How well do you know birds?

Tetzoo Quizzer said:
For 10, all four major checklists count it as one species with subspecies; but it has been suggested that it might be better treated as 2 allopatric species.
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In that case, I will amend my guess for 10.....

1) Great Frigatebird
2) American Bittern
3) Poʻouli
4) Rhynochetidae (Kagu) and Stitchbird (Notiomystidae)
5) Both are classified within the Motacillidae.
6) Gaviidae (Divers/Loons)
7) Threskiornithidae
8) Poʻouli
9) Yellow-breasted Chat
10) Leptosomiformes
 
TeaLovingDave said:
1) Great Frigatebird
2) American Bittern
3) Poʻouli
4) Rhynochetidae (Kagu) and Stitchbird (Notiomystidae)
5) Both are classified within the Motacillidae.
6) Gaviidae (Divers/Loons) - in fact my first ever wild diver was a vagrant Pacific!
7) Threskiornithidae
8) Poʻouli
9) Yellow-breasted Chat
10) Eurypygiformes
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Well done with 7.5; actually, I think you probably deserve 8 for an answer I hadn’t thought of! 3 and 10 still need correct answers; po’ouli was identified as different prior to collecting, and sunbittern has always been at least a family.
 
One more crack at 3, and my revised guess for 10 as above.....

1) Great Frigatebird
2) American Bittern
3) Hooded Grebe
4) Rhynochetidae (Kagu) and Stitchbird (Notiomystidae)
5) Both are classified within the Motacillidae.
6) Gaviidae (Divers/Loons)
7) Threskiornithidae
8) Poʻouli
9) Yellow-breasted Chat
10) Leptosomiformes
 
Happy to declare a victory to TLD, as he has now got nos 3 and 10 right.
Answers
1. Great Frigatebird, originally named as the smallest pelican!
2. American Bittern, shot in Dorset
3. It was a Hooded Grebe discovered by accidental shooting.
4. Kagu, and Plains-wanderer. Magellanic Plover and Stitchbird both estimated in the 1000-10000 bracket.
5. Both have changed names (Madanga and Sao Tome Shorttail) as they are Motacillids which have adapted to totally different lifestyles; an arboreal “nuthatch” pipit and a wren-like wagtail respectively.
6. Divers or Loons; all five species are safely on my British list (was it the first, Yorkshire, Pacific, Dave?)
7. An extinct Ibis
8. Po’ouli, the only bird whose discovery and extinction made headline news in easy to access periodicals I get.
9. Yellow breasted Chat, an Icteriid, not an Icterid! That’s a recipe for confusion!
10. The Cuckoo-roller has been promoted from a roller subfamily to its own unique order; the Comoros form has been suggested as a separate species. Dave, over to you!
 
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Tetzoo Quizzer said:
(was it the first, Yorkshire, Pacific, Dave?)
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Not quite - the Druridge Bay individual in Northumberland a few years ago :) despite sea-watching a lot I had somehow managed to never conclusively see a diver for many years - I've subsequently managed to nab all but White-billed.

Tetzoo Quizzer said:
Dave, over to you!
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I shall have to consider my questions carefully :P
 
I got the first White-billed ever in Wales, but initially called it as a Great Northern; didn’t know then that the upturn in the bill actually develops during the first winter! Went back and confirmed my sighting after later reports.
 
1. Where would one go in order to see the last-known male Great Auk?
2. Per the most recent taxonomic and genetic research, which extant group are the closest living kin of the moas?
3. What is the ornithological significance of the Tyne Bridge?
4. What is the most recent family of birds to be extirpated from Europe?
5. Which bird is associated with a notable Anglo-Saxon saint, and is sometimes named for him?
6. Which species long-thought extinct was rediscovered as a direct result of decades-old academic fraud and theft being uncovered in the 1990s?
7. What connects the ankylosaurian dinosaur Hylaeosaurus and the Takahe?
8. What is the connection between Birds-of-Paradise and swifts?
9. Which now near-ubiquitous UK breeding bird first did so in 1955?
10. Which bird of prey has a traditional name which would fall foul of the Zoochat obscenity filter?
 
1. Reykjavik?
2. Rheas?
3. Breeding site for Kittiwakes
4. Buttonquails (farewell Andalusian Hemipode)
5. The Cuddy Duck, aka Common Eider
6. Forest Owlet
7. Named by Richard Owen
8. Footlessless in the scientific name
9. Collared Dove
10. Kestrel (Windf*****)
 
TeaLovingDave said:
1. Where would one go in order to see the last-known male Great Auk?
2. Per the most recent taxonomic and genetic research, which extant group are the closest living kin of the moas?
3. What is the ornithological significance of the Tyne Bridge?
4. What is the most recent family of birds to be extirpated from Europe?
5. Which bird is associated with a notable Anglo-Saxon saint, and is sometimes named for him?
6. Which species long-thought extinct was rediscovered as a direct result of decades-old academic fraud and theft being uncovered in the 1990s?
7. What connects the ankylosaurian dinosaur Hylaeosaurus and the Takahe?
8. What is the connection between Birds-of-Paradise and swifts?
9. Which now near-ubiquitous UK breeding bird first did so in 1955?
10. Which bird of prey has a traditional name which would fall foul of the Zoochat obscenity filter?
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9. Eurasian Collared-Dove

Unsure of all the others.
 
@Tetzoo Quizzer has a starting score of 6, with one more being in the right ballpark but requiring a greater level of specificity :P
 
TeaLovingDave said:
1. Where would one go in order to see the last-known male Great Auk?
2. Per the most recent taxonomic and genetic research, which extant group are the closest living kin of the moas?
3. What is the ornithological significance of the Tyne Bridge?
4. What is the most recent family of birds to be extirpated from Europe?
5. Which bird is associated with a notable Anglo-Saxon saint, and is sometimes named for him?
6. Which species long-thought extinct was rediscovered as a direct result of decades-old academic fraud and theft being uncovered in the 1990s?
7. What connects the ankylosaurian dinosaur Hylaeosaurus and the Takahe?
8. What is the connection between Birds-of-Paradise and swifts?
9. Which now near-ubiquitous UK breeding bird first did so in 1955?
10. Which bird of prey has a traditional name which would fall foul of the Zoochat obscenity filter?
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2.Tinamous
7.They're both dinosaurs? (Does this count as birds are technically just living avian dinosaurs).
Don't know any of the other ones.
 
No-one else stepping in? Then let’s pick a time by which other answers can be given, I’ll put my other answers in, Dave can comment, and either someone else can set some questions or we’ll let the thread go.
 
Tetzoo Quizzer said:
No-one else stepping in? Then let’s pick a time by which other answers can be given, I’ll put my other answers in, Dave can comment, and either someone else can set some questions or we’ll let the thread go.
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Good plan - I'll give it til 24 hours from now (15:00 UK time).
 
TeaLovingDave said:
1. Where would one go in order to see the last-known male Great Auk?
2. Per the most recent taxonomic and genetic research, which extant group are the closest living kin of the moas?
3. What is the ornithological significance of the Tyne Bridge?
4. What is the most recent family of birds to be extirpated from Europe?
5. Which bird is associated with a notable Anglo-Saxon saint, and is sometimes named for him?
6. Which species long-thought extinct was rediscovered as a direct result of decades-old academic fraud and theft being uncovered in the 1990s?
7. What connects the ankylosaurian dinosaur Hylaeosaurus and the Takahe?
8. What is the connection between Birds-of-Paradise and swifts?
9. Which now near-ubiquitous UK breeding bird first did so in 1955?
10. Which bird of prey has a traditional name which would fall foul of the Zoochat obscenity filter?
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Looks like I missed one poll, so go for this next one. However these are difficult questions to me...

1. No idea. Several skins/mountings of great auk are in museums over the world, so I don't know which one was the last male. I suppose it must be a musem near/in Greenland...
2. Kiwis.
3. Never heard about that bridhe.
4. I would say buttonquails (Turnicidae), tough I don't remember the Common buttonquail was officially declared as extinct from Europe, tough during various decades have been in the "vaquita-situation" in the nature-related media.
5. I don't know my own country saints, so much less anglosaxon ones :P
6 Absolutely no idea
7. Hmmmm maybe are both from New Zealand????
8. The most famous species of birds of paradise is called apoda (without feet) due to old belief that these birds have not feer, having fully aerial lives (due to skins without feer offered by natives). The type genus of swifts is Apus, that means "without feet" as the feet of swifts are very tiny and they very rarely use them.
9. I'm thinking in birds that expanded naturally their range in Europe so I doubt between Great Egret and Collared Dove, but I think is most likely the later
10. Hm, absolutely IDK. I know some birds that have this kind of common name in Spanish, but not in English and none of them is a raptor...

Sorry I did very bad... again
 
I’m interested in the rude Spanish names; do they reflect facts? Beliefs? Language changes? The answer in the quiz is an example of the latter; to f*** was to beat, and a hovering kestrel beats the air with its wings. Nowadays the f word only has its sexual meeting , or is used as a swear word, so there was nothing rude about the derivation of the name.
 
So, 1 is in Brussels, or at least the skin is.
2 are Tinamous
7. Both were collected by Mantell (father and son) and examined by Owen.
 
Tetzoo Quizzer said:
Any comments on answers Dave?
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Hah, indeed - got completely distracted that afternoon by the TetZoomCon and forgot to get back to it!

1. You would indeed go to the Museum of Natural Sciences in Brussels to see the skin of the last male Great Auk - and if one wanted to see his internal organs, they are held at the natural history museum in Copenhagen (along with the organs of the female killed alongside him). The exact location of the skin of the female is still under debate, but last I heard has been pinned down to two possibilities.
2. Per the most recent taxonomic and genetic research, the tinamou family seem to be deeply nested within the ratite radiation and are the sister group of the moas - the kiwis are, it seems, rather more distantly related.
3. The Tyne Bridge is indeed the furthest inland colony of Black-legged Kittiwake anywhere in the world - and, given the decline of seabird populations across the world, quite a significant one in those terms too.
4. With the extinction of the Andalusian Buttonquail, this family is now extinct from Europe.
5. My location is something of a hint towards the correct answer, and it is indeed the Eider or Cuddy Duck, named for St Cuthbert - a notable Anglo-Saxon saint of Northumbria.
6. The Forest Owlet was rediscovered in 1996 after it was discovered that Richard Meinertzhagen had stolen the last known specimen and resubmitted it with fraudulent locality information, and therefore zoologists searching for the species had been seeking it in entirely the wrong location.
7. These two species were indeed described by father and son - Hylaeosaurus by Gideon Mantell, the Takahe (specifically the extinct northern species, as the southern species was discovered later) by Walter Mantell.
8. The link is indeed the word "apoda" and incorrect belief these birds lack feet.
9. After a massive population expansion, it would be hard to believe that the Collared Dove was absent from Europe entirely until the 20th century, and first bred in the UK in the 1950s! Sadly the Turtle Dove is heading in the reverse direction......
10. This is indeed the kestrel :) of course, had I not specified bird-of-prey one could have also said Wheatear......


I think @Tetzoo Quizzer won this one pretty clearly - if you don't feel like running another round, feel free to pass it onto someone else of your choice.
 
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