a tangent to the rainbird

["martin butterfield" <>]

The usage of "piping shrike" as a synonym for "Australian Magpie" extends to the offical description of the emblem of South Australia (see http://www.premcab.sa.gov.au/emblems/shrike1.htm.  Noting Roger's comment has 'piping crow' as a further misnomer perhaps people from SA should be referred to as magpie-munchers rather than crow eaters?

 

Wikipedia  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rainbird suggests that the name refelects the habit of the birds singing (can the Channel-billed cuckoo be said to sing?) before rain.  Do Australian magpies sing more before rain than at any other time?

 

Martin

 

On 8/15/07, roger curnow <m("bigpond.net.au","rcurnow");" target="_blank"> > wrote:

Quoting again.

 

"What Bird Is That" (Cayley) has Piping Crow-shrike for Black-backed Magpie.

 

"The Oxford English Dictionary " has Piping:  In names of particular kinds of birds or other animals having a piping note or cry: as piping crow, the Australian genus Gymnorhina...............

1845 Voy. to Port Philip, etc. 53 The warbling melops and the piping crow.
1895 C . Dixon in Fortn. Rev. Apr. 643 The Gymnorhinæ or piping crows of Australia.

 

The Australian National Dictionary (Oxford) has

piping crow. Magpie n.1 a. Also piping crow-shrike, piping shrike.

 

        roger curnow

-----

From: m("bigpond.net.au","sblaik");" target="_blank">murray&sandra

To: m("canberrabirds.org.au","canberrabirds");" target="_blank">COG

Sent: Tuesday, August 14, 2007 8:44 PM

Subject: RE: [canberrabirds]a tangent to the rainbird

 

If you will permit a tangential thought.   I had thought the "shrike" was a magpie, and the South Australian "piping shrike" was a magpie ....was it in fact intended to be a butcher-bird?

 

Murray Delahoy

 

 

-----Original Message-----
From: roger curnow [mailto:m("bigpond.net.au","rcurnow");" target="_blank"> ]
Sent: Tuesday, 14 August 2007 6:12 PM
To: COG
Subject: [canberrabirds] rainbird

The Oxford English Dictionary (2nd Ed.) offers

In Australia: (see quots.).

1860 G

. B ennett Gather. of Naturalist 283 The Australian Shrike or Butcher-bird, also called Rain-bird by the colonists (Vanga destructor).
1898 Morris Austral Eng. s.v., The rain-bird of Queensland and the interior is the great Cuckoo or Channel-bill.

        roger curnow