Black backed magpies - South Island

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Jake
Posts: 307
Joined: Sat Oct 10, 2015 11:53 am

Black backed magpies - South Island

Post by Jake »

Hey hey, just going over some pics from Marlborough and found this one that appears to show a black-backed magpie (probable/possible hybrid). Happy to have commentary on this - located in Redwood Pass, near the Vernon Lagoon
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Finn Davey
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Joined: Thu Feb 20, 2020 9:38 am
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Re: Black backed magpies - South Island

Post by Finn Davey »

It's highly likely all Australian Magpies in NZ are hybrid mongrels of the three subspecies that were released here. If you compare our magpies to the pure subspecies in Australia, you'll see how variable our magpies are because of how hybridized they are. Magpies with white or mostly white backs are just more common, possibly because two white backed subspecies were brought here and only one black backed subspecies.
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