Hi all,
OK, on a birding mailing list I guess this has probably been done before,
hopefully not done to death. There could be 400 keen birder's all rolling
their eyes as they read this or bin it! But I'm new to the mailing list so
forgive my insolence.
My point of view is this,
In my pre-birding days, when Silver Gulls were just seagulls, I always
called Xenorhynchus asiaticus a Jabiru. Imagine my surprise when I looked
through my first field guide and couldn't find this fine bird! Was I
making it up? Perhaps it only existed in the dreaming? And what was this
Black-faced Stork anyway?
I think that the aboriginal names for our birds are some of the best common
names we have for birds. Names like Kookaburra, Galah, Emu are all
preferable to the purely descriptive names like Yellow-tailed Black
Cockatoo. Such a glorious bird as this should (and probably did) have a
far grander name than the one we have given it.
I would be interested in what other people think, if no-one responds then
I'll know that this has run its course and all the words that need to be
typed have been typed.
Regards,
Stuart.
Stuart & Sam Cooney
The Sanctuary
Gembrook, Victoria
Australia
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