Bird Names

["Paul and Irene Osborn" <>]

Jill Dennings posting on the subject of bird names has prompted me to reply. I was recently thinking 'wouldn't it have been good to go birding in Australia more than 150 years ago, before all the land clearing reduced the number of birds about?' but then it occurred to me that, without a field guide, I wouldn't have known what I was looking at, or how to distinguish between similar species. So, yes, there is a lot in a bird's name.

Paul Osborn