Therefore God

 

Not an Aldabra rail, I´m afraid

Ooookay...

The bird that came back from the dead by evolving twice 

Come and see the leiothrix

Leiothrix, a bird from Himalaya introduced at Réunion?!

“Birds of the Indian Ocean Islands” is a field guide written by Ian Sinclair and Olivier Langrand, with illustrations by Norman Arlott, Hilary Burn, Peter Hagman and Ian Lewington. First published in 1998, this is the fully revised 2013 edition. Sinclair is apparently the grand old man of African field birding, and have written over 20 books. Langrand is a French conservationist. The book is sponsored by the hardware business Chamberlain and is devoted to conservation efforts.

The area covered by the field guide includes Madagascar, the Mascarenes (i.e. Mauritius, Rodrigues and Réunion), the Comoros and the Seychelles. In other words, the island-nations and colonies off the east coast of Africa. It also covers seabirds from the same general area. 502 species are included, all illustrated in color. Illustrations, species presentations and range maps are on facing pages, making the guide easy to use. It reminds me of Heinzel-Fitter-Parslow.

The introduction describes the major bird-watching hotspots on the covered islands, and how to reach them. Curiously, the guide says next to nothing about the political situation in the area. Surely, both Madagascar and the Comoros are extremely unstable? Was the text simply taken over from the 1998 version of the book? Nor is the political status of the islands mentioned. Isn´t it relevant that Mayotte is a French dependency, while the rest of the Comoros form an independent state? The introduction also include a long list of endemic species, and a ditto of “new species”, although most of these seem to be previously known populations promoted to species status (and in some cases, to conservation efforts c/o the international community).

Many of the birds are virtually unknown even to an arm-chair bookish amateur ornithologist such as the Ashtar Command, I mean, what on earth are tetrakas, jeries, newtonias, couas or the leiothrix? Only currently living or recently extinct bird species are included, so no dodos or elephant birds in this one! By contrast, European migrant birds passing the Seychelles on their way to and from the African mainland are included, including the corn crake. Strindberg would have been surprised, LOL.

With that Swedish in-house joke, I end this review of “Birds of the Indian Ocean Islands”, 2013 edition, which I got for a discounted price when buying CDs from a local vendor (sic). Swedish local, that is.

Finis coronat opus

“Birds of the Seychelles” is a Princeton field guide written by Adrian Skerret and Ian Bullock, with illustrations by Tony Disley. It was published in 2001. The Seychelles are an island-nation in the Indian Ocean, off the east coast of Africa. Why would a bird-watcher go there? The authors point to three reasons. First, there are interesting endemics on the so-called granitic islands (or granitics), since these are the oldest oceanic islands still in existence. They were formed 65 million years ago! There are currently 12 or 16 endemics on the Seychelles, depending on how you count, including the Aldabra Rail, the last surviving flightless bird on any Indian Ocean archipelago. Second, the Seychelles are home to enormous colonies of seabirds. Third, billions of birds migrate across the Indian Ocean every year, many of them flying off course and ending up on the Seychelles.

I admit that the guide does look bewildering to a non-birdwatcher firmly seated in his arm-chair in Europe. Old acquaintances from my backyard, such as the Grey Heron, the Mallard or the House Sparrow, co-exist with exotics like the Madagascar Fody (what´s a fody?), the Seychelles Magpie-Robin (which follows giant tortoises and really do look like a manikin magpie) or the Seychelles Black Parrot (which is actually brown). Weirdly, only two corvids have managed to get their feathered backsides on to these distant shores, the Pied Crow and the House Crow specifically. Quite the disappointment since corvids are my favorite bird group…

The field guide contains descriptions of the Seychelles and various important bird-watching sites on the islands. The number of bird species covered is 250. Color plates and species presentations are not on facing pages. The guide seems to be pretty exhaustive and serious, with information on juveniles, similar species (to aid identification) and current conservation status. Even extinct species have been included in the field guide! English and French vernacular names for each bird are given, but the Creole names are mostly constructed by the authors themselves in a weird display of cultural imperialism. The book also contain a major factual error: it claims that the Seychelles were separated from the nearest landmass “before mammals evolved”, but mammals of course evolved earlier than 65 million years ago.  

Still, probably indispensable if you want to visit the most successful nation in Africa…

Dead as a dodo

Birds of the Indian Ocean Islands: Madagascar, Mauritius, Reunion, Rodrigues, Seychelles and the Comoros (Chamberlain) by Sinclair, Ian, Langrand, Olivier (2013) Paperback (Paperback)

An excellent guide to the birds of the Indian Ocean islands. Those left after crazy sailors consumed the others...