Archive for Canada
Bad Feather Days
Posted by: | CommentsStrictly speaking they’re not molting their heads, just their head feathers.
But especially the first-cycle Golden-crowned Sparrows are pretty ratty right now. Even the adults look like they could use a good combing.
Tautology
Posted by: | CommentsOver time, languages come up with new words for old things, and eventually the old words are forgotten–even if they don’t always disappear.
A well-known example from the world of birds: the English lag means “goose”; probably echoic, the word is entirely obsolete, so far as I know, except in the compound “graylag.” Because the “lag” portion of the name is so completely opaque, we moderns have to add “goose” to it, giving us the “official” name Graylag Goose, an etymological redundancy.
And here’s one we rarely think of.
This is an adult Mew Gull, photographed a couple of days ago here in Vancouver. There’s a lot to admire about this bird, not least perhaps the fact that it has forced us into another everyday pleonasm: for the English mew and its endless cognates mean “gull,” almost certainly another onomatopoeia.
According to the London Times, the word was still understood in Scotland just a generation ago, but for most of us English speakers, it’s incomprehensible in this context, requiring the redundant addition of “gull” for us to make sense of it.
Who has other examples?
More Gull’s Backs
Posted by: | CommentsGellert and I spent a little time looking at gulls yesterday at Jericho Park, as usual relishing the irony of sorting through the abundant Mew Gulls in search of Ring-billed Gulls.
The light on a misty morning was perfect for looking at variation in back color, of which Mew Gulls, of course, show considerable. I think of Ring-billed Gulls as much more consistently colored, adults (almost!) invariably pale gray, which made the duo in the photo all the more interesting. From whatever angle I chose, the left-hand bird remained conspicuously dark-mantled; to my surprise, the photo came out quite close to naked-eye reality.
It doesn’t “mean” anything, but it’s still fun to discover a little bit of variation in even the most common species. They can turn out to be less boringly familiar than you think sometimes.
An Unwelcome Arrival
Posted by: | CommentsIt felt like a morning for spring arrivals, all damp and warm, so Gellert and I struck out for Jericho Park. Our walk was pleasant enough, and there was a small fall of Red-shafted Flickers and American Robins, but our hopes for novelty went unfulfilled.
Except by this.
This lone Mute Swan was out on English Bay, far from the allurements of the duck pond, and presumably got there under its own power. The nearest source is Lost Lagoon, a couple of miles away in Stanley Park, but I’m told that all those birds are pinioned; the closest obviously feral swans that I know of are on Westham Island, five or six miles south.
Or maybe this is Canada’s first wild Mute Swan.
Yeah sure.
A Hybrid Wigeon?
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It’s hard in the colder half of the year not to see flocks of American Wigeon around Vancouver. And dumpy little ponds like this one, surrounded by lawn and houses and Saturday morning joggers, seem to be their preferred habitat.
A quick scan of a flock this large is almost guaranteed to turn up a Eurasian Wigeon or two. And sure enough, one of the first birds Alison and I saw when we pulled up to Centennial Beach yesterday morning was a nice gray drake with a nice red head.
But was it really a Eurasian Wigeon?
Like all ducks, the wigeon are given to miscegenation, and every one of the three species–American, Eurasian, and Chiloe–has hybridized with each of the others, not to mention with virtually every other species of puddle duck.
The Centennial Beach bird struck us as a candidate for such a hybrid or back-cross.
There was a definite pinkish tone to the sides, and the head color was decidedly dull, with a noticeably “faded” effect to the cheek beneath the eye; the eye patch was also very conspicuous. From certain angles, I think I could see a faint, incomplete black line at the base of the bill. The wing coverts seemed to be entirely bright white, eliminating the possibility that we were dealing with just a smudgy first-cycle male.
Hybrid wigeon are over-reported in North America; too many birders see a green eye patch or a blurry flank or a dull forehead blaze and immediately assume that it couldn’t be a “pure” Eurasian–an assumption they’d be less eager to make after a few hours with a flock of Eurasians in the Old World. This time, though, I’m willing to believe that there may well be some American blood coursing through these veins.
What do you think?
