The Buff-sided Robin is a small bird in the Petroicidae

Petroicidae

The bird family Petroicidae includes roughly 45 species in about 15 genera. All are endemic to Australasia: New Guinea, Australia, New Zealand and numerous Pacific Islands as far east as Samoa. For want of an accurate common name, the family is often called the Australasian robins. Within the...

 family. It is endemic to northern Australia

Australia

Australia , officially the Commonwealth of Australia, is a country in the Southern Hemisphere comprising the mainland of the Australian continent, the island of Tasmania, and numerous smaller islands in the Indian and Pacific Oceans. It is the world's sixth-largest country by total area...

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Description

The Robin has a green to brown back with a dark brown tail and wings streaked with white, creamy white chest, with pale orange around and beneath the wings. It is distinguished from the similar White-browed Robin

White-browed Robin

The White-browed Robin is a species of bird in the family Petroicidae. It is endemic to north-eastern Australia. Its natural habitats are forest, woodland and scrub, often near water...

, which it was formerly lumped, by its larger size, thicker and longer white superciliary stripe, duskier upper back, broad black face band, broader white remigial bar, rich tawny-rufous flanks, and white tipping on all retrices.

Distribution and habitat

The Robin is found in the Kimberley region of north-west Western Australia

Western Australia

Western Australia is a state of Australia, occupying the entire western third of the Australian continent. It is bounded by the Indian Ocean to the north and west, the Great Australian Bight and Indian Ocean to the south, the Northern Territory to the north-east and South Australia to the south-east...

 and in the Top End

Top End

The Top End of northern Australia is the second northernmost point on the continent. It covers a rather vaguely-defined area of perhaps 400,000 square kilometres behind the northern coast from the Northern Territory capital of Darwin across to Arnhem Land with the Indian Ocean on the west, the...

 of the Northern territory

Northern Territory

The Northern Territory is a federal territory of Australia, occupying much of the centre of the mainland continent, as well as the central northern regions...

, where it inhabits woodland

Woodland

Ecologically, a woodland is a low-density forest forming open habitats with plenty of sunlight and limited shade. Woodlands may support an understory of shrubs and herbaceous plants including grasses. Woodland may form a transition to shrubland under drier conditions or during early stages of...

s and rainforest

Rainforest

Rainforests are forests characterized by high rainfall, with definitions based on a minimum normal annual rainfall of 1750-2000 mm...

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Breeding

Th Robin breeds from August to March. The two greenish-blue eggs, spotted with chestnut or purple, are laid in a small nest, made of twigs with paperbark and lichen, 1-10 m high in a tree.