Curruca

Curruca is a genus of Sylviid warblers, best represented in Europe, Africa, and Asia. All of these species were formerly placed in the genus Sylvia.

Curruca
Lesser whitethroat (Curruca curruca)
Scientific classification
Kingdom:	Animalia
Phylum:	Chordata
Class:	Aves
Order:	Passeriformes
Family:	Sylviidae
Genus:	Curruca Bechstein, 1802
Type species
Motacilla curruca Linnaeus, 1758
Species
Many, see text
Synonyms
Parisoma Swainson 1832. type Sylvia subcaerulea Vieillot.[1]

Taxonomy

The genus Curruca was introduced by the German naturalist Johann Matthäus Bechstein in 1802. The type species (by tautonomy) is the lesser whitethroat Curruca curruca.^[2][3][4] The name Curruca is the Latin word for an unidentified small bird mentioned by the Roman poet Juvenal.^[5] The genus was split from Sylvia in the Howard and Moore Checklist in 2014 after a molecular phylogenetic study published in 2011.^[6] The split is now recognised by most modern authorities.^[7]

Species

The genus contains 25 species:^[8]

• Barred warbler, Curruca nisoria – breeds central Palearctics; winters east Africa
• Layard's warbler, Curruca layardi – southwest Africa
• Banded parisoma, Curruca boehmi – northeast Africa
• Chestnut-vented warbler, Curruca subcoerulea – south Africa
• Lesser whitethroat, Curruca curruca – breeds in Palearctic; winters Africa, south Asia, India
• Brown parisoma, Curruca lugens – northeast Africa
• Yemen warbler, Curruca buryi – montane southwest Saudi Arabia and southwest Yemen (southwest Arabian Peninsula)
• Arabian warbler, Curruca leucomelaena – disjunctly from southeast Egypt and northeast Sudan to west, south Arabian Peninsula
• Western Orphean warbler, Curruca hortensis – breeds southwest Europe and northwest Africa; winters west Africa Senegal to Chad
• Eastern Orphean warbler, Curruca crassirostris – breeds southeast Europe to central Asia; winters northeast Africa to south Arabian Peninsula, south Iran, south Pakistan, India
• African desert warbler, Curruca deserti – Morocco to west Libya and Niger
• Asian desert warbler, Curruca nana – breeds north Iran to Mongolia and northwest China; winters northeast Africa and Asia Minor
• Tristram's warbler, Curruca deserticola – northwest Africa
• Menetries's warbler, Curruca mystacea – breeds central south Palearctic; winters northeast Africa, Arabian Peninsula
• Rüppell's warbler, Curruca ruppeli – breeds south Greece, Crete, Turkey and Syria; winters northeast Africa
• Cyprus warbler, Curruca melanothorax – breeds Cyprus; winters Egypt, Sudan
• Sardinian warbler, Curruca melanocephala – breeds southwest Palearctic; winters north Africa
• Western subalpine warbler, Curruca iberiae – breeds Iberia, south France, and extreme northwest Italy. Also northwest Africa from Morocco to Tunisia; winters northwest, west Africa
• Moltoni's warbler, Curruca subalpina – northwest to central north Italy, Corsica, Sardinia, Balearics
• Eastern subalpine warbler, Curruca cantillans – breeds northeast Italy through southeast Europe to west Turkey. Also south Italy and Sicily; winters north Africa
• Common whitethroat, Curruca communis – breeds Palearctic; winters Africa
• Spectacled warbler, Curruca conspicillata – breeds southwest Palearctic; winters northwest, north Africa
• Marmora's warbler, Curruca sarda – breeds Mediterranean Islands; winters northwest Africa
• Dartford warbler, Curruca undata – southwest Palearctic
• Balearic warbler, Curruca balearica – Balearic Islands