[obol] Re: How to identify "X" species.... Holistic vs featural recognition
- From: "Greg Gillson" <greg@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
- To: "OBOL" <obol@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
- Date: Tue, 20 Aug 2013 16:55:58 -0700
I don’t want to respond directly to Paul's trolling post. But I don’t want him
to give people the wrong idea.
It is relatively EASY to learn the dozen or so “vocabulary words” needed for
identification of all birds, including small shorebirds. Words such as
“secondary coverts” and “alternate” that Paul objects to are adequately
explained in the first few pages of EVERY field guide (Sibley: Bird Topography
and Molt and Plumage, pages 15-22; National Geographic: Parts of a bird, Molt,
Plumage sequence, page 10-14). There is nothing cerebral or advanced about it
that would leave a novice confused or “in the dust” (otherwise it would
necessitate taking up more than these 5-8 pages in the field guides).
Some birds can be identified by picture-matching. But small shorebirds (among
several other groups of birds—gulls, female hummingbirds, sparrows) can ONLY be
accurately identified by aging the bird first and/or knowing the dozen
different feather names and locations. It's all explained in the above field
guides. If you don’t pay attention to molt and plumage then you won't know the
identification of the small shorebird for a certainty and will not recognize
something different when it shows up (a rare bird).
Learn the parts of a bird. Observe birds. Identify them.
Greg
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