White-rumped Shama (Copsychus malabaricus) [XC207759]
by Mike Nelson from , Sri Lanka (song, subsong?)
White-rumped Shama (Copsychus malabaricus) [XC884709]
by Dave GUO from , Laos (song)
Subspecies
White-rumped Shama (Kittacincla malabarica) and White-crowned Shama (Copsychus stricklandii) (Sibley and Monroe 1990, 1993) have been lumped into Copsychus malabaricus following Collar (2004).
Subspecies stricklandii (together with barbouri) commonly treated as a separate species, but intergrades with suavis over a zone almost 300 km wide. Distinctive insular subspecies albiventris putatively worthy of species status; detailed analysis needed. Additional described subspecies based on minor differences and small sample sizes: indicus (Nepal east to northern Indochina), pellogynus (south-eastern Myanmar, Peninsular Thailand) and minor (Hainan I) regarded as synonyms of interpositus; mallopercnus (western Malaysia), javanus (western and central Java), omissus (eastern Java), eumesus (Natuna Is) and ochroptilus (Anamba Is) as synonyms of tricolor; and opisthopelus (Batu Is) and opisthisus (Banyak Is) as synonyms of melanurus. It seems rather improbable that characters of macrourus will prove constant, in which case this name would apply to all populations currently placed in interpositus.
The following 16 subspecies are recognised:
malabaricus (Scopoli, 1788) - Western and southern India.
leggei (Whistler, 1941) - Sri Lanka.
interpositus (Robinson and Kloss, 1922) - Nepal, north, central-eastern and north-eastern India, Myanmar, southern China (southern Yunnan), Thailand and Indochina.
macrourus (Gmelin, JF, 1789) - Con Son I, in southern Vietnam.
albiventris (Blyth, 1859) - Andaman Is. Considered by some authors to be a distinct species, Andaman Shama (Kittacincla albiventris).
tricolor (Vieillot, 1818) - Western Malaysia, Sumatra, Java, Bangka, Belitung, Natuna Is and Anamba Is.
melanurus (Salvadori, 1887) - Western Sumatran islands (except Enggano).
mirabilis Hoogerwerf, 1962 - Prinsen I.
nigricauda (Vorderman, 1893) - Kangean I.
stricklandii Motley and Dillwyn, 1855 - Northern Borneo, including Banggi I. Considered by some authors to be a distinct species, White-crowned Shama (Copsychus stricklandii).
suavis Sclater, PL, 1861 - Borneo (Sarawak and Kalimantan).
barbouri (Bangs and J. L. Peters, 1927) - Maratua Is, in eastern Borneo.
javanus Kloss, 1921 - Central Java.
omissus (Hartert, E, 1902) - Eastern Java.
hypolizus Oberholser, 1912 - Simeulue Island, west coast of Sumatra.
opisthochrus Oberholser, 1912 - Lasia and Babi Islands, west coast of Sumatra; possibly extinct in the wild.
BirdLife International Species Factsheet