The alpine accentor (''Prunella collaris'') is a small passerine bird in the family

Prunellidae The accentors are a genus of birds in the family Prunellidae, which is endemic to the Old World. This small group of closely related passerines are all in the genus ''Prunella''. All but the dunnock and the Japanese accentor are inhabitants of th ...

, which is native to

Eurasia Eurasia (, ) is the largest continental area on Earth, comprising all of Europe and Asia. Primarily in the Northern and Eastern Hemispheres, it spans from the British Isles and the Iberian Peninsula in the west to the Japanese archipelago ...

and

North Africa North Africa, or Northern Africa is a region encompassing the northern portion of the African continent. There is no singularly accepted scope for the region, and it is sometimes defined as stretching from the Atlantic shores of Mauritania in ...

Taxonomy

The Alpine accentor was described by the Austria naturalist Giovanni Antonio Scopoli in 1769. He coined the binomial name ''Sturnus collaris'' and specified the type locality as the Carinthia region of southern Austria. The specific epithet is from the

Latin Latin (, or , ) is a classical language belonging to the Italic branch of the Indo-European languages. Latin was originally a dialect spoken in the lower Tiber area (then known as Latium) around present-day Rome, but through the power of the ...

''collaris'' "of the neck". This species is now placed in the

genus Genus ( plural genera ) is a taxonomic rank used in the biological classification of living and fossil organisms as well as viruses. In the hierarchy of biological classification, genus comes above species and below family. In binomial nom ...

'' Prunella'' that was introduced by the French ornithologist Louis Vieillot in 1816. The Alpine accentor, along with the

Altai accentor The Altai accentor (''Prunella himalayana'') is a species of bird in the family Prunellidae. It is also known as the rufous-streaked accentor or Himalayan accentor. It breeds in the Altai Mountains of western Mongolia; it winters in the southern ...

is sometimes separated from the other accentors, into the genus ''Laiscopus''. The word "accentor" is from post-classical

and means a person who sings with another. The genus name ''Prunella'' is from the German ''Braunelle'', "dunnock", a diminutive of ''braun'', "brown". Nine subspecies are recognised: * ''P. c. collaris'' (

Scopoli Giovanni Antonio Scopoli (sometimes Latinized as Johannes Antonius Scopolius) (3 June 1723 – 8 May 1788) was an Italian physician and naturalist. His biographer Otto Guglia named him the "first anational European" and the "Linnaeus of the Au ...

, 1769) — southwest Europe to Slovenia and the Carpathians, northwest Africa * ''P. c. subalpina'' ( Brehm, CL, 1831) — Croatia to Bulgaria and Greece, Crete and southwest Turkey * ''P. c. montana'' ( Hablizl, 1783) — north and east Turkey to the Caucasus and Iran * ''P. c. rufilata'' ( Severtzov, 1879) — northeast Afghanistan and north Pakistan through the mountains of central Asia to west China * ''P. c. whymperi'' ( Baker, ECS, 1915) — west Himalayas * ''P. c. nipalensis'' ( Blyth, 1843) — central and east Himalayas to southcentral China and north Myanmar * ''P. c. tibetana'' ( Bianchi, 1905) — east Tibet * ''P. c. erythropygia'' ( R. Swinhoe, 1870) — east Kazakhstan and southcentral Siberia to northeast Siberia, Japan, Korea and northeast China * ''P. c. fennelli'' Deignan, 1964 — Taiwan

Description

Alpine Accentor Pangolakha Wildlife Sanctuary East Sikkim India 19

This is a robin-sized bird at in length, slightly larger than its relative, the

dunnock The dunnock (''Prunella modularis'') is a small passerine, or perching bird, found throughout temperate Europe and into Asian Russia. Dunnocks have also been successfully introduced into New Zealand. It is by far the most widespread member of th ...

. It has a streaked brown back, somewhat resembling a house sparrow, but adults have a grey head and red-brown spotting on the underparts. It has an insectivore's fine pointed bill. Sexes are similar, although the male may be contrasted in appearance. Young birds have browner heads and underparts.

Distribution and habitat

It is found throughout the mountains of southern temperate Europe,

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and

Asia Asia (, ) is one of the world's most notable geographical regions, which is either considered a continent in its own right or a subcontinent of Eurasia, which shares the continental landmass of Afro-Eurasia with Africa. Asia covers an are ...

at heights above .Fareast Russian Birds
/ref> It is mainly resident, wintering more widely at lower latitudes, but some

bird Birds are a group of warm-blooded vertebrates constituting the class Aves (), characterised by feathers, toothless beaked jaws, the laying of hard-shelled eggs, a high metabolic rate, a four-chambered heart, and a strong yet lightweig ...

s wander as rare vagrants as far as

Great Britain Great Britain is an island in the North Atlantic Ocean off the northwest coast of continental Europe. With an area of , it is the largest of the British Isles, the largest European island and the ninth-largest island in the world. It i ...

. It is a bird of bare mountain areas with some low vegetation.

Breeding

It builds a neat nest low in a bush or rock crevice, laying 3–5 unspotted sky-blue eggs. The mating system is of particular interest. Home ranges are occupied by breeding groups of 3 or 4 males with 3 or 4 females. These are unrelated birds which have a socially polygynandrous mating system. Males have a dominance hierarchy, with the alpha males being generally older than subordinates. Females seek matings with all the males, although the alpha male may defend her against matings from lower ranking males. In turn, males seek matings with all the females. DNA fingerprinting has been used to show that, within broods, there is often mixed paternity, although the female is always the true mother of the nestlings raised within her nest. Males will provide food to chicks at several nests within the group, depending on whether they have mated with the female or not – males only provide care when they are likely to be the true fathers of the chicks.

References

External links