Australasian Bushlark

About the Australasian Bushlark

The singing bush lark or Horsfield's bush lark (Mirafra javanica) is a species of lark which inhabits grassland throughout most of Australia and much of Southeast Asia. It was described by the American naturalist Thomas Horsfield.

The singing bush lark was formally described in 1821 by the American naturalist Thomas Horsfield from a specimen collected on the island of Java. He placed the lark in the genus Mirafra and coined the binomial name Mirafra javanica.

The singing bush lark is one of 100 species of larks of the rather large and fairly diverse family, Alaudidae. They are small to medium-small passerines, usually with rather drab, brownish plumage. Predominantly an Old World family, the species are distributed widely across Europe, Africa, Asia and the Indian subcontinent but the singing bush lark is the only species occurring naturally in Wallacea, New Guinea and Australia.

The alternate shortened name "bush-lark" can also refer to many of the other species in the genus Mirafra. The alternate name of "cinnamon bush lark" is also an alternate name for the flappet lark. Other alternate names for the singing bush lark include the Australasian bushlark, Australian lark... Wikipedia →