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The Asian house martin (''Delichon dasypus'') is a migratory passerine bird of the swallow family Hirundinidae. It has mainly blue-black upperparts, other than its white rump, and has pale grey underparts. Its three subspecies breed in the Himalayas and in central and eastern Asia, and spend the winter lower in the mountains or in Southeast Asia. This species is locally abundant and is expanding northward in Siberia, so there are no concerns about its conservation status. This martin breeds in colonies, building mud nests under an overhang on a vertical cliff or the wall of a building. Both sexes build the nest, incubate the three or four white eggs and feed the chicks. The Asian house martin feeds on small insects taken in flight, usually caught high in the air. The presence of terrestrial springtails and Lepidoptera larvae in its diet indicates that food is sometime picked from the ground. ==Taxonomy== The Asian house martin was first formally described from a bird collected in Borneo by French naturalist and ornithologist Charles Lucien Bonaparte in 1850 as ''Chelidon dasypus'',〔Bonaparte's nomenclature is confusing, and he may have intended ''Hirundo dasypus''. See Appendix 1〕 shortly before it was moved to the new genus ''Delichon'' by British entomologist Frederic Moore and American naturalist Thomas Horsfield in 1854. ''Delichon'' is an anagram of the Ancient Greek term ''χελιδών'' (''chelīdōn''), meaning "swallow", and ''dasypus'' is from Greek ''δασύπους'' "rough-legged". This martin's closest relatives are the two other members of the ''Delichon'' genus, the Nepal house martin and the common house martin. There are three subspecies:〔 *''D. d. dasypus'', the nominate subspecies described by Bonaparte, which breeds in eastern Russia and nearby islands *''D. d. cashmeriensis'', the Himalayan and central Asian form described by English ornithologist John Gould in 1858 from a Kashmiri specimen obtained by Andrew Leith Adams *''D. d. nigrimentalis'', the form which is found in the south east of the breeding range, was described by German ornithologist Ernst Hartert in 1910 from a specimen taken in Fujian, southeast China. 抄文引用元・出典: フリー百科事典『 ウィキペディア（Wikipedia）』 ■ウィキペディアで「Asian house martin」の詳細全文を読む スポンサード リンク
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