Hybrids like us

 

OK, the dog-fox hybrids are strange. Sure of that one? And why would conservationists "condemn" big cat hybrids? I mean, I assumed everyone loves ligers! Note also that polar bears are moving further south and hybridize with grizzlies as they go along. Are these hybrids fertile? If so, it seems the polar bear doesn´t need "saving", after all. Life will find a way. Finally, what´s up with those strange fish accidentally "created" by some crazy scientists in Hungary (I mean, where else)?   

10 of the strangest hybrid animals

Scientists accidentally create "impossible" hybrid fish

Come at me, materialists

Funny how two birds supposedly divided by 10 million years of evolution (or something to that effect) can nevertheless be so bloody similar. I´m sure convergent evolution is all there is to it, right? 

The cryptid connection

This is a special, supplemental volume of that mother lode of all encyclopedias, the multi-volume “Handbook of the Birds of the World” (HBW). Most of it contains an index to the 16 official volumes, but a few additional features have also been thrown in. An extended article deals with BirdLife International, a partnership of bird conservation organizations which co-sponsors the HBW. Danish professor Jon Fjeldså has written extensive articles on bird classification and the search for new species. 15 species from the Amazonas are described for the first time, including an entirely new species of corvid, the Campina Jay, discovered in Brazil in 2002. There is also a photo section, showing more or less stunning color photos of everything from the cassowary to small passerines.

The most interesting part of this 17th HBW volume deal with new bird species not included in the official volumes. Most of the “new” species are previously known populations which for various reasons weren't recognized as species in their own right until recently. The most sensational is the Gunnison Grouse, which lives and breeds in Utah and Colorado, in full view of bird-watchers and scientists (and, I suppose, Mormons). It was confused with the somewhat larger Greater Sage-Grouse until the 1990's, when a thoroughgoing survey revealed it to be a distinct species, the first new species of bird described in the United States since the 19th century. Another sensational find is the New Zealand Storm-Petrel, believed to be extinct and not recorded since 1850, until it showed up in creepy Fortean fashion in 2003. These days, the petrel even breeds on an island 50 km outside Auckland! Some species are genuinely new discoveries, such as the Nechisar Nightjar, known from a single wing found on a road in southern Ethiopia.

Fjeldså also mentions a number of entertaining hoaxes. One of them is over a century old. In 1894, Polish explorer Kalinowski supposedly caught and killed an unknown species of tinamou at “Licamachay” in southern Peru, a place not found on any maps. His specimen was subsequently lost during World War II. Recently, the dead bird surfaced again, and a peek into the explorer's private notebooks showed that he wasn't anywhere near the supposed place of discovery, “Kalinowski's Tinamou” being a perfectly regular tinamou of a previously recognized species. A cruder hoax was perpetrated in New Zealand in 2009, when a pink hawk created quite a stir among the local bird-watchers. It turned out to be a hawk painted pink by a private citizen, the perpetrator facing criminal charges for mistreating animals (apparently, fooling bird-watchers is legal). Fjeldså is surprisingly positive to “crypto-zoological” reports about small, unknown moas in New Zealand, observed in 1989, 1990 and 1993. He doesn't believe in Thunderbirds, though. Fjeldså then mentions Peter Hocking, a Peruvian-American who straddles the thin red line between crypto-zoology and official science, also being a Christian missionary. Hocking has apparently compiled a whole list of crypto-birds from Peru, but these are “normal” birds, such as parakeets. He also believes there are tigers native to South America…

Fjeldså's articles on bird systematics was also interesting. People who love to see scientists confused and confounded might find it comic. DNA tests have shown that traditional bird taxonomy (the system used in the official 16 volumes of HBW) is mostly wrong. Thus, it turns out that grebes and flamingoes are closely related (I have a miniature flamingo in my duck pond!). So are waterfowl (Anseriformes) and landfowl (Galliformes). Ducks and chicken are closely related? Figures. Walt Disney and Old MacDonald would love it. A strange-looking small bird in Colombia, the Broad-Billed Sapayoa, turned out to be the only “Old World suboscine” found in the New World, presumably a relict population 50 million years old. Another piece of good news is that the Tropicbird is no longer an aberrant cousin to the pelicans. Interestingly, the DNA testing showed that some counter-intuitive relations actually are genuine. Swifts and hummingbirds really are related, and so are tinamous (which look like hens) and ostriches. And yes, sandgrouse are related to doves, not to shorebirds. Glad to have that sorted out. And now some bad news: it turns out that at least five Asian subspecies of the Common Blackbird (Turdus merula) aren't really common blackbirds at all, but belong to two different and distinct species! Hmmm…did they use contaminated samples, or what?

As another reviewer pointed out, most of this volume is really an index, but since the other highlights were a great fun to skim, I will nevertheless give “HBW: New Species and Global Index” four stars. Now, please go out there and catch me a miniature moa!

Five stars for Speedy Gonzales

This is the eight volume of Lynx Edicions' "Handbook of the Birds of the World" (HBW). It's the first volume to cover passerines. 9 families of suboscine passerines are included: Broadbills, Asities, Pittas, Ovenbirds, Woodcreepers, Typical Antbirds, Ground Antbirds, Gnateaters and Tapaculos. You may be excused for never hearing about them before.

As usual, the amount of information is staggering. The editors virtually brag about previously unpublished material on poorly known Neotropical genera, unique photos, etc. The authors themselves have gathered much of the new information, or consulted highly competent bird-watchers or field ornithologists. I believe them!

The HBW includes both presentations of each family, species presentations, color plates of all described species and a lot of spectacular photos (also in color). The family presentations are divided into the following sections: Systematics, Morphological Aspects, Habitat, General Habits, Voice, Food and Feeding, Breeding, Movements, Relationship with Man, Status and Conservation. If that isn't enough to floor you, each species presentation deals with Taxonomy, Distribution, Descriptive Notes, Habitat, Food and Feeding, Breeding, Movements, Status and Conservation. Had enough? No? Each volume of HBW also contains a special chapter on some aspect of ornithology, this time it's the history of bird systematics.

It seems the passerines included in this volume are particularly elusive or otherwise problematic. The asities (singular asity) have moved around the entire bird family tree, sometimes regarded as starlings, sometimes as birds-of-paradise or sunbirds. Today, they have gotten their own little family among the suboscines. The broadbills are another problematic group, perhaps because they don't look passerine. Some resemble rollers, while the Green Broadbill looks like a petit quetzal. By contrast, the information on typical antbirds is almost ridiculously detailed, included 8 full-size pages just on the ant-following species. However, I must say that the antbirds have very unimaginative names: antshrikes, antvireos, antwrens... OK, let me guess, they have some kind of relationship with...ants? Sometimes, the authors just can't have a straight face. Under "Gnateaters: Relationship with Man", they tell us that the only people interested in these diminutive birds are bird-watchers or ornithologists! The best photo in the entire volume shows a Blackish Cinclodes (an ovenbird, apparently) sitting atop a sea lion on the Falkland Islands. Otherwise, I kind of fancied the vernacular names of the tapaculos: Chestnut-throated Huet-Huet, Moustached Turca, Crested Gallito or Chucao Tapaculo. Sounds like a bunch of characters from Speedy Gonzales!

:D

Perhaps I must emphasize that we are dealing with a very serious scientific reference work, not entirely suited for the general reader...

Be that as it may, I must (of course) give Gallito, Cinclodes and all their friends FIVE stars.

Suboscine tyranny

A review of "The Birds of South America, Vol II. The Suboscine Passerines" 

Accomplished ornithologist Robert S Ridgely and “his” illustrator Guy Tudor originally set out to publish a four-volume work on South American birds. Although only two were published (on oscine and suboscine passerines, respectively), their work was considered a major breakthrough at the time. The second volume in particular seems to have consumed a lot of the authors' spare time, making them refer to it as “an albatross around our neck”! Today, this “field handbook” (too voluminous to be a field guide) have been superseded by the HBW, but I admit that can't be used as a field guide either! If you can't afford the HBW and “only” fancy South American songbirds, investing in both volumes of the Ridgely-Tudor might perhaps be a good idea.

On a more personal note, leafing through this book was a bizarre experience, since the suboscine passerines frequently seem to recapitulate the oscines. Yeah, I know this is supposed to be “convergent evolution”, but please, how do you explain that the Kinglet Calyptura is almost identical in appearance to the Holarctic Kinglet? The wagtail tyrant is another classic…

Maybe God (or the Elan Vital) did it after all? :P

One swallow doesn´t make a summer

"Handbook of the Birds of the World" (HBW) is a 16-volume mega-encyclopedia covering all living species of birds. Yes, all of them. Really! This is the ninth volume, covering a number of passerine families. Highlights include cotingas, lyrebirds, swallows and the extraordinarily diverse tyrant-flycatchers. We also meet the primitive New Zealand wrens, believed to be the first passerines to diverge from the main stem of passerine evolution, already 85 million years ago.

As usual, the information presented is too detailed to ever by devoured by a layman, and even ornithologists might feel a bit cornered. Despite being an advanced reference work for scientists, HBW could be sold on the commercial market, as well. The stunning photos and illustrations (all in color) are what makes this book both so expensive, and so desirable...

The most fascinating chapter in this volume deals the swallow in human mythology. Apparently, barn swallows used to be associated with the crucifixion of Christ. They tried to save Christ from the temple guard in Gethsemane, and later tried to pluck out the thorns from his head. Another legend claims that while magpies tortured Christ by putting thorns into his feet, the swallows tried to remove them. For this reason, God granted swallows free access to human homes. We are also informed that a swallow reunited Adam and Eve after their expulsion from Eden.

In other legends, the swallows play a Promethean role. They steal the fire of the gods and give it to man. The fire is guarded by sparrows! (I *always* suspected them of being up to no good!) There are also many strange tales about why swallows have forked tails: because the snake in Eden bit off the middle feathers, or Thor tore the tail with a thunderbolt. The HBW also claims that the Koran mentions swallows attacking Christians besieging Mecca. This, however, cannot be correct. I never heard of any Christian attack on Mecca during the time of Muhammad. Overall, a problem with all these myths is that the HBW doesn't give their provenance. I've read in another book that magpies were popular during both Roman times and the Middle Ages, so where does the legend of magpies attacking Christ on the cross come from? 19th century British gamekeepers? Strangely, the mythology section says nothing about the old superstition that swallows hibernate during winter at the bottom of lakes.

But then, HBW isn't really about mythology, is it? ;-)

As already mentioned, this staggeringly well-produced work isn't really intended for a general audience, but rather for large libraries and universities. It's extremely expensive and the text is heavy and filled with scientific jargon. Still, if you are a really rich bird-lover, or just love spectacular books, you might actually enjoy it. Five stars!