European robin

Name and taxonomy

Carl Linnaeus described the robin in 1758 and called it Motacilla rubecula. Georges Cuvier set up the genus Erithacus in 1800, and the bird now carries the name Erithacus rubecula. The species name rubecula comes from the Latin word for red. English speakers first called the bird the redbreast, because orange was not yet a colour word. In the 15th century people gave familiar birds human names, and robin redbreast stuck. Older English names for it include ruddock and robinet.

Island and mountain populations differ enough that several subspecies are recognised. Birds in Britain and much of western Europe belong to the form melophilus. Robins on Tenerife and Gran Canaria carry a white eye ring and a stronger breast colour. Some researchers treat those two island forms as separate species. Wikidata lists names such as Rotkehlchen in German and Roodborst in Dutch. Birds of the north east are large and washed out in colour. Forms from Crimea, the Caucasus and Iran are widely accepted as distinct.

Evolution and relatives

Genetic work places the genus Erithacus in a group of otherwise African birds. A study published in 2023 confirmed the robin as the only European member of that group. The genus once held the Japanese robin and the Ryukyu robin. Those two birds moved to the genus Larvivora, and the European robin now stands alone. Sequence data suggest the Canary Islands birds split from mainland robins about 2 million years ago. The genus was once placed in the thrush family, and that view is now dropped. Robins on Gran Canaria appear to have arrived before those on Tenerife.

Many unrelated birds carry the name robin. The American robin is a thrush, and it is a much larger bird. Australasian robins sit in the family Petroicidae and are closer to crows than to this species. The shared name probably comes from the orange breast alone. The magpie-robins of Africa and Asia are Old World flycatchers as well.

Appearance

The adult robin is 12.5 to 14 centimetres long. It weighs 16 to 22 grams. The wingspan is 20 to 22 centimetres. The breast and face are orange, and a band of blue grey separates that patch from the brown back. The belly is whitish, and the legs and feet are brown. The bill and the eyes are black.

Male and female robins look alike, so plumage does not tell them apart. Juveniles are mottled brown and white, with no orange. Orange feathers appear on the chin two to three months after a young bird leaves the nest. The patch then spreads until the bird looks like an adult. Birds in their first winter keep pale tips on the wing covert feathers. British birds show an olive tinge on the upperparts.

Habitat and range

Robins live from western Siberia west to the Atlantic islands. The range reaches Algeria in the south, and Iran and the Caucasus in the south east. Birds occur on the Azores and Madeira, and they turn up in Iceland as vagrants. GBIF records the species in 96 countries, and that count includes captive and escaped birds.

Western and southern robins stay on their ground through the year. Northern and eastern robins move south to escape hard winters. Scandinavian and Russian birds winter in Britain and western Europe. A small number of British robins, mostly females, winter in southern Europe and reach Spain. Migrant birds look greyer above and duller on the breast.

In Britain the robin is a bird of parks and gardens. In northern Europe wintering robins prefer spruce woodland. In southern Iberia the resident and migrant birds keep to different woods. People released robins in Australia, New Zealand and North America in the 19th century. None of those releases produced a lasting population. The robin uses hedges, scrub and woodland edge across its range.

Diet and feeding

The robin eats mostly ground invertebrates. Worms, spiders and insects make up the bulk of the diet. In autumn and winter the bird adds berries, fruit and seeds. Robins take seed mixes and suet from bird tables, and they clear up scraps. The species also eats carrion, and it has taken small fish and lizards. The bird appears to take nearly all its prey from the ground. A robin may also work the leaf litter under a hedge for small animals.

A robin watches for disturbed soil and drops down to grab what appears. In Britain the bird follows a gardener with a spade. Robins also follow wild boar and other animals that root through the ground. This habit probably gives the robin food it could not reach on its own. The bird hunts by day, but it may also hunt under a moon or a street lamp.

Behaviour and social life

The robin is active by day and spends most of that time alone. Males defend a territory through the whole year. A male attacks any other male that enters the ground he holds. Fights sometimes kill, and disputes cause up to 10 per cent of adult deaths in some areas.

The red breast works as a signal to rivals. Robins attack stuffed models of their own kind, and some attack their own reflection. The bird shows little fear of people in Britain and Ireland. Robins on the continent keep their distance, because people once hunted small birds there. Winter is hard, and a robin can lose a tenth of its weight in one freezing night.

A female holds her own winter territory, apart from the male. She moves a short way from the summer nest site to better feeding ground. The male keeps the same patch all year round.

Communication and senses

Both sexes sing, and they sing in almost every month of the year. The song is a high fluting warble in short phrases with sudden gaps. Winter song sounds thinner and more plaintive than summer song. A male starts about an hour before civil sunrise. He usually stops about half an hour after sunset. Song probably carries the territory claim to a rival some distance away.

Robins in lit towns often sing at night. Night song may be a way to avoid daytime traffic noise. The robin senses the magnetic field of the Earth and uses it to navigate. That sense depends on light reaching the eye. Researchers link it to cryptochrome, a light sensitive protein in the eye.

Reproduction and life cycle

Robins nest in almost any sheltered hollow. Pairs use banks, crevices, plant pots, kettles, post boxes and old barbecues. Open fronted nest boxes suit them, set up to 2 metres above the ground. The nest is moss, leaves and grass, lined with fine grass, hair and feathers. The breeding season opens in March in Britain and Ireland.

A female lays five or six eggs in a clutch. Pairs raise two or three clutches across the season. The eggs are cream, buff or white with reddish brown speckles and blotches. The marks often crowd the blunt end of the egg. As in most small songbirds, the female probably does most of the sitting.

Fledglings leave the nest in mottled brown plumage. Orange feathers reach the chin in the two or three months that follow. Most robins die in their first year of life. Average life expectancy is 1.1 years because of that early loss. A bird that survives its first year can live far longer, and one reached 19 years.

Predators and threats

Like other small garden birds, robins are taken by cats and by small hawks. Nest raiders such as magpies, jays and squirrels probably take eggs and chicks. Cold weather kills robins, and a long freeze raises the death rate. The moorhen flea parasitises the species. A spiny headed worm, Apororhynchus silesiacus, also infects robins.

Other robins are a real danger, because a territorial fight can be fatal. People once trapped and killed robins across continental Europe. That pressure appears to have eased, and hunting is now rare. Numbers are not falling, so no single threat acts on the whole species. Cats are a heavy pressure on garden birds, so they probably take many robins.

Population and conservation

The IUCN lists the European robin as Least Concern. The range is very large, and the population runs into the hundreds of millions. Numbers appear to be rising rather than falling. The species sits far from the thresholds that would make it Vulnerable.

Britain places the robin on the green list of conservation concern. iNaturalist holds 190,331 observations of the species. Garden feeding helps robins through cold weather. An open fronted nest box gives the bird a safe site. Most work for robins is general habitat care, and a rescue programme is probably unnecessary.

Relationship with humans

The robin is the most familiar garden bird in Britain and Ireland. It comes close to anyone who digs the soil. British gardeners have long treated the bird as an ally. People in Britain would not harm a robin, partly for religious reasons. Robins nest in sheds, greenhouses and abandoned equipment. The bird may nest in a garden shed when a door stays open.

A public vote run by The Times made the robin an unofficial national bird in the 1960s. A second poll in 2015 confirmed the choice, with 34 per cent of the vote. The birdwatcher David Lindo organised that poll. Several English and Welsh sports clubs are nicknamed the Robins. Bristol City, Swindon Town and Cheltenham Town use a robin in the club badge.

In culture and myth

British folklore gives the robin more weight than the folklore of most of Europe. In Welsh tradition the robin carried water to souls in hell and was scorched by the flames. The Welsh name Brou-Rhuddyn means burnt breast. In Welsh mining lore a robin seen underground warned of a disaster to come.

An English legend says a robin sang to Jesus on the cross and was stained by his blood. In the English tale Babes in the Wood, robins cover the dead children. Jacob Grimm recorded a German belief that robbing a robin nest brings lightning to the house. In Welsh belief a robin crossing a threshold could mean illness or death.

The robin has appeared on British Christmas cards since the middle of the 19th century. One account says Victorian postmen wore red coats and were nicknamed robins. The bird also appears on Christmas postage stamps.