Climacteris

Climacteris
Brown treecreeper (Climacteris picumnus)
Scientific classification
Kingdom:	Animalia
Phylum:	Chordata
Class:	Aves
Order:	Passeriformes
Family:	Climacteridae
Genus:	Climacteris Temminck, 1820
Type species
Climacteris picumnus Temminck, 1824
Synonyms
Whitlocka G. M. Mathews, 1912. Neoclima G. M. Mathews, 1912.

Climacteris is a genus of bird in the family Climacteridae. These birds and the other members of the family, genus Cormobates, are similar to Northern Hemisphere creepers, Certhiidae, in climbing helically up tree trunks looking for insect food. Differences from Cormobates are

• Climacteris species have black, slightly downcurved bills.
• They have a rusty chest stripe in the female. (In Cormobates the female is marked on the face.)
• They have simple vocal repertoires that are the same for both sexes.
• They lay heavily marked pinkish eggs (Simpson and Day 1999).
• They are cooperative breeders; male offspring of previous broods and sometimes other individuals help breeding pairs (Doerr, 2003).

It contains the following species:

Image	Scientific name	Common name	Distribution
	Climacteris affinis	White-browed treecreeper	Australia.
	Climacteris erythrops	Red-browed treecreeper	Australia
	Climacteris picumnus	Brown treecreeper	Cape York, Queensland, throughout New South Wales and Victoria to Port Augusta and the Flinders Ranges, South Australia
	Climacteris melanurus	Black-tailed treecreeper	north and northwestern Australia
	Climacteris rufus	Rufous treecreeper	Australia.

The Australian author G. M. Mathews published new generic names in 1912, based on characteristics that distinguished two species from this genus,

• Whitlocka, to describe the black-tailed northwestern species, Climacteris melanurus. The generic epithet honoured the ornithologist F. Lawson Whitlock.
• Neoclima, assigning the species Climacteris picumnus, brown treecreeper, of Temminck as the type.

References

Further reading

• Doerr, V. A. J. (2003). "Australasian Treecreepers (Climacteridae)". In Christopher Perrins (ed.). The New Encyclopedia of Birds. Oxford University Press. ISBN 0-19-852506-0.
• Peterson, Alan P. (Editor). 1999. Zoological Nomenclature Resource (Zoonomen). Accessed 2007-08-30.
• Simpson, Ken; Day, Nicolas (1999). Birds of Australia. Princeton University Press. pp. 369–370. ISBN 0-691-04995-5. Retrieved 2007-08-30.

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