Interest In Birds Research Articles

Mozaika w Casa de los Pájaros w Italice (Santiponce, Sevilla) jako wyraz rzymskiej fascynacji ptakami

The aim of this article is to analyze and interpret a mosaic in one of the Roman houses (the House of Birds) in Italica (today Santiponce, Sevilla). This mosaic, depicting 33 birds of various species in square fields, will be considered in the context of the scientific interest in birds, which dates back to the Hellenistic era, as well as the custom of arranging aviaries in the country villas.

Assessing determinants and trends in bird species identification skills among students: a comparative analysis with early 2000s data

ABSTRACT The decline of Earth’s biodiversity highlights the crucial role of knowledge about species in understanding ecological interdependencies and supporting conservation efforts. This study assessed bird species identification skills among 1752 students (46.4% boys, 51.9% girls, 1.1% diverse) in grades 4–12 from different school types, focusing on 30 species. Demographic and individual factors were examined for their impact on bird species identification. Comparative analyses with a 2005 dataset reveal a significant 37.75% decrease in students’ ability to correctly name birds at the species level. The average identification score was 6.84 (SD = 4.10) out of 30. Most students were only able to classify birds at the taxonomic level of family or order, but not at the species level. Factors such as age, school type, garden stay, distance to green space, interest in birds, perception of birds, and animal-related activities significantly influenced bird species identification. The study reveals a decline in bird species identification skills across all school types, particularly in schools of the highest stratification level, which nowadays have lower identification scores than medium stratification schools in 2005. The implications for educational institutions, particularly in the context of Education for Sustainable Development, emphasise the need for a reevaluatingcurriculum and teaching methods.

Unlocking biodiversity awareness: influential factors on bird species knowledge and the links with environmental attitudes and connectedness to nature.

ABSTRACT In the face of accelerating biodiversity loss, there is a need for widespread public support for conservation efforts. To increase the understanding of biodiversity issues, researchers suggest beginning with the acquisition of species knowledge. However, to optimally support the successful acquisition of species knowledge, influencing factors must first be identified. Therefore, this study aimed to examine the relationship between species knowledge, environmental attitudes, and connection to nature, as well as individual variables such as interest, perception, and animal-related activities. Species knowledge was assessed using 50 bird species. A total of 3438 German participants were asked to identify these species in an online survey. Structural equation modelling results indicated that interest in birds and involvement in animal-related activities positively influenced species knowledge. Surprisingly, the perception of birds negatively affected species knowledge, highlighting the complexity of personal biases in environmental education. While connectedness to nature doesn’t directly influence bird knowledge, it emerges as a strong predictor of pro-environmental attitudes. Therefore, promoting species knowledge by stimulating interest and involvement in animal-related activities is essential for raising awareness of biodiversity conservation. Furthermore, connecting people with nature helps to foster pro-environmental attitudes, leading to a more sustainable and eco-centric future.

The Styles of Style

Abstract This review considers two books—Benjamin Bateman’s Queer Disappearance in Modern and Contemporary Fiction and Taylor Black’s Style: A Queer Cosmology—that define and comment on queer male style in literature and culture. Each study defines style itself as a species of dynamic interrelationships among personal presentations, literary works, and cultural environments. Bateman’s book focuses on environmental issues in E. M. Forster’s Maurice, as well as on questions about the disappearances of birds. Sharing Bateman’s interest in birds, Black’s analysis demonstrates the ways the figure of the bird offers an apt analogy to queer male style.

INTEREST IN, PREVENTION OF AND CONCERN FOR BIRDS AMONG WILDLIFE MANAGEMENT COLLEGE STUDENTS IN NIGERIA

Birds have conservation value as significant elements of natural systems because they are responsible for insects and rodent control, plant cross-pollination and seed distribution which result in perceptible paybacks to people. This study contributes to providing insights into the interest in, prevention of and concern for birds among wildlife college students. A multi-stage sampling procedure was used in the selection of 448 respondents. Primary data were obtained on respondents' characteristics and their interest in, prevention of and concern for birds through the use of a structured questionnaire. Descriptive statistics were used for data analysis. The results showed that the mean age and family size of students were 24 years and 5 persons respectively while 62.7% of the respondents were male. The respondents have a piece of very good interest in birds (3.9), seek more prevention of birds (3.1) and have more concern for birds (3.8). Pearson Product Moment Correlation showed that there was a strong positive and significant association between college students’ interest in and their prevention of birds (r = 0.787; p < 0.05), and the concern for birds (r = 0.829; p < 0.05). Similarly, the college students’ prevention of birds and their concern for birds (r = 0.943; p < 0.05). Based on the results of the study, it was suggested that college students should be taught more about birds to improve their interests, increase the promotion of birds and show more concern for birds as this will assist to create a positive perception and help the students understand their roles in the fulfilment of their training as wildlife conservators.

Sir Peter Markham Scott CH. 14 September 1909—29 August 1989

Conservationist, scientist, artist, author, broadcaster and sportsman, Sir Peter Scott was one of the leaders of the international conservation movement in the twentieth century. As founder of the Severn Wildfowl Trust (now the Wildfowl & Wetlands Trust) he and his team initiated research into the movements, ecology and behaviour of migratory populations of wildfowl (ducks, geese and swans), which were poorly known at the time, while also developing captive breeding programmes to save species such as the Hawaiian goose from extinction. As a co-founder of the World Wildlife Fund (later the Worldwide Fund for Nature), Scott worked tirelessly to raise money for programmes to save many globally endangered animals, with a particular interest in birds and cetaceans. As chairman of the Survival Service Commission (later the Species Survival Commission) of the International Union for the Conservation of Nature and Natural Resources (IUCN), Scott founded the IUCN red list , by which the level of threat to individual species and populations is measured. Through his writing and broadcasting, Scott connected with millions of ordinary citizens, raising awareness of the threat to biodiversity and the future wellbeing of mankind. A skilled wildlife artist, Scott painted throughout his life, held 16 one-man exhibitions of his work during his lifetime and illustrated numerous publications, including many of his own 23 books. Scott's sporting achievements included winning a bronze Olympic sailing medal and becoming British national gliding champion. He received a knighthood in 1973 for services to conservation and the environment, and was appointed Companion of Honour to Her Majesty the Queen in 1987.

Public Interest in Birds and Congruence with Seasonal Observational Data: A Case Study Using Japanese Wikipedia Pageview Data

Public Interest in Birds and Congruence with Seasonal Observational Data: A Case Study Using Japanese Wikipedia Pageview Data

Birds as Dads, Babysitters, and Hats

Abstract The commandment to send the mother bird from her nest before taking her eggs or chicks, known in Jewish tradition as shiluach hakan, is found in Deuteronomy 22:6–7. This essay addresses dominant perspectives on the mother bird mitzvah—its association with good luck, bad luck, and compassion—before showcasing rabbinic texts from Mishnah and Babylonian Talmud Hullin Chapter 12 that evince interest in birds as ingenious builders, as fathers and not just mothers, as queer parents and altruists, as rebel spirits who resist captivity even unto death and, finally, in birds as co-inhabitants of the earth whose lives are parallel to as well as enmeshed with our own. I offer here a bird-centric approach to the commandment, an effort to read it in a spirit of anti-anthropocentrism, drawing on animal studies scholar Matthew Calarco’s notion of indistinction.

Residential yard management and landscape cover affect urban bird community diversity across the continental USA.

Urbanization has a homogenizing effect on biodiversity and leads to communities with fewer native species and lower conservation value. However, few studies have explored whether or how land management by urban residents can ameliorate the deleterious effects of this homogenization on species composition. We tested the effects of local (land management) and neighborhood-scale (impervious surface and tree canopy cover) features on breeding bird diversity in six US metropolitan areas that differ in regional species pools and climate. We used a Bayesian multiregion community model to assess differences in species richness, functional guild richness, community turnover, population vulnerability, and public interest in each bird community in six land management types: two natural area park types (separate and adjacent to residential areas), two yard types with conservation features (wildlife-certified and water conservation) and two lawn-dominated yard types (high- and low-fertilizer application), and surrounding neighborhood-scale features. Species richness was higher in yards compared with parks; however, parks supported communities with high conservation scores while yards supported species of high public interest. Bird communities in all land management types were composed of primarily native species. Within yard types, species richness was strongly and positively associated with neighborhood-scale tree canopy cover and negatively associated with impervious surface. At a continental scale, community turnover between cities was lowest in yards and highest in parks. Within cities, however, turnover was lowest in high-fertilizer yards and highest in wildlife-certified yards and parks. Our results demonstrate that, across regions, preserving natural areas, minimizing impervious surfaces and increasing tree canopy are essential strategies to conserve regionally important species. However, yards, especially those managed for wildlife support diverse, heterogeneous bird communities with high public interest and potential to support species of conservation concern. Management approaches that include the preservation of protected parks, encourage wildlife-friendly yards and acknowledge how public interest in local birds can advance successful conservation in American residential landscapes.

Profile of John R. Speakman

John Speakman’s interest in science was spurred by his early interest in birds. “I was a very keen birdwatcher, and I used to spend lots of time watching birds in my youth,” he says. At age 16, he would go to the same site every day to count small wading birds and try to work out the factors influencing their numbers. John R. Speakman. Image credit: Shenzhen Institutes of Advanced Technology, Chinese Academy of Sciences. When he was deciding which university to attend, Speakman scoured university prospectuses, looking for researchers who studied wading birds and ended up choosing the University of Stirling in Scotland, where he was able to work on waders for his undergraduate project. He decided to stay at the university for his doctorate and continued studying wading birds with the same supervisor, David Bryant. “He gave me lots of guidance but also let me pursue my own thing, and I really enjoyed doing that,” says Speakman. “That basically cemented the idea that a career in science was the way for me to go,” he says. During a long and fruitful scientific career, Speakman has studied fundamental questions about energy balance. Much of his work has focused on understanding the factors governing variations in food intake and energy expenditure across a wide range of species, and he is a leading expert in the use of isotopes to measure energy expenditure and metabolism. Speakman’s research has contributed greatly to researchers’ understanding of how energy balance can influence obesity and aging. Speakman is currently a professor at the Chinese Academy of Sciences in Shenzhen, China and at the University of Aberdeen in Scotland. In his Inaugural Article, Speakman used data from mouse studies to investigate the mechanisms underlying caloric restriction, an approach to slow down aging by restricting caloric intake …

Bird Extinctions in Brazil’s Atlantic Forest and How They Can Be Prevented

Bird species extinctions in the Atlantic Forest of Brazil have been predicted since the early 1990s, but it has become accepted wisdom that none have yet been documented. We revisit this question in light of updates to the global Red List, and conclude that between five and seven bird species have likely been driven to extinction in the wild in this biome in recent decades, plus a further two species that occurred elsewhere in Brazil. These extinctions were the result of habitat loss in combination with other threats. A further nine Atlantic Forest bird species are Critically Endangered, plus six from elsewhere in Brazil. We review growing efforts to help these species avoid extinction using a range of tools including multi-stakeholder planning, advocacy, habitat protection and restoration on public and private land, focussed research, and intensive population management, drawing on examples from the most threatened Atlantic Forest endemics. Conservation organisations, local communities, government agencies, zoos, international funders, universities and others are working together to prevent these species from disappearing. While the political environment in Brazil has rarely been more hostile to conservation, there are also some positive trends. Rates of deforestation in the Atlantic Forest have fallen, forest restoration and recovery is increasing, and an unprecedented number of ordinary people are taking an interest in birds and participating in citizen science. With dedication, collaboration, sufficient resources, and a focus on evidence-informed solutions, we are hopeful that many of the Critically Endangered species can be pulled back from the brink of extinction.

British Ornithologists' Union

The BOU is dependent upon a number of individuals whose contribution is scarcely visible, but without whom it would not be viable. Nigel Crocker is one such person, having served the Union in two key roles over many years: as Honorary Treasurer from 1984 to 2000, and subsequently as Chair of the trustees who look after the Union’s investments. Council is delighted to recognize Nigel’s 35-year contribution by the award of the Janet Kear Union Medal. Born in Devon, Nigel was brought up in Cornwall. His interest in birds was encouraged from an early age, both by a neighbour and his grandfather, who bought him his first pair of binoculars. At school he undertook a project on Barn Owls Tyto alba, exploring abandoned Cornish mine buildings to collect owl pellets, something that might not now be encouraged in an age of health and safety! After school, Nigel began a long career with the Trustee and Executorship department of National Westminster Bank, eventually reaching a senior management position. Like many bank employees he had to move around the country as he made his way up the bank hierarchy, with postings in Exeter, two spells in Gloucestershire, interrupted by a spell in Sussex where he met his wife Beryl. He eventually ended up working in Bristol and London, and they established the family home in Somerset near Chew Valley Lake and Blagdon Lake, where he and Beryl have lived for over 30 years Throughout, Nigel has contributed to ornithology in many capacities, notwithstanding the demands of career and family life. In Gloucestershire he undertook Marsh Warbler Acrocephalus palustris surveys for the Gloucestershire Trust for Nature Conservation (GTNC), was county wildfowl count organizer, RSPB and YOC group leader, and served on the Council of GTNC and the Gloucestershire Naturalists’ Society. In Sussex he ran birdwatching classes. He has participated in many BTO surveys and undertaken fieldwork for the Somerset Breeding Bird Atlas project. His particular interest is in waterbirds and waterside birds. Living in Somerset he has been able to witness close to home the colonization of Little Egretta garzetta, Great Ardea alba and Cattle Bubulcus ibis Egrets. Nigel joined the BOU at a time when membership applications were by nomination. One of Nigel's colleagues at National Westminster, Peter Wilkinson, was instrumental in Nigel's nomination, following Nigel's work on Marsh Warblers in the Severn Valley. It was Peter who persuaded Nigel to succeed him as Honorary Treasurer of the BOU in 1984. During Nigel's period as Treasurer, prudent action ensured that it was spared the effects of the Black Monday Stock Market crash in October 1987. In 1997, as Hon. Treasurer Nigel was part of the BOU's leadership team which was responsible for one of the most significant developments ever for the BOU; appointing a full-time administrator, Steve Dudley, when the then long-serving, part-time secretary, Gwen Bonham, chose to retire. The decision to invest more of the Union's resources in securing its long-term administration provided the platform on which all subsequent development and successes of the BOU have been founded. Nigel also served as the BOU’s representative on the UK Dependent Territories Conservation Forum. On his retirement as Hon. Treasurer in 2000, he kindly agreed to become one of the Union's investment trustees, and he has now served for over 20 years in this role. The Union is not alone in benefiting from Nigel's time and expertise. He has also served as a trustee of the Herbert Stevens Trust of the British Ornithologists’ Club and as Vice-chair of the Diocese of Bath and Wells and Chair of its Investment Committee. It is particularly appropriate that Nigel's service to the BOU is marked by the award of the Janet Kear Union Medal as Janet was one of the Presidents under whom Nigel served and they shared a lifelong association with waterbirds. Neil Bucknell

Birds that are more commonly encountered in the wild attract higher public interest online

AbstractLarge body size, the defining characteristic of “charismatic megafauna,” is often viewed as the most significant correlate of higher public interest in species. However, common, local species (many of which are not large) can also generate public interest. We explored the relative importance of body size versus local occurrence in patterns of online interest in birds using a large sample of digital human‐wildlife interactions (367 million Wikipedia pageviews) that included more than 10,000 bird species and a range of cultural and geographic contexts (represented by 25 Wikipedia language editions). We compared interest in Wikipedia, as measured by pageviews, with a bird's body size and its regional observation frequency (using data from eBird.org). We found that local species (i.e., those that occur in the wild in the country responsible for the majority of a Wikipedia language edition's pageviews) attract more pageviews than global species. Both body size and observation frequency had a positive correlation with Wikipedia pageviews across languages, but eBird observation frequency explained more of the variance in pageviews on average. In a model that included both observation frequency and body size, observation frequency was a significantly better predictor of pageviews than body size in 24 of 25 languages. Our results demonstrate that the opportunity to encounter birds in the wild is a significant correlate of increased online interest in birds across multiple linguistic and geographic contexts. This relationship provides insight into why some species attract greater interest than others and emphasizes the overlooked potential of common species in conservation marketing.

Reliability and quality of artificial nectar feeders for birds in the Cape Floristic Region

Supplementary feeding of birds may have considerable ecological and evolutionary effects on bird communities. However, there is a lack of basic information on the prevalence, frequency and quality of supplementary feeders, especially in African urban areas. Here we describe the prevalence, reliability and quality of artificial nectar feeders in suburbs in the Cape Floristic Region, South Africa, where many bird-pollinated plant species occur. Results from 291 questionnaires, completed by garden owners with an interest in birds, reveal that 57% of respondents have feeders in their gardens and 51% refill their feeders multiple times per week. The sugar concentration, total duration of feeding and frequency of feeding did not affect abundances or species richness of nectarivorous birds in gardens. We found a higher incidence of breeding sunbirds and sugarbirds in gardens with feeders than gardens without. Supplementary nectar feeding in this area has the potential to contribute to conserving nectarivorous birds, but investigation into the possible negative effects is needed.

Tracking the cultural niches of North American birds through time

Abstract Conservation efforts are constrained by our poor grasp of changing relationships between humans and other species. We used internet query data describing relative public interest in different species of birds, and combined them with citizen science data describing relative encounter rates with those same taxa, to gain perspective on shifting relationships between people and birds in the United States. National‐level interest in birds increased an average of 12.6% across two sequential 5‐year periods, while controlling for the volume of internet searches and changing encounter rates with species in the United States. Geographic alignment of state‐level interest in birds and state‐level encounters with birds increased by an average of 5.7% across species. In multivariate multiple regression analysis, we found that species did not move uniformly through a 2D ‘cultural niche space’ between time periods. Shifts varied according to changes in federal protection afforded to species, by migratory strategy, whether species were native or introduced and by taxonomic Order. Together, these results suggest that people in the United States became more inquisitive about birds over a relatively short period of time, that their growing curiosity was directed disproportionately towards local species, and that cultural labels and species characteristics continue to shape relationships between people and birds. By tracking shifts in the cultural niches of birds over time, we provide quantitative perspective on general patterns of socio‐ecological change. And by identifying factors associated with those shifts, our results also offer specific information that can be used to improve conservation efforts aimed at particular species or groups of birds. A free Plain Language Summary can be found within the Supporting Information of this article.

Forms of Repetition in ‘The Robins Nest’

This essay uses Clare's interest in birds as a lens to focus its examination of the way his poetry exhibits a particular kind of attention to attention. More particularly, it explores various ways in which repetition functions in Clare's poem, ‘The Robins Nest’. The essay argues that the tension between specifics and generalities which inevitably arises in the construction of natural history, and the gap between natural history and poetry, are significantly negotiated in ‘The Robins Nest’ through the poet's use of forms of repetition. These in turn both invite the reader's attention to the world and represent something of the quality of the poet's attention as he makes his own observations.

Birds and Epipalaeolithic hunter-gatherers in northeast Iberia. The case of the Balma del Gai site

Balma del Gai (Moià, Barcelona) is an Epipalaeolithic archaeological site that provides one of the most significant archaeological records of hunter-gatherers living in the northeast of Iberia during the Pleistocene-Holocene transition. Its faunal record evidences a very diverse spectrum of hunted species and particularly an increase in the number of certain small prey that were exploited, such as rabbits and land snails. This study focuses on avian remains, which are also represented, albeit in lower numbers.Zooarchaeological and taphonomic analyses of the birds show a high diversity of taxa in the assemblage, with a predominance of specimens belonging to Perdicinae. Bone surface modifications show clear evidence of the anthropogenic origin of the sample, indicating an interest in birds as food. However, some taxa, mainly raptors, were also exploited to acquire wing feathers and claws for ornamental purposes.Our results, in conjunction with those from other sites from the same region and period, will contribute to establishing the role of avians within the broad-spectrum economy of the last hunter-gatherers from Iberia.

Hugh Alan Buck

A remarkable vet and adventurer, he spent much of his working life abroad. His interest in birds and mammals started early and developed into a lifelong obsession.

Lee Conell

Lee Conell Lee Conell (bio) It was six-thirty in the morning, too early to be awake at a writing conference, and yet here I was, a lone fiction writer standing outside the Sewanee Inn for a bird walk with a group of poets. The [End Page 707] genre imbalance made sense to me. I'd long felt that it was only poets—only good poets—who could do justice to the beauty and the weirdness and the rhythm of birds. While I was looking forward to the walk, I was also a little anxious. After almost two weeks of attending readings and lectures, of nonstop close listening, I wasn't entirely sure I had it in me to listen to birds, too. As a kid, I'd been obsessed with birds. I'd gone bird-watching with the park rangers in New York City, learned to notice not just different types of pigeons, but the different types of hawks that ate the different types of pigeons. Then I'd entered middle school and become self-conscious about outright geekery. I put the binoculars away and tried to look like I wasn't noticing anything, not even my own existence. As a writer, too, I'd tried to avoid showcasing my interest in birds, worried they'd feel like easy narrative symbolism (freedom!), or like I was trying to be Jonathan Franzen (Freedom!). Yet somehow a bird-watching scene between two important characters had lingered, persistently, in my in-progress novel. I'd tried to get rid of it, watched Portlandia's "Put a Bird On it!" to help shame me into revising away all that potentially overwrought symbolism, the stupid emotional truths revealed via bird. But the scene—maybe because of the stupid emotional truths—proved pivotal to the book. And the bird walk I took that day in Sewanee also proved pivotal to the book, though not in a way I understood at first. Its importance had nothing to do with seeing the bluebird that was so blue it shocked me, or the birds we saw hidden in brush low to the ground, like feathered spies. It had almost nothing to do with hearing Mark Jarman and Sidney Wade, whose reading voices I loved, list off bird names in a cadence that reminded me of listening to them read their work. What wound up lingering with me wasn't the birds we saw or identified, but one of the first moments of the walk, when a bird sang especially loudly as we passed beneath its tree. The group grew [End Page 708] quiet. How strange it was—to see the faces of poets I'd just heard give readings stilled into a new, surprising hush. We'd been listening these last two weeks to craft talks and readings, listening intently to each other's work. That listening suddenly felt like it had trained me to be silent here. And of course that was what the stupid emotional truths in the bird-watching scene needed too. I was getting too worried about all that noise around symbolism, around beauty, around birds. I needed to be silent in some different way with that scene. If the stupid emotional truths were really stupid, at least I'd try to hear them, to identify them more clearly. Then someone guessed at the name of the singing bird. And someone else guessed too. There was a rush of naming, an energy that felt a little bit like writing. Later, we were emailed a list of the names of the birds we saw on the walk. I shared the list with my friends at home like the lilt of the names was something I'd composed myself. Rock Pigeon, Mourning Dove, Chimney Swift, Northern Flicker, Eastern Wood-Pewee, Eastern Phoebe, Blue Jay, American Crow, Tree Swallow, Barn Swallow, Carolina Chickadee, Tufted Titmouse, Eastern Bluebird, Gray Catbird, Brown Thrasher, European Starling, Chipping Sparrow, Song Sparrow, Eastern Towhee, Northern Cardinal, Brown-headed Cowbird, and House Finch. I woke up early the next morning. Too early for a writing conference. I went back to the stupid birding scene, and I listened. Lee Conell Lee Conell's debut...

David Pearson (1941–2017)

David Pearson (1941–2017)