WagtailsEastern Yellow WagtailMotacilla tschutschensis
- ORDER: Passeriformes
- FAMILY: Motacillidae
Basic Description
Eastern Yellow Wagtails bring a touch of color and pizzazz to the arctic tundra and other open habitats of eastern Asia and Alaska. Breeding males sport bright yellow underparts, a strikingly patterned head, and a flashy black-and-white tail featured in elaborate flight displays. Females are a bit duller, but both sexes stand out by habitually wagging their long tails and giving loud, piercing calls. This wagtail forages for insects close to the ground in wet, open habitats both during the breeding season and in nonbreeding areas in southeastern Asia.
More ID InfoOther Names
- Lavandera de Chukotka (Spanish)
- Bergeronnette de Béringie (French)
- Cool Facts
- Eastern Yellow Wagtail and Western Yellow Wagtail were long treated as a single species, Yellow Wagtail, but were elevated to species status in 2004 based on genetic and vocal differences. The two species feature an incredible amount of plumage variation—Eastern Yellow Wagtail has 3 subspecies groups and Western Yellow Wagtail has 10—and collectively their breeding ranges stretch from the United Kingdom eastward to Alaska and westernmost Canada. In areas such as South Asia, ornithologists and birders are actively clarifying the nonbreeding status and distribution of the two species (and the various subspecies groups).
- The second part of Eastern Yellow Wagtail’s scientific name—tschutschensis—refers to the Chukchi Peninsula in the Russian Far East, where this species was first described to science.