Proposal (540) to South American Classification Committee
Elevate Dendrocincla
fuliginosa turdina to species rank
Effect of Proposal: This proposal would result in treatment of Plain-winged
Woodcreeper Dendrocincla turdina as
a separate species from D.
fuliginosa (Plain-brown Woodcreeper).
Background: Dendrocincla turdina
(Lichtenstein, 1823) is an allopatric, endemic, and well-defined taxon from the
Atlantic Forest (southeastern Brazil, adjacent parts of eastern Paraguay, and
extreme northeastern Argentina), and is also the type species of the genus Dendrocincla G. R. Gray, 1840.
Peters (1951), without any published justification, considered
turdina (together with enalincia) as conspecific with more
widespread Dendrocincla fuliginosa
(Vieillot, 1818). In fact, the arrangement of Peters for this species follows
conclusions of Zimmer (1934) subordinating Middle American and Amazonian taxa rufo-olivacea, atrirostris, phaeochroa,
lafresnayei, meruloides, and ridgwayi
to fuliginosa. However, the decision for the
additional subsume of two forms of Atlantic Forest: taunayi, and turdina was
a decision only of Peters, possibly because Cory & Hellmayr (1925)
considered D. atrirostris (at the
time only 5 specimens) closed allied to D.
turdina enalincia.
It is worth noting that Zimmer did not consider turdina and taunayi as members of polytypic D.
fuliginosa (see Zimmer & Mayr 1943).
The trinomial Dendrocincla
fuliginosa turdina was adopted without objection by almost forty years in
various references (e.g. Meyer de Schauensee 1966, Pinto 1978). Sibley &
Monroe (1990) was a first important work to give attention a recommendation by
Willis (1983) to treat turdina as
distinct species from fuliginosa
based on differences of vocal repertoires.
In recent years, various sources (perhaps most) have assumed
the independence of Dendrocincla turdina
with respect to congeners (e.g. Ridgely & Tudor 1994, Marantz et al. 2003).
New information: Weir & Place (2011)
analyzed mtDNA protein-coding genes (cyt b, ND2 and COI), 16s, RAG 1 and c-myc.
of samples belonging to 17 taxa in Dendrocincla
to generate a well-supported phylogeny of this genus. Among several results, beyond the scope of this proposal,
this work supports the treatment of Dendrocincla
turdina (along with taunayi) the
sister to the clade that included D. f.
fuliginosa, D. f. neglecta, D. f. meruloides, and D. f. ridgwayi, and D.
anabatina. They suggested that D.
turdina should be considered a separate species – because
vocalizations are highly distinct from Amazonian members of the D. fuliginosa – even under
Biological species concept.
Recommendation: A fortunate “YES” vote. This recent molecular phylogeny of the
genus Dendrocincla allows, finally, recognize as different what ears told us by
several years!
References:
CORY, C.
B., AND C. E. HELLMAYR. 1925. Catalogue of birds of the Americas. Field Museum
Nat. History Publ., Zool. Ser., vol. 13, pt. 4.
MARANTZ,
C. A., A. ALEIXO, L. R. BEVIER, AND M. A. PATTEN. 2003. Family Dendrocolaptidae
(woodcreepers). Pp. 358-447 in "Handbook of the Birds of the
World, Vol. 8. Broadbills to tapaculos." (J. del
Hoyo et al., eds.). Lynx Edicions, Barcelona.
MEYER DE
SCHAUENSEE, R. 1966. The species of birds of South America and their
distribution. Livingston Publishing Co., Narberth, Pennsylvania.
PETERS, J.
L. 1951. Check-list of birds of the world, vol. 7. Museum of Comparative
Zoology, Cambridge, Massachusetts.
PINTO, O.
M. DE O. 1978. Novo catálago das aves do Brasil, parte 1. Emp. Graf. Rev.
Tribunais, São Paulo.
RIDGELY,
R. S., AND G. TUDOR. 1994. The birds of South America, vol. 2. University Texas
Press, Austin.
SIBLEY, C.
G., AND B. L. MONROE, JR. 1990. Distribution and taxonomy of birds of the
World. Yale University Press, New Haven, Connecticut.
WEIR, J.
T. & M. PRICE. 2011. Andean uplift promotes lowland speciation through
vicariance and dispersal in Dendrocincla
woodcreepers. Molecular Ecology 21: 4550-4563.
WILLIS, E.
O. 1983. Three Dendrocincla
woodcreepers (Aves; Dendrocolaptidae) as army ant followers. Cienc. Cult. 35:
201-204.
ZIMMER, J.
T. 1934. Studies of Peruvian
birds, No. 13. The genera, Dendrexetastes,
Campylorhamphus, and Dendrocincla. American Museum Novitates
728: 1-20.
ZIMMER, J.
T., AND E. MAYR. 1943. New species of birds from 1938 to 1941. Auk 60: 249-262.
José
Fernando Pacheco, September 2012
Comments from Zimmer: ““YES”.
As Fernando indicates, those who are familiar with turdina have known for some time that its vocalizations are
dramatically different from those of other “Plain-brown” Woodcreepers. It is nice indeed to finally have a
published, molecular-based phylogeny that we can hang our hats on with respect
to this long overdue split. The
only surprise in this for me is the revelation that Weir & Place (2011)
apparently are treating taunayi of
northeastern Brazil as conspecific with turdina. I have recorded several individuals of taunayi, and dozens of turdina, and to my ears, the two are
markedly different vocally. If
anything, I would have expected that the molecular analysis would have
suggested that taunayi was equally
distinct from turdina as either was
from other Dendrocincla.”
Comments from Stiles: “YES. Vocal
and genetic data coincide.”
Comments solicited from
Curtis Marantz: “If the Weir-Price results are indeed accurate, it would seem like a bad
idea to split turdina and not taunayi out of D. fuliginosa, and for that matter, keeping D. fuliginosa as it is now would be somewhat problematic. So,
one needs either to make some pretty major changes to this complex or question
the genetic results. This said, it seems unlikely to me that D. homochroa is closer to D. fuliginiosa than it is to D. merula based on vocalizations,
morphology, and its overall biology, but I would be less certain about the
placement of D. anabatina within D. fuliginosa, which I suppose is not
all that shocking.
“The bottom line, is that splitting one form out of this mess and
leaving the others as they are seems like a less than ideal course of action.”
Comments from Pérez-Emán: “A reluctant NO.
Although I consider the evidence strongly supports elevating turdina to species rank, I concur with
Curtis on the need to evaluate the complete Dendrocincla
fuliginosa at once. Although we can recognize paraphyletic species under
the Biological Species Concept, the problem here is that D. fuliginosa taunayi is closer to turdina than to the rest of fuliginosa
groups. Should we consider taunayi a
subspecies of turdina as suggested by
Weir & Price (2010)? Biogeographically it makes sense and it is genetically
similar. However, it is morphologically and vocally different (though Weir
& Price considered them very similar vocally?). The node leading to turdina/taunayi and the rest of species
within D. fuliginosa (+ anabatina) is only well-supported by
bootstrap values (not posterior probabilities) and the rest of the nodes in D. fuliginosa are not well-supported at
all (with the exception of those associated to the meruloides group). Thus, if we consider elevating turdina to species rank together with taunayi,then we will need to evaluate taxonomic
decisions that go from one species, including anabatina (but without a well-supported node associated to it) up
to four different species (considering Weir & Price taxon sampling, which
was not complete). It would be interesting to bring vocal characters of the
complete group to the discussion because it is confusing to know that neither taunayi nor homochroa relationships were the ones expected based on
vocalizations (Curtis’ and Kevin’s comments). In summary, the proposal needs to
be clear in relation to actions to be taken at least with taunayi, and its consequences for the D. fuliginosa species complex.”
Comments from Jaramillo: “YES – Although a piecemeal way of dealing with Dendrocincla it seems better to me to separate this one out which is uncontroversial as far as I can see, and deal with the rest later.”
Comments from Nores: “YES. The
vocalization and molecular analyses clearly show that
there are two different species.”