Habitat
Hawaii Elepaio are most common in wet, native ohia-koa forest above 1,100 meters (3,600 feet) elevation. They also occur in drier woodland, savanna, and disturbed lower elevation habitats, including introduced forest.
Back to topFood
Hawaii Elepaio eat spiders and insects, including beetles, flies, caterpillars, moths, katydids, and lacewings. When foraging they climb on vertical trunks, cling upside down to branches and leaf clusters like a chickadee, hop on the ground like a thrush, and pursue insects in flight. Hawaii Elepaio forage in different ways depending on forest structure and composition. In dense forests and in small-leaved ohia trees, they typically stand on a perch and pick insects from the vegetation. In more open forest and in the long, leaflike foliage of koa trees, they tend to pick at prey while hovering next to the vegetation.
Back to topNesting
Nest Placement
Placed in branch forks or on horizontal branches in both native and introduced trees.
Nest Description
A finely woven cup made with fine grasses, rootlets, thin bark strips, and spider silk. The outside of the nest is often camouflaged with lichen, moss, liverwort, or tree-fern hair.
Nesting Facts
| Egg Description: | White with dark reddish-brown markings. |
Behavior
Hawaii Elepaio are agile, acrobatic birds. They hop or flit between twigs and branches, cling to vertical surfaces using strong legs and feet, and hang upside down from branches and leaf clusters. They often cock their long tail upward when perched, and use it as a rudder to quickly change direction in flight. While foraging, Hawaii Elepaio sometimes flick their wings and fan their tail to expose white spots—perhaps to startle and flush prey.
Hawaii Elepaio are monogamous and pairs defend a territory together year-round. They usually mate for life, but a bird will take a new mate if the previous one dies. Both sexes build the nest, incubate the eggs, and feed the nestlings and fledglings. Young birds stay in their home territory for up to 10 months and form family groups with their parents, which eventually evict them from the area when the next breeding season starts. Individuals do not acquire full adult plumage until after two years of age, but may begin breeding after just one year.
Back to topConservation
The International Union for Conservation of Nature lists Hawaii Elepaio's conservation status as Near Threatened and estimates its population size at 140,000 mature individuals. IUCN’s conservation assessment is based on Hawaii Elepaio’s restricted range on a single island, ongoing habitat destruction on the island of Hawaii, and a population that is thought to be declining. Elepaio are less affected by avian malaria than other native Hawaiian forest birds.
Back to topCredits
BirdLife International. 2023. Chasiempis sandwichensis. The IUCN Red List of Threatened Species 2023: e.T22736440A224140553. https://dx.doi.org/10.2305/IUCN.UK.2023-1.RLTS.T22736440A224140553.en.
Floyd, T. (2025). Field Guide to the Birds of the United States and Canada. Eighth edition. National Geographic Society, Washington, D.C.
Pratt, H. D., P. L. Bruner, and D. G. Berrett (1987). A Field Guide to the Birds of Hawaii and the Tropical Pacific. Princeton University Press, Princeton, NJ, USA.
Raine, H. and A. F. Raine (2020). American Birding Association Field Guide to Birds of Hawai'i. Scott & Nix, Inc. New York, NY, USA.
VanderWerf, E. A. (2020). Hawaii Elepaio (Chasiempis sandwichensis), version 1.0. In Birds of the World (P. G. Rodewald, Editor). Cornell Lab of Ornithology, Ithaca, NY, USA. https://doi.org/10.2173/bow.elepai.01