The Blue-faced Honeyeater (Entomyzon cyanotis) is a distinctive Australian bird that can often be identified by a combination of plumage, shape, behaviour and voice. A large honeyeater with olive-green back, white underparts, black crown and throat area, and striking bright blue bare skin around the eye in adults. Adults are typically about 26–32 cm long, so size can be a useful clue when you compare the bird with nearby species.
How to identify a Blue-faced Honeyeater
A large honeyeater with olive-green back, white underparts, black crown and throat area, and striking bright blue bare skin around the eye in adults. When you are trying to identify one in the field, start with overall size and body shape, then check the head pattern, bill, wing markings, tail and any unusually bright colours. Lighting can change how feathers look, so it is safer to use several features together rather than relying on one colour.
Blue-faced Honeyeaters are social, active birds that often forage in small groups in flowering trees and around open woodland. Behaviour is often just as useful as plumage. A bird that repeatedly uses a particular feeding style, posture or flight pattern can be much easier to identify even when it is partly hidden or too far away for a perfect view.
Where does the Blue-faced Honeyeater live in Australia?
Found across northern and eastern Australia, from the tropics into inland and eastern New South Wales.
Typical habitat includes open woodland, riverine forest, farms, parks and gardens with flowering trees. The best places to look are areas that combine suitable food with safe roosting or nesting sites. Distribution can shift locally with rainfall, flowering, breeding seasons and food availability, so a species may be common in one district and much harder to find only a short distance away.
What does the Blue-faced Honeyeater eat?
Nectar, insects, fruit and other plant material. The exact menu can change with season and location. Wild birds generally do best when they can use natural food sources, so this guide describes normal feeding ecology rather than encouraging people to offer processed human food.
Watching how a bird feeds can also help with identification. Note whether it forages on the ground, probes mud, takes nectar from flowers, hunts from a perch, dives into water or catches insects in flight.
Behaviour and calls
Blue-faced Honeyeaters are social, active birds that often forage in small groups in flowering trees and around open woodland.
They produce loud, varied calls including chattering and piping notes. Learning even one characteristic call can be extremely helpful because many Australian birds are heard before they are seen. Calls can vary with alarm, courtship, contact between flock members and time of day, so use voice together with visual clues.
Nesting and breeding
Pairs often use existing nest structures as a base, including old nests made by other birds, then remodel the site for their own breeding attempt. Breeding timing varies across Australia and can be influenced by latitude, rainfall and local conditions. If you find an active nest or dependent young, observe from a respectful distance so the adults can continue normal feeding and defence behaviour.
Similar birds
Noisy Miners are smaller and grey with yellow facial skin. Juvenile Blue-faced Honeyeaters have duller greenish facial skin and can be less obvious. If you are unsure, compare bill shape, body proportions, eye colour, leg colour and voice as well as plumage. Photographs taken from different angles can be especially useful for checking difficult features after the sighting.
Quick identification tip
For a fast identification, remember three things: the bird is approximately 26–32 cm long; its key visual clue is a large honeyeater with olive-green back, white underparts, black crown and throat area, and striking bright blue bare skin around the eye in adults.; and its usual Australian setting is open woodland, riverine forest, farms, parks and gardens with flowering trees. Those three clues will usually narrow the options quickly before you compare similar species.
Sources and further reading
For additional Australian bird information, see BirdLife Australia bird profiles and the Australian Museum bird collection.
