Eurasian Teal - Taxonomy

Taxonomy

The Eurasian Teal belongs to the "true" teals, a group of small Anas dabbling ducks closely related to the Mallard (A. platyrhynchos) and its relatives; that latter group in fact seems to have evolved from a true teal. It forms a superspecies with the Green-winged Teal and the Speckled Teal (A. flavirostris). A proposed subspecies, A. c. nimia of the Aleutian Islands, differs only in slightly larger size; it is probably not distinct.

Whether the Eurasian and Green-winged teals are to be treated as one or two species is still being reviewed by the AOU, while the IUCN and BirdLife International separate them nowadays. Despite the almost identical and highly apomorphic nuptial plumage of their males, which continues to puzzle scientists (see the Green-winged Teal page for a discussion of the species' phylogeny), they seem well distinct species, as indicated by a wealth of behavioural, morphological and molecular data.

The Eurasian Teal was first scientifically named by Carl Linnaeus in his 1758 edition of Systema naturae. His Latin description reads: macula alarum viridi, linea alba supra infraque oculos – "a duck with green speculum, a white line above and below the eyes" – and his primary reference was the bird's description in his earlier work Fauna Svecica. In fact, the description he used in Systema Naturae was the name under which the bird went in the Fauna Svecica, demonstrating the value of his new binomial nomenclature by compressing the long-winded names formerly used in biological classification into much simpler scientific names like Anas crecca. Linnaeus also noted in his description that earlier authors had already written about the Eurasan Teal at length: Conrad Gessner had described it in the Historiae animalium as the anas parva ("small duck") among his querquedulae ("teals"); Ulisse Aldrovandi had called it phascade or querquedula minor ("lesser teal"), and was duly referenced by Francis Willughby who named the species querquedula secunda Aldrovandi ("the second teal of Aldrovandus"). John Ray may be credited with formally introducing the name "Common Teal", while Eleazar Albin called it simply "the teal". As regards the type locality Linnaeus simply remarked that it inhabits freshwater ecosystems in Europe.

The specific name of Linnaeus is onomatopoetic, referring to the male's characteristic call which was already discussed by Linnaeus' sources. Thus, the scientific name of the Eurasian Teal – unchanged since Linnaeus' time – translates as "duck that makes cryc"; common names like the Bokmål krikkand, Danish krikand and German Krickente mean the same.