimen that had a slight red tinge to it's throat and asked Sam Gordon if he thought it was a juvenile male or a female. In summary, it's probably a female due to it's behaviour. Sam said "It's possible that this is an immature male, but they are very difficult to distinguish from adult females. Note that technically, juvenile and immature plumages are distinct from each other - juvenile RCRs have fairly obvious streaking (as here) that they lose after a few months when they moult into immature plumage. The red wash to the throat is better for young male, but some females can also develop a slight red wash here so it's not 100% definitive. My understanding of the white wing markings (after skimming HANZAB) is that immature birds usually have a more buff tinge to the wing markings that become whiter with age. Either way the wings of your bird don't look out of place for an adult female to me, though maybe just not a particularly old adult female. You mention that behaviour seemed to match a female, so I'm assuming it was hanging around with an adult male? If that's the case I'd say it's likely going to be a female, you'd generally expect immature birds of this age to have long since dispersed from their parents' territory, especially as many will be nesting or at least preparing to at the moment, given the conditions. Otherwise I wouldn't want to make a confident call either way!"
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