Nature Notes - Common Bronzewing

Features

As its name suggests, the Common Bronzewing Pigeon (Phaps chalcoptera) has a beautiful iridescent patch of metallic-coloured feathers on the outer part of its wings. They are large, bulky-bodied pigeons with small heads. Surprisingly for their size, they are very fast flyers – amongst the fastest birds in the bush.

Adaptations

Bronzewings are found across a diverse habitat and temperature range, showing how adaptable these birds are to almost any environment they find themselves in, as long as food and water are adequate. They can also breed all year round to take advantage of good conditions and use a vast array of nesting sites.

Habitat

Common Bronzewings can be found in a very diverse range of habitats across Australia. In the Australian deserts they are found in Mulga Country, arid scrubs and mallee.

Range

Found across all of Australia where water is available (except the tip of north-eastern Australia – Cape York).

Wild Status

They are not threatened or endangered in the wild but are not as common in the desert regions as they are closer to the coast.

Diet

Bronzewings can be seen in small parties or alone, pecking around on the ground foraging for seeds from native grasses and shrubs such as Acacia and Cassia.

Predators

Larger aerial predators such as goshawks (Accipiter spp) and Peregrine Falcons (Falco peregrinus) could catch Bronzewings while in flight or when they were drinking from waterholes. When feeding on the ground, Bronzewings are vulnerable to feral cats and red foxes.

Home

Common Bronzewings are at home on the ground, because they spend a lot of time feeding on seeds, but when flushed will flap up with a loud clutter of wings, and fly up into the foliage of a tree to watch warily. They roost in trees and bushes, where they sit mournfully calling.

Size

Bronzewings are a large pigeon, 33-36cm.

Reproduction

Common Bronzewings can breed any time of the year if conditions are suitable (but mostly from Aug-Dec). During courtship, the male puts on a “bowing” display where he bows his head and chest low, partly fans his tail and shows off his iridescent wing feathers to the female. The female lays 2 white eggs per clutch (34-x 25mm). Incubation is 16 days. Bronzewings build a rough platform of slender twigs as a nest, which are sometimes quite flimsy looking. The location of the nest ranges from low to very high, usually on a thick branch or fork, mistletoe clump, shallow hollow, stump-top, or on top of an old nest made by other birds such as crows or babblers.

Extra Fun Facts

The call of Common Bronzewings can range from a deeply resonating, mournful  “whoooo” when advertising for a mate, to a short soft “whoo-hoo-hoo” when displaying.

Compare with of the White-winged Dove of the Sonoran Desert.