Thursday, April 26, 2007

Ornithology 301: Hybrid Warblers

It has long been known that birds occasionally, though rarely, interbreed -- a male of one species will mate with a female of another, yielding often interesting results. Nowhere are the results more colorful and fascinating than in warblers, the tiny songbirds that are already seemingly infinite in variety. An informative article at the Cornell Laboratory of Ornithology website gives us a "mystery bird": while educating the reader about hybridization, the article offers a challenge for sharp-eyed birders to identify a recently discovered hybrid's parentage. Caveat -- this is for serious birders who want a) a tough challenge for the eye, and b) an introduction to a fairly advanced topic in ornithology, although it's written for the average reader and no knowledge of difficult science is assumed. I found it fascinating, and, for the record, I didn't identify either of the bird's parents correctly!

3 comments:

Dave Scherman said...

Thanks! Due for an update I guess...

Anonymous said...

You have to express more your opinion to attract more readers, because just a video or plain text without any personal approach is not that valuable. But it is just form my point of view

Dave Scherman said...

Thank you for your comment. It is currently very busy in many areas of life, and I often do not have the time to dig up all the resources necessary to illustrate a blog entry, much as I would like to. Your comments are always welcome.