Black and white, with the pattern varying across its range. The back of its neck, upper tail and shoulders (on its wings) are white in males and grey in females, and (across most of Australia) the rest of its body is black. In south-eastern, central and south-western Australia, including Tasmania, its back and rump are entirely white. Its eye is red-brown. Young birds are usually grey rather than black and have dark eyes.
Distinctive feature
One toe faces backwards and three face forwards. It has a square-tipped tail.
Grey, grey-brown to olive green body with patches of cream. It has black bands running across its body and tail and a "crest" of spines which start on its head and extend down its back and along its tail. Its belly is creamy-white to creamy brown-grey and the larger, breeding males have a red-orange chest and throat. One of two subspecies also has a broad black stripe running from behind its eye to its ear. It has long, powerful legs and a long, strong tail with flattened sides to assist with swimming. There are loose folds of skin under its jaw.
Juveniles are light brown and their head and feet appear large for their body size.
Size
Around 80 - 90 cm long (nose to end of tail) two-thirds of which is tail. Males are bigger than females.
Adults have a black body and neck with white wing tips, black legs and a red bill with white bar near tip. Male carries head higher than female in mated pair and has darker bill and iris. Juveniles are lighter in colour and cygnets have grey-brown plumage.
Size
body length 110 - 140 cm; wingspan 160 - 200 cm
It is likely that by all emerging at the same time of year, cicadas can increase their chances of survival by overwhelming predators with their huge numbers. This means that at least some of the cicadas survive to lay eggs, ensuring the survival of the species.
A green, stout body with opaque green, leaf-like wings and pink-brown eyes with two pairs of wings that are strengthened with veins. Its antennae are small and bristle-like. The male has a greatly enlarged hollow bladder.
Size
Female 3 – 3.5 cm long, Male 4.5 – 5 cm long; Wings 4 – 5 cm long.
A dark grey to black bird with a yellow-tipped red bill, red frontal shield, red legs, and white undertails. Hatchlings are also black with red frontal shield, juveniles have green legs, green horn or black coloured bill, generally paler.
Size
35-40 cm (from head to tail)
It has a grey back and head, and bright-yellow underparts. Southern birds have an olive-yellow rump, while birds in northern Australia have a brighter yellow rump. Its throat is off-white and when seen in flight, it has a pale bar on its wings. Its bill is black. Young birds are rufous-brown with paler streaks.
Size
13 – 17 cm long, the males are slightly larger
Its genus name Stenocarpus means narrow fruit, referring to its seed pods; and its species name sinuatus means wavy, referring to the edges of the leaves.
Evergreen tree, up to 35 m high, but much smaller when grown in gardens where it reaches a height of only about 10 m with a width of 5 m.
Leaves
Dark glossy green and paler underneath, they can be oval-shaped, lobed or have wavy edges. They are usually 15 – 25 cm long (but can be up to 45 cm long) and 2 – 5 cm wide, and are generally smaller on exposed branches. There is one distinct vein running down the centre of each leaf.
Flowers
Bright red with a yellow tip, and 2.5 – 4 cm long. They cluster in a wheel-like arrangement at the end of a stalk. The cluster can be up to 10 cm in diameter and consists of 6 - 20 flowers.
Grey-brown to bronze, with a dark stripe running along each side of its body from its nostril, across its eye to its tail, getting wider from its front legs. Its body pales below the stripe to a cream belly.
This species has a lighter body with a less obvious stripe running along its sides than the Southern Garden Skink.
Size
8 - 10 cm (nose to end of tail).
Grey-brown to bronze, with a dark stripe running along each side of its body from its nostril, across its eye to its tail, getting wider from its front legs. Its body pales below the stripe to a cream belly.
This species has a ‘heavier’ looking body and a more obvious stripe running along its sides, compared to the Northern Garden Skink.
Size
8 - 10 cm (nose to end of tail).
The female’s abdomen can be variable but is typically brown to yellow with short silvery-white hairs. The legs are usually black with bright yellow patches on the underside of the many leg joints. Its palps (small leg-like structures on either side of its fangs) are distinctly red.
It makes golden webs, after which it is named.
Size
Females are 4 – 4.5 cm long but the tiny males are only 5 – 6 mm long (body length). The Females can have a legspan of up to 15 cm!
Its head and upperparts are mostly dark grey, with a white eyebrow and throat, a narrow grey band across the upper breast and a creamy-buff belly. The feathers of its long tail have white edges and tips, and the tail is often fanned out.
Size
14 – 16 cm long
Deciduous tree, up to 35 m high, but much smaller when grown in gardens and in cooler areas where it reaches a height of only about 10 m. It can take 5 – 8 years to flower if grown from a seed.
Leaves
Smooth, oval-shaped and can have three or five lobes (and sometimes more). Each leaf is 10 – 30 cm long. The tree loses some or all of its leaves at the end of winter, before flowering, and the leaves turn yellow just before falling.
Flowers
Bright coral-red and bell-shaped, they occur in clusters at the end of branches. They are 1 – 2 cm long and have a waxy surface. They appear after the tree has lost all or some of its leaves.
Deciduous tree, not native to Australia. Grows up to 15 m high and wide.
Leaves
Bright green, feathery and fern-like. Individual leaves are narrow and elliptic, 3 – 12 mm long and arranged either side of a 5 – 10 cm long stem. They turn yellow in autumn before falling from the tree.
Flowers
Blue-purple and trumpet-shaped, forming clusters that are 20 – 30 cm in diameter. Each individual flower is 2 – 3 cm long and about 1 cm wide. They are lightly fragranced and remain on the tree for about 2 months.
There are four stamens inside the flower which produce pollen, and also a staminode which doesn’t produce any pollen.
Predominantly pale tawny-orange with a heavy black border that encloses large white spots in the forewing. The inner leading edge of the forewing is deep red-brown. The underside is similar to the upper side but paler with narrower black margins. Males have a distinct patch of dark grey sex-scales on the upper side of the hindwing.
The caterpillars have three pairs of tentacles and yellow, white and black rings.
Size
7 - 8 cm wingspan.
The caterpillar (larva) is initially green, white and brown and resembles bird droppings. A mature caterpillar has a dark brown head, a green body with some pale yellow and brown markings, and spines along its back.
The male butterfly (adult) is black with an arc of creamy-white spots near the tip of each forewing. Each hindwing has a creamy-white patch and a single red spot, and there are many red crescents on its underside.
The female butterfly is brown to black, and the outer half of its forewing is whitish-grey. Its hindwing has a creamy-white patch, as well as a series of blue and red crescent-shaped markings.
Size
Caterpillar up to 6 cm long; Butterflies 10 – 12 cm wingspan.
A tussock-like, rosette plant. Tussock size up to 30 cm high and wide with a flower stalk up to 1 m high.
Leaves
Long, sword-shaped and forming a clump. Each individual leaf is 8 – 20 cm long and 1 – 3 cm wide and usually stands upright. There are 5 veins running down each leaf.
Flowers
Small and initially cream, but turn brown rapidly. They grow on top of a ridged, 1 m high flower stem growing from the centre of the tussock of leaves. The flowers form a tight, cylindrical cluster which is 1 – 7 cm long.
Named in 1830 by explorer and botanist, Allan Cunningham. The genus name Grevillea honours Charles F Greville who co-founded the Royal Horticultural Society, and the species name robusta refers to its large size.
Evergreen tree usually grows 20 – 30 m tall but can range from 8 – 40 m in height.
Leaves
Silvery green and fern-like, green on the upper surface and paler underneath. They are 10 – 34 cm long and 9 – 15 cm wide, and consist of 11 – 31 segments that are narrow-elliptic to triangular in shape. The segments are 1.5 – 5 cm long and 2 – 10 mm wide, and they give the leaf a deeply divided appearance.
Flowers
Golden yellow to orange, each one is about 2 cm long but they are arranged in pairs along the flowering stalk to give an overall length of 12 – 15 cm.
The southern brown tree frog is native to southern Australia. Other common names of this tree frog are brown tree frog, whistling tree frog, or Ewing's tree frog.
Ranges from pale fawn, cream, or orange to light brown, although some individuals in western Victoria and South Australia are partly or completely green. It has a wide brown band that starts from between its eyes and runs down its back. Darker flecks are also scattered across its back. It has a narrow black or brown stripe that runs from its snout to its shoulder, and a pale stripe that runs from below its eye to the base of its arm. Its belly is white to yellow and breeding males have a light brown vocal sac (beneath their mouth).
Distinctive features
Its back is smooth with small lumps, its fingers have no webbing and its toes are half webbed.
This spider is named for the cross the female weaves into the web. There are many theories about why the female does this including, strengthening the web, for camouflage, and for increasing prey catches as the cross reflects ultra-violet light which attracts insects. It may also deter predators which must go to the effort of cleaning off the extra silk after diving into the web.
The female has a silvery head with silver, yellow, red and black bands across its abdomen, and two yellow stripes running down its underside. Its legs are dark brown to black with one or two yellowish bands. The male and juveniles are brown and cream, with brown legs. It often appears to have only four legs because it sits with its legs in pairs along the stabilimentum.
Distinctive feature
The zigzag patterns (known as the stabilimentum) it weaves into its web to form an X or a cross, after which it is named.
The striped marsh frog or brown-striped frog is a common species in urban habitats It is a mostly aquatic frog native to coastal Eastern Australia.
A pale to grey-brown back with darker brown stripes. Usually also a pale stripe running down the middle of its back. Its belly is white and often flecked with brown, and there are dark spots and stripes on its limbs.
Size
4.5 - 7.5 cm
A large bird of prey with a dark grey back and a white head, white chest and white belly. Their legs are also white and have long black talons. They have dark eyes and a light-coloured, hooked beak. When viewed in flight, the undersides of the wings are a distinctive half white and half grey-brown.
First-year juveniles have a buffish and ‘spiky’ head, contrasting with patchy cream and dark brown body and wings; underwing pattern also patchy, but note half-moon at base of tail feathers. Older juveniles have a pale buff-grey tail.
Their nests are massive, made of sticks and branches, usually found in a tall living tree near water or on a remote coastal cliff (on ground if on an island).
Distinctive feature
A wedge-shaped tail, distinctive when seen in flight.
Mostly light blue-grey in colour. The forehead, crown, chin and upper throat are white. It has a long, slim neck and a pointed grey-black bill. The legs are long and dull yellow in colour. Easily identifiable when seen from below with the dark flight feathers of the wing contrasting with the paler grey plumage.
Males and females are similar. When breeding, the birds have long feathers (nuptial plumes) on the head, neck and back. Young are similar in appearance to non-breeding adults, with little to no white on the face; underparts often have a reddish colour.
Distinctive feature
Its characteristic white face.
One of Australia's most widespread birds on mainland.Mostly black with a white belly and eyebrow. A young bird has paler, slightly rusty edges to its wing feathers.
Size
18 - 22 cm long (from head to tail)
