The glossy-backed drongo (''Dicrurus divaricatus'') is a species of

bird Birds are a group of warm-blooded vertebrates constituting the class Aves (), characterised by feathers, toothless beaked jaws, the laying of hard-shelled eggs, a high metabolic rate, a four-chambered heart, and a strong yet lightweigh ...

in the family Dicruridae. It occurs in sub-Saharan Africa from south Mauritania and Senegambia across to Somalia and northern Kenya. The glossy-backed drongo was described by the German naturalist

Hinrich Lichtenstein Martin Hinrich Carl Lichtenstein (10 January 1780 – 2 September 1857) was a German physician, explorer, botanist and zoologist. Biography Born in Hamburg, Lichtenstein was the son of Anton August Heinrich Lichtenstein. He studied medicine ...

in 1823 from a specimen obtained in

Senegambia The Senegambia (other names: Senegambia region or Senegambian zone,Barry, Boubacar, ''Senegambia and the Atlantic Slave Trade'', (Editors: David Anderson, Carolyn Brown; trans. Ayi Kwei Armah; contributors: David Anderson, American Council of Le ...

. He coined the

binomial name In taxonomy, binomial nomenclature ("two-term naming system"), also called nomenclature ("two-name naming system") or binary nomenclature, is a formal system of naming species of living things by giving each a name composed of two parts, bot ...

''Muscicapa divaricata''. It was formerly treated as a

subspecies In biological classification, subspecies is a rank below species, used for populations that live in different areas and vary in size, shape, or other physical characteristics (morphology), but that can successfully interbreed. Not all species ...

of the

fork-tailed drongo The fork-tailed drongo (''Dicrurus adsimilis''), also called the common drongo, African drongo or savanna drongo, is a small bird that can be found in a very substantial range, from the Sahel to South Africa, excepting the Congolian rainforests a ...

(''Dicrurus adsimilis'') but it is now considered as a separate species based on the

phylogenetic In biology, phylogenetics (; from Greek φυλή/ φῦλον [] "tribe, clan, race", and wikt:γενετικός, γενετικός [] "origin, source, birth") is the study of the evolutionary history and relationships among or within groups o ...

relationships determined in a molecular study published in 2018. There are two

: * ''D. d. divaricatus'' ( Lichtenstein, MHK, 1823) – Senegambia and south Mauritania to southwest Chad * ''D. d. lugubris'' (Hemprich & Ehrenberg, 1828) – south Chad to Eritrea, Ethiopia, north Kenya, and north Somalia

References

glossy-backed drongo The glossy-backed drongo (''Dicrurus divaricatus'') is a species of bird in the family Dicruridae. It occurs in sub-Saharan Africa from south Mauritania and Senegambia across to Somalia and northern Kenya. The glossy-backed drongo was describ ...

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