Nucifraga caryocatactes japonicus Hartert

Nucifraga caryocatactes japonicus Hartert, 1897: 134 (Northern Japan, Kurile Islands).

Now Nucifraga caryocatactes japonica Hartert, 1897 . See Hartert, 1903d: 27; Hartert, 1919: 125; Vaurie, 1959: 156–158; Dickinson, 2003: 511; Dickinson et al., 2004c: 93; and dos Anjos, 2009: 611–612.

LECTOTYPE: AMNH 675561, male, from Shimotsuke, Honshu (= Hondo) Island, Japan, undated, purchased from Alan Owston (no. 197). From the Rothschild Collection.

COMMENTS: In the original description, Hartert did not designate a type or say how many specimens he examined; however, on page 135 he mentioned a specimen from the Kurile Islands in BMNH that he included in japonicus in addition to the specimens in the Rothschild Collection. Hartert (1919: 125) listed the male (no. 197) as the type, thereby designating it the lectotype. In addition to the Rothschild type label, this specimen has only one label, on which Hartert has noted that it was purchased from Owston. Early Owston specimens do not bear characteristic Owston labels; instead, like this one, they have rectangular labels of stiff paper with the corners cut off. The number ‘‘197’’ on this label and on the label of the AMNH paralectotype is either a species or a collector’s number, and the collecting locality is written on the reverse.

There is only one additional specimen in AMNH collected early enough to have been in Hartert’s hand when he described japonicus. Paralectotype: AMNH 765562, female, from Shimotsuke, Honshu Island, undated, purchased from Alan Owston (no. 197).