Big-headed tit

from Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Big-headed tit
Falcunculus frontatus - Dharug National Park.jpg

Great Tit's Head ( Falcunculus frontatus )

Systematics
Order : Passerines (Passeriformes)
Subordination : Songbirds (passeri)
Superfamily : Corvoidea
Family : Falcunculidae
Genre : Falcunculus
Type : Big-headed tit
Scientific name of the  family
Falcunculidae
Chenu & Des Murs , 1853
Scientific name of the  genus
Falcunculus
Vieillot , 1816
Scientific name of the  species
Falcunculus frontatus
( Latham , 1801)

The Great Great Tit's Head ( Falcunculus frontatus ) is a species of songbird that is endemic to Australia . It is placed in its own monogeneric family Falcunculidae.

features

The thick head of the big tit reaches a body length of 15 to 19 centimeters. It has greenish-yellow plumage. The belly is yellow. The thick head is black with several large white spots around the eyes. The strong, hook-shaped beak without bristles is black and the legs are gray. The back is green and the wings and tail are black. The difference between is the coloration of the throat, which is olive green in the male and black in the female. They see the European tit very similar. A distinction is made between several subspecies, which differ only a little in the color of the plumage.

habitat

The thick head of the big tit in rainforests, open wooded areas, grasslands with eucalyptus groves. It can also be found in the gardens of human settlements.

Way of life

The big-headed great-tit chop up the bark of trees with its hooked bill in order to get to underlying insects and their larvae. The melodic singing contains whistle-like or bell-like tones.

Reproduction

During the breeding season these birds come together in small groups. The nest, which is built in the crowns of higher trees, consists of smaller pieces of bark that are held together with the help of spider silk. The female lays 2 or 3 eggs. The young hatch after 20 days. Non-breeding conspecifics help with the rearing of the young. The young leave the nest after about 2 weeks.

Systematics

The species has traditionally been assigned to a broad family Pachycephalidae . Due to the morphology and way of life, a closer relationship with the ragged plowbill ( Eulacestoma nigropectus ), endemic to New Guinea, has often been assumed, with which it was united in a subfamily , for example by Ernst Mayr (after being in the Encyclopédie d'histoire naturelle in the 19th century had already been placed in a family of their own). Phylogenomic studies, in which the relationship is determined by comparing homologous DNA sequences, have shown that such a delimited family Pachycephalidae is not a monophyletic unit and must therefore be abandoned. Later investigations then showed that there is no closer relationship to Eulacestoma . Since around 2003 it has therefore become common practice to place the great-headed great-headed chickweed in a monotypical family Falcunculidae. The sister group relationship is still unclear and not stable between different analyzes.

Subspecies

There are three known subspecies: which are also viewed by other authors as independent species, this view is followed by HBW alive .

  • Falcunculus frontatus frontatus ( Latham , 1801) occurs in the southeast of Australia. It is considered safe.
  • Falcunculus frontatus whitei A. J. Campbell , 1910 occurs in northwestern and northern Australia. It is recognized as a species by the IUCN and is considered not to be endangered. However, it is classified as "Endangered" by the Australian Ministry of the Environment and even classified as Endangered in the Action Plan for Australian Birds 2000.
  • Falcunculus frontatus leucogaster Gould , 1838 is widespread in southwest Australia. The IUCN lists this taxon as a species in the “not endangered” category. In the Action Plan for Australian Birds 2000 it is considered "near threatened".

literature

  • Philip Whitfield: The Great Animal Empire. Planet Media AG, Zug 1992, ISBN 3-8247-8614-1 , pp. 228, 229.
  • Ursula Kopp: New large animal lexicon in color. Compact Verlag München, 2000, ISBN 3-8174-5080-X , p. 251 (special edition).
  • Christopher M. Perrins: The Great Encyclopedia of Birds. Orbis Verlag, 1996, ISBN 3-572-00810-7 , pp. 298, 300 (German translation from English)
  • David Burnie (Ed.), Mariele Radmacher-Martens: Animals: The large picture encyclopedia with over 2,000 species. Translated from the English by Gabriele Lehari. Dorling Kindersley, Munich 2012, ISBN 978-3-8310-2232-8 , p. 351.
  • Christopher M. Perrins (Ed.): The FSVO encyclopedia birds of the world. Translated from the English by Einhard Bezzel. BLV, Munich / Vienna / Zurich 2004, ISBN 978-3-405-16682-3 , p. 477 (title of the original English edition: The New Encyclopedia Of Birds. Oxford University Press, Oxford 2003).
  • John Latham: Supplement II to the General synopsis of birds . Printed for Leigh, Sotheby, & Son, London 1801 ( biodiversitylibrary.org ).
  • John Gould: A synopsis of the birds of Australia, and the adjacent Islands . Published the Author, London 1838 ( biodiversitylibrary.org ).
  • Archibald James Campbell: On behalf of Mr. HL White, of Belltrees, NSW Mr. AJ Campbell exhibited a selection of North.Western bird-skins . In: The Emu . tape 10 , 1910, pp. 167-169 ( biodiversitylibrary.org ).

Web links

Commons : Great Tit's Head ( Falcunculus frontatus )  - Collection of images, videos and audio files

Individual evidence

  1. Richard Schodde & Les Christidis (2014): Relicts from Tertiary Australasia: undescribed families and subfamilies of songbirds (Passeriformes) and their zoogeographic signal. Zootaxa 3786 (5): 501-522. doi: 10.11646 / zootaxa.3786.5.1
  2. Janette A. Norman, Per GP Ericson, Knud A. Jønsson, Jon Fjeldså, Les Christidis (2009): A multi-gene phylogeny reveals novel relationships for aberrant genera of Australo-Papuan core Corvoidea and polyphyly of the Pachycephalidae and Psophodidae (Aves : Passeriformes). Molecular Phylogenetics and Evolution 52: 488-497. doi: 10.1016 / j.ympev.2009.03.019
  3. Knud Andreas Jønsson, Pierre-Henri Fabre, Jonathan D. Kennedy, Ben G. Holt, Michael K. Borregaard, Carsten Rahbek, Jon Fjeldså (2016): A supermatrix phylogeny of corvoid passerine birds (Aves: Corvides). Molecular Phylogenetics and Evolution 94: 87-94. doi: 10.1016 / j.ympev.2015.08.020
  4. ^ World Bird List Whiteheads, sittellas, Plowbill, Australo-Papuan bellbirds, whistlers
  5. ^ Les Christidis, Walter Boles: Systematics and Taxonomy of Australian Birds. Csiro Publishing, 2008, ISBN 978-0-643-06511-6 , pp. 193-194.
  6. John Latham, p. XVIII.
  7. Falcunculus frontatus in the endangered Red List species the IUCN 2017.3. Listed by: BirdLife International, 2016. Retrieved March 18, 2018.
  8. ^ Archibald James Campbell, p. 167.
  9. Falcunculus whitei in the endangered Red List species the IUCN 2017. Posted by: BirdLife International, 2016. Accessed March 19, 2018th
  10. Falcunculus frontatus whitei. SPRAT Species Profile and Threats Database
  11. a b Crested Shrike-tit (northern), Crested Shrike-tit (western), Recovery Outline. in Stephen T. Garnett 6 Gabriel M. Crowley: The Action Plan for Australian Birds 2000. Environment Australia, 2000 ISBN 0-642-54683-5 . download
  12. ^ John Gould, Appendix p. 2.