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Vagrancy in Birds: A Book Review

10,000 Birds

Vagrancy in Birds is organized into two major parts: (1) A detailed, 62-page synthesis of research and theory and (2) “Family Accounts,” 259 pages covering bird families from Struthionidae/Ostriches) to Thraupidae/Tanagers and allies (Clements is the taxonomic authority). Copyright © 2022 Alexander Lees and James Gilroy.

Birds 264
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Summer guide to bird taxonomy and systematics news

10,000 Birds

It’s mid-July, which among other things means that those of us in North America are starting to check local mudflats for returning shorebird migrants and waiting impatiently for the AOU to hurry up and create five species from the Clapper-King rail complex (the reasons for which we covered last year ). Elephant birds and their kiwi kin.

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Some Ingenuity Can Go a Long Way

10,000 Birds

Among birds the Egyptian Vulture uses rocks to crack Ostrich eggs, the New Caledonian Crow and Woodpecker Finch (one of several Darwin Finches of the Galapagos Islands), uses sticks to extract grubs from inside a branch. This is similar to the fact that all birds, even first time breeders within a species build identical nests.

Fish 164
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I Remember Elephants

10,000 Birds

We are facing a plague of poaching that is again decimating the species. A different research says, from 2002 to 2011 the known populations of forest elephants declined by 62%. The way I see it, it is a cruel joke leading towards the extinction of a threatened species. In Africa, one elephant is being killed every 15 minutes.

Elephants 219
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Mrs Pankhurst’s Purple Feather–A Book Review

10,000 Birds

Their populations, plus those of other species that ‘wore’ the coveted long, colorful feathers used for women’s fashionable hats, were being dangerously depleted by hunters intent on feeding the millinery industry. As a librarian and women’s studies scholar, I greatly appreciate the research. This is where Boase excels.

Industry 129
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The Feather Thief: A Book Review

10,000 Birds

71): Ingredients include feathers from a Spangled Cotinga (called ‘Chatterer’ by tiers), Blue Macaw, Red-Ruffed Fruitcrow (‘Indian Crow’), Ostrich, and, according to Johnson, Golden Pheasant (the jungle c**k, I think). In some cases, he took all adult males of the species or subspecies held by the museum.

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Here’s the new bird family tree. It’s amazing.

10,000 Birds

processed the entire genomes of 48 bird species and compared nearly 42 million base pairs of DNA (Hackett et al. The new 48-genome analysis included only ostrich and tinamou DNA, so it doesn’t shed further light on paleognath interrelationships, but it does reinforce their distinctiveness from all other living birds. This is why.

Family 279