The white-throated Fiji whistler (''Pachycephala vitiensis'') is a species of

bird Birds are a group of warm-blooded vertebrates constituting the class (biology), class Aves (), characterised by feathers, toothless beaked jaws, the Oviparity, laying of Eggshell, hard-shelled eggs, a high Metabolism, metabolic rate, a fou ...

in the family

Pachycephalidae The Pachycephalidae are a family of bird species that includes the whistlers, shrikethrushes, and three of the pitohuis, and is part of the ancient Australo-Papuan radiation of songbirds. The family includes 69 species that are separated into fi ...

endemic Endemism is the state of a species being found only in a single defined geographic location, such as an island, state, nation, country or other defined zone; organisms that are indigenous to a place are not endemic to it if they are also foun ...

to islands in southern

Fiji Fiji, officially the Republic of Fiji, is an island country in Melanesia, part of Oceania in the South Pacific Ocean. It lies about north-northeast of New Zealand. Fiji consists of an archipelago of more than 330 islands—of which about ...

. It was formerly considered to be

conspecific Biological specificity is the tendency of a characteristic such as a behavior or a biochemical variation to occur in a particular species. Biochemist Linus Pauling stated that "Biological specificity is the set of characteristics of living organism ...

with the yellow-throated Fiji whistler (''Pachycephala graeffii''). Before the split the combined species were known as the "Fiji whistler".

Taxonomy and systematics

It was variably considered a

subspecies In Taxonomy (biology), biological classification, subspecies (: subspecies) is a rank below species, used for populations that live in different areas and vary in size, shape, or other physical characteristics (Morphology (biology), morpholog ...

of a widespread golden whistler ('' P. pectoralis'').Boles, W. E. (2007). Golden Whistler (Pachycephala pectoralis). pp. 421–423 in: del Hoyo, J.; Elliot, A. & Christie, D. eds (2007). ''

Handbook of the Birds of the World The ''Handbook of the Birds of the World'' (HBW) is a multi-volume series produced by the Spanish publishing house Lynx Edicions in partnership with BirdLife International. It is the first handbook to cover every known living species of bird. ...

''. Volume 12: ''Picathartes to Tits and Chickadees.'' Lynx Edicions, Barcelona. IOC World Bird List, version 1.7
/ref> Three of the subspecies of the former white-throated whistler (''P. v. kandavensis, lauana, and vitiensis'') were lumped with the Fiji whistler in 2014 by the IOC. The Temotu whistler was formerly considered conspecific with the Fiji whistler. Three

are recognised: * ''P. v. kandavensis'' Ramsay, EP, 1876 –

Beqa Beqa (, also known as Mbengga in English) is an island in Fiji, an outlier to the main island of Viti Levu, to the south. The island has a land area of and reaches a maximum elevation of . Beqa has 9 villages divided between 2 ''tikinas'' (dist ...

(south of

Viti Levu Viti Levu (pronounced ; ) is the largest island in Fiji. It is the site of the country's capital and largest city, Suva, and home to a large majority of Fiji's population. Geology Fiji lies in a plate tectonics, tectonically complex area betwe ...

) and

Kadavu Island Kadavu (pronounced ), with an area of , is the fourth largest island in Fiji, and the largest island in the ''Kadavu Group'', a volcano, volcanic archipelago consisting of Kadavu, Ono Island (Fiji), Ono, Galoa Island, Galoa and a number of smaller ...

and satellites (southwest

, southwest

Polynesia Polynesia ( , ) is a subregion of Oceania, made up of more than 1,000 islands scattered over the central and southern Pacific Ocean. The indigenous people who inhabit the islands of Polynesia are called Polynesians. They have many things in ...

) * ''P. v. lauana''

Mayr Mayr is a German surname. Notable people with the surname include: * Andrea Mayr (born 1979), Austrian female long-distance runner * Ernst Mayr (1904–2005), German American evolutionary biologist * Franz Xaver Mayr (1875–1965), Austrian gastro ...

, 1932 – south

Lau Islands The Lau Islands (also called the Lau Group, the Eastern Group, the Eastern Archipelago) of Fiji are situated in the southern Pacific Ocean, just east of the Koro Sea. Of this chain of about sixty islands and islets, about thirty are inhabited. T ...

(southeast

, southwest

) * ''P. v. vitiensis'' Gray, GR, 1860 – Gau (central

, southwest

)

References

white-throated Fiji whistler Endemic birds of Fiji white-throated Fiji whistler white-throated Fiji whistler {{Pachycephalidae-stub