Sphecotheres flaviventris ashbyi Mathews

Lecroy, Mary, 2014, Type Specimens Of Birds In The American Museum Of Natural History Part 12. Passeriformes: Ploceidae, Sturnidae, Buphagidae, Oriolidae, Dicruridae, Callaeidae, Grallinidae, Corcoracidae, Artamidae, Cracticidae, Ptilonorhynchidae, Cnemophilidae, Paradisaeidae, And Corvidae, Bulletin of the American Museum of Natural History 2014 (393), pp. 1-165 : 50-51

Sphecotheres flaviventris ashbyi Mathews

Sphecotheres flaviventris ashbyi Mathews,1912a: 436 (Northern Territory (Alligator River)).

Now Sphecotheres vieilloti ashbyi Mathews, 1912 . See Mathews, 1930: 862; Greenway, 1962: 136; Schodde and Mason, 1999: 595–597; and Walther and Jones, 2008: 715–716.

HOLOTYPE: AMNH 671429 , adult male, collected on the [South] Alligator River , Northern Territory, Australia, on 21 September 1903, by J.T. Tunney (no. 1656). From the Mathews Collection (no. 5201) via the Rothschild Collection.

COMMENTS: The holotype was part of a large number of birds that Mathews received from the WAM and cataloged in 1910. In the original description, Mathews cited his catalog number of the holotype and gave the range of the form as ‘‘ Northern Territory.’’ He did not mention the name of the collector, but it was undoubtedly J.T. Tunney. Tunney collected in 1901–1903 in northwestern Western Australia and in Arnhem Land, Northern Territory. After Hartert (1905) reported on the entire collection, it was divided between WAM and Rothschild, with some additional specimens presented to BMNH ( Hartert, 1905: 194). In his report, Hartert (1905: 241) listed Tunney’s field numbers for his specimens of Sphecotheres flaviventris , including specimen no. 1656. When Hartert returned to WAM their portion of the collection, specimen no. 1656 was then given WAM 7652, which also appears on Tunney’s label of the type. A third number, ‘‘996,’’ also appears on this label, the significance of which I have not discovered.

There are two paratypes in AMNH: Mary River, AMNH 671421 (Tunney no. 720, Mathews no. 9503), female, 2 October 1902; Eureka, AMNH 671431 (Tunney no. 1064, Mathews no. 9504), male, 5 February 1903. Both of these specimens were obtained by Mathews from the Rothschild Collection and cataloged by him on 2 November 1911; the original Rothschild labels had been removed, although the Tunney labels remain; the number ‘‘853’’ that appears on the Mathews labels is the number of this species in Mathews (1908). The numbers ‘‘334’’ on AMNH 671421 and ‘‘661’’ on AMNH 671431 are of unknown significance. Other Tunney specimens now in AMNH had never been in the Mathews Collection and are not part of the original type series. Specimens collected by Rogers on Melville Island in 1912 and by Dahl in 1894 were received by Mathews (1912b: 25) too late to be included in Mathews’ (1912a) description of this form.

Storr (1966: 64) noted that during the period from 24 August to 19 October 1903 Tunney was collecting in the coastal plain and tidal sections of the South Alligator River and that on 25 September he was 16 and 35 miles from the coast. The South Alligator River flows into Van Diemen Gulf at 12.15S, 132.24E (USBGN, 1957).

DICRURIDAE

For a recent study of species-level phylogenetic relationships among members of the Dicruridae using nuclear and mitochondrial loci and a discussion of evolution within the family, see Pasquet et al. (2007).