These common fantails belong to the same family as the Willie Wagtail and are easily recognised by their constantly fanned tail and agile aerial twists and turns. They are found throughout Australia, except arid areas, and also New Guinea and nearby islands. They live in a broad range of habitats but particularly in eucalypt forests, woodlands, coastal scrub and thickly planted urban gardens, however they avoid densely forested areas such as rainforest.
These birds are almost never still and constantly flit from perch to perch, sometimes on the ground but mostly on the twigs of a tree or any other convenient object, looking out for the wide variety of flying insects on which they feed. They are not shy, they even seem quite inquisitive, and will closely approach an observer.
The sexes are similar in appearance and pairs are fiercely territorial, they build a compact, cup-shaped nest made from moss, bark and fibre, often completed with spider's web, in a thin tree fork between 2 and 5 metres from the ground. Both parents share nest-building, incubation of the eggs and feeding of the young and may raise several broods in a season.