In their 1990 work, Sibley and Monroe recognized a group comprising approximately 824 species, distributed primarily in the New World (the exception being the Old World buntings (genera Urocynchramus, Melophus, Latoucheornis, Emberiza, and Miliaria). They ranked this group at the subfamily, calling it the Emberizinae. In earlier taxonomies (e.g., AOU Checklist [1983]), the family Emberizidae had comprised species in 6 subfamilies, including the wood warblers (Parulinae), bananaquits (Coerebinae), tanagers (Thraupinae), cardinals (Cardinalinae), New World sparrows (Emberizinae), and blackbirds and allies (Icterinae). Sibley and Monroe demoted this family to subfamilial status, and the subfamilies to tribal status, placing the subfamily as a whole as sister to the subfamily Fringillinae (the chaffinch, canaries, finches, siskins, etc.) within the family Fringillidae. In addition to this re-ranking, Sibley and Monroe eliminated one group (the Coerebinae, which was lumped with the tanagers), and profoundly reorganized the membership of emberizine tribal groups. One of the most significant rearrangements involved shifting a large number of South and Central American “sparrows” from the true sparrow group (Emberizini) to the tanagers (Thraupini), a conclusion long foreshadowed by the pioneering DNA-DNA hybridization work of Anthony Bledsoe. Another rearrangement shifted the olive warbler (Peucedramus taeniatus) from the wood warblers (Parulini) to a basal position within the family Fringillidae, recognized at the subfamily level by the name Peucedraminae. This conclusion was foreshadowed by early morphological work on this species (George 1962, 1968), and supported by subsequent work using mitochondrial data (Groth 1998). Recent analyses using molecular data suggest a relationship between the olive warbler and the Old World accentors (Prunellidae; Ericson and Johansson 2003), adding to the list of recognized phyletic connections between the New and Old World passerine faunas.
More recent studies indicate that this rearrangement of emberizine taxa is incomplete. For instance, molecular data now strongly support movement of the frugivorous euphonias and chlorophonias from the Thraupini to a completely different subfamily, with the finches (Fringillinae; Burns 1997, Klicka et al. 2000, Lovette and Bermingham 2002, Yuri and Mindell 2002). Also, the longspurs and buntings appear to be deeply divergent within the group, widely separated from the true sparrows (Klicka et al. 2000). Our collaboration has gathered preliminary data from a set of 28 Emberizinae, as well as 5 species from the sister group Fringillinae, and 2 outgroups of the Motacillidae. We have sequenced four genes for these taxa, including the two mitochondrial genes cytochrome b and ND2, and two nuclear loci RAG-1 and the seventh intron of b-fibrinogen (see below).
Even these preliminary results strongly support paraphyly of all tribes
of Emberizinae, with the exception of the blackbirds and allies (Icterini).
Because of the rampant paraphyly of these groups, it is clear that work
on any “single” group cannot proceed without considering all of the others.
Our collaboration, composed of researchers who have worked on each of these
groups, until now largely independently, is now coordinating gene and taxon
sampling in order to obtain a near-complete species-level phylogeny of
the entire assemblage, using DNA sequence data from a combination of mitochondrial and nuclear loci.
Our collaboration met to coordinate our work on 16 November 2003, as evidenced below. Foreground, left to right: Irby Lovette, John Klicka. Background, left to right: Scott Lanyon, Kevin Burns, Keith Barker. Trays on left, front to back: 1) Tangara (Thraupini), 2) Macroagelaius, Pseudoleistes, Hypopyrrhus, Sturnella (Icterini), 3) Passerina (Cardinalini). Trays on right, front to back: 1) Dendroica (Parulini), 2) Atlapetes (??, Emberizini), 3) Icteria, Granatellus, Zeledonia (currently Parulini...).
