The following topics- updated September 2020– are available as condensed “lectures” in ornithology for the general public:
Avian community, Avian Ecology, Biogeography, Development, Evolution, Feathers, Flight, Foraging and Nutrition, Metabolism and Thermoregulation, Migration and Navigation, Reproduction, Respiration and Circulation, Songs and Calls, Senses and Nervous system, and Territoriality.
Violet Saberwing Hummingbird, Campylopterus hemileucurus,
These “lectures” are based upon the university level ornithology course the resident scientist of this website taught for many years. The information comes from many sources and are meant to give the reader a beginning knowledge of the science of Ornithology. As such, they are necessarily brief and incomplete. Much of this information has been gleaned from textbooks, journals, websites and science-oriented magazines. Additional information and research studies can be found elsewhere in this website and at links in these lectures.
Birds, of all animals, offer the most favorable combination of attributes for scientific study. They are numerous, diverse, and easily observed in the field. Many also adapt easily to experimentation in the laboratory. So its easy to see why Ornithology, the study of birds, has so many practitioners and has contributed so much to the sciences of ecology, evolution, distribution, behavior and others. Bird watching and identification are essential parts of ornithology but by no means all.
Especially in ecology have birds been the focus of study. A number of ecological principles have been determined or refined by ornithological studies; e.g.niche segregation, island biogeography, character displacement, adaptive radiation, territoriality, communication, the effects of environmental degradation, and indicator species (e.g. the spotted owl). These same principles apply to other organisms but in many cases birds served as the original models for the studies that developed these principles.
By the 16th and 17th centuries a system of classification was used based on birds’ behavior: swimming, fly fast, catch prey with talons, etc. An early classification of birds appeared in 1676 and divided birds on the basis of both anatomy and behavior. This classification does not work, of course, because it is too simplistic and had little to do with real relationships. As centuries passed, so did classification schemes. These schemes relied more on morphology and less on behavior. Taxonomy (classification and naming) was generally a mess until Linneaus published Systema Naturae in 1753 which set down a system of classification for all organisms.
Subclass Archeornithes : Archeopteryx
Subclass Neornithes: all other birds
Subspecies, races, etc.
For example, the Rock Dove, our city pigeon, belongs to the Order Columbiformes and the Family Columbidae. The genus is Columba and the species livia. Note that both the genus and species are italicized and that the genus is capitalized. And notice that species is always species, never specie.
Columba livia- Rock Dove
Common names of birds in North America are standardized by the American Ornithologist‘s Union Checklist of North American Birds
The definition of a species is based on the ability to interbreed. This is sometimes hard to determine leading to the Scrub Jay once being called the Santa Cruz Jay, the Santa Catalina Jay, and several other variations when one name was appropriate. Western Scrub-Jay is now split into two species: the California Scrub-Jay (Aphelocoma californica) and Woodhouse’s Scrub-Jay (Aphelocoma woodhouseii). Birders have long recognized that these widespread western jays come in different flavors: a darker, more rich color in California, Oregon, and southwestern Washington, and a somewhat paler, grayer type in the interior West, from Nevada east to Texas. Many field guides already illustrate them separately as “coastal form” (or “Pacific form”) and “interior form.” They do hybridize where their ranges come together in western Nevada, but studies have shown that such interbreeding is very limited.