''Poecile'' is a genus of birds in the tit family Paridae. It contains 15 species, which are scattered across

North America North America is a continent in the Northern Hemisphere and almost entirely within the Western Hemisphere. It is bordered to the north by the Arctic Ocean, to the east by the Atlantic Ocean, to the southeast by South America and the Car ...

, Europe and Asia; the North American species are the chickadees. In the past, most authorities retained ''Poecile'' as a subgenus within the genus '' Parus'', but treatment as a distinct genus, initiated by the

American Ornithologists Union The American Ornithological Society (AOS) is an ornithological organization based in the United States. The society was formed in October 2016 by the merger of the American Ornithologists' Union (AOU) and the Cooper Ornithological Society. Its ...

, is now widely accepted. This is supported by mtDNA cytochrome ''b'' sequence analysis. The genus ''Poecile'' was erected by the German naturalist

Johann Jakob Kaup Johann Jakob von Kaup (10 April 1803 – 4 July 1873) was a German naturalist. A proponent of natural philosophy, he believed in an innate mathematical order in nature and he attempted biological classifications based on the Quinarian system. Kaup ...

in 1829. The type species was subsequently designated as the marsh tit (''Poecile palustris'') by English zoologist George Robert Gray in 1842. The name ''Poecile'' is from Ancient Greek ''poikilos'' "colourful". A related word ''poikilidos'' denoted an unidentified small bird. It has traditionally been treated as feminine (giving name endings such as ''cincta''); however, this was not specified by the original genus author

, and under the

ICZN The International Code of Zoological Nomenclature (ICZN) is a widely accepted convention in zoology that rules the formal scientific naming of organisms treated as animals. It is also informally known as the ICZN Code, for its publisher, the I ...

the genus name must therefore be treated by default as masculine, giving name endings such as ''cinctus''.

Species

The genus includes the following fifteen species:

References

Bird genera {{Paridae-stub