[Alan Manson]

Discussion thread for Southern Rufous Sparrow. If you would like to add a comment, click the Post Reply button.
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Passer motitensis:

S&M 96: Southern Rufous-Sparrow
H&M 03: Rufous Sparrow
Clements 07: Great Rufous Sparrow
IOC: Great Sparrow

Leave as Southern Rufous Sparrow until we get some consensus???

Because this is a southern African endemic, I favour the name used in all the local field guides, i.e. Great Sparrow

[njlarsen]

Just from curiosity: is it an extra large sparrow?

Looking for more authorities, Birdlife international uses Southern Rufous-Sparrow, which is rather strange; there is not another Rufous-Sparrow on their list.

I don't think it will be possible to find a really logical argument for anything. Great Rufous Sparrow would probably be my personal preference because it kind of tie together the different inputs, but I can also see the argument of choosing based on local field guides when there is absolutely no consensus among the authorities.

Niels

[Alan Manson]

Originally Posted by njlarsen

Just from curiosity: is it an extra large sparrow?

Nope, its not extra large; at 15-16 cm it is about the same size as the more common Cape Sparrow and Southern Grey-headed Sparrow. I think its just that it looks much the same (w.r.t. colour-pattern) as the House Sparrow, but is bigger - House Sparrow is 14-15.5 cm. However, they are best separated using colour of rump (grey in House, rufous in S Rufous).

I reckon that we just leave the name as is, and hope the lists come up with more consensus in time.