__NOTOC__ Meliphagoidea is a superfamily of

passerine 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 are distinguished from other orders of birds by th ...

birds. They contain a vast diversity of small to mid-sized

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 50 ...

s widespread in the Austropacific region. The Australian Continent has the largest richness in

genera 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 ...

and

species In biology, a species is the basic unit of Taxonomy (biology), classification and a taxonomic rank of an organism, as well as a unit of biodiversity. A species is often defined as the largest group of organisms in which any two individuals of ...

Systematics

This group was proposed based on the phenetic DNA-DNA hybridization studies of Charles Sibley ''et al.''. A more modern definition of a monophyletic Meliphagoidea based on

cladistic Cladistics (; ) is an approach to biological classification in which organisms are categorized in groups (" clades") based on hypotheses of most recent common ancestry. The evidence for hypothesized relationships is typically shared derived ch ...

analysis was made by ornithologists at the American Museum of Natural History.Barker, F. Keith; Cibois, Alice; Schikler, Peter A.; Feinstein, Julie & Cracraft, Joel (2004): Phylogeny and diversification of the largest avian radiation. ''

PNAS ''Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America'' (often abbreviated ''PNAS'' or ''PNAS USA'') is a peer-reviewed multidisciplinary scientific journal. It is the official journal of the National Academy of Scien ...

'' 101 (30): 11040–11045.
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Families

*Family Maluridae: fairy-wrens, emu-wrens and grasswrens *Family Dasyornithidae: bristlebirds. Formerly in Acanthizidae. *Family Acanthizidae: scrubwrens, thornbills and gerygones *Family Pardalotidae: pardalotes (but see below) *Family

Meliphagidae The honeyeaters are a large and diverse family, Meliphagidae, of small to medium-sized birds. The family includes the Australian chats, myzomelas, friarbirds, wattlebirds, miners and melidectes. They are most common in Australia and New G ...

: honeyeaters The Sibley-Ahlquist taxonomy controversially redefines the families Acanthizidae (spinebills) and Dasyornithidae (bristlebirds) as

subfamilies 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 subfamily botanical names with "-oideae", and zoologi ...

within the larger family Pardalotidae (pardalotes). However, later work indicated that the Pardalotidae are more closely related to the

(honeyeaters) and could be considered a subfamily within them. The Acanthizidae have also been traditionally considered aberrant honeyeaters, and could also be considered a subfamily of

; however, they seem to be very ancient members of Meliphagoidea and if the pardalotes are separated as a distinct family apart from

, the spinebills might be split off too. But some ornithologists maintain that separating the spinebills and pardalotes into separate families would mean creating two

monotypic In biology, a monotypic taxon is a taxonomic group (taxon) that contains only one immediately subordinate taxon. A monotypic species is one that does not include subspecies or smaller, infraspecific taxa. In the case of genera, the term "unispec ...

families with a mere six species in total, and so keeping the spinebills within the Meliphagidae and possibly merging the pardalotes therein as well seems to be a more sensible course of action.Jønsson, Knud A. & Fjeldså, Jon (2006): A phylogenetic supertree of oscine passerine birds (Aves: Passeri). ''

Zoologica Scripta ''Zoologica Scripta'' is a bimonthly peer-reviewed scientific journal on systematic zoology, published by Wiley-Blackwell on behalf of the Norwegian Academy of Science and Letters and the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences. It was established in 19 ...

'' 35 (2): 149–186. The Sibley-Ahlquist taxonomy also placed the Petroicidae (

Australasia Australasia is a region that comprises Australia, New Zealand and some neighbouring islands in the Pacific Ocean. The term is used in a number of different contexts, including geopolitically, physiogeographically, philologically, and ecolo ...

n "robins") in the Meliphagoidea. This is now no longer favoured; as more recent work show that they form a distinct lineage of uncertain relationships; all that can be said at present with reasonable certainty is that the Petroicidae are neither Passerida ("advanced" songbirds) nor a very ancient songbird group.

References

External links

Meliphagoidea
- Highlighting relationships of Maluridae on Tree Of Life Web Project {{Taxonbar, from=Q288617 Bird superfamilies Passeri

Systematics

Families

References

Further reading

External links