Subspecies
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(1) Parus major major Linnaeus, 1758
(2) Parus major amamiensis O. Kleinschmidt, 1922
(3) Parus major ambiguus (Raffles, 1822)
(4) Parus major aphrodite Madarasz, 1901
(5) Parus major blanfordi Prazak, 1894
(6) Parus major caschmirensis E. J. O. Hartert, 1905
(7) Parus major cinereus (Vieillot, 1818)
(8) Parus major commixtus (Swinhoe, 1868)
(9) Parus major corsus (O. Kleinschmidt, 1903)
(10) Parus major dageletensis Nagamichi Kuroda et Mori, 1920
(11) Parus major decolorans Koelz, 1939
(12) Parus major ecki Jordans, 1970
(13) Parus major excelsus Buvry, 1857
(14) Parus major hainanus E. J. O. Hartert, 1905
(15) Parus major intermedius (Zarudny, 1890)
(16) Parus major kagoshimae Takatsukasa, 1919
(17) Parus major kapustini Portenko, 1954
(18) Parus major karelini Zarudny, 1910
(19) Parus major mallorcae Jordans, 1913
(20) Parus major mahrattarum E. J. O. Hartert, 1905
(21) Parus major minor (Temminck et Schlegel, 1848)
(22) Parus major newtoni Prazak, 1894
(23) Parus major niethammeri Jordans, 1970
(24) Parus major nigriloris (Hellmayr, 1900)
(25) Parus major nipalensis (Hodgson, 1837)
(26) Parus major nubicolus Meyer de Schauensee, 1946
(27) Parus major okinawae E. J. O. Hartert, 1905
(28) Parus major sarawacensis (Slater, 1885)
(29) Parus major stupae Koelz, 1939
(30) Parus major templorum Meyer de Schauensee, 1946
(31) Parus major terraesanctae E. J. O. Hartert, 1910
(32) Parus major tibetanus E. J. O. Hartert, 1905
(33) Parus major vauriei Ripley, 1950
(34) Parus major ziaratensis Whistler, 1929
The subspecies structure of this species is unclear. Most authors
recognize three large groupings of subspecies (major-group,
cinereus-group and minor-group), each comprising a number of subspecies
and there is evidence to suggest that these three groups may represent
separate species. I retain them here in a single species Parus major,
because most characters vary in clines and determining the correct
borders between taxa requires more research.
The status of the taxon mallorcae is unclear. It might be identical to the taxon aphrodite.
The status of Parus bokharensis and Parus monticolus is unclear. Most
authors regard them as separate species and I follow this notion here.
However, the phenotypic differentiation from typical Parus major is not
larger than that of many subspecies of Parus major.
Germany is home to only the nominate subspecies. However, the British
form, Parus major newtoni, has been recorded from northern France,
Belgium and the Netherlands, and this suggests that occasionally the
British form may occur along the continental North Sea coast, and may
probably be encountered in Germany.
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Synonyms
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Synonymy of Parus major major:
Parus major Linnaeus, 1758
Parus major major Linnaeus, 1758
Parus maior sulfureus Kollibay, 1904
Parus major scytharum Floericke, 1920
Parus major holsaticus Floericke, 1926
Parus major alanorum Floericke, 1926
Parus major caucasicus Domaniewski, 1933
Parus major bargaensis Yamashina, 1933
Parus maior auct. (unjustified emendation)
Parus maior maior auct. (unjustified emendation)
Synonymy of Parus major newtoni:
Parus major newtoni Prazak, 1894
Note:
the large genus Parus (sensu lato) has recently been split into several
separate genera (that previously were ranked at the subgenus or
species-group level). This action has been welcomed by some authors,
because it splits the very speciose genus Parus into more manageable
units. Other authors, however, have not endorsed this action.
The phylogeny of the Paridae has always been a difficult issue in
ornithology. Early genetic studies suffered from limited numbers of
taxa, limited sequence information and calculation artefacts (e.g. Kvist et al. 1996). A significant improvement was the analysis of cytochrome b sequence similarity for 40 species of Paridae (Gill et al. 2005),
that suggested that most species of Parus sensu lato form a large
monophyletic group, the internal relationships of which are poorly
resolved. The (sub)genera Poecile, Periparus, Lophophanes, Baeolophus
and Parus sensu stricto form monophyletic groups in the parsimony
analysis, but support for the nodes separating these monophyla is not
statistically significant. The node separating Parus (s.str.) from the
remaining groups, and the node separating Periparus and Poecile, have
bootstrap values below 50%, and other nodes have very low support (e.g.
the node supporting the monophyly of Poecile has only 59% bootstrap
support). This overall low support of key nodes in Parus s.lat. is also
seen in the maximum likelihood analysis, where the branches of Poecile,
Lophophanes, Baeolophus and Periparus have been collapsed (i.e. the
branching pattern between them is not statistically significant, and the
groups cannot be separated). Only Parus s.str. is separated from the
Poecile/Lophophanes/Baeolophus/Periparus clade with a posterior
probability of 89%. The study of Johansson et al. (2013)
expands this work by adding more species and more genes (the nuclear
genes myoglobin and ornithine decarboxylase, and the mitochondrial gene
NADH 2). This study corroborates all previously recognized (sub)genera
as monophyla, and most of the nodes are supported by very high bootstrap
values and posterior probabilities. However, it deviates in some points
from previous work (e.g. the position of Cyanistes). The study provides
a convincing phylogeny of the Paridae and is statistically well
supported, and it provides a comprehensive revised classification of the
Paridae, that I adopt here.
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Identification
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No information has been entered yet.
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Distribution
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No information has been entered yet.
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Biology
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No information has been entered yet.
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