Great Grey Shrike © birdguides.com

Vagrant to Bermuda, Brunei Darussalam, Cyprus, Equatorial Guinea, Faroe Islands, Gambia (B) (NB), Ghana, Iceland, Ireland, Malta, North Korea, South Korea, Sri Lanka.

Unknown to Mexico.

Forms a superspecies with Loggerhead Shrike (Lanius ludovicianus), Iberian Grey Shrike (Lanius meridionalis) and Chinese Grey Shrike (Lanius sphenocercus). Sometimes treated as conspecific with Iberian Grey Shrike (Lanius meridionalis), but the two overlap slightly in range, with little intergradation, in central Asia.

In Nearctic, invictus apparently interbreeds with borealis in central Canada (north-eastern Manitoba and northern Ontario) and is sometimes synonymized with latter; sibiricus and mollis intergrade in north-western Mongolia.

Proposed subspecies leucopterus (from upper R Naryn, in Kyrgyzstan) regarded as synonymous with homeyeri.

The following 19 subspecies are recognised:

• invictus Grinnell, 1900   -  Breeds Alaska (except north) and north-western and north-central Canada (Yukon and Northwest Territories, and extreme N British Columbia east to northern Ontario). Non-breeding southern Canada and most of W and central USA.
• algeriensis Lesson, R, 1839   -  North-western Africa along Atlantic and Mediterranean coasts east to northern Tunisia and northern Libya (northern Tripolitania, northern Cyrenaica), south to coastal north-western Mauritania and northern Sahara. Considered by some authors to be a subspecies of Iberian Grey Shrike (Lanius meridionalis).
• borealis Vieillot, 1808   -  Breeds north-eastern Canada (northern Ontario and northern and central Quebec east to Labrador). Non-breeding south-eastern Canada and central and eastern USA. Considered by some authors to be a distinct species, Northern Grey Shrike (Lanius borealis).
• excubitor Linnaeus, 1758   -  Breeds north, central and north-eastern Europe (eastern from Scandinavia and central France) east to north-western Siberia (lower R Ob), southern to southern Russia (Kazan area). Non-breeding southern Scandinavia, Britain and western and southern France east to Asia Minor, Caucasus and Transcaspia.
• sibiricus Bogdanov, 1881   -  Breeds central and eastern Siberia eastern to Kolyma Basin, Anadyrland and Chukotsk Peninsula, south to L Baikal, N Mongolia and south-eastern Russia (northern Amurland), possibly also northern Kurils (Paramushir I). Non-breeding south-central Siberia, Mongolia, north-eastern China (N Manchuria, perhaps northern Hebei) and Ussuriland. Considered by some authors to be a subspecies of Northern Grey Shrike (Lanius borealis).
• homeyeri Cabanis, 1873   -  Breeds south-eastern Europe (eastern Balkans, Bulgaria, southern Romania, Ukraine east to foothills of southern Urals) and SW Siberia (east to northern foothills of Altai, including Naryn region); non-breeding south-western and central Asia.
• mollis Eversmann, 1853   -  Breeds central-southern Russia (Altai and Sayan Mts) and north-western Mongolia. Non-breeding also northern China. Considered by some authors to be a subspecies of Northern Grey Shrike (Lanius borealis).
• funereus Menzbier, 1894   -  Dzhungarian Alatau Mts (E Kazakhstan) and southern and eastern Tien Shan (Kyrgystan-north-western China). Considered by some authors to be a subspecies of Northern Grey Shrike (Lanius borealis).
• bianchii E. J. O. Hartert, 1907   -  Breeds Sakhalin I and southern Kuril Is. Non-breeding northern Japan (Hokkaido, rarely farther south). Considered by some authors to be a subspecies of Northern Grey Shrike (Lanius borealis).
• koenigi Hartert, 1901   -  Canary Is. Considered by some authors to be a subspecies of Iberian Grey Shrike (Lanius meridionalis).
• elegans Swainson, 1832   -  Northern and central Sahara from north-eastern Mauritania, north-western Mali, and southern Tunisia east to central and southern Libya, Egypt (including northern and central Sinai Peninsula), north-eastern Sudan (south to Port Sudan) and south-western Israel; possibly also north-eastern Niger. Considered by some authors to be a subspecies of Iberian Grey Shrike (Lanius meridionalis).
• leucopygos Hemprich & Ehrenberg, 1833   -  Southern Sahara and Sahel from Mauritania to western and central Sudan.
• aucheri Bonaparte, 1853   -  Central-eastern Sudan (southern from Port Sudan), Eritrea, northern Ethiopia, north-western Somalia, Iraq, southern Iran, Syria, south-eastern Israel, south-eastern Sinai Peninsula, western Arabian Peninsula and Oman. Considered by some authors to be a subspecies of Iberian Grey Shrike (Lanius meridionalis).
• theresae Meinertzhagen, R, 1953   -  Southern Lebanon and northern Israel. Considered by some authors to be a subspecies of Iberian Grey Shrike (Lanius meridionalis).
• buryi Lorenz von Liburnau, L & Hellmayr, 1901   -  Yemen. Considered by some authors to be a subspecies of Iberian Grey Shrike (Lanius meridionalis).
• uncinatus Sclater, PL & Hartlaub, 1881   -  Socotra I. Considered by some authors to be a subspecies of Iberian Grey Shrike (Lanius meridionalis).
• lahtora (Sykes, 1832)   -  Pakistan (except north) and northern India (foothills of Himalayas) south to Karnataka, east to central Bangladesh. Considered by some authors to be a subspecies of Iberian Grey Shrike (Lanius meridionalis).
• pallidirostris Cassin, 1851   -  Iran to arid steppes of western China (Xinjiang, Gansu and Ningsia). Considered by some authors to be a distinct species, Steppe Grey Shrike (Lanius pallidirostris).
• leucopterus Severtsov, 1875   -  Western Siberia to Yenisey River.

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