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Fawn-breasted Bowerbird
The fawn-breasted bowerbird (''Chlamydera cerviniventris'') is a medium-sized, up to long, bowerbird with a greyish brown spotted white plumage, a black bill, dark brown iris, yellow mouth and an orange buff below. Both sexes are similar. The female is slightly smaller than the male. The fawn-breasted bowerbird is distributed throughout New Guinea and northern Cape York Peninsula, where it inhabits the tropical forests, mangroves, savanna woodlands and forest edges. Its diet consists mainly of figs, fruits and insects. The nest is a loose cup made of small sticks up in a tree. The bower itself is that of ''"avenue-type"'' with two side-walls of sticks and usually decorated with green-colored berries. A common species in its habitat range, the fawn-breasted bowerbird is evaluated as Least Concern on the IUCN Red List of Threatened Species. The following is an account by expedition naturalist John MacGillivray John MacGillivray (18 December 1821 – 6 June 1867) was a Sc ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
John Gould
John Gould (; 14 September 1804 – 3 February 1881) was an English ornithologist who published monographs on birds, illustrated by plates produced by his wife, Elizabeth Gould (illustrator), Elizabeth Gould, and several other artists, including Edward Lear, Henry Constantine Richter, Joseph Wolf and William Matthew Hart. Because of his 1840s seven-volume series ''The Birds of Australia (Gould), The Birds of Australia'' and its updates he has been considered the father of bird study in Australia, and the Gould League in Australia is named after him. His identification of the birds now nicknamed "Darwin's finches" played a role in the inception of Darwin's theory of evolution by natural selection. Gould's work is referenced in Charles Darwin's book, ''On the Origin of Species''. Early life John Gould was born in Lyme Regis, the first son of a gardener. Both father and son probably had little education. After working on Dowager Lady Poulett's glass house, his father obtained ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Bowerbird
Bowerbirds () make up the bird family Ptilonorhynchidae. They are renowned for their unique courtship behaviour, where males build a structure and decorate it with sticks and brightly coloured objects in an attempt to attract a mate. The family has 27 species in eight genera. These are medium to large-sized passerines, ranging from the golden bowerbird at and to the great bowerbird at and . Their diet consists mainly of fruit but may also include insects (especially for nestlings), flowers, nectar and leaves in some species. The satin and spotted bowerbirds are sometimes considered agricultural pests due to their habit of feeding on introduced fruit and vegetable crops and have occasionally been killed by affected orchardists. The bowerbirds have an Australo-Papuan distribution, with ten species endemic to New Guinea, eight endemic to Australia, and two found in both. Although their distribution is centered on the tropical regions of New Guinea and northern Australia, som ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Beak
The beak, bill, or rostrum is an external anatomical structure found mostly in birds, but also in turtles, non-avian dinosaurs and a few mammals. A beak is used for pecking, grasping, and holding (in probing for food, eating, manipulating and carrying objects, killing prey, or fighting), preening, courtship, and feeding young. The terms ''beak'' and '' rostrum'' are also used to refer to a similar mouth part in some ornithischians, pterosaurs, cetaceans, dicynodonts, rhynchosaurs, anuran tadpoles, monotremes (i.e. echidnas and platypuses, which have a bill-like structure), sirens, pufferfish, billfishes, and cephalopods. Although beaks vary significantly in size, shape, color and texture, they share a similar underlying structure. Two bony projections–the upper and lower mandibles–are covered with a thin keratinized layer of epidermis known as the rhamphotheca. In most species, two holes called ''nares'' lead to the respiratory system. Etymology Although the wo ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Iris (anatomy)
The iris (: irides or irises) is a thin, annular structure in the eye in most mammals and birds that is responsible for controlling the diameter and size of the pupil, and thus the amount of light reaching the retina. In optical terms, the pupil is the eye's aperture, while the iris is the diaphragm (optics), diaphragm. Eye color is defined by the iris. Etymology The word "iris" is derived from the Greek word for "rainbow", also Iris (mythology), its goddess plus messenger of the gods in the ''Iliad'', because of the many eye color, colours of this eye part. Structure The iris consists of two layers: the front pigmented Wikt:fibrovascular, fibrovascular layer known as a stroma of iris, stroma and, behind the stroma, pigmented epithelial cells. The stroma is connected to a sphincter muscle (sphincter pupillae), which contracts the pupil in a circular motion, and a set of dilator muscles (dilator pupillae), which pull the iris radially to enlarge the pupil, pulling it in folds. ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
New Guinea
New Guinea (; Hiri Motu: ''Niu Gini''; , fossilized , also known as Papua or historically ) is the List of islands by area, world's second-largest island, with an area of . Located in Melanesia in the southwestern Pacific Ocean, the island is separated from Mainland Australia, Australia by the wide Torres Strait, though both landmasses lie on the same continental shelf, and were united during episodes of low sea level in the Pleistocene glaciations as the combined landmass of Sahul. Numerous smaller islands are located to the west and east. The island's name was given by Spanish explorer Yñigo Ortiz de Retez during his maritime expedition of 1545 due to the perceived resemblance of the indigenous peoples of the island to those in the Guinea (region), African region of Guinea. The eastern half of the island is the major land mass of the nation of Papua New Guinea. The western half, known as Western New Guinea, forms a part of Indonesia and is organized as the provinces of Pap ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Cape York Peninsula
The Cape York Peninsula is a peninsula located in Far North Queensland, Australia. It is the largest wilderness in northern Australia.Mittermeier, R.E. et al. (2002). Wilderness: Earth's last wild places. Mexico City: Agrupación Sierra Madre, S.C. The land is mostly flat and about half of the area is used for grazing cattle. The relatively undisturbed eucalyptus-wooded savannahs, tropical rainforests and other types of habitat are now recognised and preserved for their global environmental significance. Although much of the peninsula remains pristine, with a diverse repertoire of endemic flora and fauna, some of its wildlife may be threatened by industry and overgrazing as well as introduced species and weeds.Mackey, B. G., Nix, H., & Hitchcock, P. (2001). The natural heritage significance of Cape York Peninsula. Retrieved 15 January 2008, froepa.qld.gov.au. The northernmost point of the peninsula is Cape York (Queensland), Cape York. The land has been occupied by a number of ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
IUCN Red List
The International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN) Red List of Threatened Species, also known as the IUCN Red List or Red Data Book, founded in 1964, is an inventory of the global conservation status and extinction risk of biological species. A series of Regional Red Lists, which assess the risk of extinction to species within a political management unit, are also produced by countries and organizations. The goals of the Red List are to provide scientifically based information on the status of species and subspecies at a global level, to draw attention to the magnitude and importance of threatened biodiversity, to influence national and international policy and decision-making, and to provide information to guide actions to conserve biological diversity. Major species assessors include BirdLife International, the Institute of Zoology (the research division of the Zoological Society of London), the World Conservation Monitoring Centre, and many Specialist Groups w ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
John MacGillivray
John MacGillivray (18 December 1821 – 6 June 1867) was a Scottish naturalist, active in Australia between 1842 and 1867. MacGillivray was born in Aberdeen, the son of ornithologist William MacGillivray. He took part in three of the Royal Navy's surveying voyages in the Pacific. In 1842 he sailed as naturalist on board HMS ''Fly'', despatched to survey the Torres Strait, New Guinea, and the east coast of Australia, returning to England in 1846. In the same year he was appointed as naturalist on the voyages of HMS ''Rattlesnake'' (Captain Owen Stanley), collecting in Australian waters at Port Curtis, Rockingham Bay, Port Molle, Cape York, Gould Island, Lizard Island and Moreton Island in Queensland, Port Essington (Northern Territory) and visiting Sydney (New South Wales) on several occasions. The expedition was in Hobart, Tasmania, in June 1847 and also surveyed in Bass Strait, and on the southern coast of New Guinea and the Louisiade Archipelago. On this series of voyag ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
HMS Rattlesnake (1822)
HMS ''Rattlesnake'' was an 28-gun sixth-rate corvette of the Royal Navy launched in 1822. She made a historic voyage of discovery to the Cape York and Torres Strait areas of northern Australia. Construction Launched at Chatham Dockyard on 26 March 1822, ''Rattlesnake'' was 114 feet (34.7 m) long and 32 feet (9.7 m) abeam. She carried twenty 32-pounder carronades, six 18-pounder carronades and two 9-pounder long guns. Service in the Greek War of Independence For most of the years 1827 to 1829 ''Rattlesnake'' was cruising off the coasts of Greece, under the command of Captain the Hon. Charles Orlando Bridgeman. During that period her log was kept by Midshipman Talavera Vernon Anson and survives in a collection at the New York Public Library. Both men went on to become admirals. On 31 January 1828, ''Rattlesnake'' was part of a force of five British and two French ships that attacked the Greek island of Gramvousa, used as a base for piracy. While most of the pirate' ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Nggamadi
The Nggamadi were an indigenous Australian people of the Cape York Peninsula of northern Queensland. Name They are often conflated with the Ankamuti, but Tindale regarded them as a separate tribal reality. Terry Crowley writes: In the region referred to locally as the "Seven Rivers" area (the seven rivers being the Jardine, MacDonald, Skardon, Doughboy, Ducie and Jackson Rivers, and Crystal Creek), which constitutes the very narrow coastal stretch from the northern side of Port Musgrave as far as the Doughboy River, and also the inland area of Crystal Creek and the middle Jardine River, were the ''aŋkamuṯi'' -speaking people. The non-coastal ''aŋkamuṯi'' of the Jardine River were alternatively called ''yampaɣuƫaŋu'' or ''utuðanamu'' (meaning "leaf people" and "scrub dwellers" respectively). The ''aŋkamuṯi'' have previously been referred to in the literature by the name ''ŋkamuṯi'' (''Gamiti'' in Roth 1910:96), ''Ngkamadyi'' in McConnel (1939-1940:60) and ''Ngga ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Noisy Friarbird
The noisy friarbird (''Philemon corniculatus'') is a passerine bird of the honeyeater family Meliphagidae native to southern New Guinea and eastern Australia. It is one of several species known as friarbirds whose heads are bare of feathers. It is brown-grey in colour, with a prominent knob on its bare black-skinned head. It feeds on insects and nectar. Taxonomy The noisy friarbird was first described by ornithologist John Latham (ornithologist), John Latham in 1790. The generic name is from the Ancient Greek ''philēmōn'' 'affectionate, kissing'. Its specific epithet is derived from the Latin ''corniculum'' '(having a) little horn'. It is sometimes known as a ''leatherhead''. ''Wirgan'' was a name used by the local Eora and Darug people, Darug inhabitants of the Sydney basin. Molecular study shows its closest relative to be the silver-crowned friarbird within the genus ''Philemon''. DNA analysis has shown honeyeaters to be related to the Pardalotidae (pardalotes), Acanthizida ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
John Gould
John Gould (; 14 September 1804 – 3 February 1881) was an English ornithologist who published monographs on birds, illustrated by plates produced by his wife, Elizabeth Gould (illustrator), Elizabeth Gould, and several other artists, including Edward Lear, Henry Constantine Richter, Joseph Wolf and William Matthew Hart. Because of his 1840s seven-volume series ''The Birds of Australia (Gould), The Birds of Australia'' and its updates he has been considered the father of bird study in Australia, and the Gould League in Australia is named after him. His identification of the birds now nicknamed "Darwin's finches" played a role in the inception of Darwin's theory of evolution by natural selection. Gould's work is referenced in Charles Darwin's book, ''On the Origin of Species''. Early life John Gould was born in Lyme Regis, the first son of a gardener. Both father and son probably had little education. After working on Dowager Lady Poulett's glass house, his father obtained ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
