Serinus
Genus of birds
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Serinus is a genus of small birds in the finch family Fringillidae found in West Asia, Europe and Africa. The birds usually have some yellow in their plumage.
| Serinus | |
|---|---|
| |
| Male European serin (Serinus serinus) | |
Scientific classification  | |
| Kingdom: | Animalia |
| Phylum: | Chordata |
| Class: | Aves |
| Order: | Passeriformes |
| Family: | Fringillidae |
| Subfamily: | Carduelinae |
| Genus: | Serinus Koch, 1816 |
| Type species | |
| Serinus hortulanus Koch, 1816=Fringilus serinus Linnaeus, 1758 | |
| Species | |
|
See text. | |
Taxonomy
The genus Serinus was introduced in 1816 by the German naturalist Carl Ludwig Koch to accommodate a single species, Serinus hortulanus Koch.[1][2] This is a junior synonym of Fringilus serinus Linnaeus, the European serin and becomes the type species by monotypy.[3][4] The genus name is Neo-Latin for "canary-yellow".[5]
Many species were at one time assigned to the genus but it became clear from phylogenetic studies of mitochondrial and nuclear DNA sequences that the genus was polyphyletic.[6][7][8] This was confirmed by Dario Zuccon and coworkers in a comprehensive study of the finch family published in 2012. The authors suggested splitting the genus into two monophyletic groups, a proposal that was accepted by the International Ornithologists' Union. The genus Serinus was restricted to the European serin and seven other species while a larger clade from Africa and Arabia was assigned to the resurrected genus Crithagra.[9][10]
The genus contains eight species:[10]
| Image | Scientific name | Common name | Distribution |
|---|---|---|---|
 | Serinus pusillus | Red-fronted serin | Alpide belt from Anatolia to western Himalayas |
_010.jpg) | Serinus serinus | European serin | southern and central Europe and North Africa |
.png) | Serinus syriacus | Syrian serin | Syria, Lebanon, Palestine, Jordan and Saudi Arabia |
| Serinus canaria | Atlantic canary | the Canary Islands, the Azores, and Madeira |
.jpg) | Serinus canicollis | Cape canary | southern Africa |
.jpg) | Serinus flavivertex | Yellow-crowned canary | eastern Africa and Angola |
 | Serinus nigriceps | Ethiopian siskin | Ethiopia |
 | Serinus alario | Black-headed canary | Lesotho, Namibia and South Africa |