Turdus merula
Linnaeus, 1758 · speciesAt a glance
Sources16 archives
Databases and archives Turdus merula's data was compiled from.
WikipediaWikimedia Foundation19 languages↗
Animal Diversity WebUniv. of Michigan MZspecies account↗
BioWikiNetmultilingual Wikipediamultilingual↗
GBIFGlobal Biodiversity Information Facility12 584 191 records↗
ENAEuropean Nucleotide Archive · EMBL-EBI190 eDNA detections↗
BOLD SystemsCentre for Biodiversity Genomics78 specimens↗
LOTUSNatural Products (Wikidata)compounds↗
Open Tree of LifeOpenTreephylogeny backbone↗
GoaTGenomes on a Tree · Sangergenome & karyotype↗
NCBIUS National Library of Medicinegenome & karyotype↗
TimeTreeTemple University319 Mya from humans↗
Paleobiology DatabasePBDB consortiumfossil record↗
NCBI Organelle GenomesNCBIorganelle genome↗
WikidataWikimedia Foundationstructured facts↗
IOC World Bird ListIOCbird checklist↗
GLoBIGlobal Biotic Interactions857 partners↗Every layer below draws on the sources above — open one to explore it, or use ← → to move between tabs.
The common blackbird (Turdus merula) is a species of true thrush. It is also called the Eurasian blackbird (especially in North America, to distinguish it from the unrelated New World blackbirds), or simply the blackbird where this does not lead to confusion with a local species. It breeds in Europe, Asiatic Russia, and North Africa, and has been introduced to Australia and New Zealand.Long, John L. (1981). Introduced Birds of the World. Agricultural Protection Board of Western Australia. pp. 21–493. . It has a number of subspecies across its large range; a few of the Asian subspecies are sometimes considered to be full species. Depending on latitude, the common blackbird may be resident, partially migratory, or fully migratory. The adult male of the common blackbird (Turdus merula merula, the nominate subspecies), which is found throughout most of Europe, is all black except for a yellow eye-ring and bill and has a rich, melodious song; the adult female and juvenile have mainly dark brown plumage. This species breeds in woods and gardens, building a neat, cup-shaped nest, bound together with mud. It is omnivorous, eating a wide range of insects, earthworms, berries, and fruits. Both sexes are territorial on the breeding grounds, with distinctive threat displays, but are more gregarious during migration and in wintering areas. Pairs stay in their territory throughout the year where the climate is sufficiently temperate. This common and conspicuous species has given rise to a number of literary and cultural references, frequently related to its song.
No narrative description available for this taxon yet.
Size & morphology14
Life cycle & reproduction10
Diet & foraging9
Habitat & environment4
Compounds documented for Turdus merula across natural-product and food-composition databases — not just the ~150 nutrients on a classic label ("nutritional dark matter").
Documented compounds4 total
| Compound | Class | Amount | Source |
|---|---|---|---|
| Biliverdine Ix Alpha | present | LOTUS |
Every species Turdus merula is documented to interact with — what eats it, what it eats, and the species it lives alongside. Pick a category to list every partner. Compiled from GLoBI.
A DNA barcode is a short, standardised stretch of genes that works like a fingerprint — enough to tell one species from another. Below is the molecular trace Turdus merula has left across the world's sequence archives.
At a glance
★ the standard DNA barcode for this group — the short region actually read to tell this species apart. The rest are extra genes sequenced along the way.
Besides the big genome in the nucleus, cells carry a small, circular loop of DNA inside the cell's energy factories — the mitochondria. It is inherited almost only from the mother and is a leftover from ancient bacteria that moved into the cell. The mitochondrial markers above (ND*, COX, CYTB…) are read from exactly this loop. Outer ring = one strand, inner ring = the other.
You and Turdus merula last shared a common ancestor about 319 million years ago — go back that far and a single family tree includes both of you. Same four DNA letters since then, just rearranged.
The complete instruction manual Turdus merula carries — its genome. We read it from three angles — how big it is, how the DNA is packed into chromosomes, and how completely it has been sequenced — and explain how to read each value as you go.
Genome sizehow big the whole instruction manual is
Measured in base pairs (bp) — the individual letters of DNA (human ≈ 3.2 Gb, a bacterium a few million). The chart places this genome on a logarithmic scale — each step to the right is ten times bigger — among reference organisms. Across species a bigger genome loosely tracks with larger cells, slower growth and lower-energy lifestyles (powered flight favours small genomes) — yet it does not imply more genes or a more advanced organism (the long-standing C-value paradox).
Chromosomes & ploidyhow the DNA is packaged
2n is the full chromosome count in a normal body cell; n is a gamete (egg or sperm), which carries half. Ploidy is how many complete chromosome sets each cell holds — 2× (diploid) is typical for animals, while higher levels (polyploidy) are common in plants. Click any value below to see the underlying records and sources.
2n 805×GoaT · Animal Chromosome Counts Database · GoaT · Bird Chromosome Database · GoaT · Animal Genome Size Database
2n 601×GoaT · Animal Chromosome Counts Database
2n 611×GoaT · Animal Chromosome Counts Database
2n 621×GoaT · Animal Chromosome Counts Database
2n 631×GoaT · Animal Chromosome Counts Database
2n 641×GoaT · Animal Chromosome Counts Database
2n 651×GoaT · Animal Chromosome Counts Database
2n 661×GoaT · Animal Chromosome Counts Database
2n 671×GoaT · Animal Chromosome Counts Database
2n 681×GoaT · Animal Chromosome Counts Database
2n 691×GoaT · Animal Chromosome Counts Database
2n 701×GoaT · Animal Chromosome Counts Database
2n 711×GoaT · Animal Chromosome Counts Database
2n 721×GoaT · Animal Chromosome Counts Database
2n 731×GoaT · Animal Chromosome Counts Database
2n 741×GoaT · Animal Chromosome Counts Database
2n 751×GoaT · Animal Chromosome Counts Database
2n 761×GoaT · Animal Chromosome Counts Database
2n 771×GoaT · Animal Chromosome Counts Database
2n 781×GoaT · Animal Chromosome Counts Database
2n 811×GoaT · Animal Chromosome Counts Database
2n 821×GoaT · Animal Chromosome Counts Database
2n 831×GoaT · Animal Chromosome Counts Database
2n 841×GoaT · Animal Chromosome Counts Database
2n 851×GoaT · Animal Chromosome Counts Database
Sequencing statusassembly quality — how far to trust these numbers
Assembly level tells you how finished the sequence is — from fragmented contigs, through scaffolds, up to a full chromosome-level assembly. BUSCO % estimates completeness: the share of genes expected to be present that were actually found. These describe the data quality, not the organism.
How far back this lineage goes — and how we know. Everything here is measured in Ma, short for “mega-annum”: millions of years ago. The chart reads left to right like a calendar of the Earth, from the deep past on the left to today at the right edgetop to bottom like a core drilled through the Earth, from the deep past at the top down to today at the bottom.
At a glance
When this lineage existed
How to read this: the coloured strip along the bottomdown the left is the geological calendar — the standard epochs (Pliocene, Pleistocene…) every museum uses, shown so you can see which chapter of Earth's history this lineage lived in. This lineage is a young one, so the strip is zoomed in to epochs — the finer subdivisions inside a period. The solid bar is the fossil range: the span between the oldest and the youngest fossil that palaeontologists have assigned to Turdus merula. Above itBeside it, each dot is one dated fossil find — few enough to count, so they are drawn individually rather than as a graph. The orange marker is the DNA clock: DNA accumulates mutations at a roughly steady rate, so comparing this species' DNA with its relatives estimates when the lineage split off — independently of any fossil.
The two clocks disagree here. The fossil record reaches back to 5.33 Ma, but the molecular clock dates the lineage to only 3.06 Ma — about 2.27 Myr younger. A fossil cannot be older than the lineage it belongs to, so one of the two is off: either the fossil is assigned to the wrong species, or the clock is running fast.
How it livedPBDB
Record type12 584 212 records
Origin
Range
Wildobservation + sensor
Human sightings and records, or camera-trap / sensor detections — someone (or a device) saw or captured the species in the wild.
Museum / Voucheredphysical evidence
Backed by a physical specimen — a herbarium sheet, sample or voucher held in a collection. “Vouchered” means supported by material evidence, not just an observation.
Cultivated / Captivenot free-living
A living individual in a botanical garden, zoo or nursery — cultivated or kept, not free-living.
Wildobservation + sensor
Human sightings and records, or camera-trap / sensor detections — someone (or a device) saw or captured the species in the wild.
Holding institutions50 of 85 geolocated
Institutions and collections holding physical, vouchered specimens of this species — click a row to fly to it on the map.
| Institution | Specimens |
|---|---|
| Sevilla, ES | 381 |
| Helsinki, FI | 335 |
| Salzburg, AT | 285 |
| Stockholm, SE | 187 |
| Australian National Wildlife Collectionlocation not on record | 180 |
| Geneva, CH | 176 |
| Provincia di Livornolocation not on record | 160 |
| Liverpool, GB | 158 |
| DOI/NPS, Salem Maritime National Historic Sitelocation not on record | 153 |
| Auckland, NZ | 147 |
| Barcelona, ES | 121 |
| Zoological Museum, Moscow Lomonosov State Universitylocation not on record | 121 |
| Sydney, AU | 101 |
| Natural History Museum Rotterdamlocation not on record | 72 |
| Museums Victorialocation not on record | 63 |
| QVMAGlocation not on record | 60 |
| SNSDlocation not on record | 55 |
| Brussels, BE | 49 |
| MZLUlocation not on record | 46 |
| Frankfurt am Main | 38 |
| Tilburg, NL | 37 |
| EEZAlocation not on record | 37 |
| Copenhagen, DK | 35 |
| Kuopio, FI | 33 |
| Seattle, US | 33 |
| Bergen, NO | 33 |
| Philadelphia, US | 31 |
| RBINS-Scientific Heritagelocation not on record | 31 |
| Oulu, FI | 28 |
| New Haven, US | 27 |
| Washington, US | 26 |
| IMEDEAlocation not on record | 26 |
| CBDClocation not on record | 25 |
| Natural History Museum, Aarhus Denmarklocation not on record | 20 |
| Tasmanian Museum & Art Gallerylocation not on record | 20 |
| SMNHTAUlocation not on record | 17 |
| NHMOlocation not on record | 16 |
| South Kensington, GB | 14 |
| Kristiansand, NO | 13 |
| Texas Cooperative Wildlife Collectionlocation not on record | 13 |
| Ann Arbor, US | 12 |
| Cambridge, US | 11 |
| Museo civico La Terra e l'Uomo di Crocetta del Montellolocation not on record | 11 |
| Bourges, FR | 10 |
| Iowa City, US | 6 |
| Ohio State University - Bird Division, Columbus, OH (OSUM)location not on record | 6 |
| Philadelphia, US | 6 |
| TMPMlocation not on record | 6 |
| Zografou, GR | 6 |
| Forssa, FI | 6 |
| BG-NMNHSlocation not on record | 5 |
| 5 | |
| Tallinn, EE | 5 |
| Western Australian Museumlocation not on record | 4 |
| Toronto, CA | 4 |
| Muzeum i Instytut Zoologii Polskiej Akademii Nauklocation not on record | 4 |
| München, DE | 3 |
| DASSHlocation not on record | 3 |
| Tromsø, NO | 3 |
| Adam Mickiewicz University in Poznańlocation not on record | 3 |
| Museum and Art Gallery of the Northern Territorylocation not on record | 3 |
| STOCKHOLM, SE | 2 |
| Universidad de Caldas (UCaldas)location not on record | 2 |
| Radicondoli, IT | 2 |
| Institute of Plant and Animal Ecology UB RASlocation not on record | 2 |
| Wuzhou, CN | 2 |
| Louisiana State University, Museum of Zoologylocation not on record | 2 |
| Edmonton, CA | 2 |
| Rovaniemi, FI | 2 |
| Gothenburg, SE | 2 |
| Chicago, US | 2 |
| Bonn, DE | 1 |
| Slovak National Museum, Natural History Museumlocation not on record | 1 |
| Berkeley, US | 1 |
| Ithaca, US | 1 |
| Vancouver, CA | 1 |
| European Distributed Institute of Taxonomy (EDIT)location not on record | 1 |
| US | 1 |
| Musée des Confluenceslocation not on record | 1 |
| Zacatecas, MX | 1 |
| NSMKlocation not on record | 1 |
| Albany, US | 1 |
| Citadel Hill, GB | 1 |
| ZMAAlocation not on record | 1 |
| Chicago, US | 1 |
Cultivated / Captivenot free-living
A living individual in a botanical garden, zoo or nursery — cultivated or kept, not free-living.
Where the DNA of Turdus merula was picked up in samples of water, soil or air — nobody saw the organism, only its DNA left behind. A trace is a clue that the species was near, not a confirmed sighting.
Signal
Where its DNA was found
How strong is each trace?
Modelled climatemodelled
How to read this: each dot is one detection of this species' DNA in an environmental sample. The confidence meter weighs how many independent studies and places back up the signal — one detection in one study is a hint; many across several studies is solid. Records dated before 2008 (when eDNA methods began) are treated as likely mislabeled and left off the map.