Order
Galliformes
Family
Cracidae
Genus
Ortalis
 
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Version 1.0

This is a historic version of this account.  Current version

SPECIES

West Mexican Chachalaca Ortalis poliocephala

Claudia I. Rodríguez-Flores and Marîa del Coro Arizmendi
Version: 1.0 — Published April 25, 2014

Systematics

Geographic Variation

Ortalis poliocephala is monotypic. Ortalis poliocephala lajuelae Moore and Medina 1957 was believed by some authors to represent intergrades between poliocephala and Ortalis wagleri (Rufous-bellied Chachalaca), and so was not recognized as a valid taxon (Vaurie 1965, Hardy and Webber 1975). Banks (1990), however, saw no difference at all in poliocephala across the range of the species, and so considered lajuelae to be a synonym of poliocephala.

Subspecies

Related Species

Described as Penelope poliocephala Wagler 1830; type locality "Mexico". Stresemann (1954: 89) identified Real de Arriba, México, Mexico as the type locality.

Formerly many authors classified poliocephala as a subspecies of Ortalis vetula (Plain Chachalaca) (e.g. Griscom 1934, Peters 1934, Hellmayr and Conover 1942, Ridgway and Friedmann 1946, Friedmann et al. 1950). Moore and Medina (1957) reinstated poliocephala as a species, but included wagleri (Rufous-bellied Chachalaca) as a subspecies of poliocephala, based on a narrow zone of introgression in northern Jalisco. Banks (1990) noted no signs of introgression north or south of this narrow region. Banks (1990) further proposed that in fact there was no population in the region that was intermediate between wagleri and poliocephala, and that the few specimens from the region, intermediate between the two taxa, perhaps represented escapes from a mixed population in captivity. Subsequent authors followed Banks (1990) in elevating wagleri to species rank, leaving poliocephala as monotypic. Howell and Webb (1995) cast doubt on Banks' conclusions as "unverified conjecture", however, and considered captive chachalacas to be rare in Mexico, and hence an unlikely source for hybrid specimens.

Recommended Citation

Rodríguez-Flores, C. I. and M. d. C. Arizmendi (2014). West Mexican Chachalaca (Ortalis poliocephala), version 1.0. In Neotropical Birds Online (T. S. Schulenberg, Editor). Cornell Lab of Ornithology, Ithaca, NY, USA. https://doi.org/10.2173/nb.wemcha1.01