I attended a lecture given by Les shortly before he moved to Sydney. He
was asked about the update and is very positive about getting it
completed as he will now be working with Walter Boles rather than mostly
corresponding. I understand that there are a number of reasons for the
delay. One is that they want to give a much fuller account of the
reasons behind the taxonomy as it will be presented so the book will be
somewhat larger than the original edition. Another is that recent DNA
work has completely tossed the taxonomy of the honeyeaters in the air
and that needs to be straightened out. For example, the Regent
Honeyeater turns out to be a wattlebird and is placed between the Red
and Yellow on one side and the Little and Western on the other. Black,
Pied and Banded Honeyeaters are not closely related but widely
separated. Spinebills (from memory) come somewhere near the start of
the tree and chats fall right in the middle of the honeyeaters. I
believe Les was looking at mid next year for the book, but don't quote
me on that.
Regards,
Tania
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