Locustellidae is a recently recognised

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 ...

of small

insectivorous A robber fly eating a hoverfly An insectivore is a carnivorous animal or plant which eats insects. An alternative term is entomophage, which can also refer to the human practice of eating insects. The first vertebrate insectivores we ...

songbird A songbird is a bird belonging to the suborder Passeri of the perching birds (Passeriformes). Another name that is sometimes seen as the scientific or vernacular name is Oscines, from Latin ''oscen'', "songbird". The Passeriformes contains 5,00 ...

s ("

warblers Various Passeriformes (perching birds) are commonly referred to as warblers. They are not necessarily closely related to one another, but share some characteristics, such as being fairly small, vocal, and insectivorous. Sylvioid warblers T ...

"), formerly placed in the

Old World warbler The Old World warblers are a large group of birds formerly grouped together in the bird family Sylviidae. They are not closely related to the New World warblers. The family held over 400 species in over 70 genera, and were the source of much taxo ...

wastebin A waste container, also known as a dustbin, rubbish bin, trash can, garbage can, wastepaper basket, and wastebasket, among other names, is a type of container intended to store waste that is usually made out of metal or plastic. The words "r ...

. It contains the

grasshopper warbler The common grasshopper warbler or just grasshopper warbler (''Locustella naevia'') is a species of Old World warbler in the genus ''Locustella''. It breeds across much of temperate Europe and the western Palearctic. It is migratory, wintering ac ...

s, grassbirds, and the '' Bradypterus'' "

bush warbler Bush-warblers (or bush warblers) are small insectivorous songbirds of the genera '' Cettia'', ''Horornis'', and '' Bradypterus''. They were formerly placed in the "wastebin" Old World warbler family. None of the genera as traditionally delimited ...

s". 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 In biological taxonomy, the type genus (''genus typica'') is the genus which defines a biological family and the root of the family name. Zoological nomenclature According to the International Code of Zoological Nomenclature, "The name-bearin ...

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

, this refers to the insect-like song of many species of ''Locustella'', most notably the

common grasshopper warbler The common grasshopper warbler or just grasshopper warbler (''Locustella naevia'') is a species of Old World warbler in the genus ''Locustella''. It breeds across much of temperate Europe and the western Palearctic. It is bird migration, migrator ...

''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 Wrens are a family, Troglodytidae, of small brown passerine birds. The family includes 96 species and is divided into 19 genera. All species are restricted to the New World except for the Eurasian wren that is widely distributed in the Old Worl ...

-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 Terrestrial refers to things related to land or the planet Earth, as opposed to extraterrestrial. Terrestrial may also refer to: * Terrestrial animal, an animal that lives on land opposed to living in water, or sometimes an animal that lives on o ...

of the "warblers". Very unusual for

Passeriformes A passerine () is any bird of the order Passeriformes (; from Latin 'sparrow' and '-shaped') which includes more than half of all bird species. Sometimes known as perching birds, passerines generally have an anisodactyl arrangement of their ...

, 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 In biology, a taxon (back-formation from ''taxonomy''; : taxa) is a group of one or more populations of an organism or organisms seen by taxonomists to form a unit. Although neither is required, a taxon is usually known by a particular name and ...

. Among the "warbler and

babbler Babbler may refer to: * Various small passerine birds: ** The Old World babblers, a large family of mostly Old World passerine birds ** The Ground babblers of family Pellorneidae ** Many species in the genera ''Argya'' and ''Turdoides'' in family ...

" superfamily

Sylvioidea Sylvioidea is a superfamily of passerine birds, one of at least three major clades within the Passerida along with the Muscicapoidea and Passeroidea. It contains about 1300 species including the Old World warblers, Old World babblers, swallows ...

, the Locustellidae are closest to the

Malagasy warblers The tetrakas, also known as the Malagasy warblers, are a recently validated family of songbirds. They were formally named Bernieridae in 2010. The family currently consists of eleven species (in eight genus, genera) of small forest birds. These ...

, another recently recognised (and hitherto unnamed) family. The

black-capped donacobius The black-capped donacobius (''Donacobius atricapilla'') is a conspicuous, vocal South American bird. It is distributed across the northern half of South America. Taxonomy In 1760 the French zoologist Mathurin Jacques Brisson included a descrip ...

(''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 Molecular phylogenetics () is the branch of phylogeny that analyzes genetic, hereditary molecular differences, predominantly in DNA sequences, to gain information on an organism's evolutionary relationships. From these analyses, it is possible to ...

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 ''Poodytes'' is a genus of passerine birds in the grassbird family Locustellidae. A molecular phylogenetic study of the grassbird family Locustellidae published in 2018 found that some of the genera, as then defined, were non-monophyletic. In th ...

'' and ''

Cincloramphus ''Cincloramphus'' is a genus of birds in the grassbird family Locustellidae. The genus ''Cincloramphus'' was introduced by the English ornithologist and bird artist John Gould in 1838 with the brown songlark as the type species. The name combin ...

'' as well as the description of a new genus ''

Helopsaltes ''Helopsaltes'' is a genus of passerine birds in the grassbird family Locustellidae. A comprehensive molecular phylogenetic study of the grassbird family Locustellidae published in 2018 found that the genus ''Locustella'' consisted of two distin ...

''. The former genera ''Megalurulus'' and ''Buettikoferella'' become

junior synonyms In taxonomy, the scientific classification of living organisms, a synonym is an alternative scientific name for the accepted scientific name of a taxon. The botanical and zoological codes of nomenclature treat the concept of synonymy differently. ...

of ''Cincloramphus''.

Genera

The family contains 67 species divided into 11 genera. * '' Robsonius'' – ground warblers (3 species) * ''

'' – grass warblers (6 species) * ''

'' – grasshopper warblers (23 species) * '' Bradypterus'' – megalurid bush warblers (12 species) * '' Elaphrornis'' – Sri Lanka bush warbler * '' Schoenicola'' – wide-tailed grassbirds (2 species) * ''

'' – grassbirds (5 species including one extinct) * '' Malia'' – malia * ''

'' – (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 ''Per'' Johan Alström (born 9 April 1961) is a Swedish Professor of ornithology. He does research in Taxonomy (biology), taxonomy, systematics, and evolution, with birds in Asia as a specialty. Alström works at the Department of Ecology and Genet ...

and coworkers.

References

{{Taxonbar, from=Q774034 Bird families Taxa named by Charles Lucien Bonaparte