Double-broodedness, burial of faecal sacs and long breeding season in the Australian Logrunner in south-eastern Queensland

Abstract

Observations of a female Australian Logrunner Orthonyx temminckii building a nest while feeding juveniles from a previous brood and, in the following year, incubating eggs while feeding a juvenile, represent the first documented evidence of multi-broodedness in this species. Consistent with the literature, incubation of eggs and feeding of nestlings were performed only by the female, which was fed frequently by the male when she was off the nest. Incubation attentiveness was 60%, and average incubation bouts were about twice the duration of absence bouts (44 vs 21 minutes) at one nest. Based on dates extrapolated from the date of fledging, brooding of the two nestlings ceased between Days 5 and 9. The hourly food-provisioning rate of nestlings increased linearly from 2.4 on Day 4 to 10 feeding visits on the day before fledging. Absence bouts during both the incubation and nestling period were apparently shorter, and food-provisioning rates substantially higher, than in the phylogenetically related Chowchilla O. spaldingii of Far North Queensland. Observations of the female Logrunner burying faecal sacs corroborate a previous observation in south-eastern Queensland and suggest a novel strategy to avoid attracting potential nest predators. Although the Logrunner is often thought to breed only in winter, records from multiple sources indicate that in Queensland >50% of clutches are laid during the rest of the year, presumably facilitated by year-round food availability.