Until the last few decades, the Yellow Wagtail (Motacilla flava) was only known in Australia from a few records of apparent vagrants, the first recorded in 1905 at Duaringa on the Dawson River in eastern Queensland. The species has been observed consistently along the Northwest coast since then, trickling in small numbers there each summer from its breeding grounds in temperate and subarctic Eurasia and northern America, despite being uncommon and patchy there. Occasionally, birds stray further south from there.
The Yellow Wagtail call is a shrill, slurred tsweep, sometimes very brief trilling, tsip-tsip-tsipsi. It is common to see Yellow Wagtails in groups larger than 50 during migration and during winter quarters, but they are often seen as solitary in Australia. Australia seems to receive only the overflow from Indonesia’s main summering grounds. The birds arriving are polyglots of two or possibly three races that breed from southwestern Russia to Alaska. It is also known as Barnard’s Wagtail.
Their name comes from their gait, which is similar to that of pipits, but longer and trimmer in wings and tails, and more colorful. Their heads nod forward and back, while their tails teeter constantly up and down as they walk briskly with long steps.
