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Passeri

(Suborder)

Overview

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A songbird is a bird belonging to the order of Passeriformes (ca. 4000 species), in which the is developed in such a way as to produce various sound notes, commonly known as bird song. There is evidence to suggest that songbirds evolved about 50 million years ago in the western part of Gondwana that later became Australia, New Zealand, New Guinea and Antarctica, before spreading around the world.1]

This 'bird song' is essentially territorial in that it communicates the identity and whereabouts of an individual to other birds and also signals sexual intentions. It is not to be confused with bird calls, which are used for alarms and contact, and are especially important in birds that feed or migrate in flocks.

Other birds have songs to attract mates or hold territory, but these are usually simple and repetitive, lacking the variety of many passerine songs. The monotonous repetition of the Common Cuckoo or Little Crake can be contrasted with the variety of a Nightingale or Marsh Warbler.

Although many songbirds have songs which are pleasant to the human ear, this is not invariably the case. Many members of the crow family make croaks or screeches which sound harsh to humans.

Taxonomy

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Under the Sibley-Ahlquist taxonomy this suborder is divided into two "parvorders", Corvida and Passerida (standard taxonomic practice would rank these as infraorders). However, more recent research[citation needed] is casting doubt on the existence of Corvida as a single clade, but given the present lack of any generally accepted redivision of Corvida into two or more groupings at the parvorderial level, the families of suborder Passeri are listed below as being in either Corvida or Passerida.

Families

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corvida

passerida

Juvenile House sparrow

Photos

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Taxonomy

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The Suborder Passeri is a member of the Order Passeriformes. Here is the complete "parentage" of Passeri:

The Suborder Passeri is further organized into finer groupings including:

Families

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Aegithalidae

The long-tailed tits or bushtits, Aegithalidae, are a family of small birds. The family contains 13 species in four genera. [more]

Alaudidae

Larks are birds of the family Alaudidae. All species occur in the Old World, including northern and eastern Australia; only one, the Shore Lark, has spread to North America, where it is called the Horned Lark. Habitats vary widely, but many species live in dry regions. [more]

Bombycillidae

The waxwings form the genus Bombycilla of birds. According to most authorities, this is the only genus placed in the family Bombycillidae. [more]

Callaeatidae

The small bird family Callaeidae (also named in some sources as Callaeatidae) is to New Zealand. It contains three monotypic genera; of the three species in the family, only two survive and one of them, the Kokako, is an endangered species. A third, the Huia became extinct early in the 20th century. [more]

Certhiidae

The treecreepers are a , Certhiidae, of small passerine birds, widespread in wooded regions of the Northern Hemisphere and sub-Saharan Africa. The family contains ten species in two genera, Certhia and Salpornis. Their plumage is dull-colored, and as their name implies, they climb over the surface of trees in search of food. [more]

Cinclidae

Dippers are members of the genus Cinclus in the family Cinclidae. They are named for their bobbing or dipping movements. They are unique among passerines for their ability to dive and swim underwater. [more]

Cisticolidae

The Cisticolidae family of small birds is a group of about 110 warblers found mainly in warmer southern regions of the Old World. They are often included within the Old World warbler family Sylviidae. [more]

Climacteridae

There are 7 of Australasian treecreeper in the passerine bird family Climacteridae. They are medium-small, mostly brown birds with patterning on their underparts, and all are endemic to Australia-New Guinea. They resemble, but are not closely related to, the Holarctic treecreepers. The family is one of several families identified by DNA-DNA hybridisation studies to be part of the Australo-Papuan songbird radiation. There is some molecular support for suggesting that their closest relatives are the large lyrebirds. [more]

Corvidae

Corvidae is a family of oscine passerine birds that contains the crows, ravens, rooks, jackdaws, jays, magpies, treepies, choughs and nutcrackers. The common English name used is corvids (more technically) or the crow family (more informally), and there are over 120 species. The genus Corvus, including the crows and ravens, makes up over a third of the entire family. [more]

Fringillidae

The true finches are birds in the family Fringillidae. They are predominantly seed-eating songbirds. Most are native to Southern Hemisphere, but one subfamily is endemic to the Neotropics, one to the Hawaiian Islands, and one subfamily – monotypic at genus level – is found only in the Palaearctic. The scientific name Fringillidae comes from the Latin word fringilla for the Chaffinch (Fringilla coelebs) – a member of that last subfamily – which is common in Europe. [more]

Hirundinidae

The swallows and martins are a group of birds in the family Hirundinidae which are characterised by their adaptation to aerial feeding. Swallow is used colloquially in Europe as a synonym for the Barn Swallow. [more]

Hypocoliidae

[more]

Irenidae

The two fairy-bluebirds are small bird species found in forests and plantations in tropical southern Asia and the Philippines. They are the sole members of the genus Irena and family Irenidae, and are related to the ioras and leafbirds. [more]

Laniidae

Shrikes are birds of the family Laniidae. The family is composed of thirty one species in three genera. The family name, and that of the largest genus, Lanius, is derived from the Latin word for butcher, and some shrikes were also known as "butcher birds" because of their feeding habits. Several African species are known as fiscals, derived from the Afrikaans term for the hangman, fiskaal. [more]

Maluridae

The Maluridae are a of small, insectivorous passerine birds endemic to Australia and New Guinea. Commonly known as wrens, they are unrelated to the true wrens of the Northern Hemisphere. The family includes 14 species of fairy-wren, 3 emu-wrens, and 10 grasswrens. [more]

Melanocharitidae

The Melanocharitidae, the berrypeckers and longbills, is a small family restricted to the forests of New Guinea. The family was once placed inside the Flowerpecker family Dicaeidae, and the longbills were once considered to be honeyeaters (which they closely resemble). It comprises ten species in two genera, the Melanocharis berrypeckers and the Toxorhamphus. There is some confusion with the common names, as there are two other berrypecker species in the tiny family Paramythiidae, once considered to be close to the flowerpeckers as well; and several Old World warbler genera in Africa also known as longbills. The Spotted Berrypecker was once attributed its own genus Rhamphocharis. [more]

Meliphagidae

The honeyeaters are a large and diverse family of small to medium sized birds most common in and New Guinea, but also found in New Zealand, the Pacific islands as far east as Samoa and Tonga, and the islands to the north and west of New Guinea known as Wallacea. Bali, on the other side of the Wallace Line, has a single species. [more]

Menuridae

A Lyrebird is either of two of ground-dwelling Australian birds, most notable for their superb ability to mimic natural and artificial sounds from their environment. Lyrebirds have unique plumes of neutral colored tailfeathers. [more]

Muscicapidae

The Old World flycatcher family Muscicapidae is a large family of small birds restricted to the Old World. These are mainly small arboreal insectivores, many of which, as the name implies, take their prey on the wing. [more]

Nectariniidae

The sunbirds and spiderhunters are a , Nectariniidae, of very small passerine birds. There are 132 species in 15 genera. The family is distributed throughout Africa, southern Asia and just reaches northern Australia. Most sunbirds feed largely on nectar, although they will also take insects, especially when feeding young. Fruit is also part of the diet of some species. Their flight is fast and direct on their short wings. [more]

Orthonychidae

The Orthonychidae is a of birds with a single genus, Orthonyx, which comprises three species of passerine birds endemic to Australia and New Guinea, the Logrunners and the Chowchilla. Some authorities consider the Australian family Cinclosomatidae to be part of the Orthonychidae. The three species use their stiffened tails to brace themselves when feeding. [more]

Paramythiidae

The painted berrypeckers, Paramythiidae, are a very small family restricted to the mountain forests of New Guinea. The family comprises two species in two genera: the Tit Berrypecker (Oreocharis arfaki) and the Crested Berrypecker (Paramythia montium). These are colorful medium-sized birds which feed on fruit and some insects. These species were formerly included in the Dicaeidae, but DNA-DNA hybridization studies showed these species were related to each other but distinct from the flowerpeckers. [more]

Pardalotidae

Pardalotes are a , Pardalotidae, of very small, brightly colored birds native to Australia, with short tails, strong legs, and stubby blunt beaks. This family is composed of four species in one genus, Pardalotus, and several subspecies. The name derives from a Greek word meaning "spotted". The family once contained several other species now split into the family Acanthizidae. [more]

Paridae

The tits, chickadees, and titmice comprise Paridae, a large family of small birds which occur in the northern hemisphere and Africa. Most were formerly classified in the genus Parus. [more]

Passeridae

True sparrows, the sparrows in the family Passeridae, are small passerine birds. As eight or more species nest in or near buildings, and the House Sparrow and Eurasian Tree Sparrow in particular inhabit cities in large numbers, sparrows may be the most familiar of all wild birds. [more]

Petroicidae

The family Petroicidae includes roughly 45 species in about 15 genera. All are endemic to Australasia or nearby areas. For want of a more accurate common name, the family is often described as the Australasian robins. The family occurs in New Guinea, Australia and numerous Pacific Islands as far east as Samoa. Within the family the species are known not only as robins but the flycatchers, and scrub-robins. They are however unrelated to Old World family Muscicapidae (to which other species with such names belong), or the monarch flycatchers (Monarchidae). [more]

Picathartidae

The picathartes, rockfowl or bald crows are a small genus of two bird species within the family Picathartidae found in the rain-forests of tropical west and central Africa. They have unfeathered heads, and feed on insects and invertebrates picked from damp rocky areas. Both species are totally non-migratory, being dependent on a specialised rocky jungle habitat. [more]

Pomatostomidae

The Pomatostomidae (Australo-Papuan or Australasian babblers, also known as pseudo-babblers) are small to medium-sized birds endemic to . For many years, the Australo-Papuan babblers were classified, rather uncertainly, with the Old World babblers (Timaliidae), on the grounds of similar appearance and habits. More recent research, however, indicates that they are too basal to belong the Passerida - let alone the Sylvioidea where the Old World babblers are placed - and they are now classed as a separate family close to the Orthonychidae (logrunners). [more]

Ptilonorhynchidae

This article is about the family of birds called bowerbirds. For the band, see . [more]

Pycnonotidae

Bulbuls (Pycnonotidae) are a of medium-sized passerine songbirds. Many forest species are known as greenbuls. The family is distributed across most of Africa and into the Middle East, tropical Asia to Indonesia, and north as far as Japan. A few insular species occur on the tropical islands of the Indian Ocean There are about 130 species in around 24 genera. While some species are found in most habitats, overall African species are predominately found in rainforest whilst rainforest species are rare in Asia, instead preferring more open areas. The only Bulbul which occurs in Europe was spotted in the Cyclades and bears a yellow patch, being otherwise of a snuffy brown ; and this is possibly the bird which has got mixed up with the nightingale in Eastern poetry, as it occurs in Israel, and is there called "bulbul" in Hebrew by the Israelis as well as in Arabic and Persian language. [more]

Regulidae

The kinglets or crests are a small group of birds sometimes included in the , but are frequently given family status because they also resemble the titmice. The scientific name Regulidae is derived from the Latin word regulus for "petty king" or prince, and comes from the colored crowns of adult birds. This family has representatives in North America and Eurasia. There are seven species in this family; one, the Madeira Firecrest, Regulus madeirensis, was only recently split from Firecrest as a separate species. One species, the Ruby-crowned Kinglet, differs sufficiently in its voice and plumage to occasionally be afforded its own genus, Corthylio. [more]

Sittidae

Sittidae is a family of small birds which has two subfamilies: [more]

Sturnidae

Starlings are small to medium-sized birds in the family Sturnidae. The name "Sturnidae" comes from the Latin word for Starling, sturnus. Starlings occur naturally in the Old World, from Europe, Asia and Africa, to northern Australia and the islands of the tropical Pacific. Several European and Asian species have been introduced to these areas as well as North America, Hawaii and New Zealand, where they generally compete for habitat with native birds and are considered to be invasive species. [more]

Sylviidae

The "Old World Warblers", family Sylviidae are a of small passerine bird species; the names sylviid warblers or true warblers may be more appropriate. The Sylviidae mainly occur as breeding species, as the name implies, in Europe, Asia and, to a lesser extent Africa. However, most birds of temperate regions are strongly migratory, and winter in the latter continent or tropical Asia. Many are accomplished songbirds, though perhaps not as much as other warblers or some thrushes. [more]

Vireonidae

The vireos (sg. pronounced ) are a group of small to medium-sized birds (mostly) restricted to the New World. They are typically dull-plumaged and greenish in color, the smaller species resembling wood warblers apart from their heavier bills. They range in size from the Choco Vireo, Dwarf Vireo and Lesser Greenlet, all at around 10 centimeters and 8 grams, to the peppershrikes and shrike-vireos at up to 17 centimeters and 40 grams (Forshaw & Parkes 1991). [more]

Zosteropidae

The white-eyes are small birds native to tropical, subtropical and temperate Sub-Saharan Africa, southern and eastern Asia, and Australasia. White-eyes inhabit most tropical islands in the Indian Ocean, the western Pacific Ocean, and the Gulf of Guinea. Discounting some widespread members of the genus Zosterops, most species are endemic to single islands or archipelagos. The Silvereye, Zosterops lateralis, naturally colonised New Zealand, where it is known as the "Wax-eye" or Tauhau ("stranger"), from 1855. The Silvereye has also been introduced to Hawaii as well as the Society Islands in French Polynesia. [more]

At least 197 species and subspecies belong to the Family Zosteropidae.

More info about the Family Zosteropidae may be found here.

References

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  1. ^ Songbirds Update and Transcript

Sources

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Last Revised: September 22, 2009
2009/09/22 09:27:36