ornithology
grrlscientist | September 3, 2007tags: Birds in the News, BirdNews, ornithology, birds, avian, newsletter
Among the animals Darwin spotted on the Galapagos Islands were the blue-footed boobies, Sula nebouxii excisa. The males show off their blue feet to potential mates with high-stepping dances.
Image: Stephen C. Quinn, AMNH. [larger].
Birds in Science
A new study published in the leading ornithological journal Ibis has uncovered that for the vast majority of bird species, there are more males than females. The discovery suggests that populations of many of the world's threatened birds could therefore be overestimated,…
grrlscientist | August 31, 2007tags: researchblogging.org, splendid fairy-wren, Malurus splendens,sexual dichromatism, evolution, behavior, promiscuity, social monogamy
Male splendid fairy-wren, Malurus splendens.
Image: Pete Morris (Surfbirds.com). [screensaver size]
Everyone is familiar with sexual dichromatism in birds; you know, the gorgeous, colorful male who is paired with the drab female or two. It has been observed in birds that, when males and females differ dramatically in appearance, the females are preferentially mating with a few "pretty boys"; those that have elaborate plumage colors or ornamentation. As…
grrlscientist | August 22, 2007tags: researchblogging.org, evolution, social behavior, cooperative breeding, environment, global warming, climate change, African starlings, birds
Superb starling, Lamprotornis superbus, a cooperative breeding savanna dweller that is abundant throughout northeast Africa.
Image: Dustin R. Rubenstein [larger]
Postponing one's own reproductive efforts to help other individuals raise their offspring might seem like a bad choice, evolutionarily speaking. But cooperative breeding, as this behavior is known, is fairly common in the animal kingdom, although the reasons underlying the evolution…
grrlscientist | August 9, 2007tags: birding, birds, ornithology, blog carnivals
The 55th edition of the bird blog carnival, I and the Bird, is now available for your reading pleasure. As usual, this blog carnival is a big one, so there's plenty there for you to read.
tetrapodzoology | August 7, 2007
I just saw the above on Stephen Bodio's Querencia, where it was posted by Matt Mullenix, and just had to steal it (sorry).
Long-time readers will know that mammal-killing eagles have been a Tet Zoo mainstay since the very beginning (and then here and here, with Haast's eagle here). I'm on lunch right now, and after scoffing down a bowl of noodles am comparing limb : body depth ratios in assorted carnivorans. Let's just say that it's relevant to a certain grey shaggy beast photographed on Dartmoor...
grrlscientist | August 5, 2007tags: birds, ornithology, swallows
A proud swallow parent and her nestlings.
Image: Barry Gomer.
Every spring, a group of swallows complete a 6,000-mile migratory journey from South Africa, where they spend the winter, so they can nest in Vivien Reynolds' barn, located in South Hams, Devon, UK. Shortly after arriving each April, the birds build their nests from mud and twigs, just as you see above. However, what makes the above nest remarkable is where the swallows chose to build it.
It turns out that this determined pair of swallows actually built their nest on top of a plastic eagle owl…
grrlscientist | August 1, 2007tags: researchblogging.org, white-crowned sparrow, Zonotrichia leucophrys, steroids, brain growth
White-crowned sparrow, Zonotrichia leucophrys [song and other information].
Image: Birds of Oklahoma.
The first thing that most people think of when they hear the word "steroids" is baseball players who rely on these chemicals to increase their muscle mass and thereby improve their athletic performance. But recently, a small songbird that I studied for my dissertation work, Gambel's white-crowned sparrow, Zonotrichia leucophrys gambelii, has shown scientists that steroids trigger the growth…
grrlscientist | July 27, 2007tags: AOU, American Ornithologists' Union, ornithology, checklist supplement
The new AOU checklist update has been published and is available as a free PDF. The only major split that is obvious to a quick inspection is that the Bean Goose is now split into two species.
tetrapodzoology | July 26, 2007
Hello loyal readers: I know you're still there. Yet again I can't resist the lure of posting something new when I really shouldn't. Most of you, I'm sure, think that archaeopterygids - the archaic basal birds of Late Jurassic Germany (and Portugal too if Weigert's (1995) identification of isolated teeth is correct) - are long extinct, but here is evidence indicating otherwise. Ha ha ha. This is actually a monument at Dotternhausen in Bavaria; it's near a bridge that crosses the Altmühl, but I forget the exact location. If you want to see more of those archaeopterygid statues...
... below is…
grrlscientist | July 19, 2007tags: recurve-billed bushbird, Clytoctantes alixii, ornithology, birds, avian, endangered species
Female Recurve-billed Bushbird, Clytoctantes alixii. More images below the fold.
Image: Chris Sharpe 2004 [larger].
[listen to this species' song]
Chris Sharpe emailed me this following statement about the Recurve-billed Bushbird rediscovery, which I quote in full. I also present Chris's original 2004 images here, although some of the images will re-appear on this site soon (one will be the featured image for the next issue of Birds in the News, for example).
The Recurve-billed Bushbird,…
grrlscientist | July 18, 2007tags: researchblogging.org, flight speed, birds, ornithology, aerodynamics, evolution
Not Bad, But Not Perfect
A peregrine falcon keeps a close eye as she circles her nest in St. Louis.
A new survey of 138 species of birds finds that closely-related birds fly at roughly the same speeds and that no birds are perfect flying specimens.
Image: Tom Gannam (AP) [larger]
When it comes to flight speeds, human-made contraptions, such as airplanes, conform to basic aerodynamic scaling rules, which generate predictions based on how much an object weighs and how large its wings are. However, those…
grrlscientist | July 17, 2007tags: researchblogging.org, birds, ornithology, evolution, radiation, Chernobyl
Normal Barn Swallow (a),
while the other pictures show signs of albinism (white feathers; b & c),
unusually colored feathers (d), deformed beaks (e & f), deformed air sacs (g),
and bent tail feathers (h & i).
Images: Tim Mousseau.
Twenty years after the Chernobyl reactor disaster, which released clouds of radioactive particles in April 1986, the uninhabited forests within the 19 mile (30 kilometer) "exclusion zone" around the disaster site are lush and teeming with wildlife, giving the appearance…
grrlscientist | July 8, 2007tags: recurve-billed bushbird, Clytoctantes alixii, ornithology, birds, avian, endangered species
This male Recurve-billed Bushbird, Clytoctantes alixii, was recently photographed by ProAves staff, Adriana Tovar and Luis Eduardo Uruena. This is the first time this globally endangered species has been captured on film. [larger].
[listen to this species' song]
For the first time ever, an elusive recurve-billed bushbird, Clytoctantes alixii, has been photographed in the wild. The bird, recently rediscovered by scientists in Colombia a Colombian ornithologist named Oscar Laverde after a 40-…
grrlscientist | July 3, 2007tags: Dodo, Raphus cucullatus, birds, ornithology, Mauritius
Dodo reconstruction reflecting new research at Oxford University Museum of Natural History.
Image: Ballista. [larger]
The most complete skeleton of an extinct Dodo, Raphus cucullatus, ever found was discovered recently in the highlands of Mauritius, an island located in the Indian Ocean. Because this skeleton was preserved intact and isolated in a cave, it appears that it might provide an excellent DNA source for numerous scientific studies, according to the scientist who recovered it. Dodo remains are rare and precious finds:…
grrlscientist | July 2, 2007tags: teratornis, Argentavis magnificens, birds, ornithology, giant bird
Dr. Kenneth E. Campbell, (one of the discoverers) in front of the 25 ft. wingspan Argentavis magnificens. Display from the Natural History Museum, Los Angeles. The feather size from such a bird is estimated to have been 1.5 meters long (60 inches); and 20 centimeters wide (8 inches). [larger]
Image source.
Discovered decades ago and formally described in 1980, Argentavis magnificens is the largest bird known. It lived six million years ago during the Miocene period throughout Argentina. It is nearly the size of a…
tetrapodzoology | July 2, 2007
No temnospondyls for you: mystery pictures strike back! Congratulations in advance to the bright spark who can successfully identify what's shown above - and you don't have to get the identification down to the species, the genus will do. To the rest of you, commisserations in advance. No time for a post today, but coming next: Crassigyrinus, giant Carboniferous tadpole from hell (© Tet Zoo 2007. All rights reserved).
UPDATE (added 3-7-2007): the answer is...
As so many of you correctly guessed, it's part of a frogmouth, and in particular a Tawny frogmouth Podargus strigoides, the only one…
grrlscientist | June 29, 2007tags: blog carnival, birds, birding, ornithology
The 52nd edition of I and the Bird blog carnival is now available for your reading pleasure. As usual, they included one (and only one) of my many submissions, along with lots of other essays that you are sure to enjoy.
grrlscientist | June 29, 2007tags: book review, birds, birding, ornithology
Gulls are found nearly everywhere, from their usual haunts on the shorelines of oceans, lakes and rivers, to newly tilled fields, garbage dumps and sewage treatment plants. Due to their ubiquity, they are popular among birdwatchers, but gulls are often challenging to identify because they can take up to four years to mature, and they have different plumages each year. They also have seasonal differences and individual variations in plumage as well. Further, considering that, for most people, one "seagull" looks just like all the others,…
grrlscientist | June 27, 2007tags: Icadyptes salasi, giant penguin, ornithology, birds, avian
Two fossils recently discovered in Peru reveal that early penguins responded differently to natural climate change than scientists would have predicted. The larger skull, Icadyptes salasi (top), would have been fearsome to encounter because this penguin stood over five feet tall, and had a seven-inch beak, and is one of the largest penguins ever described. Compare this new penguin species to the smaller skull (below), which is from the modern-day Peruvian (Humboldt) penguin, Spheniscus humboldti.
Image: PNAS / Daniel Ksepka…
grrlscientist | June 20, 2007tags: researchblogging.org, superb starling, Spreo superbus, Lamprotornis superbus, birds, behavior, infidelity
Superb starling, Lamprotornis (Spreo) superbus.
These small birds are commonly found in open woodlands and savannahs throughout Northeast Africa.
Image: Hogle Zoo, Utah.
While it is widely known that males of many species seek out extra-pair copulations in order to produce as many offspring as possible, the reasons for female "infidelity" are much more complex. For example, a study was recently published that showed how a bird species uses sexual politics to ensure maximal…