[2] The population continued to be assigned to a monotypic genus Lacustroica,[3] or as most closely related to two other species, the rufous-banded (Conopophila rufogularis) and rufous-throated (C. albogularis) honeyeaters.

At the beginning of his later expedition, in 1909, Whitlock killed and skinned a male of the species, recognised as the same he collected in 1903, and located the preparation of a nest by a breeding pair close to the town-site of Wiluna.

He continued to observe the progress of the nest near the main street, that had remained undisrupted, eventually removing the branch that held it for his collection.

[4] The plumage of the upper body is generally cold grey, the lower parts paler, becoming browner until a moult.

[5] Juveniles have a faintly yellowish cast to the thin eye-ring, that almost disappears as they mature, and on the pale grey feathers of the throat.

[2][4][3] The grey honeyeater is found in a range extending across the mid-west to the centre of the Australian continent, especially in the Pilbara and Murchison regions of Western Australia, and southern and central Northern Territory.

[4] Some good locations for finding the grey honeyeater are the Olive Pink Botanic Garden, Alice Springs, in the Northern Territory, and Wanjarri Nature Reserve, south of Wiluna, and Tom Price, in Western Australia.

[12] The nest is a small, frail, untidy cup of fine grass stems, lined with hair and plant down, bound with spider web, hanging from slender twigs in the outer foliage of a mulga shrub.

[3] Threats are uncontrolled fires from which mulga takes many years to recover, and also grazing by introduced animals that damage the habitat.