Locustellidae is a recently recognised
family of small
insectivorous songbirds ("
warblers"), formerly placed in the
Old World warbler "
wastebin"
family. It contains the
grasshopper warblers, grassbirds, and the ''
Bradypterus'' "
bush warblers". These birds occur mainly in
Eurasia
Eurasia ( , ) is a continental area on Earth, comprising all of Europe and Asia. According to some geographers, Physical geography, physiographically, Eurasia is a single supercontinent. The concept of Europe and Asia as distinct continents d ...
,
Africa
Africa is the world's second-largest and second-most populous continent after Asia. At about 30.3 million km2 (11.7 million square miles) including adjacent islands, it covers 20% of Earth's land area and 6% of its total surfac ...
, and the
Australia
Australia, officially the Commonwealth of Australia, is a country comprising mainland Australia, the mainland of the Australia (continent), Australian continent, the island of Tasmania and list of islands of Australia, numerous smaller isl ...
n region. The family name is sometimes given as Megaluridae, but Locustellidae has priority.
The name derives from the
type genus name ''
Locustella
''Locustella'' is a genus of small passerine birds that include the grasshopper warblers. Formerly placed in the paraphyletic "Old World warbler" assemblage, they are now considered the northernmost representatives of a largely Gondwanan family, ...
'', which is from
Latin
Latin ( or ) is a classical language belonging to the Italic languages, Italic branch of the Indo-European languages. Latin was originally spoken by the Latins (Italic tribe), Latins in Latium (now known as Lazio), the lower Tiber area aroun ...
and is a diminutive of ''locusta'', "grasshopper".
Like the English name
grasshopper warbler, this refers to the insect-like song of many species of ''Locustella'', most notably the
common grasshopper warbler ''Locustella naevia''.
The
species
A species () is often defined as the largest group of organisms in which any two individuals of the appropriate sexes or mating types can produce fertile offspring, typically by sexual reproduction. It is the basic unit of Taxonomy (biology), ...
are smallish birds with tails that are usually long and pointed; the
scientific name
In Taxonomy (biology), taxonomy, binomial nomenclature ("two-term naming system"), also called binary nomenclature, is a formal system of naming species of living things by giving each a name composed of two parts, both of which use Latin gramm ...
of the
genus
Genus (; : genera ) is a taxonomic rank above species and below family (taxonomy), family as used in the biological classification of extant taxon, living and fossil organisms as well as Virus classification#ICTV classification, viruses. In bino ...
''Megalurus'' in fact means "the large-tailed one" in plain English. They are less
wren-like than the typical shrub-warblers (''
Cettia''), but they are similarly drab brownish or buffy all over. They tend to be larger and slimmer than ''Cettia'' though, and many have bold dark streaks on wings and/or underside. Most live in scrubland and frequently hunt food by clambering through thick tangled growth or pursuing it on the ground; they are perhaps the most
terrestrial of the "warblers". Very unusual for
Passeriformes, the beginning of an
evolution
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 ...
towards
flightlessness is seen in some
taxa.
Among the "warbler and
babbler"
superfamily Sylvioidea, the Locustellidae are closest to the
Malagasy warblers, another recently recognised (and hitherto unnamed) family. The
black-capped donacobius (''Donacobius atricapillus'') is a
South American
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 ...
relative derived from the same ancestral stock and not a wren as was long believed.
A comprehensive
molecular phylogenetic study of the grassbird family Locustellidae published in 2018 found that many of the genera, as then defined, were non-
monophyletic
In biological cladistics for the classification of organisms, monophyly is the condition of a taxonomic grouping being a clade – that is, a grouping of organisms which meets these criteria:
# the grouping contains its own most recent co ...
. The resulting revision of the genus level taxonomy involved many changes including the resurrection of the genera ''
Poodytes'' and ''
Cincloramphus'' as well as the description of a new genus ''
Helopsaltes''. The former genera ''Megalurulus'' and ''Buettikoferella'' become
junior synonyms of ''Cincloramphus''.
Genera
The family contains 67 species divided into 11 genera.
* ''
Robsonius'' – ground warblers (3 species)
* ''
Helopsaltes'' – grass warblers (6 species)
* ''
Locustella
''Locustella'' is a genus of small passerine birds that include the grasshopper warblers. Formerly placed in the paraphyletic "Old World warbler" assemblage, they are now considered the northernmost representatives of a largely Gondwanan family, ...
'' – grasshopper warblers (23 species)
* ''
Bradypterus'' – megalurid bush warblers (12 species)
* ''
Elaphrornis'' – Sri Lanka bush warbler
* ''
Schoenicola'' – wide-tailed grassbirds (2 species)
* ''
Poodytes'' – grassbirds (5 species including one extinct)
* ''
Malia'' – malia
* ''
Cincloramphus'' – (12 species)
* ''
Megalurus'' – striated grassbird
* ''
Catriscus'' – fan-tailed grassbird
The relationships between the genera is shown in the following cladogram. It is based on a 2018 study by
Per Alström and coworkers.
[
]
References
{{Taxonbar, from=Q774034
Bird families
Taxa named by Charles Lucien Bonaparte