Hainan peacock-pheasant


The Hainan peacock-pheasant is an endangered bird that belongs to the pheasant family Phasianidae. This extremely rare species is endemic to the island of Hainan, China.

Description

The bird was long considered a subspecies of grey peacock-pheasant or Polyplectron bicalcaratum. The Hainan peacock-pheasant is smaller, and it possesses a short crest and ruff. It has red facial skin as opposed to grey in the yellow-orange facial skin of the grey peacock-pheasant. Beebe noted various plumage differences between the two and considered them separate species.

Taxonomy

Due to lack of detailed taxonomic studies, whether it was truly a subspecies or a full species remained unclear. Scientists used molecular markers, including the complete mitochondrial cytochrome b gene and intron G of the nuclear ovomucoid gene, to reevaluate the taxonomy of the Hainan peacock-pheasant. The results showed phylogeographic monophyly and large genetic distance between the Hainan peacock-pheasant and the grey peacock-pheasant. Sequence differences corroborated the species-level distinction between these two peacock-pheasants, which were inferred to have diverged about 1.4±0.3 million years ago, near the time Hainan Island became separated from mainland China. BirdLife International has also decided to recognize the split of Polyplectron katsumatae from Polyplectron bicalcaratum.

Conservation status

Due to a very low population density in tropical forest and declining population, it is now becoming severely endangered and should be regarded as the rarest species in the order Galliformes in China. Taking more conservation action immediately to protect this endangered island endemic is imperative.

Literature cited

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