Advanced search
Start date
Betweenand
Related content
(Reference retrieved automatically from Web of Science through information on FAPESP grant and its corresponding number as mentioned in the publication by the authors.)

Tiny Bird, Huge Mystery-The Possibly Extinct Hooded Seedeater (Sporophila melanops) Is a Capuchino with a Melanistic Cap

Full text
Author(s):
Ignacio Areta, Juan [1] ; Piacentini, Vitor de Q. [2, 3] ; Haring, Elisabeth [4, 5] ; Gamauf, Anita [4, 5] ; Silveira, Luis Fabio [2] ; Machado, Erika [2] ; Kirwan, Guy M. [6]
Total Authors: 7
Affiliation:
[1] Consejo Nacl Invest Cient & Tecn, Inst Bio & Geociencias Noroeste Argentino IBIGEO, Rosario De Lerma, Salta - Argentina
[2] Univ Sao Paulo MZUSP, Museu Zool, Sao Paulo - Brazil
[3] Drexel Univ, Acad Nat Sci, Dept Ornithol, Philadelphia, PA 19104 - USA
[4] Museum Nat Hist Vienna, Vienna - Austria
[5] Univ Vienna, Dept Integrat Zool, Vienna - Austria
[6] Field Museum Nat Hist, Chicago, IL 60605 - USA
Total Affiliations: 6
Document type: Journal article
Source: PLoS One; v. 11, n. 5 MAY 11 2016.
Web of Science Citations: 3
Abstract

Known with certainty solely from a unique male specimen collected in central Brazil in the first quarter of the 19th century, the Critically Endangered (Possibly Extinct) Hooded Seedeater Sporophila melanops has been one of the great enigmas of Neotropical ornithology, arguably the only one of a host of long-lost species from Brazil to remain obstinately undiscovered. We reanalysed the morphology of the type specimen, as well as a female specimen postulated to represent the same taxon, and sequenced mitochondrial DNA (COI and Cyt-b) from both individuals. Furthermore, we visited the type locality, at the border between Goias and Mato Grosso, and its environs on multiple occasions at different seasons, searching for birds with similar morphology to the type, without success. Novel genetic and morphological evidence clearly demonstrates that the type of S. melanops is not closely related to Yellow-bellied Seedeater S. nigricollis, as has been frequently postulated in the literature, but is in fact a representative of one of the so-called capuchinos, a clade of attractively plumaged seedeaters that breed mostly in the Southern Cone of South America. Our morphological analysis indicates that S. melanops has a hitherto unreported dark-coffee throat and that it is probably a Dark-throated Seedeater S. ruficollis collected within its wintering range, acquiring breeding plumage and showing melanism on the cap feathers. Alternatively, it may be a melanistic-capped individual of a local population of seedeaters known to breed in the Esteros del Ibera, Corrientes, Argentina, to which the name S. ruficollis might be applicable, whilst the name S. plumbeiceps might be available for what is currently known as S. ruficollis. A hybrid origin for S. melanops cannot be ruled out from the available data, but seems unlikely. The purported female specimen of S. melanops pertains either to S. nigricollis or to Double-collared Seedeater S. caerulescens based on genetic and morphological data, and thus cannot be a female of S. melanops. We conclude that Sporophila melanops is not typical of any natural population of seedeaters, appears to have been collected far from its breeding grounds while overwintering in central Brazil, and should not be afforded any conservation status. (AU)