Biology:Junglefowl

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Junglefowl are the four extant species of bird from the genus Gallus in the order Galliformes. They occur in parts of South and Southeast Asia. One of the species in this genus, the red junglefowl, is of historical importance as the direct ancestor of the domestic chicken, although the grey junglefowl, Sri Lankan junglefowl and green junglefowl are likely to have also been involved.[1] The Sri Lankan junglefowl is the national bird of Sri Lanka. They diverged from their common ancestor about 4–6 million years ago.[1] Although originating in Asia, junglefowl bones have also been found in Chile, which date back to 1321–1407 CE, providing evidence of possible Polynesian migration through the Pacific Ocean.[2]

Junglefowl are omnivorous, eating a variety of leaves, plant matter, invertebrates, and occasionally mice and frogs. They are large birds, with colourful plumage in males, but are often difficult to see in the dense vegetation they inhabit.

As with many birds in the pheasant family, the male takes no part in the incubation of the egg or rearing of the precocial young. These duties are performed by the drab and well-camouflaged female. Females and males do not form pair bonds.

Taxonomy

The genus Gallus was erected by the French scientist Mathurin Jacques Brisson in his Ornithologie published in 1760.[3] The type species is the red junglefowl (Gallus gallus).[4] The Swedish naturalist Carl Linnaeus had introduced the genus Gallus in the 6th edition of his Systema Naturae published in 1748,[5] but Linnaeus dropped the genus in the important tenth edition of 1758 and put the red junglefowl together with the common pheasant in the genus Phasianus.[6][7] However, the red junglefowl and common pheasant are now known to have diverged about 18–23 million years ago, and belong to different subfamilies.[1] This pairwise divergence time was also the same between the other three junglefowls and the pheasant.[1] As the publication date of Linnaeus's sixth edition was before the 1758 starting point of the International Commission on Zoological Nomenclature, Brisson and not Linnaeus is considered as the authority for the genus.[8] Template:Phylogeny/Gallus More recent phylogenetic evidence supports the closest relatives of Gallus being the bamboo partridges in the genus Bambusicola, from which they diverged about 15 million years ago.[9]

Extant species

The genus contains four species.[10]

Genus Gallus Brisson, 1760 – four species
Common name Scientific name and subspecies Range Size and ecology IUCN status and estimated population
Red junglefowl


Male
{{{image2-alt}}}
Female

Gallus gallus
(Linnaeus, 1758)

India, Pakistan, eastwards across Indochina and southern China and into Malaysia, Singapore, Philippines and Indonesia
Map of range
Size:

Habitat:

Diet:
 LC 


Sri Lankan junglefowl


Male
{{{image2-alt}}}
Female

Gallus lafayettii
Lesson, 1831
Sri Lanka
Map of range
Size:

Habitat:

Diet:
 LC 


Grey junglefowl


Male
{{{image2-alt}}}
Female

Gallus sonneratii
Temminck, 1813
Indian Peninsula, but extends into Gujarat, Madhya Pradesh, south Rajasthan, and Pakistani Punjab
Map of range
Size:

Habitat:

Diet:
 LC 


Green junglefowl


Male
{{{image2-alt}}}
Female

Gallus varius
(Shaw, 1798)
Java, Bali, Lombok, Komodo, Flores, Rinca, and small islands linking Java with Flores, Indonesia Size:

Habitat:

Diet:
 LC 



Fossil record

Prehistorically, the genus Gallus was found all over Eurasia; in fact, it appears to have evolved in southeastern Europe. A number of fossil species have been described, but their distinctness is not firmly established in most cases:

  • Gallus aesculapii Jánossy, 1976 (Late Miocene/Early Pliocene of Greece) - possibly belongs in Pavo[12]
  • Gallus moldovicus Burchak, Ganea & Shushpanov, 1993 (Late Pliocene of Moldavia) - sometimes misspelt moldavicus, may be synonym of Pavo bravardi[12]
  • Gallus beremendensis Jánossy, 1976 (Late Pliocene/Early Pleistocene of Eastern Europe)
  • Giant junglefowl Gallus karabachensis Burchak and Aliev, 1989 (Early Pleistocene of Nagorno-Karabakh)
  • Gallus tamanensis Burchak-Abramovich & Potapova, 1996 (Early Pleistocene? of Taman Peninsula)
  • Gallus kudarensis Burchak-Abramovich & Potapova, 1996 (Early/Middle Pleistocene of Kudaro, South Ossetia)
  • Gallus europaeus Harrison, 1978 (Middle Pleistocene of Italy)
  • Gallus imereticus Burchak-Abramovich & Potapova, 1996 (Late Pleistocene of Gvardjilas-Klde, Imeretia)
  • Gallus meschtscheriensis Burchak-Abramovich & Potapova, 1996 (Late Pleistocene of Soungir, Russia)
  • Gallus georgicus Burchak-Abramovich & Potapova, 1996 (Late Pleistocene - Early Holocene of Georgia)
  • Gallus sp. (Middle/Late Pleistocene of Trinka Cave, Moldavia)
  • Gallus sp. (Late Pleistocene of Krivtcha Cave, Ukraine)
  • Gallus sp. (Early Holocene of Dnieper region)

References

  1. 1.0 1.1 1.2 1.3 Lawal, R.A. (2020). "The wild species genome ancestry of domestic chickens". BMC Biology 18 (13): 13. doi:10.1186/s12915-020-0738-1. PMID 32050971. 
  2. Storey, Alice (June 2007). "Radiocarbon and DNA Evidence for a Pre-Columbian Introduction of Polynesian Chickens to Chile". Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences 104 (25): 10335–10339. doi:10.1073/pnas.0703993104. PMID 17556540. PMC 1965514. Bibcode2007PNAS..10410335S. https://www.pnas.org/content/pnas/104/25/10335.full.pdf. 
  3. Brisson, Mathurin Jacques (1760) (in fr, la). Ornithologie, ou, Méthode contenant la division des oiseaux en ordres, sections, genres, especes & leurs variétés. 1. Paris: Jean-Baptiste Bauche. Vol. 1, p. 26, Vol. 1, p. 166. 
  4. Peters, James Lee, ed (1934). Check-list of Birds of the World. 2. Cambridge, Massachusetts: Harvard University Press. p. 118. https://biodiversitylibrary.org/page/14482931. 
  5. Linnaeus, Carl (1748) (in la). Systema Naturae sistens regna tria naturae, in classes et ordines, genera et species redacta tabulisque aeneis illustrata (6th ed.). Stockholmiae (Stockholm): Godofr, Kiesewetteri. pp. 16, 28. https://biodiversitylibrary.org/page/25749140. 
  6. Linnaeus, Carl (1758) (in la). Systema Naturæ per regna tria naturae, secundum classes, ordines, genera, species, cum characteribus, differentiis, synonymis, locis. 1 (10th ed.). Holmiae (Stockholm): Laurentii Salvii. p. 158. https://biodiversitylibrary.org/page/727065. 
  7. Allen, J.A. (1910). "Collation of Brisson's genera of birds with those of Linnaeus". Bulletin of the American Museum of Natural History 28: 317–335. 
  8. . "Article 3". International Code of Zoological Nomenclature (4th ed.). London: International Trust for Zoological Nomenclature. 1999. ISBN 978-0-85301-006-7. http://www.nhm.ac.uk/hosted-sites/iczn/code/index.jsp?article=3&nfv=true. 
  9. "Galliformes" (in de-DE). http://www.bird-phylogeny.de/superorders/galloanseres/galliformes/. 
  10. Gill, Frank; Donsker, David, eds (2017). "Pheasants, partridges & francolins". World Bird List Version 7.3. International Ornithologists' Union. http://www.worldbirdnames.org/bow/pheasants/. 
  11. (in en) IOC World Bird List 13.1 (Report). doi:10.14344/ioc.ml.13.1. https://www.worldbirdnames.org/ioc-lists/crossref. 
  12. 12.0 12.1 Mourer-Chauviré, Cécile (1989). "A peafowl from the Pliocene of Perpignan, France". Palaeontology 32 (2): 439. https://www.palass.org/sites/default/files/media/publications/palaeontology/volume_32/vol32_part2_pp439-446.pdf. 
  • Steve Madge; Philip J. K. McGowan; Guy M. Kirwan (2002). Pheasants, Partidges and Grouse: A Guide to the Pheasants, Partridges, Quails, Grouse, Guineafowl, Payton Moore, Buttonquails and Sandgrouse of the World. A&C Black. ISBN 978-0-7136-3966-7. 

Template:Phasianidae Template:Pangalliformes Wikidata ☰ Q222951 entry