Tag: AOS

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.

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.