|
The yellow-legged gull (''Larus michahellis''), sometimes referred to as western yellow-legged gull (to distinguish it from eastern populations of yellow-legged large white-headed gulls), is a large gull of Europe, the Middle East and North Africa, which has only recently achieved wide recognition as a distinct species. It was formerly treated as a subspecies of either the Caspian gull ''L. cachinnans'', or more broadly as a subspecies of the herring gull ''L. argentatus''. It is named after the German zoologist Karl Michahelles. ==Classification== It is now generally accepted that the yellow-legged gull is a full species, but until recently there was much disagreement. For example, ''British Birds'' magazine split yellow-legged gull from herring gull in 1993 but included the Caspian gull in the former,〔Sharrock, J. T. R. (1993). Editorial. ''British Birds'' 86 (1): 1–2.〕 but the BOU in Great Britain retained the Yellow-legged Gull as a subspecies of the Herring Gull until 2007. DNA research however suggests that yellow-legged gull is actually closest to great black-backed gull ''L. marinus'' and Armenian gull ''L. armenicus'', while Caspian gull is closer to Herring gull and lesser black-backed gull ''L. fuscus'', rather than being each other's closest relatives.〔Collinson, J. M. et al. (2008). Species boundaries in the Herring and Lesser Black-backed Gull complex. ''British Birds'' 101: 340–363.〕 There are two subspecies of the yellow-legged gull:〔 *''Larus michahellis michahellis'' Naumann, 1840. Mediterranean. *''Larus michahellis atlantis'' (Dwight, 1922), syn. ''Larus fuscus atlantis'' Dwight, 1922. Macaronesia (Canary Islands, Madeira, Azores) is also sometimes known as the Atlantic gull and is potentially a full species in its own right. Birds breeding on the Atlantic coasts of Morocco, Portugal and Galicia (and spreading north from there) are usually also included here, but are sometimes considered to be a third subspecies ''L. m. lusitanius''. Atlantic Ocean birds have darker wings and back by comparison with Mediterranean birds, creating a more pronounced contrast to the white parts. 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「Yellow-legged gull」の詳細全文を読む スポンサード リンク
|