Studying where, when, and why specific behaviours occur is critical for identifying meaningful habitat use patterns of marine organisms. However, for some groups including stingrays, information on behavioural ecology is sorely lacking, despite its relevance for understanding their ecological roles/impacts and supporting conservation strategies for different species and habitats. Recently, studying natural behaviours has been facilitated by aerial drone technology. In this study, we used drone surveys to observe behaviours of juvenile Himantura australis at an inland estuarine sandflat over different tidal phases. Analysis of video data from 2020-2022 showed these areas are productive feeding grounds for juvenile rays and that there are small-scale differences for when/where feeding occurs. Specifically, rays were inactive at low tidal levels, but abundances and feeding behaviours increased during rising tides when upper intertidal habitats were submerged. During these times, rays showed fine-scale spatial variability by dispersing across open sandflats or forming feeding clusters along the edges. We conclude that using aerial drones improved our knowledge on how rays use inland estuary habitats at fine scales by linking spatio-temporal distribution patterns with real-time behaviours, and these methods could be widely applicable for studying other organisms in shallow coastal environments.