Crows (Corvidae)

Black-billed Magpie (Pica hudsonia) - HBW 14, p. 606

French: Pie d'Amérique German: Spanish: Urraca de Hudson
Other common names: American Black-billed Magpie

Taxonomy: Corvus hudsonia Sabine, 1823, Cumberland House, Saskatchewan, Canada.
Forms a superspecies with P. pica, P. asirensis and P. nuttalli, and often treated as conspecific with first or all of those; recent analysis of mitochondrial genome suggests that P. nuttalli and present species are sister-taxa, closely related to P. pica, the three exhibiting low average divergence (only 2.35%), suggesting that they may be better considered conspecific. Monotypic.

Distribution: Coastal S Alaska (E from Alaska Peninsula and Shumagin Is) and SW Canada (SW Yukon, extreme NW & E British Columbia, N Alberta, C Saskatchewan, C Manitoba, extreme SW Ontario) S in W USA to NE & EC California (to Inyo County), SC Nevada, Utah, extreme NE Arizona (Apache County), N New Mexico, W (casually also NE) Oklahoma, C Kansas, and Nebraska (except SE).