Saturday, October 21, 2006

All change

Interesting post at The Birdchaser here:

In case you haven't heard this yet, there is a proposal to get rid of the common names of some familiar North American birds, including Common Loon, Eared Grebe, Ring-necked Pheasant, Dovekie, Rock Pigeon, European Starling, Bank Swallow, White-winged Crossbill, and Saltmarsh Sharp-tailed Sparrow.

In Frank Gill and Minturn Wright's new book Birds of the World: Recommended English Names, the names of these birds are replaced by Great Northern Loon, Black-necked Grebe, Common Pheasant, Little Auk, Common Pigeon, Common Starling, Sand Martin, Two-barred Crossbill, and Saltmarsh Sparrow.

Interesting, because you'd think from the way that some British birders go on about it, that it was one-way traffic. That we Brits were being forced to adopt weird American names for our common birds.

Read more about it here
.

(Winter Wren is really stupid on this side of the Atlantic, though)

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