[The Great grey Shrike Lanius excubitor L. of the Arrigoni degli Oddi’s ornithological collection at the Museo Civico di Zoologia, Rome (Italy)]

[Lanius excubitor is a polymorphic species with 12 subspecies. In the last years the taxonomy of this species has been reviewed several times. According to the literature, in Italy Lanius excubitor is a regular migrator, wintering and irregular nesting, occurring with three subspecies: L. excubitor excubitor, L. e. homeyeri and L. e. sibiricus. This paper aims at reviewing the subspecies actually occurring in Italy by analyzing the specimens preserved in the Arrigoni degli Oddi’s collection at the Museo Civico di Zoologia in Rome (Italy). The morphometrics and colouring of 66 specimens were examined in relation to the most recent literature data. This review allowed to demonstrate that all specimens described as L. e. homeyeri in this collection have to be attributed to the nominate subspecies; only the specimen described as L. przelwaskii (now L. e. leucopterus) is a true L. e. homeyeri. According to these data, the ssp. homeyeri must be considered very rare in Italy, contrarily to some previously reported information. Specimens ascribed to L. borealis sibiricus do not show the characters of this subspecies, consequently they should not be included in the check list of Italian species.] [Article in Italian

Sinanthropic avifauna: an introduction.

In the present contribution the importance of qualitative and quantitative approach in the realization of Italian urban ornithological atlases is discussed. The importance of these atlases as tools for the investigation of urban biodiversity is also highlighted

Check-list of the birds of Latium, updated to 2009.

This check-list includes all species found in Latium, assigning them the AERC categories. In this region 397 species are included in the Lists A, B and C, 16 species in the List D, and 70 in the List E. The accidental species are 82, 14 of them were not recorded since 1950. For each species the conventional categories are mentioned, in addition to the AERC categories

Yellow-legged Gull Larus michahellis captures and drowns a Feral Pigeon Columba livia

A Yellow-legged Gull catching a Feral Pigeon, flies to a nearby small lake and kills him drowning. This behaviour can be explained or with higher cognitive ability, related with the use of innovative methods, or with a generalist behaviour that offers the opportunity to use new techniques

A morphometric sexing approach for the Ring-necked Parakeet Psittacula krameri in Italy.

Only one fact is certain when sexing the Ring-necked Parakeet visually: adult males have a rosecoloured ring and a black bib that is fully developed by their third year. Sexually immature males (those <3 years old) and females are considered impossible to separate without using biometric measures, some additional to those in previous literature. While the biometrics of males and females overlap broadly in value, males tend to be slightly larger than females in all measurements. We tested the possibility of sexing individuals of this species using a series of biometric measurements. A total of 97 parakeets were captured and measured in 2016–17. Measurements of wing length, tail length, bill length, height and thickness, tarsus length, mass, third-primary length and number of yellow underwing coverts were recorded for these individuals. In addition, photographs of the head and wing were taken. Feather samples were taken from all individuals for DNA extraction and 45 of these birds (26 females and 19 males) have been sexed. The measurements from these known-sex individuals were pooled with the measurements for adult males and a logistic regression of the known sexes was performed to verify whether the mean value of the biometric variables was statistically different between females and males. We found that it is possible to separate the sexes using morphological measures of wing, tail, bill length and thickness, tarsus and the number of yellow underwing cover