Tringa is a genus of waders, containing the shanks and tattlers. The genus name Tringa is the Neo-Latin name given to the green sandpiper by the Italian naturalist Ulisse Aldrovandi in 1599. They are mainly freshwater birds, often with brightly coloured legs as reflected in the English names of six species, as well as the specific names of two of these and the green sandpiper. They are typically associated with northern hemisphere temperate regions for breeding. Some of this group—notably the green sandpiper—nest in trees, using the old nests of other birds, usually thrushes.
The willet and the tattlers have been found to belong in Tringa; these genus changes were formally adopted by the American Ornithologists' Union in 2006.
The present genus in the old, more limited sense was even further subdivided into Tringa proper and Totanus, either as subgenera or as full genera. The available DNA sequence data suggests however that neither of these is monophyletic and that the latter simply lumps together a number of more or less closely related apomorphic species. Therefore, it seems unwarranted to recognize Totanus even as a subgenus for the time being.
Taxonomy
The genus Tringa was introduced in 1758 by the Swedish naturalist Carl Linnaeus in the tenth edition of his Systema Naturae. The name Tringa is the Neo-Latin name given to the green sandpiper by the Italian naturalist Ulisse Aldrovandi in 1603 based on Ancient Greek trungas, a thrush-sized, white-rumped, tail-bobbing wading bird mentioned by Aristotle. The type species is the green sandpiper (Tringa ochropus).
Species
The genus contains 13 species. Green sandpiper, Tringa ochropus Solitary sandpiper, Tringa solitaria Grey-tailed tattler, Tringa brevipes – formerly Heteroscelus brevipes Wandering tattler, Tringa incana – formerly Heteroscelus incanus Spotted redshank, Tringa erythropus Greater yellowlegs, Tringa melanoleuca Common greenshank, Tringa nebularia Willet, Tringa semipalmata – formerly Catoptrophorus semipalmatus Lesser yellowlegs, Tringa flavipes Nordmann's greenshank, Tringa guttifer Marsh sandpiper, Tringa stagnatilis Common redshank, Tringa totanus Wood sandpiper, Tringa glareola
Systematics and evolution
The shanks' and tattlers' closest relatives are sandpipers of the genera Actitis and Xenus. Together with these, they are related to the phalaropes, as well as the turnstones and calidrids. The large genus Tringa and the two very small genera which are most closely related form a phylogeny similar to the situation found in many other shorebird lineages such as calidrids, snipes and woodcocks, or gulls.
The same study has indicated that some morphological characters such as details of the furcula and pelvis have evolved convergently and are no indicators of close relationship. Similarly, the leg/foot color wildly varies between close relatives, with the spotted redshank, the greater yellowlegs, and the common greenshank for example being more closely related among each other than to any other species in the group; the ancestral coloration of the legs and feet was fairly certainly drab buffish as in e.g. the green sandpiper. On the other hand, the molecular phylogeny reveals that the general habitus and size as well as the overall plumage pattern are good indicators of an evolutionary relationship in this group.
The Nordmann's greenshank, a rare and endangered species, was not available for molecular analyses. It is fairly aberrant and was formerly placed in the monotypic genus Pseudototanus. It appears closest overall to the semipalmata-flavipes and the stagnatilis-totanus-glareola groups, though it also has some similarities to the greater yellowlegs and common greenshank.