Category: Uncategorized

Renaming Birds: Steller’s Eider

Christina Wilsdon

This dapper duck is a male Steller’s Eider (Polysticta stelleri), a bird that breeds in far north Arctic regions and winters in what, to our way of thinking, are locations that are just as chilly (Aleutian Islands, northern Scandinavia, and the like).

This species is named after Georg Wilhelm Steller, a physician, naturalist, and explorer who introduced Western scientists to a variety of animals (and also endured a shipwreck and survived months on an island now called Bering Island while saving fellow crew members from dying of scurvy).

Male Steller’s Eider photographed by Ron Knight, Wiki Commons image

Steller had a menagerie of animals named after him in addition to this sea duck: a jay, a sea eagle, a sea lion, a sculpin, and a sea cow, and that’s just the ones in which he appears in common names. (Sadly, the Steller’s sea cow was hunted to extinction within a few decades of its being described by Steller.)

But with eponymous bird names giving way to new titles, what could the Steller’s Eider be called instead?

Well, the Finnish people have a word for it that actually reflects a modern supposition about the species’ genetics: Allihaahka (alli is “Long-Tailed Duck,” haahka is “eider”). According to one study, Steller’s Eider may be a species that evolved via “hybrid speciation,” a long-ago “gene flow” between two different kinds of birds. But it seems unlikely this name would catch on in North America. Nor would its German name, Scheckente, “piebald duck,” referring to its bold black and white markings (which reflects its scientific name, too: polustiktos means “many spotted” in Greek).

This eider is known as a “soldier duck” in Alaska for its habit of swimming in single file, but the name that really stands out in literature about the far north is the Inupiat name Igniquaqtuq. This name is inspired by the golden sheen on the duck’s belly and breast and is translated variously as “the duck that sat in the campfire,” “duck that sat in fire,” and “the bird who travels with fire” (this site has wonderful information about indigenous names for birds). And so this sea duck could glory in the terrific rhyming name Fire Eider.

It would be in good company with other birds whose markings gave rise to legends involving fire. In Iroquois lore, for example, the American Robin once had a pure white breast, but because it saved a man from freezing to death by carrying a live coal and kindling to start a campfire and then tended it by fanning it with its wings, its feathers first became spotted and then turned rusty red–a wonderful summary of the actual bird’s transition from a polka-dotted youngster to a red-breasted adult.

Likewise, in European lore, the European Robin fanned embers to warm the baby Jesus and thus burned its feathers forever red. (In another story, the red is a bloodstain caused by the bird’s efforts to pluck merciless thorns from Jesus’s crown on Golgotha.)

None of the other eiders have eponymous names. One splendidly marked species bears the royal name King Eider, a goggle-faced species is aptly named Spectacled Eider, and the third is the Common Eider. The Common Eider in this photos appears to be giving some side-eye about being called “common.”

Common Eider photo courtesy WikiCommons (c) Mike Pennington.

Renaming the Birds: Ross’s Goose

Christina Wilsdon

As birders, bird lovers, and most people who have ever seen a bird know by now, the American Ornithological Society announced on November 1, 2023, that it will change the English common names of all North American birds who are named after people.

Ross’s Goose (courtesy Andrew C via Wikimedia Commons)

No matter how you feel about this decision, it’s still a rare opportunity to give these feathered friends of ours names that befit their appearance, behavior, history, and habitat. Indeed, many websites offered readers to join in the effort just for fun, asking them to suggest new names for these birds saddled with possessive ones. (Unofficially, of course, else the entire AOS bird list might read “Birdy McBirdface.”)

The history of folkloric names for birds is a topic that’s long fascinated me, so I’m going to make use of all the books I’ve collected on this topic to dredge up some of those old-timey names and offer them up for consideration. (Not that anyone’s asked me.)

So here we go, beginning at the top of the official AOS checklist with Ross’s Goose (Anser rossii).

Ross’s Goose, with caruncle. (courtesy Ken Billington via Wikimedia Commons)

Who’s Ross, for starters? He was a top-level fur trader for the Hudson Bay Company, but he was also a keen naturalist who supplied research and specimens to institutions such as the Smithsonian. And he sported an impressive set of muttonchops.

As for the goose itself, it is a bird about half the size of a Snow Goose, with sleek white feathers and black wingtips. (For an extra fee, you can order one in the rare color variation “blue morph,” a dark-gray version with a white head.)

This goose had plenty of names before an ornithologist, John Cassin, dubbed it Ross’s Goose in 1861. So today’s committee members could possibly choose one of them: Wavey.

According to Folk Names of Canadian Birds by W. L. McAtee (1956), wavey is derived from Cree, Chinook, and Ojibway names for the goose, which are all imitative of its call–a perfectly good way to name a bird. Long-ago ornithologists embellished this name with various adjectives:

  • Barking Wavey (listen to them online and yeah, they do sound like small dogs barking at times)
  • Lesser Wavey or Little Wavey (is there a Greater Wavey out there?)
  • Wart-nosed Wavey (Well, now, there’s no need to be insulting. This unfortunate name was slung at the goose because many adult birds have wartlike bumps at the base of the bill. They’re called “caruncles,” which sounds a bit like a kind of crunchy snack food. Caruncles with Cheez!)
  • Horned Wavey (This name also appears to refer to the aforementioned caruncles. I guess they can sometimes be pretty dramatic; a photographer on this site left a comment about seeing one with a caruncle that resembled a rhino’s horn.)
  • Scabby-nosed Wavey (OK, now that’s just plain mean. See: caruncles. By now I’m thinking the bird should just be called a Caruncle.)

Oh, and one more old-time name (again with the insults): Galoot (apparently due to the bird not being sufficiently wary of humans, but I bet that’s changed since it was “discovered” by European explorers).

Well, if the powers that be settle on wavey, perhaps they can come up with more flattering descriptors. I doubt the goose would mind being called, say, the Pink-legged Wavey.

Barn Swallows and Valentines

Christina Wilsdon

It’s Valentine’s Day, and along with flowers and chocolates, birds of various species flutter charmingly across many Valentine cards. Birds have long been associated with love.

During the Middle Ages, people in parts of Europe believed that birds began their courtship and breeding season on February 14. Geoffrey Chaucer immortalized this sentiment in “The Parliament of Fowls” when he wrote “For this was sent on Seynt Valentyne’s day / Whan every foul cometh ther to choose his mate.” (Forgive the spelling. This was written between 1372 and 1386, after all.)

One bird frequently depicted on Valentine’s Day cards is the barn swallow. Swallows, which are migratory, have long served as harbingers of spring–they return to their breeding grounds just as this season of renewal unfolds. The ancient Greeks linked swallows with Aphrodite, the goddess of love. Swallows have also been credited with bearing departed souls on their slender wings. And their long-distance flights, agility, and swiftness make them the perfect messengers for carrying tokens of affection to loved ones.

Since an adult swallow barely outweighs a first-class letter, I chose not to send any Valentines by barn-swallow post, so I’ll just wish you a happy Valentine’s Day here. And tomorrow, February 15, marks a one-month countdown to the publication of my book about barn swallows, Swallows Swirl (illustrated by Jess Mason and published by Sleeping Bear Press). I’m quite thrilled about that!

Sloth Bear Has Something to Say…

Christina Wilsdon

Editor’s Note:

Hello! Today’s guest post is brought to you by Ursula, a sloth bear who is determined to show, despite her species’ common name, that sloth bears have a lot of get-up-and-go. In that interest, she has learned to read and write.

“Greetings. Yes, I am a sloth bear, and yes, I wrote this myself, though the editor had to type it up for me because my claws are too long to make use of a keyboard.

I am writing because even way off in my homeland on the continent of Asia, I have heard that many North American bird species will be getting new names. And this raised my hackles because I have long chafed at being called by my English-language name, ‘sloth bear.’

Sloth bear! As if! No offense to my fellow mammals, the sloths of Central and South America, who can’t help but move slowly and hang upside down from tree limbs. But I can run faster than one of you human beings if I’ve a mind to, and I am fully aware that you consider the trait of ‘sloth’ to be a deadly sin.

If you think I’m overreacting, listen to this. This is how I am described by a prominent geographical institute online: ‘Shaggy, dusty, and unkempt.’ (It also says I emit ‘noisy grunts and snorts.’ Can I help it if my snout is made for hoovering up termites and ants?)

Visit Wikipedia, and you’ll see me described again as having a coat that is ‘long, shaggy, and unkempt.’ (Again with the unkempt!) Plus it says that when I walk, my feet are set down ‘in a noisy, flapping motion’ and that I appear ‘slow and clumsy.’ Sheesh! (At least it acknowledges that I run and climb well.)

And a prominent zoological organization says that I am ‘a bit messy in appearance,’ as if I were a badly decorated cake being judged by Paul Hollywood on ‘The Great British Baking Show.’ It adds that my hair is ‘unruly.’ Well, I guess that’s a step up from ‘unkempt.’ But then it gets in one last dig by noting that my walk is ‘a bit awkward.’ Way to boost a bear’s self-confidence!

Just take a look at the other bears of the world and their glorious names.

Black bear? Totally sensible, even though they can also be brown or white. Brown bear? A-OK. Polar bear? Sure, why not, they live way up there around the northern pole. Moon bear and sun bear? Heavenly! Spectacled bear? Spectacles are pretty nifty. Panda? A name derived from a Nepalese name for “eater of bamboo.” (Well, it’s not snazzy, but it’s accurate—I dined out with a panda once, and believe you me, our choice of restaurants was pretty limited.)

You’ll notice none of those guys are named after an undesirable feature.

How did I get this undeserved name? It’s all because of this zoologist guy George Shaw who lived way back in the 1700s. He thought we bears were sloth-like because of our claws and our missing front teeth. So he called us bear-sloths. Which at some point got swapped around and became sloth bears. George, Pshaw!

So what would I like us to be called? Well, the Hindi word for ‘bear’ is ‘Bahlu,’ and I rather like that (and it would right the wrong done to my species in ‘The Jungle Book’ where a lumbering brown bear is usurping the spotlight from my kind of bear). But the scientific moniker you’ve given us, Melursus ursinus, basically means ‘honey bear,’ and I can totally live with that, especially if that honey’s got some termites in it.

OK, think about it, humans. Then you can get to work on the Dumb Gulper Shark and the Bone-eating Snot-flower Worm.

Yours truly,

Ursula ‘Way Too Busy to Be Slothful’ Bear”

Name That Bird!

Christina Wilsdon

Feathers are flying now that the American Ornithological Society has decided to rename all bird species in the Americas that are named after people. The main reason for this decision is to eradicate names of people with racist or colonial associations. It paves the way for the creation of new names that focus on the birds themselves.

I’ve always idly thought I’d love to have a job naming racehorses or paint colors, so I’m interested in seeing what the AOS comes up with. (If they put votes out to the public, I hope they take care not to repeat the actions of the British agency that enlisted the public in naming a research vessel back in 2016, or we’ll end up with a lot of birds being called Birdy McBirdface.)

The bird enlisted in many articles to showcase the changes to come is the Wilson’s warbler, Cardellina pusilla, a lively little bird clad in bright yellow and olive green. The male sports a jaunty black cap, the female a paler version that is typically olive.

What to call this sprite?

Male Wilson’s Warbler (photo courtesy of Alaska Science Center, photographer Rachel M. Richardson)

It’s not like its name hasn’t changed in the past. For a start, its scientific name wasn’t always Cardellina pusilla. (Cardellina derives from an Italian word that refers to the European goldfinch, and pusilla is Latin for “very small.”) Naturalist Alexander Wilson, who first described the bird scientifically in 1811, called it Muscicapa pusilla (Muscicapa translates to “flycatcher”).

The bird was subsequently shuffled between genera for the next few decades until it became Wilsonia pusilla in 1899. And there it perched until another relocation in 2011 put it into the genus Cardellina. A lot of other warblers also found themselves alighting in new genera at that time–you can read about that here.

But the warbler doesn’t stand on ceremony, so it’s not going to insist you call it by its scientific name. Wilson himself called it the “green black-capt flycatcher.” Many people in online comment sections suggest “black-capped yellow warbler,” though some point out that this name sidelines the female bird (a tendency that’s not unusual in common bird names).

Past common names for this species aren’t exactly an exciting treasure trove of monikers: green black-capped warbler, Wilson’s blackcap, Wilson’s black-capped flycatching warbler (a lot of name to stick to a bird that weighs 0.4 ounces, or less than an empty soda can), and golden pileolated warbler (pileolated being a schmancy word for “crested”).

Well, Wilson’s Warbler, one can only hope great things are in store for you with your new name. Maybe the official name-granters will channel the imagination and zest of whoever named the hummingbirds. Some hummers are named after people, but most of them flaunt dazzling, descriptive names: Amethyst Woodstar, Black-billed Streamertail, Green-Backed Firecrown, Turquoise-Throated Puffleg, Booted Racket-Tail, and Spangled Coquette, just to name a few.

2 Big Dogs + 1 Tiny Mouse

Christina Wilsdon

A) I cannot believe it has been a year since I last added anything to this blog.

B) I cannot believe that, like the last entry, it involves rescuing a small creature from our two lumbering dogs.

This time, I found both dogs standing stockstill on the deck, one pointing east and one pointing west, both staring down at a mouse. Both seemed befuddled as to what to do with their prey. They probably were just stunned that they’d even caught it.

I shooed the dogs away and scooped up poor Mousie in a plastic container. He was unharmed except for being a little soggy with dog drool. I let him recover for a bit and then tipped him out in the front yard beneath the safety of a large rhubarb leaf.

The Sneaky Squirrel and the Sunflower Seeds

Christina Wilsdon

At long last the soil has warmed up enough to plant dahlias. Every fall, after the flowers’ fireworks display of color is long gone, I dig up the tubers before the soil gets cold and soggy and tuck them to sleep in a laundry basket filled with peat moss in the garage. Come spring, I bring the wizened, gnarled batch back outside and bury them in the soil of the planters on the deck.

This year, however, a little Douglas squirrel who lives in our garden decided to get in on the act of spring planting. Which meant kicking my dahlia tubers aside as he buried sunflower seeds filched from beneath the birdfeeder.

Here’s the little dickens, contemplating his next move.

He spent hours each day bounding back and forth between the little garden that was blanketed in spilled seeds and the planters.

Leaving the scene of the crime to go back and get more seeds.

I investigated a few days later to find out more about his work and spotted a dozen holes crammed with sunflower seeds.

There are about 10 seeds in this hole so far.

Now, of course, the seeds are growing, and because they’re not properly spaced out, they’re doing so in a tangled, helter-skelter fashion.

Little Squirrel did not expect this result.

Eventually I had to spoil Squirrel’s fun by tacking chicken wire over the planters so the poor dahlias could sprout. I did leave a big pot of soil near the sunflower seeds, though, so that he could continue his sunflower-stashing project.

We Rescued a Bunny!

Christina Wilsdon

What do you like to do after school or work ends for the day? If it’s nice out, I usually like to go for a walk with my dogs. Today, however, I decided to wander around the garden and see what was blooming and what little creatures might be stirring in the flowers and under the leaves.

I didn’t expect to find this little creature.

A baby bunny with its tummy full of milk…and very sleepy.

The poor little mite had been plucked out of its nest by Pippi, one of my two dogs. The bunny squeaked, and Pippi dropped it in surprise. That gave me just enough time to scoop it up. As soon as it felt the warmth of my hand, the little bunny curled up to go back to sleep.

I quickly took its picture and tucked it back into its nest. The nest was a swirl of grass padded with rabbit fur. Another little bunny was fast asleep in the nest, and this one quickly crawled back in to snooze next to its sibling.

The dogs, of course, were eagerly watching and waiting their chance to take the bunny out again. So my husband shooed them into the house, and together we built a weird contraption out of garden stakes, chairs, and an old parakeet cage. It will let Mama Rabbit in, but keep out curious dogs. At least, it will keep them out long enough for us to barge in and protect the rabbits if the dogs try to get through this barrier.

Sleep well, bunnies!

Keep out, doggies! Bunnies sleeping…do not disturb.