Trevor's Birding

Yellow-rumped Thornbill

I love seeing dozens of tiny thornbills flitting around our garden. The most common thornbill here is the Yellow-rumped Thornbill with its bright yellow tail. Less common is the Chestnut-rumped Thornbill, an occasional visitor to the garden. Even less common is the Yellow Thornbill (also called the Little Thornbill). We recently had several of these quite close to the bird bath, but it didn’t stop to drink so I can’t count it on that list.

The Yellow-rumped Thornbills must have had a very good breeding season; there seems to be about 30 or 40 around at present. It is lovely seeing them come to the bird bath or just hopping around on the ground just a few metres away.

Despite the numbers I have found it very hard to get a good photo of one, especially of the yellow on the rump. They are constantly on the move – and when they move it can leave either a blur or an empty frame in the camera. The two in the photo above were bathing in a little pool of water near the base of a rose bush. They were having a great time on a hot day.

The photo below was taken several years ago in another location. It doesn’t show the yellow rump.

Yellow Rumped Thornbill