Multivariate Assessment of the Phenetic Affinities of Australasian Oystercatchers (Aves: Charadriiformes)

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Abstract
Phenetic affinities of Australasian oystercatchers were elucidated by multivariate statistical analysis of seven morphometric characters taken from museum skins. Nineteen operational taxonomie units (OTUs), representing all the currently recognized species and most of the subordinate taxa, were used to calibrate morphological variation in Australasian Haematopus against the range displayed by the Haematopodidae. The rather homogeneous nature of variation among OTUs was not well suited for analysis by hierarchical clustering methods, but a non-hierarchical ordination method utilizing both principal components and nonmetric scaling produced excellent summaries of the similarity matrices. Phenetic affinities of Australasian oystercatchers were elucidated by multivariate statistical analysis of seven morphometric characters taken from museum skins. Nineteen operational taxonomie units (OTUs), representing all the currently recognized species and most of the subordinate taxa, were used to calibrate morphological variation in Australasian Haematopus against the range displayed by the Haematopodidae. The rather homogeneous nature of variation among OTUs was not well suited for analysis by hierarchical clustering methods, but a non-hierarchical ordination method utilizing both principal components and nonmetric scaling produced excellent summaries of the similarity matrices.

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