Magnolia grandiflora is a very popular ornamental tree throughout its native range in the coastal plain of the Gulf/South Atlantic states. Grown for its attractive, shiny green leaves and fragrant flowers, it has a long history in the southern United States. Many large and very old specimens can be found in the subtropical port cities such as Houston, TX; New Orleans, LA; Mobile, AL; Jacksonville, FL; Savannah, GA; Charleston, SC; and Wilmington, NC. M. grandiflora is the state tree of Mississippi and the state flower of Louisiana.
The species is also cultivated as far north as coastal areas of New Jersey, Connecticut, Long Island, NY, and Delaware, and in much of the Chesapeake Bay region in Maryland, and eastern Virginia. On the West Coast, it can be grown as far north as the Vancouver, B.C., Canada area, though cooler summers on the West Coast slow growth compared to the East Coast. In the interior of the US, some of the cold-hardy cultivars have flourished as far north as Louisville, Kentucky and Cincinnati, Ohio, where a sizable population exists. Farther north, few known long term specimens are found due to the severe winters, and/or lack of sufficient summer heat.
Magnolia grandiflora is also grown in parts of Mexico, Central America, and South America as well as parts of Asia.
Until early 2018, an iconic Southern Magnolia planted by President Andrew Jackson nearly 200 years earlier grew near the South Portico of the White House. It was reputedly planted as a seedling taken from Jackson's plantation, The Hermitage in Tennessee. It was the oldest tree on the White House grounds and was so famous that it was for decades pictured on the back of the $20 bill as part of a view of the South Front. There was a tradition of gifting cuttings or seedlings grown from the tree: Reagan gifted a cutting to his Chief of Staff Howard Baker upon his retirement, and Michelle Obama donated a seedling to the "people's garden" of the U.S. Department of Agriculture. Since the 1940s, when the tree suffered a gash that caused a large section of its trunk to rot, the tree had been supported by metal poles and cables. In 2017 it was decided on the advice of the National Arboretum to cut down and remove the Magnolia because the trunk was in an extremely fragile condition and the supports had been compromised.
It is recommended for seashore plantings in areas that are windy but have little salt spray. The foliage will bronze, blotch, and burn in severe winters at the northern limits of cultivation, especially when grown in full winter sun, but most leaves remain until they are replaced by new foliage in the spring. In climates where the ground freezes, winter sun appears to do more damage than the cold. In the Northern Hemisphere, the south side of the tree will experience more leaf damage than the north side. Two extremes are known, with leaves white underneath and with leaves brown underneath. The brown varieties are claimed to be more cold-hardy than the white varieties, but this does not appear to be proven as yet. Once established, the plants are drought tolerant, and the most drought tolerant of all the Magnolia species.
The leaves are heavy and tend to fall year round from the interior of the crown and form a dense cover over the soil surface, and they have been used in decorative floral arrangements.  The leaves have a waxy coating that makes them resistant to damage from salt and air pollution.
In the United States, southern magnolia, along with sweetbay (Magnolia virginiana) and cucumbertree (Magnolia acuminata), is commercially harvested. Lumber from all three species is simply called magnolia, which is used in the construction of furniture, boxes, pallets, venetian blinds, sashes, and doors and used as veneers. Southern magnolia has yellowish-white sapwood and light to dark brown heartwood tinted yellow or green. The usually straight-grained wood has uniform texture with closely spaced rings. The wood is ranked moderate in heaviness, hardness, and stiffness, and moderately low in shrinkage, bending, and compression strength; it is ranked moderately high in shock resistance. Its use in the Southeastern United States has been supplanted by the availability of harder woods.


Over 150 cultivars have been developed and named, although only 30 to 40 of these still exist and still fewer are commercially propagated and sold. Most plants in nurseries are propagated by cuttings, resulting in more consistent form in the various varieties available. Many older cultivars have been superseded by newer ones and are no longer available.  Some cultivars have been found to be more cold hardy, they include:
'Bracken's Brown Beauty' was developed by Ray Bracken of Easley, South Carolina, in the late 1960s and patented in 1985. It is a popular cultivar that has survived long-term in West Virginia, New Jersey, and Long Island, NY. This cultivar grows in a dense and compact pattern, with narrow, medium-sized, glossy leaves. Flowers measure 5–6 in (13–15 cm).
'Edith Bogue' was brought to the coastal plain of New Jersey from Florida in the 1920s. The original tree sent to Edith A. Bogue from Florida helped to establish cold-hardy specimens in the Middle Atlantic states from Delaware to coastal Connecticut. Once established, 'Edith Bogue' has been known to have only minor spotting and margin burn on the leaf in temperatures as low as −5 °F (−21 °C). With a vigorous classic pyramidal shape, this cultivar grows to 35 ft with a 15-ft spread. The leaves are large and deep green, but lack the brown indumentum on their undersides which make other cultivars so distinctive.
'Angustifolia', developed in France in 1825, has narrow, spear-shaped leaves 20 cm (7.9 in) long by 11 cm (4.3 in) wide, as its name suggests.
'Exmouth' was developed in the early 18th century by John Colliton in Devon. It is notable for its huge flowers, with up to 20 petals, and vigorous growth. Erect in habit, it is often planted against walls. The leaves are green above and brownish underneath. The flowers are very fragrant and the leaves are narrow and leathery.
'Goliath' was developed by Caledonia Nurseries of Guernsey, and has a bushier habit and globular flowers of up to 30 cm (12 in) diameter. Long-flowering, it has oval leaves which lack the brownish hair underneath.
'Little Gem', a dwarf cultivar, is grown in more moderate climates, roughly from New Jersey, Maryland and the Virginias southward. Originally developed in 1952 by Steed's Nursery in Candor, North Carolina, it is a slower-growing form with a columnar shape which reaches around 4.25 m (13.9 ft) high and 1.2 m (3.9 ft) wide. Flowering heavily over an extended period in warmer climate, it bears medium-sized, cup-shaped flowers, and has elliptic leaves 12.5 cm (4.9 in) long by 5 cm (2.0 in) wide. It flowers relatively quickly after planting compared with other cultivars.
"Victoria" is a form grown in the Pacific Northwest that is reportedly hardy to -12 F. It has a more open habit and shiny dark green leaves with brown undersides.
Other commonly grown cultivars include:
'Ferruginea' has dark-green leaves with rust-brown undersides.
'Southern Charm' is a dwarf form that grows into a bushy shrub with a pyramidal shape up to 20–25 ft high and 10 ft wide. It has dark green shiny leaves 3-6 in long and 2-4 in wide with brown undersides. It is also known as 'Teddy Bear', for the fuzzy brown undersurface of the leaves.


Magnolia grandiflora contains phenolic constituents shown to possess significant antimicrobial activity. Magnolol, honokiol, and 3,5′-diallyl-2′-hydroxy-4-methoxybiphenyl exhibited significant activity against Gram-positive and acid-fast bacteria and fungi. The leaves contain coumarins and sesquiterpene lactones. The sesquiterpenes are known to be costunolide, parthenolide, costunolide diepoxide, santamarine, and reynosin.


Magnolia virginiana, most commonly known as sweetbay magnolia, or merely sweetbay (also laurel magnolia, swampbay, swamp magnolia, white bay, or beaver tree), is a member of the magnolia family, Magnoliaceae. It was the first magnolia to be scientifically described under modern rules of botanical nomenclature, and is the type species of the genus Magnolia; as Magnolia is also the type genus of all flowering plants (magnoliophytes), this species in a sense typifies all flowering plants.


Magnolia virginiana was one of the many species described by Carl Linnaeus.


Magnolia virginiana is an evergreen or deciduous tree to 30 m (100 ft) tall, native to the lowlands and swamps of the Atlantic coastal plain of the eastern United States, from Florida to Long Island, New York. Whether it is deciduous or evergreen depends on climate; it is evergreen in areas with milder winters in the south of its range (zone 7 southward), and is semi-evergreen or deciduous further north. The leaves are alternate, simple (not lobed or pinnate), with entire margins, 6–12 cm long, and 3–5 cm wide. The bark is smooth and gray, with the inner bark mildly scented, the scent reminiscent of the bay laurel spice.
The flowers are creamy white, 8–14 cm diameter, with 6-15 petal-like tepals. The flowers carry a very strong vanilla scent that can sometimes be noticed several hundred yards away.  The fruit is a fused aggregate of follicles, 3–5 cm long, pinkish-red when mature, with the follicles splitting open to release the 1 cm long seeds. The seeds are black but covered by a thinly fleshy red coat, which is attractive to some fruit-eating birds; these swallow the seeds, digest the red coating, and disperse the seeds in their droppings.


Magnolia virginiana is often grown as an ornamental tree in gardens, and used in horticultural applications to give an architectural feel to landscape designs.  It is an attractive tree for parks and large gardens, grown for its large, conspicuous, scented flowers, for its clean, attractive foliage, and for its fast growth. In warmer areas Magnolia virginiana is valued for its evergreen foliage.
The English botanist and missionary John Banister collected Magnolia virginiana in the southeastern United States in 1678 and sent it to England, where it flowered for Bishop Henry Compton.  This species was the first magnolia to be cultivated in England, although it was soon overshadowed by the evergreen, larger-flowered southern magnolia (M. grandiflora)
The sweetbay magnolia has been hybridized horticulturally with a number of species within subgenus Magnolia. These species include M. globosa, M. grandiflora, M. insignis, M. macrophylla, M. obovata, M. sieboldii and M. tripetala. Some of these hybrids have been given cultivar names and registered by the Magnolia Society.


Flowers contain the neolignans 3,5′-diallyl-2′,4-dihydroxybiphenyl, 4,4′-diallyl-2,3′-dihydroxybiphenyl ether, 5,5′-diallyl-2,2′-dihydroxybiphenyl and 3,5′-diallyl-2′-hydroxy-4-methoxybiphenyl.


Maianthemum dilatatum (snakeberry, two-leaved Solomon's seal or false lily of the valley) is a common rhizomatous perennial flowering plant that is native to western North America from northern California to the Aleutian islands, and Asia across the Kamchatka Peninsula, Japan, and Korea. It grows in coastal temperate rainforests, and is often the dominant groundcover plant in Sitka Spruce forests.


The plant produces an erect, unbranched flower stem, occasionally to 40 centimeters in height, but typically much shorter. A non-flowering shoot bears one smooth, waxy, shiny leaf up to 10 centimeters long and 5 to 8 cm broad, hence its scientific name (dilatatum means 'broad'). The leaf is oval in shape with a heart-shaped base.
The inflorescence is an erect raceme with star-shaped white flowers. They each have four tepals and four stamens. After fertilization the fruit produced is a berry 6 millimeters in diameter. The berry is speckled red when immature and solid red when ripe. Each has 1 to 4 seeds.


The plant has many ethnobotanical uses. The roots and leaves were used medicinally, and the berries were occasionally used for food. Native Americans used the plant to treat wounds and eyestrain.
Being tolerant of deep shade, drought, and extensive watering, the plant is becoming more popular as a shade groundcover in gardening. Care should be taken when using it in gardens as it can quickly escape confines with its creeping rhizomes and may crowd out other plants.


Maianthemum stellatum (star-flowered, starry, or little false Solomon's seal, or simply false Solomon's seal; star-flowered lily-of-the-valley or starry false lily of the valley; syn. Smilacina stellata) is a species of flowering plant, native across North America. It has been found in northern Mexico, every Canadian province and territory except Nunavut, and from every US state except Hawaii and the states of the Southeast. It has little white buds in the spring, followed by delicate starry flowers, then green-and-black striped berries, and finally deep red berries in the fall.


Maianthemum stellatum is a herbaceous perennial plant It grows from extensively branching rhizomes, often forming dense patches. Plants are 2-6 dm tall with 8-11 leaves.


Leaves can be variable, but are usually clasping and often blue-green and folded along the mid-rib.


Flowers are set in an un-branched cluster (raceme) at the tip of the flowering stem. Racemes are 1.5–5 cm long and 6–15-flowered. Flowers are set at one per node along the flowering stem, on stalks (pedicles) 6–12 mm long.


Tepals are white and 3–5 mm long. Green berries have distinctive dark stripes, eventually ripening to black.


Native across North America generally from Alaska to California to North Carolina to Newfoundland, plus northern Mexico (Sonora, Chihuahua, Coahuila, Nuevo León). It has been found in every Canadian province and territory except Nunavut, and from every US state except Hawaii and the states of the Southeast.


Found in open woods, prairies and shorelines.


Maianthemum stellatum is smaller than its close relative M. racemosum. For comparison, M. stellatum has smaller, more open inflorescences that are un-branched and have fewer flowers, flowers with stamens shorter rather than longer than the tepals, and usually somewhat narrower and more curved leaves. Both species show the characteristic zigzag of the stem between the alternate leaves. True Solomon's seal (Polygonatum multiflorum and related species) have a similar overall appearance, but the flowers hang from the stem underneath the leaves, rather than forming a terminal cluster.


Maianthemum trifolium (Three-leaf Solomon's-seal, three-leaf Solomon's-plume, threeleaf false lily of the valley, smilacine trifoliée) is a species of flowering plant that is associated with extremely wet environments and is native to Canada and the northeastern United States as well as St. Pierre and Miquelon and Asia (Siberia).


It is a herbaceous perennial plant growing erect, 10–25 cm (4–10 in) tall. It grows off spreading sympodial rhizomes with roots found only at nodes. New plants produce two petiolate foliage leaves the first year, then a flowering shoot the second year with 2-4 sessile leaves.


Fertile plants have 2-4 alternate leaves that are elliptic, 5–12 cm (1.97–4.72 in) long and 2.5–4 cm (1–1+1⁄2 in) broad. Leaf bases are narrowly tapered and tips pointed.


5 to 15 flowers are produced on a simple raceme 5–10 cm (2–4 in) long. There is only one flower per node, set on a 1–3 mm (0.04–0.12 in) long pedicel.


Found in all Canadian provinces and territories and in the USA in some northeastern states (Connecticut, Maine, Massachusetts, Michigan, Minnesota, New Hampshire, New Jersey, New York, Ohio, Pennsylvania, Rhode Island, Vermont, and Wisconsin). Also found in St. Pierre and Miquelon and Asia (Siberia).


Maianthemum trifolium often forms dense patches in wet forests, sphagnum bogs and other wetlands and is sometimes considered to be aquatic.


Malachius bipustulatus, the malachite beetle, is a species of soft-winged flower beetles belonging to the family Melyridae, subfamily Malachiinae.
The body is 5–7 millimetres (0.20–0.28 in) long, the head and pronotum are brownish, while elytrae are shining metallic green with a bright red spot at the end. Along the sides of the abdomen this species has a peculiar structure with orange poaches.
These beetles mainly inhabit meadows at low altitudes. During the day they stay on herbs and flowers, including flowers of garden plants, mainly on Apiaceae, Asteraceae and Rosaceae species, where they feed on pollen, nectar and small insects.
In case of necessity, this beetle can release a smell that deters predators. The males attract females producing special secretions from its antennae.
Malachius bipustulatus is an insect with a complete metamorphism, (or holometabolism), with four life stages (egg, larva, pupa and imago or adult). The pupal stage is a period of rest, when inner and outer bodies change.
The larvae and the adults largely differ in physique and lifestyle. The larvae usually live under bark, in old wood or on the ground in grass roots, hunting small insects, larvae and slugs.


The pink-eared duck (Malacorhynchus membranaceus) is a species of duck found in Australia. It has a large spatulate bill like the Australasian shoveler, but is smaller at 38–40 cm length. Its brown back and crown, black and white barred sides and black eye patches on its otherwise white face make this bird unmistakable. Juveniles are slightly duller, but otherwise all plumages are similar. Its vernacular name refers to a pink spot in the corner formed by the black head pattern; it is only noticeable at close distance however, making the seldom-used Australian name of zebra duck more appropriate.


The pink-eared duck was first described by the English ornithologist John Latham in 1801 under the binomial name Anas membranacea. It is the only living member of the genus Malacorhynchus; a closely related, but slightly larger extinct form from New Zealand was described as Scarlett's duck (Malacorhynchus scarletti). This peculiar duck may be most closely related to the shelducks but its relationships are enigmatic. It may be closer to the musk duck and the stiff-tails (Sraml et al. 1996) and, formerly placed in the paraphyletic "perching ducks"; it is in any case not close to the dabbling ducks.
This species is the only member of the order Anseriformes known to have carotenoid pigments in its feathers, in the characteristic pink "ear" spot.
The pink-eared duck was reportedly known as the New Holland duck by early colonists in Western Australia.


Widely distributed throughout Australia and highly mobile, these ducks can appear anywhere there is standing water, especially in dry inland regions, where annual rainfall rarely exceeds 15 in (380 mm).


Nesting is stimulated by the drying and filling of pools that promote increased levels of organic material. In good years, large numbers of pink-eared ducks concentrate in shallow flood plains. However, when conditions do not meet specifications, reproduction may be completely curtailed.


Malacothrix glabrata, commonly known as the smooth desert dandelion or desert dandelion, is an annual plant in the family Asteraceae. It is common to the southwestern deserts of North America and has showy pale-yellow to white flowers. The name "glabrata" refers to the leaves being (nearly) hairless. Like other members of its genus, it has a milky sap and flower heads composed of smaller strap-like flowers called "ligules".
The species is native to the western United States, excluding much of the Pacific Northwest, and into northern Mexico. It is a dicot.
Malacothrix glabrata is typically 125 to 380 mm (5 to 15 in) tall with a 40 to 65 mm (1+1⁄2–2+1⁄2 in) flower head. Its fragrant, daisy-like flower heads are in shades of yellow or white, and flower heads may have an orange to red "button" in the center of the flower head, composed of several immature flowers.


Malacothrix saxatilis is a species of flowering plant in the family Asteraceae known by the common names cliff desertdandelion or cliff aster. It is endemic to California, where it grows in the central and southern coastal hills and mountain ranges. It is a perennial herb growing 30 to 60 centimeters tall from a rhizome and caudex unit. The leaves are variable in size and shape and may be lobed or not. The inflorescence is an array of flower heads lined with lance-shaped phyllaries. The ray florets are 1 or 2 centimeters long and white in color.
There are five varieties which intergrade, some of which are very limited in distribution.


Malosma is a plant genus which contains only a single species, Malosma laurina, with the common names laurel sumac and lentisco (Spanish).Malosma laurina is found along the southern California and Baja California coasts of the Pacific Ocean.


Malosma laurina is a large, rounded evergreen shrub or small tree growing 3 to 5 meters (10–15 feet) tall.
The leaves have a taco shell shape.  When flattened, they have the shape of laurel leaves, with lance-shaped leaf blades up to 10 cm (4") long.  The tips of the stems, little stem attaching the leaf to the stems (petiole), the veins of the leaves, and the edges of the leaves, are a glowing reddish color all year long.
The fragrant leaves and stems give chaparral its characteristic fragrance.  The leaves and stems are full of volatile compounds that give it the scent. Laurel sumac has adapted to fire return intervals of 50-100+ years in the chaparral areas where it grows, and after a fire burns its above ground parts, a large burl underground resprouts new stems and leaves.
In southern California where it grows, the winters are relatively wet and the summers are dry (a Mediterranean climate).  The laurel sumac grows new leaves and stems all year long, even during dry season.  Most other plants where it grows stop growing leaves during the summer dry season and focus their energies on their root systems.  The fragrant saps flow through laurel sumac all year to supply the leaves.  One effect of this is that laurel sumac is one of the first plants that resprout after a fire, before the winter rains cause other plants to stop being dormant for the dry season.  Another effect is that the parasitic plant (a plant that grows into other plants, not the soil) California dodder (Cuscuta californica), which dies in the summer on other plants, can be seen covering laurel sumac in large stringy "cobwebs" of yellow/orange color.
Laurel sumac is sensitive to cold and tolerates extended freezing conditions poorly.  Orange growers in the early history of southern California used to pick places to plant their oranges based on where laurel sumac was growing because this indicated it would not get too cold for oranges if laurel sumac could grow there.
The very small flowers have five white petals and five-lobed green sepals. Large clusters of these flowers occur at the ends of twigs in late spring and early summer. The clusters (panicles) are 7–15 cm (3 to 6 ") long, and are reminiscent of lilac (see photo). The fruit is a whitish drupe 3 mm (1/8") in diameter with a smooth, flattish stone inside (see photo).
In bloom, the flowers give off a "woodsy-herbal" smell that is likened to both green apples and turpentine.


Malosma laurina is distributed along the southern California coastline (primarily from Point Conception south to La Paz), and on several of the Channel Islands lying off the coast. Several records of the species have also been made north of Point Conception, around the city of Arroyo Grande, California. Malosma laurina is not frost-hardy.
Malosma laurina occurs in coastal sage scrub, chaparral, and oak woodland formations. It occasionally grows in nearly pure stands in coastal sage scrub; more frequently, it codominates with California sagebrush (Artemisia californica) and black, white, or purple sage (Salvia mellifera, S. apiana, or S. leucophylla). In mixed chaparral, it often codominates with bigpod ceanothus
(Ceanothus megacarpus) and spiny ceanothus (C. spinosus). In woodlands, Malosma laurina is an understory associate in Engelmann oak (Quercus engelmannii), valley oak (Q. lobata), coast live oak (Q. agrifolia), and California black walnut (Juglans californica).


The common name "laurel" was chosen because the foliage is reminiscent of bay laurel – Laurus nobilis, an otherwise unrelated shrub and small tree of the Mediterranean Basin. The species was previously assigned to the genus Rhus, and was known as Rhus laurina.


Malosma laurina is used as a landscape plant, native plant, drought tolerant, and wildlife gardens in frost-free areas.
Naturally occurring plants have been used as "sentinel plants" by avocado and citrus growers to indicate areas that are free of frost and suitable for their orchards in Southern California.


The Chumash crushed and ate the dried fruits of Malosma laurina — perhaps as a flour or meal — and also used the root bark to make a tea for treating dysentery.


The superb fairywren (Malurus cyaneus) is a passerine bird in the Australasian wren family, Maluridae, and is common and familiar across south-eastern Australia. It is a sedentary and territorial species, also exhibiting a high degree of sexual dimorphism; the male in breeding plumage has a striking bright blue forehead, ear coverts, mantle, and tail, with a black mask and black or dark blue throat. Non-breeding males, females and juveniles are predominantly grey-brown in colour; this gave the early impression that males were polygamous, as all dull-coloured birds were taken for females. Six subspecies groups are recognized: three larger and darker forms from Tasmania, Flinders and King Island respectively, and three smaller and paler forms from mainland Australia and Kangaroo Island.
Like other fairywrens, the superb fairywren is notable for several peculiar behavioural characteristics; the birds are socially monogamous and sexually promiscuous, meaning that although they form pairs between one male and one female, each partner will mate with other individuals and even assist in raising the young from such pairings. Male wrens pluck yellow petals and display them to females as part of a courtship display.
The superb fairywren can be found in almost any area that has at least a little dense undergrowth for shelter, including grasslands with scattered shrubs, moderately thick forest, woodland, heaths, and domestic gardens. It has adapted well to the urban environment and is common in suburban Sydney, Canberra, Melbourne and Brisbane. The superb fairywren eats mostly insects and supplements its diet with seeds.
The superb fairywren was named 'Australian Bird of the Year' for 2021, after a survey conducted by Birdlife Australia saw the species narrowly defeat the tawny frogmouth with a margin of 666 votes (over 400,000 votes were cast in total).


The superb fairywren is one of eleven species of the genus Malurus, commonly known as fairywrens, found in Australia and lowland New Guinea. Within the genus, the superb fairywren's closest relative is the splendid fairywren; these two "blue wrens" are also related to the purple-crowned fairywren of northwestern Australia.
William Anderson, surgeon and naturalist on Captain James Cook's third voyage, collected the first superb fairywren specimen in 1777 while traveling off the coast of eastern Tasmania, in Bruny Island's Adventure Bay. He classified it in the genus Motacilla because its tail reminded him of the European wagtails. Anderson did not live to publish his findings, although his assistant William Ellis described the bird in 1782. The genus Malurus was later described by Louis Jean Pierre Vieillot in 1816, giving the bird its current scientific name.
Shortly after the First Fleet's arrival at Port Jackson, Sydney, the bird gained the common name superb warbler. In the 1920s came common names wren and wren-warbler—both from its similarity to the European wren—and fairywren. The bird has also been called Mormon wren, a reference to observations of one blue-plumaged bird accompanied by many brown-plumaged birds, which were incorrectly assumed to be all female.  The Ngarrindjeri people of the Murray River and Coorong regions call it waatji pulyeri, meaning "little one of the waatji (lignum) bush", and the Gunai call it deeydgun, meaning "little bird with long tail". Both it and the variegated fairywren are known as muruduwin to the local Eora and Darug inhabitants of the Sydney basin. Other alternative names for the superb fairywren include the Australian fairywren, blue wren, superb blue fairywren, and superb blue wren.
Like other fairywrens, the superb fairywren is unrelated to the true wren. It was previously classified as a member of the Old World flycatcher family Muscicapidae and later as a member of the warbler family Sylviidae before being placed in the newly recognised Maluridae in 1975. More recently, DNA analysis has shown the family Maluridae to be related to the Meliphagidae (honeyeaters), and the Pardalotidae (pardalotes, scrubwrens, thornbills, gerygones and allies) in the large superfamily Meliphagoidea. To help resolve this a high-quality 1.07‐Gb reference genome was sequenced in 2019.


In his 1982 monograph, Schodde proposed a southern origin for the common ancestor of the superb and splendid fairywrens. At some time in the past it was split into south-western (splendid) and south-eastern (superb) enclaves. As the southwest was drier than the southeast, once conditions were more favourable, the splendid forms were more able to spread into inland areas. In the east, the superb fairywren spread into Tasmania during a glacial period when the sea level was low and the island was connected with the rest of the continent via a land bridge. This gave rise to the subspecies cyaneus as it became isolated when the sea levels rose. The Bass Strait forms were isolated from Tasmania more recently and so their subspecific status was not maintained. A 2017 genetic study using both mitochondrial and nuclear DNA found the ancestors of the superb and splendid fairywrens diverged from each other around 4 million years ago, and their common ancestor diverged around 7 million years ago from a lineage that gave rise to the white-shouldered, white-winged and red-backed fairywrens.


The superb fairywren is 14 cm (5+1⁄2 in) long and weighs 8–13 g (0.28–0.46 oz), with males on average slightly larger than females. The average tail length is 5.9 cm (2+1⁄3 in), among the shortest in the genus. Averaging 9 mm (0.4 in) in subspecies cyaneus and 8 mm (0.3 in) in subspecies cyanochlamys, the bill is relatively long, narrow and pointed and wider at the base. Wider than it is deep, the bill is similar in shape to those of other birds that feed by probing for or picking insects off their environs.
Like other fairywrens, the superb fairywren is notable for its marked sexual dimorphism, males adopting a highly visible breeding plumage of brilliant iridescent blue contrasting with black and grey-brown. The brightly coloured crown and ear tufts are prominently featured in breeding displays. The breeding male has a bright-blue forehead, ear coverts, mantle and tail, brown wings, and black throat, eye band, breast and bill. Females, immatures, and non-breeding males are a plain fawn colour with a lighter underbelly and a fawn (females and immatures) or dull greyish blue (males) tail. The bill is brown in females and juveniles and black in males after their first winter. Immature males moult into breeding plumage the first breeding season after hatching, though incomplete moulting sometimes leaves residual brownish plumage that takes another year or two to perfect. Both sexes moult in autumn after breeding, with males assuming an eclipse non-breeding plumage. They moult again into nuptial plumage in winter or spring. Breeding males' blue plumage, particularly the ear-coverts, is highly iridescent because of the flattened and twisted surface of the barbules. The blue plumage also reflects ultraviolet light strongly, and so may be even more prominent to other fairywrens, whose colour vision extends into this part of the spectrum.


Vocal communication among superb fairywrens is used primarily for communication between birds in a social group and for advertising and mobbing, or defending a territory. The basic, or Type I, song is a 1–4 second high-pitched reel consisting of 10–20 short elements per second; it is sung by both males and females. Males also possess a peculiar song-like Type II vocalization, which is given in response to the calls of predatory birds, commonly grey butcherbirds. The purpose of this behaviour, which does not elicit a response from other nearby wrens, remains unknown. It is not a warning call, but in fact gives away the location of the vocalizing male to the predator. It may serve to announce male fitness, but this is far from certain. The superb fairywrens' alarm call is a series of brief sharp chits, universally given and understood by small birds in response to predators. Females also emit a purr while incubating. The bird appears to also use vocalisations as a password for its chicks to give it a chance to avoid cuckoo parasites.


Like all fairywrens, the superb fairywren is an active and restless feeder, particularly on open ground near shelter, but also through the lower foliage. Movement is a series of jaunty hops and bounces, with its balance assisted by a proportionally large tail, which is usually held upright, and rarely still. The short, rounded wings provide good initial lift and are useful for short flights, though not for extended jaunts. During spring and summer, birds are active in bursts through the day and accompany their foraging with song. Insects are numerous and easy to catch, which allows the birds to rest between forays. The group often shelters and rests together during the heat of the day. Food is harder to find during winter and they are required to spend the day foraging continuously.
The superb fairywren is a cooperative breeding species, with pairs or groups of 3–5 birds maintaining and defending small territories year-round. The group consists of a social pair with one or more male or female helper birds that were hatched in the territory, though they may not necessarily be the offspring of the main pair. These birds assist in defending the territory and feeding and rearing the young. Birds in a group roost side-by-side in dense cover as well as engaging in mutual preening.
Major nest predators include Australian magpies, butcherbirds, laughing kookaburra, currawongs, crows and ravens, shrike-thrushes as well as introduced mammals such as the red fox, cat and black rat. Superb fairywrens may utilise a 'rodent-run' display to distract predators from nests with young birds. The head, neck and tail are lowered, wings held out and feathers fluffed as the bird runs rapidly and voices a continuous alarm call. A field study in Canberra found that superb fairywrens that lived in areas frequented by noisy miners recognised miner alarm calls and took flight, and had learnt to ignore their non-alarm calls, while those that live in areas not frequented by noisy miners did not respond to miner alarm calls. This suggests the species has adapted and learned to discriminate and respond to another species' vocalisations.


Several courtship displays by superb fairywren males have been recorded. The 'sea horse flight', named for its seahorse-like undulations, is one such display. During this exaggerated flight, the male—with his neck extended and his head feathers erect—tilts his body from horizontal to vertical, and descends slowly and springs upwards by rapidly beating his wings after alighting on the ground. The 'face fan' display may be seen as a part of aggressive or sexual display behaviours; it involves the flaring of the blue ear tufts by erecting the feathers.
During the reproductive season, males of this and other fairywren species pluck yellow petals, which contrast with their plumage, and show them to female fairywrens. The petals often form part of a courtship display and are presented to a female in the male fairywren's own or another territory. Males sometimes show petals to females in other territories even outside the breeding season, presumably to promote themselves. Fairywrens are socially monogamous and sexually promiscuous: pairs will bond for life, though both males and females will regularly mate with other individuals; a proportion of young will have been fathered by males from outside the group. Young are often raised not by the pair alone, but with other males who also mated with the pair's female assisting.


Breeding occurs from spring through to late summer; the nest is a round or domed structure made of loosely woven grasses and spider webs, with an entrance in one side generally close to the ground, under 1 m (3.3 ft), and in thick vegetation. Two or more broods may be laid in an extended breeding season. A clutch of three or four matte white eggs with reddish-brown splotches and spots, measuring 12 mm × 16 mm (0.47 in × 0.63 in). The eggs are incubated for 14 days, after which they hatch within 24 hours. Newborn chicks are blind, red and featherless, though quickly darken as feathers grow. Their eyes open by day five or six and are fully feathered by day 10. All group members feed and remove fecal sacs for 10–14 days. Fledglings are able to feed themselves by day 40 but remain in the family group as helpers for a year or more before moving to another group or assuming a dominant position in the original group. In this role they feed and care for subsequent broods and repel cuckoos or predators. Superb fairywrens also commonly play host to the brood parasite Horsfield's bronze cuckoo and, less commonly, the shining bronze cuckoo and fan-tailed cuckoo.


Superb fairywrens are predominantly insectivorous. They eat a wide range of small creatures (mostly insects such as ants, grasshoppers, shield bugs, flies, weevils and various larvae) as well as small quantities of seeds, flowers, and fruit. Their foraging, termed 'hop-searching', occurs on the ground or in shrubs that are less than two metres high. Because this foraging practice renders them vulnerable to predators, birds tend to stick fairly close to cover and forage in groups. During winter, when food may be scarce, ants are an important 'last resort' food, constituting a much higher proportion of the diet. Nestlings, in contrast to adult birds, are fed a diet of larger items such as caterpillars and grasshoppers.


The superb fairywren breeding male is used as an emblem by the Bird Observation & Conservation Australia. On 12 August 1999, a superb fairywren was mistakenly illustrated for an Australia Post 45c pre-stamped envelope meant to depict a splendid fairywren. Called the blue wren as it was then known, it had previously featured on a 2s.5d. stamp, released in 1964, which was discontinued with the advent of decimal currency.


The splendid fairywren (Malurus splendens) is a passerine bird in the Australasian wren family, Maluridae. It is also known simply as the splendid wren or more colloquially in Western Australia as the blue wren. The splendid fairywren is found across much of the Australian continent from central-western New South Wales and southwestern Queensland over to coastal Western Australia. It inhabits predominantly arid and semi-arid regions. Exhibiting a high degree of sexual dimorphism, the male in breeding plumage is a small, long-tailed bird of predominantly bright blue and black colouration. Non-breeding males, females and juveniles are predominantly grey-brown in colour; this gave the early impression that males were polygamous as all dull-coloured birds were taken for females. It comprises several similar all-blue and black subspecies that were originally considered separate species.
Like other fairywrens, the splendid fairywren is notable for several peculiar behavioural characteristics; the birds are socially monogamous and sexually promiscuous, meaning that although they form pairs between one male and one female, each partner will mate with other individuals and even assist in raising the young from such trysts. Male wrens pluck pink or purple petals and display them to females as part of a courtship display.
The habitat of the splendid fairywren ranges from forest to dry scrub, generally with ample vegetation for shelter. Unlike the eastern superb fairywren, it has not adapted well to human occupation of the landscape and has disappeared from some urbanised areas. The splendid fairywren mainly eats insects and supplements its diet with seeds.


The splendid fairywren is one of eleven species of the genus Malurus, commonly known as fairywrens, found in Australia and lowland New Guinea. Within the genus it is most closely related to the superb fairywren. These two "blue wrens" are closely related to the purple-crowned fairywren of north-western Australia.
Specimens were initially collected at King George Sound, and the splendid fairywren then described as Saxicola splendens by the French naturalists Jean René Constant Quoy and Joseph Paul Gaimard in 1830, three years before John Gould gave it the scientific name of Malurus pectoralis and vernacular name of banded superb-warbler. Though he correctly placed it in the genus Malurus, the specific name of the former authors took priority. The specific epithet is derived from the Latin splendens, which means "shining".
Like other fairywrens, the splendid fairywren is unrelated to the true wren. It was first classified as a member of the Old World flycatcher family Muscicapidae by Richard Bowdler Sharpe, though it was later placed in the warbler family Sylviidae by the same author, before being placed in the newly recognised family Maluridae in 1975. More recently, DNA analysis has shown the family Maluridae to be related to the family Meliphagidae (the honeyeaters), and the family Pardalotidae within a large superfamily, Meliphagoidea.
The splendid fairywren is also alternatively named the splendid blue wren.


Initially, three of the subspecies were considered separate species as they were each originally described far from their borders with the others. However, as the interior of Australia was explored, it became apparent there were areas of hybridisation where subspecies overlapped. Thus in 1975, they were then reclassified as subspecies of the splendid fairywren. There are four subspecies currently recognized:
Banded fairywren (M. s. splendens) - (Quoy & Gaimard, 1830): Also named the banded wren or banded blue wren. This is the nominate subspecies and is found in much of central and southern Western Australia.
Turquoise fairywren (M. s. callainus) - Gould, 1867: Originally collected by ornithologist Samuel White and described as a separate species by John Gould. Although the taxonomy is not yet settled, it is now considered to include the former subspecies musgravei described in 1922 by amateur ornithologist Gregory Mathews from the Lake Eyre Basin in central Australia. Also named the turquoise wren. It is found in mulga and mallee country across much of South Australia and the southern Northern Territory. It has lighter blue or turquoise upperparts than the splendid fairywren, as well as a black rump.
Black-backed fairywren (M. s. melanotus) - Gould, 1841: Originally described as a separate species. Also named the black-backed wren, it is found in the mallee country of South Australia (Sedan area north-east of Adelaide) through western Victoria, western New South Wales and into south-western Queensland. It differs from the nominate subspecies in having a black back and whitish lower belly.
M. s. emmottorum - Schodde & Mason, IJ, 1999: Named after Angus Emmott, a farmer and amateur biologist from western Queensland. Found in south-western Queensland.


In his 1982 monograph, ornithologist Richard Schodde proposed a southern origin for the common ancestor of the superb and splendid fairywrens. At some time in the past it was split into southwestern (splendid) and southeastern (superb) enclaves. As the southwest was drier than the southeast, once conditions were more favourable, the splendid forms were more able to spread into inland areas. These split into at least three enclaves which subsequently evolved in isolation in the following drier glacial periods until the current more favourable climate saw them expand once again and interbreed where they overlap. This suggests the original split was only very recent as the forms had insufficient time to speciate. Further molecular studies may result in this hypothesis being modified. A 2017 genetic study using both mitochondrial and nuclear DNA found the ancestors of the superb and splendid fairywrens diverged from each other around 4 million years ago, and their common ancestor diverged around 7 million years ago from a lineage that gave rise to the white-shouldered, white-winged and red-backed fairywrens.


The splendid fairywren is a small, long-tailed bird 14 cm (5.5 in) long. Exhibiting a high degree of sexual dimorphism, the breeding male is distinctive with a bright blue forehead and ear coverts, a violet throat and deeper rich blue back wings, chest and tail with a black bill, eye band and chest band. The blue breeding plumage of the male is often referred to as nuptial plumage. The non-breeding male is brown with blue in the wings and a bluish tail. The female resembles the non-breeding male but has a chestnut bill and eye-patch. Immature males will moult into breeding plumage the first breeding season after hatching, though this may be incomplete with residual brownish plumage and may take another year or two to perfect. Both sexes moult in autumn after breeding, with males assuming an eclipse non-breeding plumage. They will moult again into nuptial plumage in winter or spring. Some older males have remained blue all year, moulting directly from one year's nuptial plumage to the next. Breeding males' blue plumage, particularly the ear-coverts, is highly iridescent due to the flattened and twisted surface of the barbules. The blue plumage also reflects ultraviolet light strongly, and so may be even more prominent to other fairywrens, whose colour vision extends into this part of the spectrum. The call is described as a gushing reel; this is harsher and louder than other fairywrens and varies from individual to individual. A soft single trrt serves as a contact call within a foraging group, while the alarm call is a tsit. Cuckoos and other intruders may be greeted with a threat posture and churring threat. Females emit a purr while brooding.


The splendid fairywren is widely distributed in the arid and semi-arid zones of Australia. Habitat is typically dry and shrubby; mulga and mallee in drier parts of the country and forested areas in the southwest. The western subspecies splendens and eastern black-backed fairywren (subspecies melanotus) are largely sedentary, although the turquoise fairywren (subspecies musgravei) is thought to be partially nomadic. Unlike the eastern superb fairywren, the splendid fairywren has not adapted well to human occupation of the landscape and has disappeared from some urbanised areas. Forestry plantations of pine (Pinus spp.) and eucalypts are also unsuitable as they lack undergrowth.


Like all fairywrens, the splendid fairywren is an active and restless feeder, particularly on open ground near shelter, but also through the lower foliage. Movement is a series of jaunty hops and bounces, with its balance assisted by a proportionally large tail, which is usually held upright and rarely still. The short, rounded wings provide good initial lift and are useful for short flights, though not for extended jaunts. However, splendid fairywrens are stronger fliers than most other fairywrens. During spring and summer, birds are active in bursts through the day and accompany their foraging with song. Insects are numerous and easy to catch, which allows the birds to rest between forays. The group often shelters and rests together during the heat of the day. Food is harder to find during winter and they are required to spend the day foraging continuously.
Groups of two to eight splendid fairywrens remain in their territory and defend it year-round. Territories average 4.4 ha (11 acres) in woodland-heath areas; size decreases with increasing density of vegetation and increases with the number of males in the group. The group consists of a socially monogamous pair with one or more male or female helper birds that were hatched in the territory, though they may not necessarily be the offspring of the main pair. Splendid fairywrens are sexually promiscuous, each partner mating with other individuals and even assisting in raising the young from such trysts. Over a third of offspring are the result of an 'extramarital' mating. Helper birds assist in defending the territory and feeding and rearing the young. Birds in a group roost side-by-side in dense cover as well as engaging in mutual preening.
Major nest predators include Australian magpies (Gymnorhina tibicen), butcherbirds (Cracticus spp.), laughing kookaburra (Dacelo novaeguineae), currawongs (Strepera spp.), crows and ravens (Corvus spp.), shrike-thrushes (Colluricincla spp.) as well as introduced mammals such as the red fox (Vulpes vulpes), cat (Felis catus) and black rat (Rattus rattus). Like other species of fairywrens, splendid fairywrens may use a 'rodent-run' display to distract predators from nests with young birds. While doing this, the head, neck and tail of the bird are lowered, the wings are held out and the feathers are fluffed as the bird runs rapidly and voices a continuous alarm call.


Several courtship displays by splendid fairywren males have been recorded; the 'sea horse flight,' so named for the similarity of movements to those by a seahorse, is an exaggerated undulating flight where the male, with his neck extended and his head feathers erect, flies and tilts his body from horizontal to vertical and by rapidly beating wings is able to descend slowly and spring upwards after alighting on the ground. The 'face fan' display may be seen as a part of aggressive or sexual display behaviours; it involves the flaring of the blue ear tufts by erecting the feathers.
Another interesting habit of males of this and other fairywren species during the reproductive season is to pluck petals (in this species, predominantly pink and purple ones which contrast with their plumage) and show them to female fairywrens. Petals often form part of a courtship display and are presented to a female in the male fairywren's own or another territory. Outside the breeding season males may sometimes still show petals to females in other territories, presumably to promote themselves. It is notable that fairywrens are socially monogamous and sexually promiscuous: pairs will bond for life, but regularly mate with other individuals; a proportion of young will have been fathered by males from outside the group. Young are often raised not by the pair alone, but with other males who also mated with the pair's female assisting. Thus, petal-carrying might be a behaviour that strengthens the pair-bond. Petal carrying might also be a way for extra males to gain matings with the female. In either case, the data does not strongly link petal-carrying and presenting to a copulation soon thereafter.
Researchers at Department of Ecology and Evolution, University of Chicago published a paper in Behavioral Ecology in 2010 showing that male splendid fairywrens sing display-like vocalizations (Type II song) in response to predator calls. The trills "hitchhike" on the predator's vocalization and the female splendid fairywrens, which have become more alert due to the predator calls, also respond more strongly to this type II song than when it's given without a predator call preceding it.


Breeding occurs from late August through to January, though heavy rain in August may delay this. The nest is built by the female; it is a round or domed structure made of loosely woven grasses and spider webs, with an entrance in one side close to the ground and well-concealed in thick and often thorny vegetation, such as Acacia pulchella or a species of Hakea. One or two broods may be laid during the breeding season. A clutch of two to four dull white eggs with reddish-brown splotches and spots, measuring 12 × 16 mm (½ × ⅝ in), are laid. Incubation takes about two weeks. The female incubates the eggs for 14 or 15 days; after hatching, nestlings are fed and their fecal sacs removed by all group members for 10–13 days, by which time they are fledged. Young birds remain in the family group as helpers for a year or more before moving to another group, usually an adjacent one, or assuming a dominant position in the original group. In this role they feed and care for subsequent broods.
Splendid fairywrens also commonly play host to the brood parasite Horsfield's bronze cuckoo (Chalcites basalis), with the shining bronze cuckoo (Chalcites lucidus) also recorded.


The splendid fairywren is predominantly insectivorous; its diet includes a wide range of small creatures, mostly arthropods such as ants, grasshoppers, crickets, spiders and bugs. This is supplemented by small quantities of seeds, flowers, and fruit. They mostly forage on the ground or in shrubs that are less than two metres above the ground; this has been termed 'hop-searching'. Unusually for fairywrens, they may also occasionally forage in the canopy of flowering gums. Birds tend to stick fairly close to cover and forage in groups as this foraging practice does render them vulnerable to a range of predators. Food can be scarce in winter and ants are an important 'last resort' option, constituting a much higher proportion of the diet. Adult fairywrens feed their young a different diet, conveying larger items such as caterpillars and grasshoppers to nestlings.


The bird was intended to be illustrated on an Australia Post 45c pre-stamped envelope released on 12 August 1999; however, a superb fairywren was mistakenly illustrated instead.


Malus fusca, with the common names Oregon crabapple and Pacific crabapple, is a species of crabapple native to western North America.


Malus fusca is a deciduous tree growing up to 13 metres (43 feet) tall, with a trunk 20–25 centimetres (8–10 inches) thick. The leaves are 5–8 cm (2–3 in) long, dark green above, and both pale and fibrous beneath; they turn bright orange to red in autumn.
The flowers are white or pale pink, blooming in spring. The fruits are small round apple-shaped pomes, about 2 cm (3⁄4 in) long and from red to yellow-green in colour. They may stay on the tree until winter.
The trees can reach at least 100 years of age.


Archibald Menzies described the species in 1792 after finding it near today's Port Angeles, Washington.


The species can be found from Alaska, through British Columbia, to northwestern California. It grows in temperate coniferous forest, primarily in the Cascade Range and the Pacific Coast Ranges.


It can be found growing along with red alder, bigleaf maple, willows, and cascara. Animals including grouse and bears eat the fruit.


The oblong fruit can be eaten, but has a sour flavor. The fruit can also be used for extraction of pectin, useful in helping make jams and jellies from other fruits, and is also made into jams and jellies itself. The bark can be used as an herbal medicine. It is also grown in parks and gardens as an ornamental plant.
Pacific crabapple fruits were prized by indigenous peoples of the Pacific Northwest as a food source, and were gathered all along the coast. As a traditional medicinal plant, infusions of the bark and/or fruit were used, including for stomach disorders, skin and eye infections, and as an analgesic.
The tree was also valued for its tough, resilient wood, used for making implements, and for its bark, used for a wide range of medicinal purposes.


Malva assurgentiflora, formerly classified as Lavatera assurgentiflora, the island mallow,  mission mallow, royal mallow, malva rosa island mallow, island tree mallow or malva rosa ('pink mallow') in Spanish, is a species of flowering plant in the mallow family.


Malva assurgentiflora is a sprawling perennial herb or bushy shrub generally exceeding a meter tall and approaching four meters in maximum height. The leaves are up to 15 centimeters long and wide and are divided into 5 to 7 toothed lobes.
The showy flowers have five dark-veined deep pink petals which are somewhat rectangular in shape and 2.5 to 4.5 centimeters long. The disc-shaped fruit is divided into 6 or 8 segments each containing a seed.


It is endemic to southern California, where it is native only to the Channel Islands. It can also be found growing as an escapee from cultivation in localised spots in coastal mainland California and Baja California, as well as sparingly in locations in Guatemala, cooler regions in mountainous or Mediterranean areas in western South America, New Zealand and Australia.


Malva assurgentiflora has been grown in California for a very long time as an ornamental plant and as a windbreak.


Malva moschata, the musk mallow or musk-mallow, is a species of flowering plant in the family Malvaceae, native to Europe and southwestern Asia, from Spain north to the British Isles and Poland, and east to southern Russia and Turkey. Growing to 60 cm (24 in) tall, it is a herbaceous perennial with hairy stems and foliage, and pink saucer-shaped flowers in summer.


The leaves are alternate, 2–8 cm long and 2–8 cm broad, palmately lobed with five to seven lobes; basal leaves on the lower stem are very shallowly lobed, those higher on the stems are deeply divided, with narrow, acuminate lobes. The flowers are produced in clusters in the leaf axils, each flower 3.2–5 cm in diameter, with five bright pink petals with a truncated to notched apex; they have a distinctive musky odour. The fruit is a disc-shaped schizocarp 3–6 mm in diameter, containing 10–16 seeds, the seeds individually enclosed in a mericarp covered in whitish hairs. It has a chromosome count of 2n=42.


It occurs on dry, but fertile soils at altitudes from sea level up to 1,500 m (4,900 ft). Natural hybrids with the closely related Malva alcea are occasionally found.
The flowers are usually pollinated by bees.


Malva moschata is widely grown as an ornamental plant for its attractive scented flowers, produced for a long period through the summer. Several cultivars have been selected for variation in flower colour, including 'Rosea' with dark pink flowers.
Leaves and flowers of muskmallow are common additions to "wild" salads. The seeds are also edible.
It has been introduced to and become naturalised in several areas with temperate climates away from its native range, including Scandinavia, New Zealand, and North America.


Malvaviscus arboreus is native to Central America, Mexico, and the Gulf Coast of the United States, particularly as an understory shrub in coastal Texas and Louisiana.


Malvaviscus arboreus is a common understory shrub where it occurs in Texas and is an important food source for female and juvenile Ruby-throated Hummingbirds (Archilochus colubri) and Black-chinned Hummingbirds (A. alexandri). Each individual flower lasts two days but contains more nectar on the first day.
An example occurrence of M. arboreus is within the coastal Petenes mangroves of the Yucatán region of Mexico, in which plant community it is a subdominant species. M. arboreus is the primary host plant for the caterpillars of the Turk's-cap White-Skipper (Heliopetes macaira).


Malvaviscus arboreus is commonly cultivated in shady to sunny sites in butterfly and hummingbird gardens across the southern United States.  It can be propagated from fresh seeds or from softwood cuttings.  It often blooms from May through November, but will bloom throughout a mild winter.


Malvella leprosa is a species of flowering plant in the mallow family known by the common names alkali mallow and alkali sida. It is native to much of the western United States, Mexico, Argentina, and Chile. It is known in parts of Australia as an introduced species. In many regions, whether native there or not, the plant is often a noxious weed and easily invades habitat, including areas with alkaline and saline soils. In California, the plant can be found in agricultural lands, including fields and orchards. This is a decumbent perennial herb producing a white-hairy stem up to about 40 centimetres (16 in) long, spreading along the ground. The leaves are variable in shape but are generally lobed and wavy along the edges, measuring 1 to 3 centimetres (3⁄8 to 1+1⁄8 in) wide. Leaves appear in the leaf axils singly or in clusters of up to 3. Each flower is a cup-shaped corolla of five petals up to 1.5 centimetres (2⁄3 in) long in shades of pale pink, white, or light yellow. The disc-shaped fruit is divided into several segments.


Mammillaria dioica, also called the strawberry cactus, California fishhook cactus, strawberry pincushion or fishhook cactus, is a cactus species of the genus Mammillaria. Its common name in Spanish is biznaga llavina.


The cactus is found in the western Colorado Desert scrub including in Anza-Borrego Desert State Park, and in Coastal sage scrub habitats of Southern California; and in coastal chaparral and Sonoran Desert habitats of Baja California and Baja California Sur states on the Baja California Peninsula of México.   It grows from 10–1,500 feet (3.0–457.2 m) in elevation.
Polyploid wild plants of this species have been found in Mexico.  Both tetraploid and hexaploid varieties have been recorded.


Mammillaria dioica possesses short, firm tubercles ending in the spines.  Most of these spines are whitish and straight, but each tubercle has a longer central spine which is slightly curved and dark.
A single plant can bear both male and female flowers, from mid-spring to mid-summer.  Some plants may produce bisexual flowers as well, thus totaling three types of flower on a single plant.  The flowers are white to cream in color and range from 10 millimeters (0.4 inch) to 30 millimeters (1.2 inches) in length.
The fruits produced are bright red and ovoid, often with one end thicker than the other and are edible and tastes like a cross between a strawberry and a kiwi. The seeds are small (0.6 to 0.8 millimeters), black, and pitted.


Recognized subspecies include:
Mammillaria dioica subsp dioica
Mammillaria dioica subsp angelensis
Mammillaria dioica subsp estebanensis


The Kumeyaay people (Diegueño), of Baja California and Southern California, eat the raw fruits as a food source.


Mammillaria dioica is cultivated by specialty cactus plant nurseries and by botanical gardens for plant sales. It requires very well-drained soil, and so is often grown in pots and in raised beds in drought tolerant gardens.


Mammillaria grahamii is a species of cactus also known by the name Graham's nipple cactus.
In the United States, this plant can be found in Arizona, California, New Mexico, and Texas.


This cactus has hooked stems and flowers pink or lavender in April and May. The cactus is commonly found in a dry habitat of gravel or grassland.


Agave virginica, synonym Manfreda virginica, commonly known as the  false aloe, rattlesnake master, American aloe, and Virginia agave, is a species of agave. It is native to an area stretching from North Carolina west to Texas in the United States and south to Nuevo León and Tamaulipas in Mexico.


False aloe is acaulescent, meaning the stem is extremely short. Leaves and flowering stems are from a bulbous herbaceous caudex. The fleshy green leaves are usually spotted or speckled with maroon.  Sufficient precipitation yields an inflorescence up to 68 cm (27 in) tall in the period from early summer to late summer, rarely in the spring.
The inflorescences bears 10–61 closely spaced flowers. Flowers are sessile or pedicellate, nearly erect, slender, with a fragrant sweet fruity odor.  Seed capsules are globose and 1–1.7 cm diameter.
Leaf shape and size in Agave virginica vary with soil type, amount of shade, length of cold period, and position of leaf in the rosette. Speckles and spots occur frequently on some leaves in most populations, and some authors have used the informal designation "forma tigrina" for such variants.


The noisy miner (Manorina melanocephala) is a bird in the honeyeater family, Meliphagidae, and is endemic to eastern and southeastern Australia. This miner is a grey bird, with a black head, orange-yellow beak and feet, a distinctive yellow patch behind the eye, and white tips on the tail feathers. The Tasmanian race has a more intense yellow panel in the wing, and a broader white tip to the tail. Males, females and juveniles are similar in appearance, though young birds are a brownish-grey. As the common name suggests, the noisy miner is a vocal species with a large range of songs, calls, scoldings and alarms, and almost constant vocalisations, particularly from young birds. One of four species in the genus Manorina, the noisy miner itself is divided into four subspecies. The separation of the Tasmanian M. m. leachi is of long standing, and the mainland birds were further split in 1999.
Found in a broad arc from Far North Queensland through New South Wales and Victoria to Tasmania and southeastern South Australia, the noisy miner primarily inhabits dry, open eucalypt forests that lack understory shrubs. These include forests dominated by spotted gum, box and ironbark, as well as in degraded woodland where the understory has been cleared, such as recently burned areas, farming and grazing areas, roadside reserves, and suburban parks and gardens with trees and grass, but without dense shrubbery. The density of noisy miner populations has significantly increased in many locations across its range, particularly in human-dominated habitats. The popularity of nectar-producing garden plants, such as the large-flowered grevilleas, was thought to play a role in its proliferation, but studies now show that the noisy miner has benefited primarily from landscaping practices that create open areas dominated by eucalypts.
Noisy miners are gregarious and territorial; they forage, bathe, roost, breed and defend territory communally, forming colonies that can contain several hundred birds. Each bird has an 'activity space', and birds with overlapping activity spaces form associations called 'coteries', which are the most stable units within the colony. The birds also form temporary flocks called 'coalitions' for specific activities, such as mobbing a predator. Group cohesion is facilitated not only by vocalisations, but also through ritualised displays, which have been categorised as flight displays, postural displays, and facial displays. The noisy miner is a notably aggressive bird, so that chasing, pecking, fighting, scolding, and mobbing occur throughout the day, targeted at both intruders and colony members.
Foraging in the canopy of trees, on trunks and branches, and on the ground, the noisy miner mainly eats nectar, fruit, and insects. Most time is spent gleaning the foliage of eucalypts, and it can meet most of its nutritional needs from manna, honeydew, and lerp gathered from the foliage. The noisy miner does not use a stereotyped courtship display, but copulation is a frenzied communal event. It breeds all year long, building a deep cup-shaped nest and laying two to four eggs. Incubation is by the female only, although up to twenty male helpers take care of the nestlings and fledglings. Noisy miners have a range of strategies to increase their breeding success, including multiple broods and group mobbing of predators. The noisy miner's population increase has been correlated with the reduction of avian diversity in human-affected landscapes. Its territoriality means that translocation is unlikely to be a solution to its overabundance, and culling has been proposed, although the noisy miner is currently a protected species across Australia.


English ornithologist John Latham described the noisy miner four times in his 1801 work Supplementum Indicis Ornithologici, sive Systematis Ornithologiae, seemingly not knowing it was the same bird in each case: the chattering bee-eater (Merops garrulus), black-headed grackle (Gracula melanocephala), hooded bee-eater (Merops cucullatus), and white-fronted bee-eater (Merops albifrons). Early notes recorded its tendency to scare off prey as hunters were about to shoot. It was as the chattering bee-eater that it was painted between 1792 and 1797 by Thomas Watling, one of a group known collectively as the Port Jackson Painter. John Gould treated the name Merops garrulus as the original description, and renamed it Myzantha garrula in his 1865 work Handbook to the Birds of Australia, giving it the common name of garrulous honeyeater, and noting the alternate name of chattering honeyeater. He noted the colonists of Tasmania called it a miner, and aboriginal people of New South Wales called it cobaygin. Que que gang was a local aboriginal name from the Blue Mountains.
In the early 20th century, Australian ornithologists started using the name Manorina melanocephala instead, because it was listed first by Latham in 1801. This usage did not follow the letter of the International Code of Zoological Nomenclature, and in 2009 the International Commission on Zoological Nomenclature conserved the current name by formally suppressing the name M. garrula. The species name melanocephala is derived from the Ancient Greek words melas 'black', and kephale 'head', referring to its black crown. Other common names include Mickey miner and soldierbird. Four subspecies are recognised, including subspecies leachi found in eastern Tasmania. The mainland population was split into three subspecies in 1999 by Richard Schodde—titaniota from Cape York Peninsula in Queensland as far south as Mareeba, lepidota from central Queensland and inland New South Wales west of Nyngan, and the nominate subspecies melanocephala from southeastern New South Wales, Victoria, and southern South Australia. There are broad zones where birds are intermediate between subspecies. Further study is required to settle the taxonomic status of these populations.
The noisy miner is one of four species in the genus Manorina in the large family of honeyeaters known as Meliphagidae. The other three species of the genus Manorina are the black-eared miner (M. melanotis), the yellow-throated miner (M. flavigula), and the bell miner (M. melanophrys). One of the most obvious characteristics of the genus is a patch of bare yellow skin behind the eyes, which gives them an odd 'cross-eyed' look. Within the genus, the noisy, black-eared and yellow-throated miners form the subgenus Myzantha. The noisy miner occasionally hybridises with the yellow-throated miner. Molecular analysis has shown honeyeaters to be related to the Pardalotidae (pardalotes), Acanthizidae (Australian warblers, scrubwrens, thornbills, etc.), and the Maluridae (Australian fairy-wrens) in the large superfamily Meliphagoidea.


The noisy miner is a large honeyeater, 24–28 centimetres (9.4–11.0 in) in length, with a wingspan of 36–45 centimetres (14–18 in), and weighing 70–80 grams (2.5–2.8 oz). Male, female and juvenile birds all have similar plumage: grey on the back, tail and breast, and otherwise white underneath, with white scalloping on the nape and hind-neck, and on the breast; off-white forehead and lores; a black band over the crown, bright orange-yellow bill, and a distinctive patch of yellow skin behind the eye; a prominent white tip to the tail; a narrow olive-yellow panel in the folded wing; and orange-yellow legs and feet. A juvenile can be distinguished by softer plumage, a brownish tinge to the black on its head and the grey on its back, and a duller, greyish-yellow skin-patch behind the eye.
The noisy miner is similar in appearance to the yellow-throated miner and the black-eared miner; it has a dull white forehead and a black crown, while the others have grey heads.


Size variation in the noisy miner over its range follows Bergmann's rule; namely, birds tend to be larger where the climate is colder. Adults from central-eastern and northern Queensland tend to have little or no olive-yellow edging to the feathers of the back and wings, and have a wider white fringe on the feathers of the hind-neck and back, giving birds from Queensland the appearance of having more distinctive scalloping than other populations. Wing length generally increases with latitude, yet M. m. leachi has measurably shorter wings than the nominate race, although no significant difference in wing length was found in a study comparing populations north of 30° S and south of the Murray River. The subspecies leachi also has finer scalloping on the hind-neck than the nominate race, a more intense yellow tinge to the wing panels, and a slightly broader off-white tip to the tail.
The far north Queensland subspecies titaniota has a shorter tail, paler crown, larger yellow skin-patch, and paler upper parts without the yellow-olive of the nominate race; and lepidota, found in western New South Wales, is smaller than the nominate race with a black crown, and darker, more mottled upperparts.


As the common name suggests, the noisy miner is an unusually vocal species. Previously known as the garrulous honeyeater, it has a large and varied repertoire of songs, calls, scoldings, and alarms. Most are loud and penetrating, and consist of harsh single notes. It has two broad-frequency alarm calls that are used when mobbing intruders into their territory, or when predators (including humans) are sighted; and a narrow-frequency alarm call that is primarily used when airborne predators are seen, such as the brown falcon (Falco berigora), or other large flying birds, including the Australian magpie (Gymnorhina tibicen) and the pied currawong (Strepera graculina). The aerial predator alarm call is a series of high-pitched, slurred whistling notes. The broad-frequency alarm calls are a series of 'churr' notes, low-pitched and harsh, occurring at low and high levels of intensity. The narrow-band call is used in situations where the bird signals the presence of a predator and restricts information about its own location, while the broad-band alarm is used to attract attention, and can initiate mobbing behaviour. These churring calls vary between individuals, and laboratory tests show that noisy miners can distinguish calls by different birds. Hence, this may be integral to the complex social structure of the species.
Contact or social facilitation calls are low-pitched sounds that carry long distances. 'Chip' calls are given by individual birds when foraging, and a similar call is given by nestlings that call at an increased rate as the mother approaches the nest. Where there is a high level of social activity, such as during territorial disputes with conspecifics, calls are a series of quick, regular, single notes. The noisy miner has a mating display flight song: a soft warble of low-frequency notes given during short, undulating flights by the male, and responded to by the female with a low-frequency whistle. The noisy miner is found in open woodland habitats, where it is an advantage to call from the air, so as to overcome sound attenuation. Another display call, described as 'yammer', is a rapid rhythmical series of notes that is uttered during open-bill, wing-waving displays. The noisy miner has a song described as the 'dawn song'—a communal song of clear, whistled notes emitted in chorus in the early hours of the morning from May through January. The dawn song, which is also sung at dusk, is audible over long distances and features duets that often involve antiphony.
A nestling begins to give the 'chip' call soon after it emerges from the egg, and it calls frequently for the first two-thirds of the nestling period and constantly for the last third. The call does not vary in the presence of an adult at the nest, so it seems likely that the call is not directed at the adult bird. The nestling becomes silent when an adult gives an alarm call, and makes a squealing sound when the adult delivers food. The begging call of a fledgling is similar to the call of the nestling, but significantly louder and covering a greater frequency range (which may make it more directional). The rate of calling, on average, is 85 to 100 calls in a minute, and in open scrub, the call can be heard up to a kilometre away. Subsong, a juvenile vocalisation comprising elements of various calls, begins to be uttered when the fledgling is around thirty days old.
The noisy miner also produces non-vocal sounds by clicking or snapping its bill, usually during antagonistic encounters with other bird species, or when mobbing a predator.


The noisy miner is endemic to eastern and southeastern Australia, occupying a broad arc from Far North Queensland where there are scattered populations, to New South Wales where it is widespread and common from the coast to a line from Angledool to Balranald, through Victoria into southeastern South Australia, and eastern Tasmania. Its range in South Australia has been steadily expanding since it was first recorded near Adelaide in the early 1890s. It is sedentary over its entire range. The noisy miner is territorial, and the territory of a colony is aggressively defended—which has led to a significant reduction in avian diversity in areas occupied by the noisy miner, with smaller species excluded.
The noisy miner primarily inhabits dry, open eucalypt forest without understory shrubs. It is commonly found in open sclerophyll forests, including those on coastal dunes or granite outcrops; forests dominated by spotted gum on mountain ridges and exposed slopes; box and ironbark forests on the foothills of the Great Dividing Range; mixed forests of eucalypts and cypress (Callitris); forests dominated by yapunya, mulga, gidgee, brigalow or emu bush; in stands of belah and scattered clumps of boree; on the edges of woodlands of river red gum, including swamp woodlands bordering floodplains, and areas dominated by exotic species, such as European ash and willow. It regularly inhabits degraded patches of forest where the understory has been cleared, including recently burned areas, and modified habitats, such as lightly-timbered farming and grazing areas, roadside reserves, bushland remnants in towns and cities, and suburban parks and gardens with trees and grass, but without dense shrubbery.
The noisy miner has benefited from the thinning of woodland on rural properties, heavy grazing that removes the understory, fragmentation of woodland that increases the percentage of edge habitat, and urban landscaping practices that increase open eucalypt environments. It has been described as a 'reverse keystone' species, as it is colonising an ever-increasing range of human-dominated habitats, and aggressively excluding smaller bird species from urban environments. This phenomenon has been also observed in rural areas. A field study across the South West Slopes of New South Wales showed that the noisy miner's presence corresponded with reduced numbers of insectivorous birds, such as fantails, whistlers, the restless flycatcher (Myiagra inquieta), and other honeyeater species, and that this decrease was most marked in sites with better access to water and nutrients. While it has been hypothesised that the proliferation of large-flowering grevillea cultivars has contributed to the abundance of noisy miners, recent research has identified the proliferation of lightly treed, open areas, and the presence of eucalypt species as the most significant factors in the population increase. Large-flowered grevillea hybrids, such as Grevillea 'Robyn Gordon', can benefit the noisy miner, in that an abundance of resources is usually dominated by larger, aggressive honeyeaters, and a continuous nectar source could provide an advantage for the non-migratory species. A field study in box-ironbark country in central Victoria found that noisy miner numbers were correlated with the occurrence of yellow gum (Eucalyptus leucoxylon), which reliably produces flowers (and nectar) each year. The abundance of the noisy miner is primarily determined by habitat structure.
While the range of the noisy miner has not significantly expanded, the density of the population within that range has substantially increased. High densities of noisy miners are regularly recorded in forests with thick understory in southern Queensland, 20 kilometres (12 mi) or more from the forest/agricultural land edge. Many of these sites have extensive road networks used for forest management, and picnic areas and walking tracks for recreational use, and it has been found that these cleared spaces play a role in the abundance of noisy miners in the forest. There is evidence to suggest that higher road densities correspond with higher noisy miner population levels. Field work in Victoria showed that noisy miners infiltrated anywhere from 150 to 300 m (490 to 980 ft) into remnant woodland from the edges, with greater penetration occurring in less densely forested areas. This has implications for the size of woodland habitat needed to contain miner-free areas—around 36 hectares (89 acres). Revegetation projects restoring buloke woodland, a species of she-oak integral to the survival of the red-tailed black cockatoo (Calyptorynchus banksii), have been interplanted with a nurse species, usually fast-growing eucalypts. Noisy miner populations were more likely in those buloke woodlands where eucalypts had been planted at densities of up to 16 per hectare (6.4 per acre). The presence of noisy miners was accompanied by a substantial difference in number and types of other birds found in the woodland.


The noisy miner is a gregarious species, and the birds are rarely seen singly or in twos; they forage, move and roost in colonies that can consist of several hundred birds
Within a colony, a male bird will occupy an 'activity space', which will overlap with the activity spaces of other males. Males with overlapping activity spaces form associations called 'coteries', usually consisting of 10 to 25 birds. Coteries are the most stable unit within the colony. The birds also form temporary flocks when engaged in the same activity. These flocks, called 'coalitions', usually comprise five to eight birds, although coalitions of up to 40 birds can occur when mobbing a potential predator. Membership of the coalition changes frequently as individuals leave the group as it passes beyond the boundary of their activity space, or the activity ends or changes, as when the breeding season begins. Females use activity spaces that overlap with those of male birds, but not other females, so that females will join coalitions with males in their area, but only rarely will there be more than one female in the coalition. The exclusivity of female activity spaces leads to young females being driven out of the colony in which they were born, and also makes it difficult for them to gain a place in a new colony. A study of banded nestlings that survived in one colony until the next breeding season, found that they were all male birds, suggesting that all female nestlings had died or left the colony. Emigration of males does not seem to occur until the population density of the colony reaches a critical level.
Looking after the young is communal, with males of the coterie bringing food to the nestlings and removing faecal sacs. Communal feeding increases after fledging, when males from nearby coteries may even bring food to the young birds, if not driven off. Roosting is usually communal, with two to six adults and juveniles roosting in contact with each other, usually near the end of a hanging branch up to 20 metres (66 ft) above ground, within their activity space. They select a new site each evening, often selecting and rejecting several sites, and engaging in aggressive calling and chasing as other birds attempt to join the group. They are often the last birds to roost at night, but appear to sleep soundly, undisturbed by torchlight. Noisy miners drink together at the edge of lakes and dams, and from cattle troughs, often perching on a submerged branch. They bathe by diving head first into water and, when almost totally submerged, flapping their wings vigorously and ducking their heads under the water. They shake excess water off and then fly to a nearby branch to preen. They have been observed using rain- or dew-soaked foliage to bathe, and in dry weather will dust-bathe in dry soil or fine litter, such as grass clippings. Bathing is communal, with birds stimulated to participate by observing others. They are occasionally observed anting.


The noisy miner engages in most activities in a group. Roosting, foraging, preening, bathing and dust-bathing or anting are communal activities. Dawn song is a communal chorus, particularly during the breeding season. The communal interaction is facilitated by ritualised displays that have been categorised as flight displays, postural displays, and facial displays. In 'long flight' displays, initiated by either male or female birds, groups of up to twenty birds from more than one coterie fly about 40 metres (130 ft) above the canopy for distances of up to 1.5 kilometres (0.93 mi) from the colony, constantly calling and not returning to the colony for about twenty minutes. As they return, the remaining birds show signs of agitation, and sometimes fly up to join them. The 'short flight' display is performed by the male, and may be analogous to the territorial advertising displays of other birds. In a ritualised movement, the noisy miner flies out from a perch across an open area, in a rhythmic undulating pattern, usually calling in flight. At the end of the clearing it turns on an upward swoop and flies silently back to a perch near the starting point. The 'head-up flight' is performed by the female during the nesting period, and may function to attract male helpers. In its most intense form the body and tail are held almost vertically, with legs dangling, and the head held up and back. It is performed by the female when she is selecting the nest site, and when carrying nest-building material, and probably has the function of indicating the location of the nest to other group members.
Postural displays include tall and low poses, pointing, open-bill and wing-waving. The 'tall posture' is used when in close contact with another bird and is a mild threat. The bird holds itself upright with neck and legs stretched, and it faces the other bird. The 'low posture' is a submissive gesture; the bird sits low on a perch with legs obscured by fluffed feathers, and often faces away from the other bird. Fledglings threatened by adult birds will adopt a low posture and open their bill widely. 'Pointing' is a threat display where the bird stretches out horizontally, with feathers sleeked and the bill pointed at the target of the aggression. A bill snap will sometimes accompany pointing. An 'open-bill display' is used by subordinates in encounters between two birds, and by a female on the nest when other birds approach. The 'trident bill display' involves a fully open bill with the tongue raised and protruding, and is a higher-intensity submissive display. 'Wing-waving' is often performed at the same time as an open-bill display. The wings are flexed and held slightly away from the body, and flapped out and up around three to six times. Wing-waving may be accompanied by a yammer call. 'Eagle' displays involve holding the wings and tail spread out, in either a vertical or horizontal position.
Eye displays are made by exposing or covering the bare yellow patch behind the eye—when the feathers are completely sleeked the entire patch is visible, and when they are fluffed the patch is hidden. Eye displays are used in conjunction with postural displays, with the yellow patch fully displayed by dominant birds using threat postures, and immature birds tending to reduce the size of the eye-patch when under attack from other members of the coterie.
On occasion early in the breeding season, mass displays erupt, where twenty or thirty birds perform the various wing-spreading displays, short flights, and constant calling. Displaying birds are attacked by others, and groups of silent but agitated birds watch the interactions. Mass displays are more common in the early morning, can last for up to 40 minutes, and seem to be a combination of sexual and agonistic behaviour.
A 'corroboree' (from the word for a ceremonial meeting of Aboriginal Australians) is a group display, where birds converge on adjacent branches and simultaneously pose hunchbacked, giving wing-waving and open-bill displays, and the yammer call. A corroboree occurs when birds meet after a change in the social environment, such as a bird returning after an absence, or the repulsion of an intruder, or the coming together of different coteries. The corroboree appears to have a bonding function, and may involve all members of a colony.


Described as "always at war with others of the feathered kind" in early notes, the noisy miner is one of the most aggressive of the honeyeaters. Much of the activity within a noisy miner colony is agonistic with chasing, pecking, fighting, scolding, and mobbing occurring frequently throughout the day. The birds unite to attack predators and to defend the colony area against all other species of birds; the species is also highly aggressive intraspecifically.
Female noisy miners are aggressive towards each other, and one cause of a male-biased sex-ratio in colonies may be the females' greater intolerance for each other, driving immatures out of the colony and preventing the immigration of new females. Aggression at the nest is common between males. Adult males begin attacking juveniles when they are around 11 weeks old, and attackers can include males that previously cared for the fledgling. Adult females are less aggressive towards young birds, although mothers do occasionally attack their own offspring, and infanticide has been recorded. There is little male to female aggression other than the 'driving flights' that form part of the mating ritual. In direct attacks on young birds, pecks are directed at the eye-patch. Agonistic behaviour has been observed among nestlings, with aggression intensifying after fledging and at times resulting in the death of a sibling.
The noisy miner colony unites to mob inter-specific intruders and predators. The noisy miner will approach the threat closely and point, expose eye patches, and often bill-snap. Five to fifteen birds will fly around the intruder, some birds diving at it and either pulling away or striking the intruder. The mobbing continues until the intruder remains still, as with a tawny frogmouth (Podargus strigoides), or it leaves the area. Mobbing of snakes and goannas is particularly intense, and most species of bird, even non-predators, entering the territory are immediately chased. The noisy miner has been recorded attacking an Australian owlet-nightjar (Aegotheles cristatus) during the day, grebes, herons, ducks and cormorants on lakes at the edge of territories, crested pigeons (Ocyphaps lophotes), pardalotes, and rosellas. Non-predatory mammals such as bats, cattle, sheep, and wallabies are also attacked, though less vigorously than birds.
Noisy miner attacks are not limited to chasing the intruder, and aggressive incidents often result in the death of the trespasser. Reports include those of two noisy miners repeatedly pecking a house sparrow (Passer domesticus) at the base of its skull and killing it in six minutes; one noisy miner grasping a striated pardalote (Pardalotus striatus) by the wing, while another pecked it on the head until it died; and a sacred kingfisher (Todiramphus sanctus) being chased and harassed for over five hours, and then found dead with a fractured skull.


Noisy miners make louder alarm calls in noisier sections of urban environments, such as main roads. The most common initial response to alarm calls is to stay in the area and scan for threats, rather than withdraw. A study conducted in Melbourne and a nearby rural area found that noisy miners in urban areas were less likely to take flight, and when they did they flew shorter distances. It is unclear whether this is an adaptation or that bolder miners had been the ones to settle in the city. A field study in Canberra found that superb fairywrens (Malurus cyaneus) that lived in areas frequented by noisy miners recognised miner alarm calls and took flight, and had learnt to ignore their non-alarm calls, while those that live in areas not frequented by noisy miners did not respond to miner alarm calls. This suggests that the species has adapted and learnt to discriminate and respond to another species' vocalisations.


The noisy miner does not use a stereotyped courtship display; displays can involve 'driving', where the male jumps or flies at the female from 1–2 metres (3.3–6.6 ft) away, and if she moves away he pursues her aggressively. The female may perform a 'bowed-wing display', where the wings and tail are spread and quivered, with the wings arched and the head pointing down. The male may adopt a vertical or horizontal 'eagle display', with wings and tail spread wide and held still for several seconds. Copulation is frequent and conspicuous, with both males and females copulating with several birds, while other members of the colony display or otherwise interfere with the mating pair. Copulation usually occurs on larger, exposed branches close to the nest site and can occur at any time of the day, although slightly more often between 11:00 and 13:00, when communal activities are less frequent. The frenzied courtship activity had led to speculation that the female mates promiscuously to recruit males to help care for the young, but recent genetic testing shows that 96.5% of noisy miner broods result from monogamous mating and that multiple paternity is rare. An observation of banded birds noted that while females copulated repeatedly, it was always with the same male. Mate switching between broods is uncommon, with pairs staying together over several years.
The noisy miner breeds all year long, with most activity from July through November, though the peak period is subject to seasonal variations, with sharp peaks in laying activity when conditions are particularly favourable for raising young. The nest is built in prickly or leafy trees, and the noisy miner is often recorded nesting in eucalypts, and also in wattles, Araucaria, Banksia, Bursaria, Hibiscus, mistletoe, Melaleuca, Pittosporum, Schinus, and jacaranda. It seems to prefer moderately dense foliage for nesting, often near the end of drooping horizontal branches. Support for the nest may be the primary criterion of a suitable nest site, rather than characteristics of the vegetation or location. The female alone builds the nest, which is deep and cup-shaped, woven of twigs and grasses with other plant material, animal hair and spider webs. Occasionally, the nest will include man-made materials such as twine, scraps of material, and tissue paper. It is lined with wool, hair, feathers, flowers or plant down, and padded with a circular mat woven from fibres pulled from the cocoons of the processional caterpillar. The female noisy miner walks around on the ground close to the nest site, picking up material. She gathers material from disused nests of other birds, or dismantles its most recent nest to build a new one. The female completes the nest in five or six days. On average, nests have an external diameter of 15–17.8 centimetres (5.9–7.0 in) and an external depth of 9–11.4 centimetres (3.5–4.5 in). The internal depth of the nest is around 5.5 centimetres (2.2 in).
Eggs vary greatly in size, shape and markings, but are generally elongated ovals; white to cream or pinkish or buff coloured; freckled, spotted or blotched with reddish brown to chestnut or a purplish red, sometimes with underlying markings of violet or purplish grey. The clutch consists of two to four eggs. Incubation is by the female only, and the incubation period is around sixteen days. Hatching is asynchronous, with up to six days being recorded between the hatching of the first and last chicks in a clutch. Young are naked at hatching, and develop a cover of down within two to three days. The fledging period is around sixteen days, and young begin to find food for themselves between twenty-six and thirty days after fledging, but are still regularly fed by adults to thirty-five days. The young leave the nest before they are fully fledged, and only able to fly downwards, and scramble up. They do not go far from the nest, return to it at night, and take some weeks to completely leave the nest. Many fledglings are found on the ground and in low shrubs during this period, where they continue to be cared for until they can make their way up into the trees. These birds are often mistakenly 'rescued'. The fledglings seek out siblings if separated, and huddle together for up to three weeks after fledging.
The noisy miner has some of the largest group sizes of any communally breeding bird, with up to twenty males and one female attending a single brood. Only males help with a nest, and while many birds may be associated with a particular brood, some males devote all their time to a single nest, while others spread their helping efforts across five or six nests. Behavioural evidence and genetic testing indicate that helpers are male offspring of the breeding pair, or full siblings of the male parent. Males nearly always bring food to the nestling singly, and if several arrive at once, one will pass food to a nestling while the others wait. The female leaves the nest quickly when a male bird arrives, and never takes food from one of the helpers. Communal feeding of the young increases after fledging, and the young beg for food with constant 'chip chip' calls and gaping mouths. The female rarely feeds the young birds after they have fledged.


Cooperative breeding has been described as a strategy for decreasing nest predation, although one study found no relationship between the number of helpers visiting a nest site and its success or failure. Noisy miners were seen to have a range of strategies to increase their breeding success, including multiple broods, laying eggs early in the season, nesting low in the canopy and group mobbing of predators; these measures did not guarantee against nest failure, due to the diversity of potential predators in the noisy miner's open woodland habitat.