Australian Logrunner

About the Australian Logrunner

The Australian logrunner (Orthonyx temminckii) is a species of bird that is endemic to eastern Australia where it uses unique foraging techniques and adaptations to search for its food on the floors of temperate, subtropical, or tropical moist lowland forests in south-eastern Australia. Until 2002, it was widely considered to be conspecific with the New Guinea logrunner, but studies showed the two differ significantly, both genetically and vocally.

It is known by a number of common names including spine-tailed logrunner, spine-tail, logrunner, scrub quail and chowcilla. The Australian logrunner is a Passeriform in the family Orthonychidae. It is one of only three species within the Orthonyx genus; the other two are the chowcilla (Orthonyx spaldingii) from northern Queensland and the New Guinean logrunner (Orthonyx novaeguineae) from Papua New Guinea.

Logrunners as a group are characterised by their distinctive tail feathers where the rachis (or central shafts) of the tail feathers protrude and are stiffened. The broad tail of the bird is less than four inches (10 cm) in length and the strong protruding rachis at the ends of the tail feathers are almost... Wikipedia →