Wildlife -Winter 2008

[Diane Whitehead]

I think it is a bit odd that we use common names for birds while
we very seldom use common names for plants.

Is it just that we are mainly plant people?  Do birders use
scientific names on their checklists?

[J.B.Wyllie]

Talking about cleaning windows, my grandchildren gave me a fridge magnet for Christmas which says

Gardening forever
Housework whenever

I will remove the 'whe' from the last word.

Jean

[mark smyth]

Diane anyone I know who knows their birds doesnt refer to them with scientific names. All bird guides I have use common names first

[Maggi Young]

What are blackcaps?
Here they are the blackcapped chickadee, lovely little birds, they always look neat and are very neat feeders, they grab their sunflower seed and buzz off, not like some birds that just like to sit in the feeder and drop the shells right back into the feeder.
The goldfinches do that as do the pine siskins.

Helen, this is "our" BlackCap in the UK....  http://www.rspb.org.uk/wildlife/birdguide/name/b/blackcap/

this is a page for our Goldfinch : http://www.rspb.org.uk/wildlife/birdguide/name/g/goldfinch/index.asp


This RSPB site is very handy... it has recordings of their calls, too.... http://www.rspb.org.uk/wildlife/birdguide/name

[Anthony Darby]

Diane anyone I know who knows their birds doesn't refer to them with scientific names. All bird guides I have use common names first

I think the general populous know common birds because they feed, or at least see them, them in their gardens. They would probably know the difference between a daisy and a dandelion, but not much else. Tell them grass is a flowering plant and they wouldn't believe you! Common names for plants vary - even garden plants. I was told 'ice plants' would attract butterflies so my mum filled the garden with 'Livingstone Daisies', which we always knew as ice plants. Years later I found out that it was meant to be Sedum spectabile! Birds too have different common names: peewit/lapwing; dunnock/hedge sparrow for example.

[maggiepie]

Maggi, thanks for the links, I do have to say that our version of the blackcapped chickadee has much more spiffy dress sense.

http://animal.discovery.com/guides/wild-birds/a-c/black-capped-chickadee.html

[Maggi Young]

He certainly does.....related to our tit family... esp. the Great Tit, Parus major... the other tits must be more distantly related, for their names vary, though they are family Paridae.....your  blackcapped chickadee is quite like our Coal Tit....we've got a lot of these birds around just now... the natives are supplemented by flocks of winter visitors.

[Paul T]

Howdy All,

Some wildlife pics taken recently.....

Firstly, a couple of pics of one of the ANBG local male Blue Wrens.... which aren't technically wrens at all as it happens. 

And a very cool moth.  It was sitting on a glass door, vertically like in the picture, with it's abdomen curled and the wigs curled slightly to look just like a dead leaf caught on a spiderweb.  Very, very cool.  When you look closely at the fur on the back of the thorax there looks like there is a little face on there as well, so I enlarged that bit of the pic a bit to show it more clearly.  Absolutely amazing what nature produces!! 

[mark smyth]

That's amazing Paul. I would say it's one of the hawk moths.

Someone must be studying the fairy wrens because of thee bird ringers ring on one leg and a coloured ring on the other

Maggi the chickadee has the same call as our coal tit - chick-a-de-de-de, chick-a-de-de-de

[ranunculus]

Looks like a mummified Billy Connolly after a couple of drams.

[Paul T]

Mark,

There are studiers of the Blue Wrens (called Wrenners), and studiers of the White-browed Scrub Wrens (called Scrubbers).  I am guessing that the Wrenners were the ones who made up the names, as I am doubting that anyone would call themselves Scrubbers (unsure whether that name has any meaning elsewhere, but I am not going to explain if!).  We see people from both groups regularly, at all hours of the day.  Sometimes they're recording calls, or replaying the calls to chicks to check their responses etc.  They certainly spend a lot of time at their studies, that is for sure.  Some of them I also know through the Canberra Ornithologists Group, of which I am a member.  It's a small world. 

Cliff,

Now that you mention it..... it does look a bit like him doesn't it. 

[mark smyth]

We use it also

[Anthony Darby]

Paul, many moons ago I collected 'Endangered Animals' cards from Brookbond tea packets (pre-tea bags). One such animal was the 'noisy scrub bird'. How's it doing?

[Paul T]

Haven't come across the noisy scrub wren.  Where is it from?

[maggiepie]

Paul, that is an amazing moth, it looks like it has a monkey face, am thinking I have seen those at some time.

Maggi, we have lots of them around all year, I have a feeder on the window of the computer room, it provides great entertainment, even the cat loves to sit and watch.