Researchers have found that the tiger-parrots of New Guinea‘s rainforests – named for their striped or barred plumage – are not, as has been widely accepted, closely related either to a group of rosella-like parrots found in Australia and Oceania, nor a similar group found in Asia and Africa. In press in Molecular Phylogenetics and Evolution, the scientists report that tiger-parrots instead occupy their own perch on the parrot evolutionary tree. Co-author, the Director of CSIRO’s Australian National Wildlife Collection (ANWC) Dr. Leo Joseph, said the findings will help improve our understanding of how parrots have evolved. “This research on tiger-parrots – and some other enigmatic Australian parrots such as the little-known Night Parrot of inland Australian deserts – sheds light on the bigger picture of parrot evolution for Australia and New Guinea,” Dr. Joseph said. “It has shown for the first time, for example, that tiger-parrots represent a very early branch of the parrot evolutionary tree in Australia and New Guinea. “The research team’s quest has been to understand the true places of parrots such as the Night Parrot and the tiger-parrots in the ecological and evolutionary history of parrots across the Australian continent. “During our research on these oddball parrots of Australia and New Guinea, we affirmed that the Australian parrots are far from one cohesive group. They appear, instead, to be made up of about five different main branches of the parrot evolutionary tree,” Dr Joseph said. “We have shown that the New Guinea tiger-parrots aren’t rosella-like parrots and that their resemblance in some aspects of their appearance to rosellas probably indicates some plumage characters that have been part of the evolution of parrots of Australia and New Guinea for a long time.Login Or Register To Read Full Story