Chamaetylas

Chamaetylas
Brown-chested alethe, Chamaetylas poliocephala
Scientific classification Edit this classification
Domain: Eukaryota
Kingdom: Animalia
Phylum: Chordata
Class: Aves
Order: Passeriformes
Family: Muscicapidae
Genus: Chamaetylas
Heine, 1860
Type species
Geocichla compsonota[1]
Cassin, 1859
Species

See text

Synonyms

Pseudalethe

Chamaetylas is a genus of small, mainly insectivorous birds in the Old World flycatcher family Muscicapidae that are native to sub-Saharan Africa.

The genus was introduced by the German ornithologist Ferdinand Heine in 1860 with the type species as Geocichla compsonota Cassin, 1859, now a subspecies of the brown-chested alethe.[2][3][4] Species in the genus were previously assigned to the genus Alethe which was included in the thrush family Turdidae. In 2010 two separate molecular phylogenetic studies found that Alethe was polyphyletic and that the members of both clades were better placed in the Old World flycatcher family Muscicapidae.[5][6]

The genus contains four species:[7]

  1. ^ "Muscicapidae". aviansystematics.org. The Trust for Avian Systematics. Retrieved 2023-07-15.
  2. ^ Heine, Ferdinand (1860). "Neue bisher unbeschriebene Arten". Journal für Ornithologie (in German). 7: 425. The title page gives the year 1859 but page 463 has the date 22 January 1860.
  3. ^ Mayr, Ernst; Paynter, Raymond A. Jr, eds. (1964). Check-list of Birds of the World. Vol. 10. Cambridge, Massachusetts: Museum of Comparative Zoology. p. 61.
  4. ^ Dickinson, E.C.; Christidis, L., eds. (2014). The Howard & Moore Complete Checklist of the Birds of the World. Vol. 2: Passerines (4th ed.). Eastbourne, UK: Aves Press. p. 596. ISBN 978-0-9568611-2-2.
  5. ^ Sangster, G.; Alström, P.; Forsmark, E.; Olsson, U. (2010). "Multi-locus phylogenetic analysis of Old World chats and flycatchers reveals extensive paraphyly at family, subfamily and genus level (Aves: Muscicapidae)". Molecular Phylogenetics and Evolution. 57 (1): 380–392. doi:10.1016/j.ympev.2010.07.008. PMID 20656044.
  6. ^ Zuccon, D.; Ericson, P.G.P. (2010). "A multi-gene phylogeny disentangles the chat-flycatcher complex (Aves: Muscicapidae)". Zoologica Scripta. 39 (3): 213–224. doi:10.1111/j.1463-6409.2010.00423.x. S2CID 85963319.
  7. ^ Gill, Frank; Donsker, David (eds.). "Chats, Old World flycatchers". World Bird List Version 6.2. International Ornithologists' Union. Retrieved 20 May 2016.