Madagascan stonechat

The Madagascan stonechat (Saxicola sibilla) or Madagascar stonechat, is a species of stonechat, endemic to Madagascar. It is a small bird, closely similar to the African stonechat in both plumage and behaviour, but distinguished from it by the more extensive black on the throat and minimal orange-red on the upper breast of the males.[1]

Madagascan stonechat
male
female
both near Andasibe
Scientific classification
Kingdom: Animalia
Phylum: Chordata
Class: Aves
Order: Passeriformes
Family: Muscicapidae
Genus: Saxicola
Species:
S. sibilla
Binomial name
Saxicola sibilla
(Linnaeus, 1766)
Synonyms
  • Motacilla sibilla Linnaeus, 1766
  • Saxicola torquatus sibilla (Linnaeus, 1766)

Taxonomy

In 1760 the French zoologist Mathurin Jacques Brisson included a description of the Madagascan stonechat in his Ornithologie based on a specimen collected in Madagascar. He used the French name Le traquet de Madagascar and the Latin Rubetra Madagascariensis.[2] Although Brisson coined Latin names, these do not conform to the binomial system and are not recognised by the International Commission on Zoological Nomenclature.[3] When in 1766 the Swedish naturalist Carl Linnaeus updated his Systema Naturae for the twelfth edition, he added 240 species that had been previously described by Brisson.[3] One of these was the Madagascan stonechat. Linnaeus included a brief description, coined the binomial name Motacilla sibilla and cited Brisson's work.[4] The specific name sibilla is from the Latin sibilare "to whistle".[5] This species is now placed in the genus Saxicola that was introduced by the German naturalist Johann Matthäus Bechstein in 1802.[6]

The Madagascan stonechat has generally been considered a subspecies of African stonechat (as Saxicola torquatus sibilla[1]), but recent genetic evidence has shown that it is distinct, more closely related to Reunion stonechat than it is to African stonechat,[7] on which basis it is now accepted as a distinct species. Three subspecies are recognised.[8]

References
  1. Urquhart, E., & Bowley, A. (2002): Stonechats. A Guide to the Genus Saxicola. Christopher Helm, London. ISBN 0-7136-6024-4
  2. Brisson, Mathurin Jacques (1760). Ornithologie, ou, Méthode contenant la division des oiseaux en ordres, sections, genres, especes & leurs variétés (in French and Latin). Volume 3. Paris: Jean-Baptiste Bauche. pp. 439–440, Plate 24 fig 4. The two stars (**) at the start of the section indicates that Brisson based his description on the examination of a specimen.
  3. Allen, J.A. (1910). "Collation of Brisson's genera of birds with those of Linnaeus". Bulletin of the American Museum of Natural History. 28: 317–335.
  4. Linnaeus, Carl (1766). Systema naturae : per regna tria natura, secundum classes, ordines, genera, species, cum characteribus, differentiis, synonymis, locis (in Latin). Volume 1, Part 1 (12th ed.). Holmiae (Stockholm): Laurentii Salvii. p. 337.
  5. Jobling, J.A. (2018). del Hoyo, J.; Elliott, A.; Sargatal, J.; Christie, D.A.; de Juana, E. (eds.). "Key to Scientific Names in Ornithology". Handbook of the Birds of the World Alive. Lynx Edicions. Retrieved 10 May 2018.
  6. Bechstein, Johann Matthäus (1802). Ornithologisches Taschenbuch von und für Deutschland, oder, Kurze Beschreibung aller Vögel Deutschlands für Liebhaber dieses Theils der Naturgeschichte (in German). Leipzig: Carl Friedrich Enoch Richter. p. 216.
  7. Woog, F.; Wink, M.; Rastegar-Pouyani, E.; Gonzalez, J.; Helm, B. (2008). "Distinct taxonomic position of the Madagascar stonechat (Saxicola torquatus sibilla) revealed by nucleotide sequences of mitochondrial DNA". Journal of Ornithology. 149: 423–430. doi:10.1007/s10336-008-0290-1.
  8. Gill, Frank; Donsker, David, eds. (2018). "Chats, Old World flycatchers". World Bird List Version 8.1. International Ornithologists' Union. Retrieved 10 May 2018.
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