I gave up using Christidis and Boles quite some time ago because, as with all “hard copy” checklists, including the one I co-authored when at CSIRO, they are out of date the day they are published due to constant taxonomic discoveries and revisions. I prefer to use the IOC list as noted by Harvey for both my Australian and overseas lists. I much prefer the name Pacific Koel as it a far more descriptive name for the majority of the species’ distribution. The name Pacific Koel, is listed in the Zoological Catalogue of Australia, the Federal Governments series on all things biological in Australia, the relevant section of which was written by Dick Schodde and Ian Mason from CSIRO.
There was recently much discussion on the Birding-aus forum as what list Australia should follow. It appears more and more people are using either the IOC list or the Clements checklist. Both of these lists are regularly updated, the IOC often up to four times per year. I can’t see any benefit in following a list that is so out of date it’s not funny! The other unfortunate thing about C&B is that it does not list subspecies, something that is often complained about, especially by people doing EIS work and the like, which makes it even less useful.
Mark
From: Perkins, Harvey [
Sent: Wednesday, 24 August 2011 4:05 PM
To:
Cc: Canberra Birds
Subject: RE: [canberrabirds] KOELS [SEC=UNOFFICIAL]
Bruce et al,
The other commonly used source these days is the IOC World Bird List form the International Ornithological Congress (currently up to v2.9 and available at http://www.worldbirdnames.org/)
It also has three species of Eudynamys koels, with geographic distributions as below:
Eudynamys scolopaceus Asian Koel Oriental region: widespread, also Lesser Sundas
Eudynamys melanorhynchus Black-billed Koel Australasian region: Sulawesi, Sula Islands.
Eudynamys orientalis Pacific Koel Australasian region: s Moluccas to n, e Australia.
So the difference cf Christidis & Boles 2008 regarding our local species is whether you call it Eastern or Pacific Koel. Under either of these treatments, the use of Common Koel for a single encompassing species is obsolete.
cheers,
Harvey
From: Ian Fraser [
Sent: Wednesday, 24 August 2011 3:46 PM
Cc: 'Canberra Birds'
Subject: Re: [canberrabirds] KOELS
G'day Bruce. There will be those out there more qualified than I, but my understanding is that currently (ie per Chrisitidis and Boles) there are three koel species recognised (though others still recognise only one variable species from Australia to southern Asia). By their taxonomy 'our' Koel is Eudynamys orientalis, which they call Eastern Koel from the species name; it's found into the SW Pacific and west to eastern Indonesia.
E. scolopaceus, which they refer to as Asian Koel (and which ranges across southern Asia to the Philippines), has been recorded as a vagrant to Christmas Island.
hope this is of some help, and as ever I'll be interested to hear other opinions
cheers
Ian
On 24/08/2011 11:08, m("bigpond.net.au","blaags");"> wrote:
I’m interested in the up-to-date taxonomic position of koels, currently accepted English & scientific names and which species/sub-species are migrants to SE Australia. I have looked at HANZAB Vol 4, but I understand that classification has now been revised.
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