Posted by Scott Frye on February 24, 2007 at 12:44 PM
How do birds get their names.
Some names just conjure up a much different meaning than the bird itself. For instance, a Killdeer does not actually butcher or feed on deer. Before birding, the only coot I ever knew was a old one.
What is a Scaup? I have seen pictures of a Greater and a lesser Scaup. Is there a medium Scaup?
Wigeon is a great name and rhymes with pigeon.
I would like to get a picture of a Hooded Merganser. Now thats a great name. I would like to have that in my portfolio as much for the name as the beautiful bird it is.
If I were to discover a brand new bird. Could I name it? I would call it the Greater Scotter.
But if I did discover a brand new bird, who does name the bird? What agency is the final authority for bird naming?
Posted by Steve Foss on February 24, 2007 at 12:56 PM
Good topic. Bird names can be very cool. King eider, for example, or crested auklet, or magnificent frigatebird. How about zone-tailed hawk?
Some bird names are based on the bird's song. The killdeer may be one of those. Its piercing cry can be rendered kil-DEER, kil-DEER.
Latin genus names do not go to the discoverer, but species names sometimes do. One of many examples is the scientifc name for the Steller's jay, with a genus name not reflecting its discoverer, but a species name that does: Cyanocitta stelleri.
I do not know who has final authority for bird scientifc names, probably some international society of bird taxonomists.
There are bunches of names for most. I suspect all start locally, and the more popular spread and eventually become the standard. At some point one or more make it into some kind of official or scientific press, and it spreads from there.
A good parallel is in my fishy world. The coho salmon is a great example. Though the scientific name is standard worldwide, a source that also lists common names cites over twenty of them.
In fact, that's one of the big points behind scientific language in general, and scientific names specifically, being based on Latin, a "dead" language that spans most other languages. It provides a common or neutral term that spans all cultures and languages when scientists need to talk to each other.
Discussion
2 repliesSome names just conjure up a much different meaning than the bird itself. For instance, a Killdeer does not actually butcher or feed on deer. Before birding, the only coot I ever knew was a old one.
What is a Scaup? I have seen pictures of a Greater and a lesser Scaup. Is there a medium Scaup?
Wigeon is a great name and rhymes with pigeon.
I would like to get a picture of a Hooded Merganser. Now thats a great name. I would like to have that in my portfolio as much for the name as the beautiful bird it is.
If I were to discover a brand new bird. Could I name it? I would call it the Greater Scotter.
But if I did discover a brand new bird, who does name the bird? What agency is the final authority for bird naming?
Some bird names are based on the bird's song. The killdeer may be one of those. Its piercing cry can be rendered kil-DEER, kil-DEER.
Latin genus names do not go to the discoverer, but species names sometimes do. One of many examples is the scientifc name for the Steller's jay, with a genus name not reflecting its discoverer, but a species name that does: Cyanocitta stelleri.
I do not know who has final authority for bird scientifc names, probably some international society of bird taxonomists.
There are bunches of names for most. I suspect all start locally, and the more popular spread and eventually become the standard. At some point one or more make it into some kind of official or scientific press, and it spreads from there.
A good parallel is in my fishy world. The coho salmon is a great example. Though the scientific name is standard worldwide, a source that also lists common names cites over twenty of them.
In fact, that's one of the big points behind scientific language in general, and scientific names specifically, being based on Latin, a "dead" language that spans most other languages. It provides a common or neutral term that spans all cultures and languages when scientists need to talk to each other.