Brachypodius

The genus Brachypodius is a small genus of songbirds in the bulbul family, Pycnonotidae, that are found in South and Southeast Asia.

Brachypodius
Grey-headed bulbul
Scientific classification
Domain:	Eukaryota
Kingdom:	Animalia
Phylum:	Chordata
Class:	Aves
Order:	Passeriformes
Family:	Pycnonotidae
Genus:	Brachypodius Blyth, 1845
Type species
Lanius melanocephalos (Black-headed bulbul) Gmelin, JF, 1788

Taxonomy

The genus Brachypodius was introduced in 1845 by the English zoologist Edward Blyth to accommodate the black-headed bulbul.^[1] The word Brachypodius combines the Ancient Greek brakhus meaning "short" with pous, podos meaning "foot".^[2]

These species were formerly placed in the genus Pycnonotus. A molecular phylogenetic study of the bulbul family published in 2017 found that Pycnonotus was polyphyletic.^[3] In the revision to create monophyletic genera Brachypodius was resurrected to contain four species that were previously placed in Pycnonotus.^[4]

The genus contains four species:^[4]

Image	Scientific name	Common Name	Distribution
	Grey-headed bulbul	Brachypodius priocephalus	Western Ghats
	Black-headed bulbul	Brachypodius melanocephalos	Southeast Asia
	Andaman bulbul	Brachypodius fuscoflavescens	Andaman Islands
	Blue-wattled bulbul	Brachypodius nieuwenhuisii	northern Sumatra and northern Borneo