Chachalacas are

galliform Galliformes is an order (biology), order of heavy-bodied ground-feeding birds that includes turkey (bird), turkeys, chickens, Old World quail, quail, and other landfowl. Gallinaceous birds, as they are called, are important in their ecosystems ...

birds from the genus ''Ortalis''. These birds are found in wooded habitats in the far southern

United States The United States of America (USA), also known as the United States (U.S.) or America, is a country primarily located in North America. It is a federal republic of 50 U.S. state, states and a federal capital district, Washington, D.C. The 48 ...

(

Texas Texas ( , ; or ) is the most populous U.S. state, state in the South Central United States, South Central region of the United States. It borders Louisiana to the east, Arkansas to the northeast, Oklahoma to the north, New Mexico to the we ...

Mexico Mexico, officially the United Mexican States, is a country in North America. It is the northernmost country in Latin America, and borders the United States to the north, and Guatemala and Belize to the southeast; while having maritime boundar ...

, and Central and

South America South America is a continent entirely in the Western Hemisphere and mostly in the Southern Hemisphere, with a considerably smaller portion in the Northern Hemisphere. It can also be described as the southern Subregion#Americas, subregion o ...

. They are social, can be very noisy and often remain fairly common even near humans, as their relatively small size makes them less desirable to hunters than their larger relatives. As agricultural pests, they have a ravenous appetite for tomatoes, melons, beans, and radishes and can ravage a small garden in short order. They travel in packs of six to twelve. Their nests are made of sticks, twigs, leaves, or moss and are generally frail, flat structures only a few feet above the ground. During April, they lay from three to five buffy white eggs, the shell of which is very rough and hard. They somewhat resemble the guans, and the two have commonly been placed in a

subfamily In biological classification, a subfamily (Latin: ', plural ') is an auxiliary (intermediate) taxonomic rank, next below family but more inclusive than genus. Standard nomenclature rules end botanical subfamily names with "-oideae", and zo ...

together, though the chachalacas are probably closer to the

curassow Curassows are one of the three major groups of cracid birds. They comprise the largest-bodied species of the cracid family. Three of the four genera are restricted to tropical South America; a single species of ''Crax'' ranges north to Mexico. ...

Taxonomy

The genus ''Ortalis'' was introduced (as ''Ortalida'') by the German naturalist

Blasius Merrem Blasius Merrem (4 February 1761 – 23 February 1824) was a German natural history, naturalist, zoologist, Ornithology, ornithologist, mathematician, and Herpetology, herpetologist. In 1804, he became the professor of political economy and botan ...

in 1786 with the

little chachalaca The little chachalaca (''Ortalis motmot'') is a bird in the family Cracidae, the chachalacas, guans, and curassows. It is found in Brazil, French Guiana, Suriname, Guyana, Venezuela and possibly Colombia.Remsen, J. V., Jr., J. I. Areta, E. Bona ...

(''Ortalis motmot'') as the

type species In International_Code_of_Zoological_Nomenclature, zoological nomenclature, a type species (''species typica'') is the species name with which the name of a genus or subgenus is considered to be permanently taxonomically associated, i.e., the spe ...

. The generic name is derived from the

Ancient Greek Ancient Greek (, ; ) includes the forms of the Greek language used in ancient Greece and the classical antiquity, ancient world from around 1500 BC to 300 BC. It is often roughly divided into the following periods: Mycenaean Greek (), Greek ...

word όρταλις, meaning "pullet" or " domestic hen." The common name derives from the

Nahuatl Nahuatl ( ; ), Aztec, or Mexicano is a language or, by some definitions, a group of languages of the Uto-Aztecan language family. Varieties of Nahuatl are spoken by about Nahuas, most of whom live mainly in Central Mexico and have smaller popul ...

verb ''chachalaca'', meaning "to chatter." With a glottal stop at the end, ''chachalacah'' was an alternate name for the bird known as the ''chachalahtli''. All these words likely arose as an onomatopoeia for the four-noted cackle of the

plain chachalaca The plain chachalaca (''Ortalis vetula'') is a large bird in the chachalaca, guan and curassow family Cracidae. It breeds in tropical and subtropical environments from mezquital thickets in the Rio Grande Valley in southernmost Texas, United St ...

(''O. vetula''). The genus contains 16 species.

Mitochondrial A mitochondrion () is an organelle found in the cells of most eukaryotes, such as animals, plants and fungi. Mitochondria have a double membrane structure and use aerobic respiration to generate adenosine triphosphate (ATP), which is used ...

and

nuclear DNA Nuclear DNA (nDNA), or nuclear deoxyribonucleic acid, is the DNA contained within each cell nucleus of a eukaryotic organism. It encodes for the majority of the genome in eukaryotes, with mitochondrial DNA and plastid DNA coding for the rest. ...

sequence In mathematics, a sequence is an enumerated collection of objects in which repetitions are allowed and order matters. Like a set, it contains members (also called ''elements'', or ''terms''). The number of elements (possibly infinite) is cal ...

data tentatively suggest that the chachalacas emerged as a distinct lineage during the

Oligocene The Oligocene ( ) is a geologic epoch (geology), epoch of the Paleogene Geologic time scale, Period that extends from about 33.9 million to 23 million years before the present ( to ). As with other older geologic periods, the rock beds that defin ...

, somewhere around 40–20 mya, possibly being the first lineage of modern cracids to evolve; this does agree with the known fossil record – including indeterminate, cracid-like birds – which very cautiously favors a north-to-south expansion of the

family Family (from ) is a Social group, group of people related either by consanguinity (by recognized birth) or Affinity (law), affinity (by marriage or other relationship). It forms the basis for social order. Ideally, families offer predictabili ...

Species

Prehistoric species

The cracids have a very poor

fossil A fossil (from Classical Latin , ) is any preserved remains, impression, or trace of any once-living thing from a past geological age. Examples include bones, shells, exoskeletons, stone imprints of animals or microbes, objects preserve ...

record, essentially being limited to a few chachalacas. The prehistoric species of the present genus, however, indicate that chachalacas most likely

evolved Evolution is the change in the heritable Phenotypic trait, characteristics of biological populations over successive generations. It occurs when evolutionary processes such as natural selection and genetic drift act on genetic variation, re ...

North North is one of the four compass points or cardinal directions. It is the opposite of south and is perpendicular to east and west. ''North'' is a noun, adjective, or adverb indicating Direction (geometry), direction or geography. Etymology T ...

or northern

Central America Central America is a subregion of North America. Its political boundaries are defined as bordering Mexico to the north, Colombia to the southeast, the Caribbean to the east, and the Pacific Ocean to the southwest. Central America is usually ...

: * ''Ortalis tantala'' (Early Miocene of Nebraska, USA) * ''Ortalis pollicaris'' (Flint Hill Middle Miocene of South Dakota, USA) * ''Ortalis affinis'' (Ogallala Early Pliocene of Trego County, Kansas, USA) * ''Ortalis phengites'' (Snake Creek Early Pliocene of Sioux County, Nebraska, USA)Wetmore, Alexander. 1923. Avian Fossils from the Miocene and Pliocene of Nebraska. ''Bulletin American Museum of Natural History'' XLVIII pp. 483–45
Web access
/ref> The Early Miocene fossil '' Boreortalis'' from

Florida Florida ( ; ) is a U.S. state, state in the Southeastern United States, Southeastern region of the United States. It borders the Gulf of Mexico to the west, Alabama to the northwest, Georgia (U.S. state), Georgia to the north, the Atlantic ...

is also a chachalaca; it may actually be referrable to the extant genus.

References

External links

* {{Authority control