Picidae

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Picidae
Yellow-bellied SapsuckerSphyrapicus varius
Yellow-bellied Sapsucker
Sphyrapicus varius
Scientific classification
Kingdom: Animalia
Phylum: Chordata
Class: Aves
Subclass: Neornithes
Infraclass: Neognathae
Superorder: Neoaves
Order: Piciformes
Suborder: Pici
Family: Picidae
Vigors, 1825
Subfamilies

Jynginae - wrynecks
Nesoctitinae - Antillean Piculet
Picinae - woodpeckers
Picumninae - typical piculets

The avian family Picidae includes the woodpeckers, piculets and wrynecks. Members of this family are found worldwide, except for Australia, Madagascar, and the extreme polar regions. Most species live in forests or woodland habitats, although a few species are known to live in desert areas.

The Picidae are just one of the eight living families in the order Piciformes. Members of the order Piciformes, such as the jacamars, puffbirds, barbets, toucans and honeyguides, have traditionally been thought to be very closely related to the woodpeckers, piculets and wrynecks. More recently, DNA sequence analyses have confirmed this view.[1]

There are about over 200 species and about 30 genera in this family. Many species are threatened or endangered due to loss of habitat or habitat fragmentation. Two species of woodpeckers, the Ivory-billed Woodpecker and the Imperial Woodpecker, have been considered extinct for about 30 years (there has been some controversy recently whether these species still exist).

Contents

[edit] Description

The smallest woodpecker is the Bar-breasted Piculet, at 7 g and 8 cm (3.2 inches). The largest woodpecker was the Imperial Woodpecker, at an average of 58 cm (23 inches) and probably over 600 g (1.3 lb). The Ivory-billed Woodpecker is (or was) slightly smaller at 50 cm (20 inches) and a weight of 500 g (1.1 lb). If both the Ivory-billed and Imperial Woodpeckers are indeed extinct, the largest extant woodpecker is the Great Slaty Woodpecker of Southeast Asia, at about 50 cm (20 inches) and 450 g (1 lb). Most species possess predominantly white, black and brown feathers, although especially Picini and Malarpicini are often green above, and many piculets show a certain amount of gray and olive green. In woodpeckers, many species exhibit patches of red and yellow on their heads and bellies. Although the sexes of Picidae species tend to look alike, many woodpecker species have more prominent red or yellow head markings in males than in females.

A 19th Century lithograph of the Heart-spotted Woodpecker by John Gould.
A 19th Century lithograph of the Heart-spotted Woodpecker
by John Gould.

Members of the family Picidae have strong bills for drilling and drumming on trees and long sticky tongues for extracting food. Woodpecker bills are typically longer, sharper and stronger than the bills of piculets and wrynecks, however their morphology is very similar. Due to their smaller bill size, many piculets and wrynecks will forage in decaying wood more often than woodpeckers. The long sticky tongues, which possess bristles, aid these birds in grabbing and extracting insects deep within a hole of a tree.

Woodpeckers, piculets and wrynecks all possess zygodactyl feet. Zygodactyl feet consist of four toes, the first and the fourth facing frontward and the second and third facing back. This type of foot arrangement is good for grasping the limbs and trunks of trees. Members of this family can walk vertically up a tree trunk, which is beneficial for activities such as foraging for food or nest excavation.

The diet of these birds consists mainly of insects, such as ants and beetles, nuts, seeds, berries, some fruit and sap. Species may feed generally on all of these, or may specialize on one or two.

All members of the family Picidae nest in cavities. Woodpeckers and piculets will excavate their own nests, but wrynecks will not. The excavated nest is usually only lined from the wood chips produced as the hole was made. Many species of woodpeckers excavate one hole per breeding season, sometimes after multiple attempts. It takes around a month to finish the job. Abandoned holes are used by many other birds and animals, such as flying squirrels.

Members of Picidae are typically monogamous. A pair will work together to help build the nest, incubate the eggs and raise their altricial young. However, in most species the male does most of the nest excavation and takes the night shift while incubating the eggs. A nest will usually consist of 2-5 round white eggs. Since these birds are cavity nesters their eggs do not need to be camouflaged and the white color helps the parents to see them in dim light. The eggs are incubated for about 11-14 days before the chicks are born. It takes about 18-30 days before the young are ready to leave the nest.

Picidae species can either be sedentary or migratory. Many species are known to stay in the same area year around while others, such as the Eurasian Wryneck and the Yellow-bellied Sapsucker, travel great distances from their breeding grounds to their wintering ground.

[edit] Systematics and evolution

The phylogeny has been updated according to new knowledge about convergence patterns and evolutionary history[2]. Most notably, the relationship of the picine genera has been largely clarified, and it was determined that the Antillean Piculet is a surviving offshoot of proto-woodpeckers.

The evolutionary history of this group is not well documented, but the known fossils allow some preliminary conclusions: the earliest known modern picids were piculet-like forms of the Late Oligocene, about 25 million years ago (mya). By that time, however, the group was already present in the Americas and Europe, and it is hypothesized that they actually evolved much earlier, maybe as early as the Early Eocene (50 mya). The modern subfamilies appear to be rather young by comparison; until the mid-Miocene (10-15 mya), all picids seem to have been small or mid-sized birds similar to a mixture between a piculet and a wryneck. On the other hand, there exists a feather enclosed in fossil amber from the Domincan Republic, dated to about 25 mya, which seems to indicate that the Nesoctitinae were already a distinct lineage by then[3].

Prehistoric representatives of the extant Picidae genera are treated in the genus articles. An enigmatic form based on a coracoid found in Pliocene deposits of New Providence, Bahamas, has been described as Bathoceleus hyphalus and probably also is a woodpecker[4].

Young Eurasian Wryneck (Jynx torquilla), a relative of the woodpeckers
Young Eurasian Wryneck (Jynx torquilla), a relative of the woodpeckers
Ochre-collared Piculet (Picumnus temminckii)
Ochre-collared Piculet (Picumnus temminckii)

[edit] Prehistoric taxa

Basal

  • Genus Palaeopicus (Late Oligocene of France)

Incertae sedis

  • Picidae gen. et sp. indet. (Middle Miocene of New Mexico, USA)
  • Picidae gen. et sp. indet. (Late Miocene of Gargano Peninsula, Italy)

[edit] Subfamily Jynginae: Wrynecks

  • Genus Jynx (2 species)

[edit] Subfamily Picumninae: Typical piculets

  • Genus Picumnus - American Piculets (c.27 species)
  • Genus Verreauxia - African Piculet (sometimes included in Sasia)
  • Genus Sasia - Asian Piculets (2 species)

[edit] Subfamily Nesoctitinae: Antillean Piculet

[edit] Subfamily Picinae: Woodpeckers

Incertae sedis

  • Genus Palaeonerpes (Ogalalla Early Pliocene of Hitchcock County, USA) - possibly dendropicine
  • Genus Pliopicus (Early Pliocene of Kansas, USA) - possibly dendropicine
  • cf. Colaptes DMNH 1262 (Early Pliocene of Ainsworth, USA) - malarpicine?
Great Spotted Woodpecker (Dendrocopos major)
Great Spotted Woodpecker (Dendrocopos major)

Tribe Dendropicini

Female Yellow-shafted Flicker (Colaptes auratus auratus)
Female Yellow-shafted Flicker (Colaptes auratus auratus)

Tribe Malarpicini

The famous Ivory-billed Woodpecker (Campephilus principalis) may or may not be extinct
The famous Ivory-billed Woodpecker (Campephilus principalis) may or may not be extinct

Tribe Picini

Tribe Megapicini

[edit] Footnotes

  1. ^ Johansson & Ericson (2003)
  2. ^ Benz et al. (2006), Moore et al. (2006)
  3. ^ Grimaldi & Case (1995)
  4. ^ Cracraft & Morony (1969)
  5. ^ Moore et al. (2006)

[edit] References

Wikimedia Commons has media related to:
  • Benz, Brett W.; Robbins, Mark B. & Peterson, A. Townsend (2006): Evolutionary history of woodpeckers and allies (Aves: Picidae): Placing key taxa on the phylogenetic tree. Mol. Phylogenet. Evol. 40(2): 389–399. doi:10.1016/j.ympev.2006.02.021 (HTML abstract)
  • Cracraft, Joel & Morony, John J. Jr. (1969): A new Pliocene woodpecker, with comments on the fossil Picidae. American Museum Novitates 2400: 1-8. PDF fulltext
  • Grimaldi, David A. & Case, Gerard Ramon (1995): A feather in amber from the Upper Cretaceous of New Jersey. American Museum Novitates 3126: 1-6. PDF fulltext
  • Johansson, U.S. & Ericson, G.P. (2003): Molecular support for a sister group relationship between Pici and Galbulae (Piciformes sensu Wetmore 1960). J. Avian Biol. 34(2): 185-197. doi:10.1034/j.1600-048X.2003.03103.x PDF fulltext
  • Koenig, W.D. & Haydock, J. (1999): Oaks, acorns, and the geographical ecology of acorn woodpeckers. J. Biogeogr. 26(1): 159-165. doi:10.1046/j.1365-2699.1999.00256.x (HTML abstract)
  • Lemaitre, J. & Villard, M.A. (2005): Foraging patterns of pileated woodpeckers in a managed Acadian forest: a resource selection function. Can. J. Forest Res. 35(10): 2387-2393. doi:10.1139/x05-148 (HTML abstract)
  • Michalek, K.G. & Winkler, H. (2001): Parental care and parentage in monogamous great spotted woodpeckers (Picoides major) and middle spotted woodpeckers (Picoides medius). Behaviour 138(10): 1259-1285. doi:10.1163/15685390152822210 (HTML abstract)
  • Moore, William S.; Weibel, Amy C. & Agius, Andrea (2006): Mitochondrial DNA phylogeny of the woodpecker genus Veniliornis (Picidae, Picinae) and related genera implies convergent evolution of plumage patterns. Biol. J. Linn. Soc. 87(4): 611–624. doi:10.1111/j.1095-8312.2006.00586.x PDF fulltext
  • Stark, R.D.; Dodenhoff, D.J. & Johnson, E.V. (1998): A quantitative analysis of woodpecker drumming. Condor 100(2): 350-356. DjVu fulltext PDF fulltext
  • Villard, P.; Cuisin, J. & Karasov, W.H. (2004). How do woodpeckers extract grubs with their tongues? A study of the Guadeloupe woodpecker (Melanerpes herminieri) in the French Indies. Auk 121: 509-514. DOI:10.1642/0004-8038(2004)121[0509:HDWEGW]2.0.CO;2 HTML abstract
  • Webb, Daniel Matthew & Moore, William S. (2005): A phylogenetic analysis of woodpeckers and their allies using 12S, Cyt b, and COI nucleotide sequences (class Aves; order Piciformes). Mol. Phylogenet. Evol. 36(2): 233-248. doi:10.1016/j.ympev.2005.03.015 PDF fulltext
  • Wiebe, K.L. & Swift, T.L. (2001): Clutch size relative to tree cavity size in northern flickers. J. Avian Biol. 32(2): 167. doi:10.1034/j.1600-048X.2001.320210.x (HTML abstract)
  • Wiktander, U.; Olsson, O. & Nilsson, S.F. (2000): Parental care and social mating system in the lesser spotted woodpecker Dendrocopos minor. J. Avian Biol. 31(4): 447. doi:10.1034/j.1600-048X.2000.310003.x (HTML abstract)
  • Yom-Tov, Y. & Ar, A. (1993): Incubation and fledging durations of woodpeckers. Condor 95(2): 282-287. DjVu fulltext PDF fulltext