Buntings and New World Sparrows (Emberizidae)

Pallas's Bunting (Emberiza pallasi) - HBW 16, p. 534

French: Bruant de Pallas German: Pallasammer Spanish: Escribano de Pallas
Other common names: Pallas’s Reed Bunting; Mongolian Bunting (lydiae)

Taxonomy: Cynchramus pallasi Cabanis, 1851, near Selenga River, Transbaikalia.
This species, together with E. yessoensis and E. schoeniclus, sometimes placed in genus Schoeniclus. Recent molecular study indicates that it is a sister-species to E. schoeniclus, with E. yessoensis as sister to both. Race minor of E. schoeniclus sometimes included in present species. Significance of geographical variation not fully understood, and possibly linked to variation in habitat preferences; further study required. Race lydiae, differing from others vocally and in ecology, possibly a separate species. Race polaris exhibits partially clinal variation, with gradation towards darker plumage and more heavily streaked rump in E of range. Proposed race montana and its synonym suschkiniana (described from SE Russian Altai) considered synonymous with nominate, and latolineata (from Kolyma Peninsula) with polaris. Three subspecies recognized.

Subspecies and Distribution:

polaris Middendorff, 1853 - breeds NE European Russia E in Siberia (S to basins of R Angara, R Lena and R Aldan) to Chukotskiy Peninsula, Sea of Okhotsk coast and N Kamchatka; winters in NE & E China, extreme SE Russia (S Ussuriland) and Korea.
pallasi (Cabanis, 1851) - breeds from Altai and Sayan Mts E to Transbaikalia and W Amurland (S of Tukuringra Mts) and S to N Mongolia and NE China (NW Heilongjiang), also disjunctly in E Tien Shan; winters in W & N China (Xinjiang and Inner Mongolia).
lydiae Portenko, 1929 - breeds from S Siberia (Tuva and S Transbaikalia) through N, C & E Mongolia, probably to adjacent NE China (NE Inner Mongolia); non-breeding probably in N China.