An international team of ornithologists has described three new species of the bird genus Scytalopus from the Peruvian Andes.
New Scytalopus species from the Peruvian Andes: (upper left) adult male and female of the Jalca tapaculo (Scytalopus frankeae); (upper right) male Jalca tapaculo from Junin; (lower left) adult males of the Ampay tapaculo (Scytalopus whitneyi), left from Apurimac, right from Ayacucho; (lower right) adult male (top) and female (below) of the white-winged tapaculo (Scytalopus krabbei). Image credit: Jon Fjeldsa.
Scytalopus is a genus of small passerine birds in the family Rhinocryptidae (tapaculos).
Members of this genus inhabit mountains and foothills in Central America and the Atlantic Forest, but their diversity is greatest in the Andes.
All species prefer forest understory and shrubby alpine habitats. They skulk in dense vegetation, are poor fliers, and are reluctant to cross habitat gaps, making them unusually poor dispersers prone to population isolation.
Along much of the humid Amazonian slopes of the Andes and parts of the humid Pacific slope of Colombia and Ecuador, multiple species replace each other elevationally with little or no local overlap.
Elsewhere, such as in Bolivia, Venezuela, and parts of western Ecuador and Peru, there are fewer species and their elevational ranges are broader.
In a new study, Dr. Niels Krabbe, an ornithologist in the Natural History Museum of Denmark at the University of Copenhagen, and colleagues revised the taxonomy of Scytalopus tapaculos from the Peruvian Andes.
“We employ an integrated framework using a combination of vocal information, mitochondrial DNA sequences, and appearance, gathered from our own fieldwork over the past 40 years and supplemented with community-shared birdsong archives and museum specimens,” they explained.
As a result, the researchers identified three previously unknown species, named the Jalca tapaculo (Scytalopus frankeae), the Ampay tapaculo (Scytalopus whitneyi), and the white-winged tapaculo (Scytalopus krabbei), all endemic to Peru.
The Jalca tapaculo is known from two geographically separate populations: the northern population is known from three areas in Huanuco and Pasco; the southern population is found in Junin.
“The type locality of this species is on the uppermost slopes of a semi-isolated spur of the humid eastern Andes above stunted treeline forest 5-9 m tall,” the scientists said.
“Above treeline, where the Jalca tapaculo was common, dense bunchgrass and scattered shrubs occurred on steep rocky slopes; flatter areas were heavily grazed by cattle and sheep and were strewn with boulders.”
The Ampay tapaculo is known from two populations: one in eastern Ayacucho south of Rio Mantaro; the other occurs in Apurimac between the Rio Apurimac and Rio Pampas.
“The species is common in montane forest and shrubbery in Apurimac. In Ayacucho, it was instead found in open shrubby and bunchgrass habitats,” the authors said.
The white-winged tapaculo is known from five localities in three widely separated areas in the Central Andes of north-central Peru.
“This new species has been recorded in wet shrub forest and upper montane forest,” the researchers said.
“Where it co-occurs with the Tschudi’s tapaculo (Scytalopus acutirostris), the species may be more closely tied to actual shrubline vegetation where it interdigitates with open tussock grass habitat, whereas the Tschudi’s tapaculo is also found in deeper elfin forest understory.”
The team’s data also suggested that Scytalopus opacus androstictus, a subspecies of the Paramo tapaculo (Scytalopus opacus), should be elevated to species rank.
“Our results demonstrate that basic exploration and descriptive work using diverse data sources continues to identify new species of birds, particularly in tropical environs,” the scientists said.
The team’s paper was published in the April 1 issue of The Auk.
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Niels K. Krabbe et al. 2020. Untangling cryptic diversity in the High Andes: Revision of the Scytalopus [magellanicus] complex (Rhinocryptidae) in Peru reveals three new species. The Auk 137 (2): ukaa003; doi: 10.1093/auk/ukaa003
