Tree warbler

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Tree Warblers
Several Hippolais species.
Several Hippolais species.
Scientific classification
Kingdom: Animalia
Phylum: Chordata
Class: Aves
Order: Passeriformes
Family: Acrocephalidae
Genus: Hippolais
von Baldenstein, 1827
Species

H. caligata
H. rama
H. pallida
H. languida
H. olivetorum
H. opaca
H. polyglotta
H. icterina

Tree warblers are medium-sized birds belonging to the genus Hippolais ,[1] formerly placed in the "Old World warbler" family Sylviidae but now separated in the marsh- and tree-warbler family Acrocephalidae. They occur in Europe, Africa and western Asia.

These warblers are always associated with trees, though normally in fairly open woodland rather than tight plantations. They are quite clumsy in their movements.

These are plump, strong-looking birds with long bills, strong feet and long wing. Most are unstreaked greenish or brownish above and cream or white below. They are insectivorous, but will occasionally take berries or seeds.

Species breeding in temperate regions are usually strongly migratory.

Considerable evidence, much of it summarised in Parkin et al (2004),[2] suggests that the genus Hippolais is paraphyletic with respect to Acrocephalus. DNA studies e.g. Leisler et al (1997),[3] interpreted in Sangster (1997),[4] indicated that the olivaceous and Booted/Sykes's warbler grouping (the subgenus Iduna) are more closely related to Acrocephalus species than they are to Icterine and Melodious Warblers and as a result the Dutch CSNA has moved these four species into Acrocephalus.[5] A subsequent review [6] by the BOURC retained the genus Hippolais, for all eight species, but in agreement with Sangster, acknowledged that they fell into two groups. The retention of the Iduna grouping within Hippolais was done because it was felt that more evidence was needed for its placement, because of low bootstrap values,[7] rather than because of a belief that the status quo was correct - no evidence was put forward to refute the DNA findings. Mark Constantine, in "The Sound Approach to Birding" [8] illustrated that there is extensive overlap in song types between species from the two genera, and that vocally, no characters existed which enabled species to be sorted into one genus or the other. Kenneth Wiliamson [9] and Hadoram Shirihai,[10] in discussing the identification of Hippolais and Acrocephalus warblers stressed the similarities between species in the two genera. Colin Bradshaw, in British Birds, has written several articles on morphological similarity between cross-generic species-pairs e.g. Eastern Olivaceous and Blyth's Reed warblers (Bradshaw 2000 [11]) and Paddyfield and Booted warblers (e.g. Bradshaw & Steele 1995 ,[12] Bradshaw & Steele 1997, [13] the latter a response to Lars Svensson's comments [14] on Bradshaw & Steele 1995).

The species are:

(subgenus Iduna)

(subgenus Hippolais)

[edit] References

  1. ^ Del Hoyo, J.; Elliot, A. & Christie D. (editors). (2006). Handbook of the Birds of the World Volume 11: Old World Flycatchers to Old World Warblers. Lynx Edicions. ISBN 849655306X.
  2. ^ Parkin, David T., Martin Collinson, Andreas J. Helbig, Alan G. Knox, George Sangster and Lars Svensson (2004) Species limits in Acrocephalus and Hippolais warblers from the Western Palearctic British Birds Vol 97 No 6 pages 276-299
  3. ^ Leisler, B. P. Heidrich, K. M. Schulze-Hagen and M. Wink (1997) Taxonomy and phylogeny of reed warblers (genus Acrocephalus) based on mtDNA sequences and morphology J. Ornithol. 138:469-496
  4. ^ Sangster, George (1997) Trends in Systematics - Acrocephalus and Hippolais relationships: shaking the tree Dutch Birding Vol 19 No 6 pages 294-300
  5. ^ Sangster, George, Cornelius J. Hazevoet, Arnoud B. van den Berg and C. S. Roselaar (1998) Dutch avifaunal list: species concepts, taxonomic instability, and taxonomic changes in 1998 Dutch Birding Vol 20 No 1 pages 22-32
  6. ^ Alan G. Knox, Martin Collinson, Andreas J. Helbig, David T. Parkin, George Sangster (2002) Taxonomic recommendations for British birds Ibis 144 (4): 707–710. doi:10.1046/j.1474-919X.2002.00110.x
  7. ^ Helbig, A. J. and Seibold, I. (1999) Molecular phylogeny of Palearctic-African Acrocephalus and Hippolais warblers (Aves:Sylviidae) Mol. Phyl. Evol. 11:246-260
  8. ^ Constantine, Mark & the Sound Approach (2006) The Sound Approach to birding - a guide to understanding bird sound ISBN 90-810933-1-2 pages 142-148
  9. ^ Williamson, K. (1968) Identification for ringers 1. The genera Cettia, Locustella, Acrocephalus and Hippolais
  10. ^ Harris, A., H. Shirihai and D. Christie (1995) The Macmillan birder's guide to European and Middle Eastern birds
  11. ^ Bradshaw, Colin (2000) Separating Acrocephalus and Hippolais warblers British Birds Vol 93 No 6 Page 277
  12. ^ Bradshaw, Colin and Jimmy Steele (1995) Mystery photographs 195 British Birds Vol 88 No 11 pages 561-564
  13. ^ Bradshaw, Colin and Jimmy Steele (1997) Mystery warblers in Tselinograd British Birds Vol 90 No 4 pages 155-158
  14. ^ Svensson, Lars (1997) Mystery warblers in Tselinograd British Birds Vol 90 No 4 pages 152-154