Species flock

As a species flock is in evolutionary biology, a group referred to very closely related species that have evolved in an isolated area of a Ursprungsart and exist in the same area today side by side. In the train of adaptive radiation, the less specialized species has adapted to the existing different environmental conditions and different ecological niches occupied today.

An example of a species flock are the 14 species of Darwin's finches, which were described by Charles Darwin, and their adaptation in the Galapagos Islands different ecological niches.

The Antarctic fish are a group of over 100 marine fish species that can live in the Southern Ocean as prevent glycoproteins in their blood a freezing at temperatures around and below freezing. Other species flocks are the many cichlid species in the Great Lakes of East Africa, the Caribbean and the Hamlet perch stony corals of the genus Acropora in the coral reefs of the tropical Indo-Pacific.

Not necessarily the same thing is meant by the term Artkomplex or species complex often used. Here, too, is understood in biology, a group of species by similarities, be it a closer genetic relationship or similar appearance, as a group are addressed. Individual members are not necessarily described nominally. On the contrary, the Artverhältnisse are often unclear. In contrast to the species flock of the species complex can with fewer members ( already two form a complex in this case ) get along. For clarity, the entire cichlids of Lake Malawi or large groups ( Mbuna and so-called " Malawi Haplochromis " ) each have a species flock that form " Blue Black Zebra " from the group of mbuna form a species complex. The large barbs of Lake Tana in Ethiopia, however, are species complex and species flock in one. It is also not established that the members of a species complex in the same area must occur next to each other, as is the case in a species flock. A species complex, for example, even from sibling species (german sibling species) exist, in extreme cases, it contains cryptic species. The taxon of the famous group member states is usually used for the eponymous group.