Mecopoda yunnana Liu 2020, stat. nov.

Mecopoda cf. yunnana

Unfortunately, we did not find specimens of this group for our study, but in bio.acousti.ca is a recording from Myanmar [probably from the city of Taunggyi (20° 47’N, 97° 02’E), as spoken in the recording] with the typical group-specific pattern (Fig. 6). It was made by Sismondo in 1985, but the corresponding specimen could not be localized in NHM .

In this recording the syllable repetition rate is ca. 12 Hz in the trill and 50 Hz in the chirp (recording temperature unknown). M. minor minor has 33 Hz in the trill (20–40 Hz in Liu Cx et al. 2020) and 60 Hz in the chirp (Liu Cx, unpublished), whereas M. minor yunnana shows a rhythm of 12.5 Hz (8–11 Hz; 14–18ºC; Liu et al. 2020) in the trill (possibly from syllable groups; no data for chirp).

The song of Sismondo’s specimen is thus quite similar to that of yunnana, not surprising considering the proximity of the collecting localities. Compared to minor minor, however, the SRR during the trill is much slower, but similar during the chirp. The song differences between the subspecies thus cannot result from different temperatures, but are species-specific characters large enough to consider yunnana as a separate species.