Peucaea
Genus of birds
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Peucaea is a genus of American sparrows. The species in this genus used to be included in the genus Aimophila.
| Peucaea | |
|---|---|
| |
| Cassin's sparrow (Peucaea cassinii) | |
Scientific classification  | |
| Kingdom: | Animalia |
| Phylum: | Chordata |
| Class: | Aves |
| Order: | Passeriformes |
| Family: | Passerellidae |
| Genus: | Peucaea Audubon, 1839 |
| Type species | |
| Fringilla bachmani | |
| Species | |
|
See text | |
Taxonomy and species
A molecular phylogenetic study published in 2009 found that the genus Aimophila was polyphyletic.[3] In the resulting reorganization to create monophyletic genera, eight species were moved from Aimophila to the resurrected genus Peucaea.[4] Peucaea had been introduced by the Franco-American ornithologist John James Audubon in 1839.[5] The genus name is from the Ancient Greek peukē meaning "pine-tree".[6] The type species was designated by English zoologist George Robert Gray in 1841 as Fringilla bachmani, a taxon now considered to be a subspecies of Bachman's sparrow with the trinomial name Peucaea aestivalis bachmani.[4][7][8] Peucaea is the sister genus to Ammodramus within the family Passerellidae.[9]
The genus contains the following 8 species:[4]
- Rufous-winged sparrow, Peucaea carpalis
- Cinnamon-tailed sparrow, Peucaea sumichrasti
- Stripe-headed sparrow, Peucaea ruficauda
- Black-chested sparrow, Peucaea humeralis
- Bridled sparrow, Peucaea mystacalis
- Botteri's sparrow, Peucaea botterii
- Cassin's sparrow, Peucaea cassinii
- Bachman's sparrow, Peucaea aestivalis