Apostlebirds are very sociable and most of the time live in family groups which occasionally reach twelve or more in number, hence their common name. The family group usually consists of a dominant male and female together with the progeny from recent nestings. It takes three to four years for birds to become adult. The only obvious indicator of adulthood is the eye colour - when adult the eyes are greyish with a pearly coloured outer ring (see 675206). Young ones have brown eyes. In the breeding season, Apostlebirds occupy much the same territories year after year, but in winter in drier inland areas family groups may congregate at a suitable food source to form loose flocks of a hundred or so. Noisy and active, they are familiar birds around homesteads and freely associate with humans. They feed almost entirely on the ground keeping loosely together as a group and visit a water source daily. The stout, but still quite curved bill is well adapted to seed eating, a useful attribute in harsh inland winters.(see 675212 and compare with their near relative, the White-winged Chough pics 693217 and 693218.)