Wilson didn’t name birds after himself, that was done by later ornithologists in tribute. The plate above shows the three birds now grouped in genus wilsonia (ignore the Carolina Parakeet, it may be big and flashy but it’s now extinct.) Wilson’s Warbler is at lower left, here called the Green Black-capt Flycatcher. To the right are the Hooded and Canada Flycatchers, which still bear those names today, except that we call them warblers, with flycatchers being a whole other, unrelated group. Bird names change as our understanding of them changes, but Wilson himself was a good taxonomist, a better scientist than Audubon, if not a better artist. One gratifying recent development in avian taxonomy is the return of Wilson’s Snipe (below) which had been lumped with the Old World’s Common Snipe, until being re-split a few years back.
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Wilson didn’t name birds after himself, that was done by later ornithologists in tribute. The plate above shows the three birds now grouped in genus wilsonia (ignore the Carolina Parakeet, it may be big and flashy but it’s now extinct.) Wilson’s Warbler is at lower left, here called the Green Black-capt Flycatcher. To the right are the Hooded and Canada Flycatchers, which still bear those names today, except that we call them warblers, with flycatchers being a whole other, unrelated group. Bird names change as our understanding of them changes, but Wilson himself was a good taxonomist, a better scientist than Audubon, if not a better artist. One gratifying recent development in avian taxonomy is the return of Wilson’s Snipe (below) which had been lumped with the Old World’s Common Snipe, until being re-split a few years back.
- alex 4-10-2007 5:04 am