Red-Browed Finch
Neochmia temporalis
Also known as: Red-Browed Firetail, Australian Red-Browed Finch
About This Species
A small, gregarious finch of grassy woodland edges, reed beds, and scrubby creek lines, usually encountered in tight flocks feeding on grass seed close to the ground or perched together in low vegetation. Its fine, high-pitched contact calls and red rump patch, visible in flight, are the easiest features to pick out as a flock moves between feeding and cover. It can be found year-round, with flocks often larger and more mobile outside the breeding season as birds move locally in search of seeding grasses.
Ethical Viewing Guidelines
- A distance of several metres is enough for good views with binoculars, since flushing a tight flock repeatedly wastes their feeding time without improving the sighting.
- Protections for native finches vary across the range of this species, so avoid assuming any particular rule applies uniformly and default to observing without capturing, feeding, or approaching nests in dense low vegetation.
- Move slowly and pause rather than walking directly at a feeding flock, which is more likely to let birds settle back down nearby.
Seasonal Activity
462,722 sightings · 2000–2026
Citizen science records via GBIF
Classification
- Kingdom
- Animalia
- Phylum
- Chordata
- Class
- Aves
- Order
- Passeriformes
- Family
- Estrildidae
Photo
(c) Graham Winterflood, some rights reserved (CC BY-SA), uploaded by Graham Winterflood
CC-BY-SA-4.0
Occurrence data from GBIF.