Shriketit

Crested Shrike-tit
Conservation status
Least Concern
Scientific classification
Kingdom:	Animalia
Phylum:	Chordata
Class:	Aves
Order:	Passeriformes
Family:	Pachycephalidae
Genus:	Falcunculus Vieillot, 1816
Species:	F. frontatus
Binomial name
Falcunculus frontatus (Latham, 1802)

The Crested Shrike-tit (Falcunculus frontatus) occurs in Australia, with three subspecies inhabiting open eucalypt forest and woodland in the southwest (F. f. leucogaster), north (F. f. whitei) and east (F. f. frontatus). It has a parrot-like bill, used for distinctive bark-stripping behaviour, which gains it access to invertebrates.

Males are larger than females in wing length, weight, and bill-size (Noske 2003). Males have black throats, while females have olive green.

Recent work with nuclear gene sequencing suggests that the Shrike-tits and Wattled Ploughbill (Eulacestoma nigropectus) may require their own family, Falcunculidae (Dickinson 2003).

References

• Template:IUCN2006 Database entry includes justification for why this species is of least concern
• Dickinson, E. C. 2003. The Howard & Moore Complete Checklist of the Birds of the World. 3rd Ed. Princeton University Press, Princeton, N.J.
• Schodde, R. and I. J. Mason. 1999. Directory of Australian Birds. Passerines: i-x, 1-851. CSIRO Publishing, Canberra.