The American Ornithological Society’s Committee on Classification and Nomenclature of North and Middle American Birds published its 2018 checklist supplement in late June. In recent years, the release of the checklist supplement has generated taxonomic shake-ups and even the addition and loss of species. For example, last year we lost Thayer’s Gull as that taxon was lumped with Iceland Gull. This year’s changes are relatively mild with the most notable being rather superficial. The name of Gray Jay (Perisoreus canadensis), for which there is only a single Nebraska record, has now been changed back to Canada Jay. Other changes include splitting of the sparrow genus Ammodramus and the woodpecker genus Picoides. Grasshopper Sparrow is the only Nebraska species that remains in the genus Ammodramus. Baird’s and Henslow’s sparrows are now in the genus Centronyx and LeConte’s and Nelson’s sparrows are in the genus Ammospiza. Black-backed and American Three-toed woodpeckers remain in the genus Picoides, but Downy and Hairy woodpeckers are now in the genus Dryobates. Additional changes were made in the sequence of hawks (Accipitriformes).
All the these changes have been incorporated into the Birds of Nebraska – Online (BONO). If you want to read the entire AOS checklist supplement, it can be found HERE.