The Madagascar stonechat (''Saxicola sibilla'') is a species of stonechat,

endemic Endemism is the state of a species being found 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 found else ...

Madagascar Madagascar (; mg, Madagasikara, ), officially the Republic of Madagascar ( mg, Repoblikan'i Madagasikara, links=no, ; french: République de Madagascar), is an island country in the Indian Ocean, approximately off the coast of East Africa ...

. It is a small

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 lightweig ...

, closely similar to the

African stonechat The African stonechat or common stonechat (''Saxicola torquatus'') is a species of the Old World flycatcher family (Muscicapidae), inhabiting sub-Saharan Africa and adjacent regions. Like the other chats, it was long assigned to the thrush f ...

in both plumage and behaviour, but distinguished from it by the more extensive black on the throat and minimal orange-red on the upper breast of the males.Urquhart, E., & Bowley, A. (2002): ''Stonechats. A Guide to the Genus Saxicola''.

Christopher Helm Christopher Alexander Roger Helm (born Dundee, 1 February 1937 – 20 January 2007) was a Scottish book publisher, notably of ornithology related titles, including the '' Helm Identification Guides''. Born in Dundee, he was raised in Forfar ...

, London.

Taxonomy

In 1760 the French zoologist

Mathurin Jacques Brisson Mathurin Jacques Brisson (; 30 April 1723 – 23 June 1806) was a French zoologist and natural philosopher. Brisson was born at Fontenay-le-Comte. The earlier part of his life was spent in the pursuit of natural history; his published works ...

included a description of the Madagascar stonechat in his ''Ornithologie'' based on a specimen collected in Madagascar. He used the French name ''Le traquet de Madagascar'' and the Latin ''Rubetra Madagascariensis''. The two stars (**) at the start of the section indicates that Brisson based his description on the examination of a specimen. Although Brisson coined Latin names, these do not conform to the binomial system and are not recognised by the International Commission on Zoological Nomenclature. When in 1766 the Swedish naturalist

Carl Linnaeus Carl Linnaeus (; 23 May 1707 – 10 January 1778), also known after his Nobility#Ennoblement, ennoblement in 1761 as Carl von Linné#Blunt, Blunt (2004), p. 171. (), was a Swedish botanist, zoologist, taxonomist, and physician who formalise ...

updated his '' Systema Naturae'' for the twelfth edition, he added 240 species that had been previously described by Brisson. One of these was the Madagascar stonechat. Linnaeus included a brief description, coined the binomial name ''Motacilla sibilla'' and cited Brisson's work. The specific name ''sibilla'' is from the Latin ''sibilare'' "to whistle". This species is now placed in the genus ''

Saxicola ''Saxicola'' (Latin: ''saxum'', rock + ''incola'', dwelling in.), the stonechats or chats, is a genus of 15 species of small passerine birds restricted to the Old World. They are insectivores occurring in open scrubland and grassland with scatte ...

'' that was introduced by the German naturalist Johann Matthäus Bechstein in 1802. The Madagascar stonechat has generally been considered a subspecies of African stonechat (as ''Saxicola torquatus sibilla''), but recent genetic evidence has shown that it is distinct, more closely related to Reunion stonechat than it is to African stonechat, on which basis it is now accepted as a distinct species. Three subspecies are recognised.

References

External links

Xeno-canto: audio recordings of the Madagascan stonechat
Madagascar stonechat Endemic birds of Madagascar Madagascar stonechat Madagascar stonechat {{Muscicapidae-stub