Well said Michael. There's nothing more annoying than a scientific name
masquerading as a common name. We managed to get rid of the Myzomelas,
Hylacolas and Calimanthuses. How did Gerygone survive?
Steve Murray
-----Original Message-----
From:
On Behalf Of Michael Hunter
Sent: Monday, 30 November 2009 6:30 PM
To: Tony Russell
Cc:
Subject: "Jabiru"
I presume Tony that you are aware that about twenty five years ago, a
self-appointed, un-Australian committee (PBs mainly) changed our best local
bird names to intellectualised bland boring hard-to-remember or greco-roman
non-colloquial misnomers to wrestle with. Unfortunately, many of the younger
generation (ie under sixty) of Oz birders have been suckered into
acceptance.
Delightful though it is to roll off the tongue,( like "Jabiru"), once
taught to pronounce it, "Gerygone" smacks of the pseudo. I am sure that
Linnaeus would not have approved of semi-scientific semantic bastardry like
"White-throated Gerygone".
If distinguishing Australian species from their Northern Hemisphere
DNA-different look-a-likes was the name of the game for the name changers,
how come our taxonomically discrete Robins weren't changed to Petroids or
something.
The most commonly used name for Malurus cyaneus is "Blue Wren". I'm
not sure that Australians were ever strong on fairies, and apart from
checklisting, I don't hear "Superb Fairy-wren" very often. A rose is a
rose.
If popularising birding is at all a priority in Australia, the more
descriptive and less precious Australia's common bird names should be.
Cheers
Michael
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