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We can start first with what catbirds are not.  Catbirds are not the unfortunate result of unwise experiments with radioactivity.  Catbirds are also not the result of unholy intercourse between avians and felines.  They are not flying cats nor birds with whiskers.  So what are catbirds? Catbirds are a group of rather distantly related species [...]

One common feature of the relationship between early explorers and colonists and the birds of the New Worlds was the tendency of said explorers to name birds after familiar birds from back home (although of course there was the counter notion that the same species deserved a new name – I’m looking at you loons/divers). In some instances the names [...]

Lumpers, rejoice!  Splitters and armchair tickers, cry into your beer.  The Yellow-rumped Warbler will remain the Yellow-rumped Warbler, at least for the foreseeable future, and will not be split into two, three, or even four species.  That is, if you believe in the authority of the American Ornithologists Union, which voted down a proposal to [...]

Kenn Kaufmann, David Sibley, Pete Dunne, Corey Finger and – it seems the rest of the American birding world have it all wrong. I was living in the hope that Richard Crossley would set it right with his brilliant new book, but alas even he decided to not shake the boat or upset the powers [...]

One of the joys of blogging for a widely read blog is that it gives one a platform on which to moan and complain about subjects which interest the blogger and no one else in particular. In that particular spirit I hope to set the record straight on two separate issues that revolve around a [...]

I am a funny man in a very peculiar way. I am odd, and whenever I am not odd, I am different. In fact, my singularity is such that, if the Gaussian distribution of humanity’s normality was the Himalayas, I’d be the guy standing on the beaches of Rodrigues [and boy, do I wish that [...]

Pacific Horneros always have pale legs but some do not consider Pacific Horneros to be Pale-legged Horneros.  That is, Pale-legged Horneros Furnarius leucopus have, according to some, a subspecies called F. l. cinnamomeus, but others consider F. l. cinnamomeus to be the Pacific Hornero Furnarius cinnamomeus, a species in its own right.  Which is my convoluted way [...]

While birding the east slope of the Andes in Ecuador one bird that was relatively common was the Inca Jay, a bird that was until recently considered merely an interesting population of Green Jays by all of the listing authorities.  But in 2009, the International Ornithological Congress* split the Inca Jay Cyanocorax yncas from the [...]

When it’s a Piranga species tanager, obviously. Have you heard the news? The Fiftieth Supplement to the American Ornithologists’ Union Check-list of North American Birds, published in the July 2009 issue of The Auk, is bursting with taxonomic and nomenclatural changes that will wreak havoc on your life lists and possibly knock your birding world [...]

February 12 is Darwin Day, the birthday of the brilliant author of On The Origin of Species. This year marks the 200th anniversary of Charles Darwin’s birth, which nature lovers everywhere should celebrate joyously. The name of this humble website is based on a round number, a very round one indeed considering the shape of [...]

…when it’s been renamed in the newly-released 49th Supplement to the A.O.U. Check-list of North American Birds, Seventh Edition. The new supplement includes various and sundry switches of interest to North American listers, ornithologists, and taxonomists but probably very few others. Paramount among the changes is a new classification and sequence of genera and species [...]