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Fringillidae (1 Viewer)

I'm glad someone is working on this. From what I saw across their altitudinal range in Manu last year, Hooded Siskins are a mess.
 
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I'm glad someone is working on this. From what across their altitudinal range in Manu last year, Hooded Siskins are a mess.
From what can be seen on the "Fig. 2" linked in Richard's post, they indeed seem to be a mess. (Apparently three other species [Black, Thick-billed & Saffron Siskins] are minimally divergent and embedded in the Andean group of Hooded...)
 
Wow! Ok, if I'm interpreting these fig.s correctly all the South American siskins + the (ancestral?) Central American Spinus notatus evolved and diverged in less time than S. spinus diverged from pinus/atriceps.

The hooded plumage type seems to be some kind of default ancestral form that persists in different clades within the South American group.

Cucullatus & barbatus diverged early and are not particularly close to any of the others.

The next group to diverge contains olivaceous (a hooded magellanicus lookalike) + spinescens (a capped Páramo specialist).

Next is a group containing S. magellanicus alleni (a lowland hooded form) + yarrellii (a capped Caatinga specialist?) + xanthogastrus (a Central American and Andean forest species).

Lastly is a clade containing uropygialis positioned basally in an otherwise closely knit group consisting of atratus (a black Puna species), crassirostris (a hooded Polylepis specialist), siemiradzkii (a hooded species) all intermingled with various Andean hooded magellanicus forms.

At the very least this confirms the species status of S. olivaceous and suggests the lowland magellanicus subspecies (magellanicus, ictericus, alleni)? could be separated from the Andean subspecies.

Not sure how to sort out the atratus, crassirostris, Andean magellanicus mess. Haven't read the paper yet so don't know if the authors have any solutions.

As an aside it might be worth investigating the relationships of the geographically remote subspecies of magellanicus (longirostris in the Guiana Highlands) and xanthogastrus (stejnegeri in SE Peru to C. Bolivia) too.
 
Beckman & Witt 2015

Beckman & Witt (in press). Phylogeny and biogeography of the New World siskins and goldfinches: Rapid, recent diversification in the Central Andes. Mol Phylogenet Evol. [abstract] [Fig 1] [Fig 2] [Fig 3]
Beckman & Witt 2015. Mol Phylogenet Evol 87: 28–45.

AOU-SACC...
3. ... SACC proposal passed to resurrect Sporagra (and Astragalinus for psaltria). Beckman & Witt (2015), however, found that Spinus (s.s.) was the sister group to the Neotropical Sporagra group. SACC proposal needed.

3b. ... Sporagra magellanica, S. siemiradzkii, and S. olivacea were considered to form a superspecies by Sibley and Monroe (1990), but genetic data (Nguembock et al. 2009) did not recover a sister relationship between siemiradzkii and magellanica (olivacea not sampled). Beckman & Witt (2015) found that siemiradzkii was indeed embedded in the S. magellanica group. Although Sporagra olivacea traditionally (e.g., Hellmayr 1938, Howell et al. 1968, Meyer de Schauensee 1970) has been treated as a separate species from C. magellanica, Ridgely & Tudor (1989) and Ridgely & Greenfield (2001) questioned whether it merits species rank. Beckman & Witt (2015), however, [sic] but that S. olivacea was sister to S. spinescens.

4. ... Beckman & Witt (2015) found that he subspecies S. m. alleni was sister to S. xanthogastra.

5. ... Beckman & Witt (2015), however, found relationships that differed from most of the above relationships, with S. atratus and S. crassirostris embedded with the magellanicus group. Beckman & Witt (2015) noted that genetic differentiation among sympatric species of Sporagra is minimal; thus, resolving the relationships within this lineage is difficult. SACC proposal needed to revise linear sequence <or wait for better data?>.
 
Beckman & Witt (in press). Phylogeny and biogeography of the New World siskins and goldfinches: Rapid, recent diversification in the Central Andes. Mol Phylogenet Evol. [abstract] [Fig 1] [Fig 2] [Fig 3]

Astragalinus (and Sporagra) are recognised by AOU SACC, but not by NACC.

Hooded Siskin: potentially eastern Spinus (magellanicus) magellanicus and Andean S (m) capitalis. (ref Clement 2010.)​
Related threads:

TiF Update May 11:

Siskins: The arrangement of Spinus and Sporagra is now based on Beckman and Witt (2015). The Hooded Siskin, Sporagra magellanica, has been split into Lowland Hooded Siskin, Sporagra magellanica, and Andean Hooded Siskin, Sporagra capitalis.
 
Pine Siskin and Black-capped Siskin

Sofía Alvarez, Jessie F. Salter, John E. McCormack and Borja Milá. Speciation in mountain refugia: phylogeography and demographic history of the pine siskin and black-capped siskin complex. Journal of Avian Biology. Accepted manuscript online: 28 OCT 2015 09:29PM EST | DOI: 10.1111/jav.00814

[Abstract]
 
Beckman & Witt 2015. Mol Phylogenet Evol 87: 28–45.

[pdf]

How can they get away with this??

Voucher/source Species Locality Genbank accession number
.....
NRM:20026502 Serinus canaria Captivity – JN715576 – JN715301 –
unknown Serinus canaria Captivity EU327666 – – – –
unknown Serinus canaria Unknown – – AY914135 – –
.....
AHNU:A0001 Spinus spinus Unknown HQ915866 HQ915866 HQ915866 – –
.....
Unknown Spinus yarrellii Captivity: BRA; Recife – – U83200.1 – –
Using dodgy hybrid mule canaries and unverified cagebirds for sequence data??

If I'd been reviewing their manuscript, I'd be telling them to go back and get new data from verified wild origin birds before the paper could be considered for publication.
 
Have you read this paper? If so could you give a summary of the conclusions. I've only access to the abstract.
Паевский ends up suggesting (largely based on Zuccon et al. 2012):
Family Fringillidae Leach 1820—true finches, 56 genera, 218 species
Subfamily Fringillinae Leach 1820—chaffinches and brambling, 1 genus, 3 species​
Subfamily Euphoniinae Cabanis 1847—euphonias and chlorophonias, 2 genera, 32 species​
Subfamily Carduelinae Vigors 1825—cardueline finches and Hawaiian honeycreepers, 53 genera, 183 species
Tribe Coccothraustini Swainson 1831—hawfinch and grosbeaks, 4 genera, 9 species
Tribe Carpodacini Bonaparte 1854—rosefinches and Bonin grosbeak, 2 genera, 25 species
Tribe Drepanidini Cabanis 1847—Hawaiian honeycreepers, 22 genera, 33 species
Tribe Pyrrhulini Vigors 1825—bullfinches, trumpeter finches, pine grosbeak, crimson-winged finch, mountain finches, 9 genera, 22 species
Tribe Carduelini Vigors 1825—goldfinches, siskins, greenfinches, linnets, redpolls, crossbills, serins and canaries, 16 genera, 94 species​

American rosefinches are not explicitly placed, but should be in Carduelini if Zuccon et al's tree is accepted (and they do not form a separate tribe, for which no available name exists, I think). The 16 genera in Carduelini also suggests more generic splitting than recommended by Zuccon et al, albeit this is not fully clear/explicit.

(With the usual less-than-perfect citations inherited from Bock 1994: Fringillidae is by Leach 1819, not 1820; Euphoniinae is by Tschudi 1846, not Cabanis 1847; Carpodacini is by Bonaparte 1853, not 1854.)
 
Pine & Black-capped Siskins

Sofía Alvarez, Jessie F. Salter, John E. McCormack and Borja Milá. Speciation in mountain refugia: phylogeography and demographic history of the pine siskin and black-capped siskin complex. Journal of Avian Biology. Accepted manuscript online: 28 OCT 2015 09:29PM EST | DOI: 10.1111/jav.00814

[Abstract]
Alvarez, Salter, McCormack & Milá. 2016. Speciation in mountain refugia: phylogeography and demographic history of the pine siskin and black-capped siskin complex. J. Avian Biol. 47:335-345. [abstract] [pdf] [suppl.mat.] [data]
 

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