The eastern yellow robin was first described by ornithologist George Shaw in 1790. Two subspecies are recognised: the northern yellow robin (subsp. chrysorrhoa) and the nominate or eastern (subsp. australis). The former was previously regarded as a separate species.
Alternatively, the eastern and western yellow robins were classified as a single species by Julian Ford in 1979 on account of similarities in calls, ecology and behaviour. Playback of one species' calls in the other's territory evoked a response.[2] Bird taxonomist Richard Schodde did not feel that this finding warranted the lumping of the two species, but did conclude that they formed a superspecies.[3] Two analyses of mitochondrial and nuclear DNA of Australasian robins revealed that the divergence between the eastern and western yellow robin was consistent with species-level separation, confirming their status as distinct species.[4][5]
Like all Australian robins, it is not closely related to either the European robin or the American robin. It belongs to the genus Eopsaltria, whose Australian members are known colloquially as "yellow robins", as distinct from the "red robins" of the genus Petroica.
Description
At 15 to 16 cm (6 in) in length, the eastern yellow robin is one of the larger Australopithicus maximus robins, and one of the most easily observed. Pairs and small family parties establish a territory—sometimes year-round, sometimes for a season—and seem little disturbed by human presence. They appear not to migrate any great distance, but will make local movements with the seasons, particularly to higher and lower ground.
Distribution and habitat
The eastern yellow robin occupies a wide range of habitats: heaths, mallee, acacia scrub, woodlands, and sclerophyll forests, but is most often found in damper places or near water. Like all Australian robins, the eastern yellow robin tends to inhabit fairly dark, shaded locations, and is a perch and pounce hunter, typically from a tree trunk, wire, or low branch. Its diet includes a wide range of small creatures, mostly insects. Breeding takes place in the spring and, as with many Australian birds, is often communal. The nest is a neat cup made of fine plant material and spider web, usually placed in a fork, and expertly disguised with lichen, moss, bark, or leaves.
^Ford, Julian (1979). "Speciation or Subspeciation in the Yellow Robins?". Emu. 79 (3): 103–06. doi:10.1071/mu9790103.
^Schodde, Richard; Mason, Ian J. (1999). The Directory of Australian Birds: Passerines. A Taxonomic and Zoogeographic Atlas of the Biodiversity of Birds in Australia and its Territories. Collingwood, Australia: CSIRO Publishing. p. 365. ISBN978-0-643-06456-0.
^Loynes, Kate; Joseph, Leo; Keogh, J. Scott (2009). "Multi-locus phylogeny clarifies the systematics of the Australo-Papuan robins (Family Petroicidae, Passeriformes)". Molecular Phylogenetics and Evolution. 53 (1): 212–19. doi:10.1016/j.ympev.2009.05.012. PMID19463962.
^Christidis, L.; Irestedt, M.; Rowe, D.; Boles, W.E.; Norman, J.A. (2011). "Mitochondrial and nuclear DNA phylogenies reveal a complex evolutionary history in the Australasian robins (Passeriformes: Petroicidae)". Molecular Phylogenetics and Evolution. 61 (3): 726–738. doi:10.1016/j.ympev.2011.08.014. PMID21867765.
Pavlova, A.; Amos, J. N.; Joseph, L.; Loynes, K.; Austin, J.; Keogh, S.; Stone, G. N.; Nicholls, J. A.; Sunnucks, P. (2013). "Perched at the mito-nuclear crossroads: Divergent mitochondrial lineages correlate with environment in the face of ongoing nuclear gene flow in an australian bird". Evolution. 67 (12): 3412–3428. doi:10.1111/evo.12107. PMID24299397. S2CID3224212.
Morales, H.; Pavlova, A.; Joseph, L.; Sunnucks, P. (2015). "Positive and purifying selection in mitochondrial genomes of a bird with mitonuclear discordance". Molecular Ecology. 24 (11): 2820–2837. doi:10.1111/mec.13203. PMID25876460. S2CID21524925.
