Australasian Shoveler

Male
Photo by Tony Brown
Lake Monger, Perth, Australia

Anas rhynchotis

Identification

46-56cm

• Long, spatulate bill

Male

• Blue-grey head, with a vertical white crescent
• Chestnut sides
• Blue forewing
• White underwing shows in flight
  

Female

• Overall rufous-brown plumage, with darker streaks on upperparts
• Buffish feather edges

Female
Photo by Neil
Sydney,Australia, February 2004

Distribution

Australasia: found in south-western and south-eastern Australia; Tasmania, and New Zealand.

Taxonomy

Subspecies^[1]

There are 2 subspecies

• A. r. rhynchotis:

• Discontinuously distributed south-western and south-eastern Australia and Tasmania

• A. r. variegata:

• New Zealand

Habitat

A wide variety of wetlands; prefers large permanent lakes or swamp that have abundant shrubbery cover of melaleuca and cumbungi.
Only an infrequent user of mangrove swamps, floodwaters, sewage farms.

• 

  Eclipse
  Photo by Rookery
  Cape Kidnappers, New Zealand, November 2008

• 

  Sub Adult or Non breeding Male
  Photo by aussietrev
  Queensland, Australia, June 2009

Behaviour

Diet

The diet includes a wide variety of vegetable matter: herbs, grasses, pondweeds, wigeon grass, eelgrass, and algae.

Breeding

Seven or eight eggs are laid and incubated for 25-26 days; the young fledge after 40-45 days.

References

1. Clements, JF. 2008. The Clements Checklist of Birds of the World. 6th ed., with updates to December 2008. Ithaca: Cornell Univ. Press. ISBN 978-0801445019.
2. Avibase
3. Animal Bytes
4. BF Member observations

• List of references

Recommended Citation

• BirdForum Opus contributors. (2024) Australasian Shoveler. In: BirdForum, the forum for wild birds and birding. Retrieved 20 May 2024 from https://www.birdforum.net/opus/Australasian_Shoveler

External Links

• Arthur Grosset's Birds

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