![]() After the breakup of Gondwana over 100 million years ago into Africa, Australia, and South America, hawks evolved in Africa and falcons evolved in South America independently of each other. Well, if you go back millions of years they are related in the same way that songbirds and owls are related (which is very very distantly).Įssentially, the story is this. ![]() ![]() Near the top of this list of DNA-discovered examples of convergent evolution is the conclusion that Falconiformes (falcons and caracaras) and Accipitriformes (which includes eagles, hawks– both Buteos and Accipiters, kites, harriers, and Old World vultures) are not related to each other. It now seems that convergent evolution is practically the norm rather than the exception– that various groups of species once thought closely related (and put adjacent to each other in field guides) are not related after all– that they each evolved, convergently but separately from each other, to serve a similar role in the ecosystem on different continents, though many have since spread out over each other. However, recent DNA analysis has blown the lid off this idea. It used to be that there were a few obvious examples of convergent evolution in the bird world– like meadowlarks and longclaws- and then a bunch of lesser known examples for which this blog is dedicated, in part, to illustrating. ![]() Here is the dramatic rationale behind it. Birders are well-aware of the recent change in their checklists, which annoyingly relocates the falcons away from hawks, eagles, and other diurnal birds of prey, and puts them deep among the little birds– just before flycatchers. ![]()
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