The black-breasted buttonquail (Turnix melanogaster) is a rare buttonquail endemic to eastern Australia. As with other buttonquails, it is unrelated to the true quails. The black-breasted buttonquail is a plump quail-shaped bird in length with predominantly marbled black, rufous, and pale brown plumage, marked prominently with white spots and stripes, and white eyes. Like other buttonquails, the female is larger and more boldly coloured than the male, with a distinctive black head and neck sprinkled with fine white markings. The usual sex roles are reversed, as the female mates with multiple male partners and leaves them to incubate the eggs.
The black-breasted buttonquail is usually found in rainforests, foraging on the ground for invertebrates in large areas of thick leaf litter. Most of its original habitat has been cleared and the remaining populations are fragmented. The species is rated as vulnerable on the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN)'s Red List of Endangered species and is listed as vulnerable under the Environment Protection and Biodiversity Conservation Act 1999. A three-year conservation project has been under way since 2021.
Taxonomy
The black-breasted buttonquail was originally described by ornithologist John Gould in 1837 as Hemipodius melanogaster, from specimens collected around Moreton Bay in Queensland. Its specific epithet is derived from the Ancient Greek terms melas "black" and gaster "belly". In 1840 English zoologist George Robert Gray established that the genus name Turnix, coined in 1790 by French naturalist Pierre Joseph Bonnaterre, had priority over Hemipodius, which had been published in 1815 by Coenraad Jacob Temminck. In his 1865 Handbook to the Birds of Australia, Gould used its current name Turnix melanogaster. Gregory Mathews placed it in its own genus Colcloughia in 1913, which was not followed by later authors. He also described a subspecies Colcloughia melanogaster goweri from Gowrie on the basis of less extensive black plumage, though this was later regarded as individual variation. Along with other buttonquails, the black-breasted buttonquail was traditionally placed in the order Gruiform, but more recent molecular analysis shows it belongs to an early offshoot within the shorebirds (Charadriiformes).
"Black-breasted buttonquail" has been designated the official name by the International Ornithologists' Union (IOU). "Black-fronted buttonquail" is an alternative vernacular name. Gould called it "black-breasted hemipode" initially, and then "black-breasted turnix", corresponding with its scientific name. The buttonquail species were generally known as "quail" (hence "black-breasted quail" or "black-fronted quail") until the Royal Australasian Ornithologists Union (RAOU) promoted the current usage of "buttonquail" in 1978, which was then universally adopted. The Butchulla people, the traditional owners of K'gari (Fraser Island), know the bird as the mur'rindum bird.
Description
The black-breasted buttonquail is a plump quail-shaped bird with predominantly marbled black, rufous and pale brown plumage, marked prominently with white spots and stripes, white eyes, a grey bill and yellowish feet. The short tail has twelve rectrices and the wings are short with round tips. The length ranges from , with females tending to be larger and heavier, weighing , compared to males, which weigh . Like other buttonquails, the female is more distinctively coloured than the male. Its head, neck, and breast are black with a chestnut tinge on the and rear of its , and small white spots on its neck and face forming a moustache and eyebrow-like pattern. The white spots coalesce into bars on its breast, and its are dark grey. The male has a whitish face and neck with black speckles and darker , and a brown-grey crown and nape. Its breast has black and white bars and spots, with red-brown on its flanks and more grey with dark barring on the rest of its underparts. The juvenile resembles the adult male though has a blue-grey iris, duller brown-grey more heavily blotched with black on outer back and and less pale streaks.
The female makes a low-pitched oom calla sequence of 5–7 notes that last 1.5–2.0 seconds eachwhich can be repeated 14–21 (or less commonly 1–4) times. This advertising call cannot be heard more than away, and is uttered only after there has been sufficient rainfall of within a few days. The female whistles quietly to its young. The male makes a range of high staccato and clucking alarm or rallying calls, including an ak ak call when separated from others in its covey. Juveniles have a range of chirping or piping calls to induce feeding or raise an alarm.