- Oriolus sagittatus
Identification
Photo taken: NSW, Australia
The Olive-backed Oriole (Oriolus sagittatus) is a very common medium-sized passerine bird. The most wide-ranging of the Australasian orioles, it is noisy and conspicuous, but drab in colour.
The Olive-backed Oriole is part of a worldwide family, of which Australia has two other members (the Yellow Oriole and the Figbird). Males and females have an olive-green head and back, grey wings and tail, and cream underparts, streaked with brown. They both have a bright red eye and reddish beak. Females can be distinguished from males by a paler bill, duller-green back, and an extension of the streaked underparts up to the chin.
Distribution
It is native to northern and eastern Australia and New Guinea. Common to very common in the north, Olive-backed Orioles are less frequently seen in the south, but nevertheless reach as far as south-eastern South Australia. Most birds breed during the tropical wet season, but some migrate south to breed in the southern summer.
Taxonomy
Habitat
The Olive-backed Oriole is more versatile, preferring more open woodland environments, and tolerating dryer climates (but not desert). The Olive-backed Oriole lives in forests, woodlands and rainforests.
Olive-backed Orioles are commonly encountered in urban parks and golf-courses, particularly those that have fruit-bearing trees.
Behaviour
Olive-backed Orioles are less gregarious than Figbirds, with which they are often seen foraging. Although they are sometimes seen in small groups, particularly in autumn and winter, they more often occur alone or in pairs, feeding on insects and fruit in canopy trees.
The female Olive-backed Oriole builds a cup-shaped nest which is attached by its rim to a horizontal fork on the outer-edge of the foliage of a tree or tall shrub. Nests are usually around 10 m above the ground, and built of strips of bark and grass, bound with spider web. The male does not build the nest, or incubate the eggs, but he feeds the young after the eggs hatch.
