Magpie-lark
Grallina cyanoleuca
The magpie-lark (Grallina cyanoleuca), also known as wee magpie, peewee, peewit or mudlark, is a passerine bird native to Australia, Timor and southern New Guinea. The male and female both have black and white plumage, though with different patterns. John Latham described the species in 1801. Long thought to be a member of the mudnest builder family Corcoracidae, it has been reclassified in the family Monarchidae (the monarch flycatchers). Two subspecies are recognized.
The magpie-lark (also known as wee magpie) is of small to medium size, reaching 25 to 30 cm (9.8 to 11.8 in) long when fully grown, or about the same size as a European common blackbird, and boldly pied in black and white. The sexes are similar from a distance but easy to tell apart: the female has a white throat, the male a black throat and a white "eyebrow". Juveniles and immatures of either sex have the white throat of the female and the black eye stripe of the male, and a white belly.