Stop! Do not read anything more unless you are seated down. I am about to Rock. Your. World.
That’s right I’m about to tell you something so unbelievable, so Earth shattering it will change your life forever – black will be white, up will be down – you will be through the looking glass and nothing will be the same again. There will be No. Going. Back.
Are you ready? Okay: Willie wagtails aren’t wagtails – they’re actually fantails.
There. Don’t say l didn’t warn you. Just take a deep breath and let it sink in for a while. Willie wagtails aren’t wagtails – they’re fantails. Your breathing will return to normal soon – you are experiencing a heightened state of dysphoria as a previously held belief gives way to a deeper and unexpected truth. Your amygdala is objecting, but your neocortex is telling it to shut the hell up and enjoy the beauty of fantails.
So what on Earth am I talking about? Fantails and wagtails aren’t closely related – in fact Willie wagtails are more closely related to Black-faced cuckoo-shrikes and Spangled drongos, than they are to wagtails. Almost all wagtails in Australia are vagrants that are blown in – only two species the Eastern yellow wagtail and the Australasian pipit are Australian natives. So why the confusion? Although it is a fantail, the Willie wagtail behaves fairly differently to the other fantails. Most fantails fan their tail out, and wiggle it from side to side – the Willie wagtail will fan it occasionally but will do far more wiggling – perhaps this made the early colonists think of it as being similar to a wagtail – but then wagtails wag their tails up and down, not side to side – so what the hell?
Perhaps it’s because they forage on the ground. Anyone on the farms around here with large grassy paddocks will most likely have seen Australasian pipits running about feeding. Although they are fawny brown in colour their general dimensions, with a long wagging tail, are reminiscent of a Willie wagtail.
So why are Willie wagtails so different to the other fantails? Most fantails (like the Grey and Rufous fantails we see here) will dart in and out of tree limbs to catch insects on the wing – but not the Willie – wide open grass, park lands and back yards are its favourite hunting ground.
In doing this they are avoiding competition with the other members of its family – and breaking out like a teenager that’s finally left home. This is not a new phenomenon and we see it a lot with groups of birds where one is just slightly different. Magpies are basically butcherbirds that have adapted to ground foraging, rather than the perching and pouncing behaviour of the other butcherbirds. And not to be outdone, Rose robins do their best fantail impression by fanning their tail and flitting in and out of trees to feed on insects, unlike the other robins which also perch and pounce on prey on the ground.
So what we are witnessing is evolution in action as some species take up a new niche available to them – but ground foraging comes with high risks – the birds are quite exposed and unsurprisingly only the most aggressive types can survive – like Australian magpies, Masked lapwings and Willie wagtails.
To think of a Willie wagtail as aggressive seems comical – until you see one chasing a Wedge-tailed eagle away. A sight like this can only leave you questioning your own life choices, and why the hell the Wedge-tailed eagle doesn’t just slash it to bits.
I’m afraid I have no answer to that question – but I hope you enjoyed this insight into one of our most common, well-loved and intriguing birds. If you have other birds you’d like me to profile please let editor Wendy know.
This article first appeared in The Crows Post in May 2026