About Erithacus komadori namiyei (Stejneger, 1886)
The Ryukyu robin, scientifically known as Larvivora komadori, is a bird species that is endemic to Japan’s Ryūkyū Islands. The Okinawa robin, currently classified as Larvivora namiyei, was previously treated as a subspecies of the Ryukyu robin. The specific epithet komadori is somewhat confusingly the Japanese common name for the Japanese robin, a close relative of the Ryukyu robin. The Ryukyu robin, along with the Japanese robin and the European robin, was formerly classified in the genus Erithacus. A 2006 molecular phylogenetic study discovered that the two east Asian species were more closely related to the Siberian blue robin (which was classified in the genus Luscinia at that time) than to the European robin. A large 2010 study confirmed this finding, and also determined that the genus Luscinia was not monophyletic. As a result, the genus Larvivora was resurrected to hold a clade that includes the Japanese robin, the Ryukyu robin, the Siberian blue robin, and multiple other species that had previously been placed in Luscinia.
