Lapwings, Loons & Lousy Jacks: The How and Why of Bird Names
10,000 Birds
AUGUST 19, 2016
Long ago, before I became the bird-name rancoteur I am today, I had an idle question. Why, I asked myself, did the loons come to be called loons in the English-speaking regions of North America when they were already known by the much more practical term divers back in the colonists’ mother country? As the title suggests, Lapwings, Loons & Lousy Jacks has the answer (it’s to do with the evolution of language and the fact that colloquial names come in and out of currency, but I ur
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