''Ptilopachus'' is an African genus 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 lightweig ...
s in the
New World quail
The New World quail are small birds only distantly related to the Old World quail, but named for their similar appearance and habits. The American species are in their own family, the Odontophoridae, whereas Old World quail are in the pheasant ...
family.
Taxonomy
The genus ''Ptilopachus '' was introduced in 1837 by the English naturalist
William John Swainson to accommodate a single species, the
stone partridge, which is therefore the
type species
In zoological nomenclature, a type species (''species typica'') is the species name with which the name of a genus or subgenus is considered to be permanently taxonomically associated, i.e., the species that contains the biological type specime ...
. The genus name is from
Ancient Greek
Ancient Greek includes the forms of the Greek language used in ancient Greece and the ancient world from around 1500 BC to 300 BC. It is often roughly divided into the following periods: Mycenaean Greek (), Dark Ages (), the Archaic p ...
''ptilon'' meaning "feather" with ''pakhus'' meaning "thick" or "dense".
As traditionally defined, only the
stone partridge was included in this genus, but based on
genetic evidence, it now also includes
Nahan's partridge
Nahan's partridge (''Ptilopachus nahani''), also known as the Nahan's francolin, is a bird traditionally placed in the family Phasianidae. As suggested by its alternative name, it was formerly believed to be a francolin and placed either in ''Fr ...
(formerly considered a
francolin
Francolins are birds in the tribe Gallini that traditionally have been placed in the genus ''Francolinus'', but now commonly are divided into multiple genera.
As previously defined, they were paraphyletic as the genus '' Pternistis'', which wa ...
). The study also concludes that this genus is more closely related to the
New World quail
The New World quail are small birds only distantly related to the Old World quail, but named for their similar appearance and habits. The American species are in their own family, the Odontophoridae, whereas Old World quail are in the pheasant ...
s (Odontophoridae) and might be considered their only African representative.
Description
At about in length, both are relatively small,
terrestrial
Terrestrial refers to things related to land or the planet Earth.
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 or near the ground, as opposed to ...
birds with a red eye-ring, base of the bill, and legs, and brownish upperparts.
[McGowan, P. J. K. (1994). Francolins (genus ''Francolinus''). Pp. 489-504 in: del Hoyo, J., Elliott, A., & Sargatal, J. eds. (1994). '' Handbook of the Birds of the World.'' Vol. 2. New World Vultures to Guineafowl. Lynx Edicions, Barcelon. ]
See also
*''
Donacobius'', the only American species of an otherwise Old World bird lineage
References
Bird genera
{{Galliformes-stub