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Taxonomy in-flux updates (2 Viewers)

Jim LeNomenclatoriste said:
December 25
Caracaras: Fuch et al. (2015) found that many of the caracaras are closely related, with their living with their common ancestor estimated to live less than 5 million years ago. The differences between them are not large, so I've merged the genera Ibycter, Milvago, and Phalcoboenus into Daptrius. See also SACC proposal #1038.
[Falconidae, Basal Australaves, 3.49a]
Click to expand...
Actually Ibycter is not merged with Daptrius in the listing on the Australaves page, although the other genera are.

Likewise the Campylorhynchus name changes from December 22 don't appear in the listing on the Certhioidea page.

And on December 27 there is "Yellow-lored Tanager Tanager".
 
Last edited:

January 2025​

January 7​

Caracaras: Replacement for changes on Dec. 25:
Fuchs et al. (2015) found that many of the caracaras are closely related, with their common ancestor estimated to live less than 5 million years ago. The differences between them are not large, so I've merged the genera Milvago, and Phalcoboenus into Daptrius. Ibycter is somewhat different, not just because it is much less closely related to the Daptrius than the Daptrius are to one another, but in other ways. E.g., the syrinx is different from that of the Caracaras in the expanded Daptrius. See also SACC proposal #1038.
[Falconidae, Basal Australaves, 3.49a]

I've also slighted edited some previous pages, including, but not limited to the issues recently mentioned on BirdForum.

December 2024​

December 27​

Cardinalidae Phylogeny: The Cardinalidae have been rearranged based on Scott (2022). Mainly, this means the Pheucticus grosbeaks are now the basal group. The remaining Cardinalidae divide into two clades that, except for Pheucticus, are the same as before at the generic level.
[Cardinalidae, Core Passeroidea V, 3.40]

Olive Tanager: I had adopted the split of the Olive Tanager, Habia frenata, from Carmiol's Tanager, Habia carmioli, prior to SACC proposal #950. The SACC also adopted the split, but also changed the English name of Chlorothraupis frenata to Yellow-lored Tanager at the same time. This avoids confusion with C. olivacea I have now done the same.
[Cardinalidae, Core Passeroidea V, 3.40]

Habia Tanagers: The genus Habia has been restricted to its type, rubica (Red-crowned Ant-Tanager). I've restored the former Chlorothraupis tanagers to Chlorothraupis, and put the remaining four Habia species in new genus Driophlox, introduced by Scott, Chesser, Unitt, and Burns (2024). Then Driophlox is sister to Piranga and the Habia-Chlorothraupis group is sister to a clade consisting of Driophlox, Piranga, and 7 other species.

The genus Driophlox consists of:

  • Red-throated Ant-Tanager, Driophlox fuscicauda
  • Black-cheeked Ant-Tanager, Driophlox atrimaxillaris
  • Sooty Ant-Tanager, Driophlox gutturalis
  • Crested Ant-Tanager, Driophlox cristata
Moreover, Chlorothraupis is restored as:



  • Ochre-breasted Tanager, Chlorothraupis stolzmanni
  • Carmiol's Tanager, Chlorothraupis carmioli
  • Lemon-spectacled Tanager, Chlorothraupis olivacea
  • Yellow-lored Tanager Tanager, Chlorothraupis frenata
[Cardinalidae, Core Passeroidea V, 3.40]
 
Jim LeNomenclatoriste said:

January 2025​

January 7​

Caracaras: Replacement for changes on Dec. 25:
Fuchs et al. (2015) found that many of the caracaras are closely related, with their common ancestor estimated to live less than 5 million years ago. The differences between them are not large, so I've merged the genera Milvago, and Phalcoboenus into Daptrius. Ibycter is somewhat different, not just because it is much less closely related to the Daptrius than the Daptrius are to one another, but in other ways. E.g., the syrinx is different from that of the Caracaras in the expanded Daptrius. See also SACC proposal #1038.
[Falconidae, Basal Australaves, 3.49a]

I've also slighted edited some previous pages, including, but not limited to the issues recently mentioned on BirdForum.
Click to expand...
There is still Milvago chimachima under Falconidae in the species list.
 
comparatively minor update:

January 8​


Blue-headed Quail-Dove: The first paper from 2025 that I read was Oswald et al. (2025). They were able to show that Starnoenadinae both deserves subfamily status and is sister to the subfamily Columbinae.
[Columbidae, Columbiformes II, 3.51]
 

February 6​

Long-tailed Rosefinch: Long-tailed Rosefinch, Uragus sibiricus is split into Siberian Long-tailed Rosefinch, Uragus sibiricus, including sanguinolentus and ussuriensis, and Chinese Long-tailed Rosefinch, Uragus lepidus, including henrici, based on Liu et al. (2020). They suggest synonymizing ussuriensis with sanguinolentus, although IOC has not followed that suggestion.
[Fringillidae, Core Passeroidea II, 3.51]

Crossbills: Scottish and Parrot crossbills have been demoted to subspecies of the new Common Crossbill, Loxia curvirostra (old world plain-winged crossbills). New world plain-winged crossbills are still Red Crossbills, which are now Loxia minor. I've also recognized the Cassia Crossbill, which AOS did in 2018. I also split the White-winged Crossbill, Loxia leucoptera into the White-winged Crossbill, Loxia leucoptera, of North America and the Two-barred Crossbill, Loxis bifasciata, of Eurasia. Click here for more.
[Fringillidae, Core Passeroidea II, 3.51]
 
The changes to crossbills are awfully big leap to make based on a tree posted on bird forum based entirely on a small bit of mitochondrial DNA (the control region IIRC). I don't think any current study would argue for a taxonomic revision based on so little data. Also a rather strict definition of the phylogenetic species concept that if applied consistently would require TiF to split hundreds of species, probably doubling the list total.

Not saying more data might not prove TiF correct, but it's far too early to make this call
 
Jim LeNomenclatoriste said:
Crossbills: Scottish and Parrot crossbills have been demoted to subspecies of the new Common Crossbill, Loxia curvirostra (old world plain-winged crossbills). New world plain-winged crossbills are still Red Crossbills, which are now Loxia minor. I've also recognized the Cassia Crossbill, which AOS did in 2018. I also split the White-winged Crossbill, Loxia leucoptera into the White-winged Crossbill, Loxia leucoptera, of North America and the Two-barred Crossbill, Loxis bifasciata, of Eurasia. Click here for more.
[Fringillidae, Core Passeroidea II, 3.51]
Click to expand...
Doesn't mention ssp pusilla, which is also an older name (than minor) for the New World group of plain-winged crossbills.

Anyone know if this is deliberate or accidental?
 

February 23, 2025​

Swallows: I've updated the Hirundinidae, primarily based on Schield et al. (2024). This includes adding a species tree.

2025 Genus changes: De Silva et al. (2018) discovered that the Forest Swallow, formerly in genus Petrochelidon, was actually sister to the Delichon swallows. They established the new genus Atronanus for it. That makes the Forest Swallow Atronanus fuliginosa.

H&M-4 had already split Phedina into 3 monotypic genera. This is consistent with Schield et al. (2024). As a result, the Banded Martin, Phedina cincta, becomes Neophedina cincta (Roberts 1922) and Brazza's Martin, Phedina brazzae, becomes Phedinopsis brazzae (Wolters 1971).

2025 Species changes: The Rock Martin, Ptyonoprogne fuligula has been split into Large Rock Martin, Ptyonoprogne fuligula, and Red-throated Rock Martin, Ptyonoprogne rufigula. The Large Rock Martin consists of the more southern subspecies anderssoni, fuligula, and pretoriae. The Red-throated Rock Martin has the northern subspecies pusilla, bansoensis and rufigula. See Brown (2019).

The Pacific Swallow, Hirundo tahitica, has been split into Tahiti Swallow, Hirundo tahitica and Pacific Swallow, Hirundo javanica based on morphological differences (HBW/BirdLife).

There are a complex set of changes to the Red-rumped Swallows (Cecropis).

  • The monotypic European Red-rumped Swallow, Cecropis rufula, is split from Red-rumped Swallow, Cecropis daurica.
  • Three subspecies of Red-rumped Swallow, melanocrissus, kumboensis, and emini are merged with the West African Swallow Cecropis domicella. Both the commmon and scientific names change, giving us African Red-rumped Swallow, Cecropis melanocrissus.
  • The remaining subspecies of Red-rumped Swallow, Cecropis daurica: daurica, japonica, nipalensis, and erythropygia join with all four subspecies of Striated Swallow, Cecropis striolata, to create the Eastern Red-rumped Swallow, Cecropis daurica. The name daurica has priority over striolata.
Finally, the Madagascan Martin, Riparia cowani, has been split from the Brown-throated Martin Riparia paludicola. Shield et al. (2024) found they split a healthy 3.3 million years ago. BoW and HBW/BirdLife support the split based on morphology and vocalizations. [Hirundinidae, Sylvioidea II, 3.50]
 

March 16​

Sylvioidea reordered: I've reordered the families in Sylvioidea based on a combination of Oliveros et al. (2019), Kuhl et al. (2021), and Stiller et al. (2024). As a result, Paroidea shrank to two families, and was subsumed into Sylvoidea, along with Hyliotidae and Stenostiridae (in that order). I've also demoted Alcippeidae to a subfamily of Leiothrichidae. See the diagram for latest current arrangement. I will revisit the genera and species later.
[Sylvioidea I, 3.50]
[Sylvioidea II, 3.50]
[Sylvioidea III, 3.50]

Alcippeidae now subfamily Alcippeinae: I've demoted Alcippeidae to a subfamily of Leiothrichinae. I'd ranked Alcippeidae as a family because it was unclear whether it grouped with Leiothrichidae or Pellorneidae. Cai et al. (2019, 2020) sequenced all of Alcippeidae, and their results make it clear it is sister to Leiothrichidae.
[Sylvioidea III, Sylvioidea III, 3.50]

Elminia Blue Flycatchers: I've removed the Crested-Flycatcher names from the true Elminia, leaving only the Blue Flycatcher names. The hyphens are removed to avoid confusion with Cyornis. Thus Blue Crested-flycatcher / African Blue-flycatcher, Elminia longicauda, becomes African Blue Flycatcher and Blue-and-white Crested-flycatcher / White-tailed Blue-flycatcher, Elminia albicauda, becomes White-tailed Blue Flycatcher.
[Stenostiridae, Sylvioidea I, 3.50]

Grauer's Warbler: Grauer's Warbler, Graueria vittata, has moved from Macrosphenidae to Acrocephalidae, where it gets its own subfamily Graueriinae. The remaining Acrocephalidae become subfamily Acrocephalimae.
[Acrocephalidae, Sylvioidea I, 3.50]

Forest Swallow Correction: De Silva et al. (2018) discovered that the Forest Swallow, formerly in genus Petrochelidon, was actually sister to the Delichon swallows. They attempted to establish the new genus ‘Atronanus’ for it, but didn't preregister it with ZooBank as is required for electronic changes to nonmenclature. As a result, I'm referring to the Forest Swallow as ‘Atronanus’ fuliginosus.
[Hirundinidae, Sylvioidea II, 3.50]
 
Jim LeNomenclatoriste said:
Elminia Blue Flycatchers: I've removed the Crested-Flycatcher names from the true Elminia, leaving only the Blue Flycatcher names. The hyphens are removed to avoid confusion with Cyornis. Thus Blue Crested-flycatcher / African Blue-flycatcher, Elminia longicauda, becomes African Blue Flycatcher and Blue-and-white Crested-flycatcher / White-tailed Blue-flycatcher, Elminia albicauda, becomes White-tailed Blue Flycatcher.
[Stenostiridae, Sylvioidea I, 3.50]
Click to expand...

So, the Blue Flycatchers are Fairy Flycatchers and are closely related to the Crested-flycatchers and Canary-flycatchers.
And the Blue-Flycatchers are Old World Flycatchers (subfamily Blue Flycatchers) and closely related to species like Dull-blue Flycatcher.
... apart from Chinese Blue Flycatcher, which is in the same genus as the Blue-Flycatchers after being split from Blue-throated Blue-Flycatcher.

To me at least, this increases confusion rather than avoids it! 🤯
 

March 19​

The genus Erythrogenys was never actually made available, as it is based on the misreading of a comment by Hodgson 1836. The correct name for that scimitar-babbler genus is Megapomatorhinus, Moyle et al. (2012). It has type hypoleucos.
[Sylvioidea III, 3.51]
 

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