Bird names

Steve Suttill · Status: Offline

RE: Bird names

Ian Campbell · Status: Offline

Sorry to contradict you Steve, you are correct that only the first name should start with a capital but I'm sure this is the Genus not the Family part of the scientific name.
Cheers Ian

-- Edited by Ian Campbell at 11:32, 2008-06-18

Steve Suttill · Status: Offline

Surely it's "Troglodytes troglodytes zetlandicus" etc. The third section of the trinomial system being the race rather than the species. Only the first section (family) having a capital letter.

Many of these scientific names are odd mixtures of Latin and Greek and some of them quite ungrammatical. There was a good letter about this in a recent British Birds by Ferguson-Lees.

Schoolboy Latin has its uses!

Steve

Paul Heaton · Status: Offline

You will enjoy Birds Britannica a lot then you will know why we have.

Troglodytes Troglodytes

Troglodytes Zetlandicus ( shetland)
Troglodytes Fridariensis (fair isle)
Troglodytes Hebridensis (outer Hebrides)
Troglodytes Hirtensis (St Kilda )

also wren joins Smew Ruff and Rook as a bird that only has 4 letters in its name.

Keep reading those bird books

Keep birding.

Ian Campbell · Status: Offline

Cheers all, as soon as I saw the answers about the Wren I realised I'd seen it before.
Looks like "Birds Britannica" is now on my shopping list!.
Cheers Ian

Mike Chorley · Status: Offline

Dean Macdonald wrote:

Ian Campbell wrote:

Wren, why does such a small bird have such a long Latin name and does anyone know it's origin ?
Cheers Ian
Also just thought, why is the latin name for thrush an excretory product?

-- Edited by Ian Campbell at 21:40, 2008-06-17

Troglodytes, i believe means "cave dweller" why it's written twice i don't know.

"Turdus" could be coincidence but Thrushes do use poo as a defence. ie they literally **** on anything threatening them

Simple, really. The reason why the Latin name for thrushes is "turdus" is because the Roman (i.e. Latin) name for a thrush is "turdus" Sadly, my Latin-English dictionary doesn't do slang so i can't tell you what the Romans actually called "faeces" which just means "impurities"

The reason for the double trog. is because it is the family name (the 1st trog) AND the specific name (the 2nd trog) like, for example, house sparrow is passer (sparrow) domesticus (of the house). I suspect that when it was named under the Linnean system there was only one species of wren known to science, as the other four closely related wrens are all New World species. As the system is based on a two word name they just repeated the word and called it a cavedwelling cavedweller!

BTW. the other 55 species of wren (all New World) have different family names

-- Edited by Mike Chorley at 00:39, 2008-06-18

Judith Smith · Status: Offline

Troglodytes means cave dweller and it's because wrens tend to inhabit crevices, wood piles, crannies, hedge bottoms etc. (from Birds Britannica, Cocker and Mabey, 2005.)

Dean Macdonald · Status: Offline

Ian Campbell wrote:

Wren, why does such a small bird have such a long Latin name and does anyone know it's origin ?
Cheers Ian
Also just thought, why is the latin name for thrush an excretory product?

-- Edited by Ian Campbell at 21:40, 2008-06-17

Troglodytes, i believe means "cave dweller" why it's written twice i don't know.

"Turdus" could be coincidence but Thrushes do use poo as a defence. ie they literally **** on anything threatening them

Paul Wilson · Status: Offline

Ian, you really ought to treat yourself to a copy of "Birds Britannica" - with questions like that one, you'd love it.

Ian Campbell · Status: Offline

Wren, why does such a small bird have such a long Latin name and does anyone know it's origin ?
Cheers Ian

Also just thought, why is the latin name for thrush an excretory product?

-- Edited by Ian Campbell at 21:40, 2008-06-17

Geoff Hargreaves · Status: Offline

paul,strange that one can,t think of a vernacular for pie,so i,ll just pack 2 of them this morning to keep me going past scotsmans,i,ll check the terns and hope that no stray skua (stercorarius skua) bother us.

cheers geoff

p.s. oh yes i can 'lathoms lobbers'

-- Edited by Geoff Hargreaves at 15:17, 2008-06-14

Paul Cliff · Status: Offline

but a pie is always a pie, right? please tell me it's so...

or is a pie is always gonna be eaten?

Ian Woosey · Status: Offline

Is this what you mean Geoff ? ;

Bonxie = Great Skua

Geoff Hargreaves · Status: Offline

ok i give up can some one please just answer this bonxie = ,thanks

ian w , i think i,ve decoded your post,

if everyone calls it a sheppy(local wigan term for starlings)then thats what it is a sheppy,pee wit(lapwing or green plover)scilly used for skylark ,there all names from my early birding years when i didn,t realise i was birding

thought i was just growing up in abram.

chiers goff

who craes about teh spulling

Ian Campbell · Status: Offline

From what I've read on this site a "Gropper" would feel in the most suitable habitat at Binn Green car park

.
Cheers Ian

Mark Rigby · Status: Offline

Tony Coatsworth wrote:

There's been a spate of Sprossers this week and as I'm down to Norfolk on Sunday I'll be keeping my eyes open !

--------------------------------------------------------------

I think you will stand more chance keeping your ears open instead of your eyes as they are a real bugger to see!! Just ask Mr.Chorley

(Behind the toilet block at Minsmere)

Ian McKerchar · Status: Offline

I think there's a time and a place for shortening birds names. Gropper's commonly used whilst out birding with mates but might confuse less experienced birders if you told them there was one about and it never really looks right in print, stinky pinky? I think people would die laughing if you ever really used that at a twitch, I know I would, PG Tips is actually a nice nickname but again is rarely used, it's mainly shortened to Pallas Gropper, as in " I've just kicked out a Pallas Gropper" (at Pennington please

) but again doesn't look right in print. Icky, short for Icterine Warbler is perhaps the most terrible of the shortened names and to be honest I haven't heard anything other than straight "Icterine" (without the warbler) for years.

There are loads of them out there, they all have their time and place and are fine when out birding with like minded people but on forums, in print or in the presence of birders of different experiences and knowledge they can cause confusion and unfortunately feelings of inferiority in those that don't understand them and that's not what birding's about

Tony Coatsworth · Status: Offline

There's been a spate of Sprossers this week and as I'm down to Norfolk on Sunday I'll be keeping my eyes open !

(German for Thrush Nightingale)

Paul Heaton · Status: Offline

Since our beloved webmaster Mr McKerchar stopped the use of nicknames

I am sure we all miss WARFY RIGGERS SKIDDO and was it WOOSEYMASTER OR LISTMAN

So maybe we should not shorten our birds.

(bx) Black Redstart phoenicurus ochruros

(pgtips) Pallas,s Grasshopper warbler locustella certhiola

(stinky pinky) Rose coloured Starling sturnus roseus of which I belive Mr & Mrs Adderley left the county for yesteday.

Keep birding or should that be KB

Simon Warford · Status: Offline

Craig Higson wrote:

Ok, PG Tips I've heard of. Stinky Pinky though....

One not too far from GM today

Craig Higson · Status: Offline

Simon Warford wrote:

Geoff its a Bonxie not Bronxie

Okay what about Stinky Pinky and PG Tips??

-- Edited by Simon Warford at 22:31, 2008-06-12

Ok, PG Tips I've heard of. Stinky Pinky though....

Paul Heaton · Status: Offline

Gentlemen what a wonderful thread this is, and you may have guessed the library in the 200 club has many a book on bird names or NOMENCLATURE,

On the fly-leaf of the " Hand-list of British Birds" published in 1912 is the remark
nomenclature is only a means, not an end but without uniformity it is a confusion.

T A COWARDS 3rd part of The birds of the british isles is a starting point
Birds Britannica Mark Cocker is a must for the coffee table

The Folklore of Birds by E A Armstrong will have all the answers, sadly my copy was stolen so if anyone has a copy of this please let me know.

Always name the blighters.

KEEP BIRDING

Ian Woosey · Status: Offline

Just for you Geoff

-

"The word `Bonxie` provides the best example of a localised vernacular name assuming nationwide ascendancy over the official version. This is especially true in an oral context, where few birdwatchers would use anything else. It possibly derives originally from the old Norse word `bunki`, whence came the Shetland term `bunski`, for a dumpy, untidy, or heavily dressed person (often a woman)."

Cocker & Mabey (Birds Britannica)

Geoff Hargreaves · Status: Offline

simon ,logged out but i,ve just seen that i,ll spend dinner time tommorow buried in my collins

cheers geoff

Simon Warford · Status: Offline

Geoff its a Bonxie not Bronxie

Okay what about Stinky Pinky and PG Tips??

-- Edited by Simon Warford at 22:31, 2008-06-12

Geoff Hargreaves · Status: Offline

quite right, come on ,gropper i sorted on my own but i still can,t sort out why a bird gets to be called a bronxie,i,ve not seen this years black redstarts but they do deserve there full title,before you know it we,ll pgf at pf ths m.

cheers geoff

Simon Warford · Status: Offline

Its not as bad as birds names being spelt wrong all the time, erm like Meadow Pipet..
Its meadow PIPIT

One or two guilty parties on here

Craig Higson · Status: Offline

I'm afraid I'm guilty of this Ian, but mine stems from using the five letter name codes used for ringing. Hence Long-tailed Tit becomes Lotti, Blackbird becomes Blabi, Garden Warbler Garwa, Reed Bunting = Reebu...you get the picture. Mind you the code for Black Redstart (Blare) is much better than BX

Ian Campbell · Status: Offline

I've never understood why birders shorten wonderful names of birds, post instigated by Ian's request of where does "Bx" mean Black Redstart, which I also don't understand.
One eg is "Gropper" nothing like as aesthetic as Grasshopper Warbler. GIVE BIRDS THEIR PROPER NAMES- thats what I say !!

Cheers E