Mediterranean Crossbills are as much differentiated as L. scotica and L. pytyopsittacus. They are sedentary, linked to pine trees
and have evolved a thicker bill to extract the seeds from Pine cones.
Their decolorization could be due to dietary causes. The authors studied
biometrics, breeding phenology, and primary food of Italian popula tions living in Calabria and Etna (Sicily) and compared them with the
other Mediterranean populations. A coevolutive radiation between the
different populations of Mediterranean Crossbills presently living in
the three main peninsulas, adiacent islands and North Africa occurred
separately and this may be demonstrated by their morphometrics, their
sedentariness, as well as by songs and some genetic results recently
published. They conclude that the same criteria followed to raise L.
curvirostra scotica to the species rank as scotica occur also for the dif ferent Mediterranean population
