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GrrlScientist is an evolutionary biologist, ornithologist, aviculturist, birder and freelance science and nature writer. A native of the Pacific Northwest, she relocated from Seattle to NYC with her parrots after earning a BS in Microbiology (emphasis in Virology) and PhD in Zoology (Ornithology) from the University of Washington. In NYC, she was the Chapman Postdoctoral Fellow at the American Museum of Natural History for two years, pursuing part of her "dream" research project by reconstructing a molecular phylogeny of the parrots of the South Pacific islands. GrrlScientist and her five parrots are currently relocating to Germany, where she will continue writing her blog while also writing a book and learning German. (Meanwhile, her parrots will continue to nibble on her extensive personal library.) If you appreciate GrrlScientist's writing, you can help pay her living expenses by hiring her to "blog" your conference, speak at your club or write articles for your publication (or by clicking on the Paypal button below). If you read an essay on this blog that you especially enjoyed, please nominate it for inclusion in OpenLab2009.
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Topic Categories: Art • Birding • Education • Mystery Birds • Photography • Teaching
Posted on: November 2, 2009 9:59 AM, by "GrrlScientist"
tags: Short-tailed Magpie, Cissa thalassina, birds, mystery bird, bird ID quiz
[Mystery bird] Short-tailed Magpie, Cissa thalassina, endemic to the South Pacific Maritime
Southeast Asian islands of Borneo and Java. [I will identify this bird for you in 48 hours]
Watercolour and gouache sketch on paper.
Please name at least one field mark that supports your identification.
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Comments
Ooh I know, I know!
Short-tailed magpie (Cissa thalassina). The bright green plumage and black mask set the green magpies apart from all other corvids. And the short-tailed magpie is the only species endemic to Borneo and Java.
Posted by: Hai~Ren | November 2, 2009 11:10 AM
More spectacular in real-life despite the uninspiring name - and Borneo and Java aren't really in the South Pacific.
Posted by: andrewt | November 2, 2009 3:50 PM
Damn! Hai-Ren beat me to it! But I cheated by reading the caption on the BibliOdyssey post! http://bibliodyssey.blogspot.com/2009/11/image-dump.html
Posted by: Richard Carter, FCD | November 2, 2009 4:26 PM
ahh, but which subspecies?
Because of the dark eyes, this is a depiction of the nominate subspecies Cissa thalassina thalassina which is only found on Java... the oher subspecies, Cissa thalassina jeffreyi is only found on Borneo and has whitish eyes:
Cissa thalassina jeffreyi, Borneo
By the way, from an ecological geography persepctive, I agree with Andrew (South Pacific = Australasia or Oceania) where both Borneo and Java are considered west of the Wallace Line and therefore Maritime Southeast Asia (as opposed to the geopolitical entity of Southeastern Asia) and more likely related to Asiatic taxa (the Line is based upon the deep water between two large continental shelf areas, a barrier that kept the flora and fauna of Australia separated from that of Asia for over 50 million years)
Posted by: David | November 2, 2009 6:07 PM
okay, i changed the name of the area to match your comments. but that entire oceania/southeast asian/australasian/wallace's line region is where my heart and mind have been firmly planted ever since i first read wallace's book, the malay archipelago, when i was a mere grasshopper.
Posted by: "GrrlScientist" | November 2, 2009 6:16 PM