With its position in the middle of the Americas, Venezuela provides an ideal stop-over for migratory shorebirds on their annual journeys between high northern latitudes and the tropics, or onward to the southern hemisphere. Thirty-five species use Venezuela’s wetlands, alongside a further 13 residents, and aerial and terrestrial shorebird surveys conducted since the 1980s confirm the regional importance of the country’s coasts and marshes. Video credit: Carolina Dávila We have been involved in shorebird work […]
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Genetics, geographies and good looks: unravelling the taxonomy of the glossy swiftlets
Since Ernst Mayr defined species in 1942 (1), classifying swiftlets (Aves, Collocaliini) into taxonomic groups has presented a major challenge. The glossy swiftlets represent some of the most taxonomically challenging and relatively under-studied birds in the family Apodidae. The appearance of white-bellied glossy swiftlets (the Collocalia esculenta group) is somewhat unremarkable. They all have dark, black plumage with a green or blue gloss. Until recently, phenotypic characters were used to separate the species of white-bellied […]
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