The California Academy of Science in San Francisco has an impressive display
composed of birds collected “before they are all gone.”
—Jerry Tangren
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________________________________
From: obol-bounce@xxxxxxxxxxxxx <obol-bounce@xxxxxxxxxxxxx> on behalf of Robert
C. Faucett <rfaucett@xxxxxx>
Sent: Wednesday, April 1, 2020 10:14:24 AM
To: rick.mark1217@xxxxxxxxx <rick.mark1217@xxxxxxxxx>; Jeff Gilligan
<jeffgilligan10@xxxxxxxxx>
Cc: t4c1x@xxxxxxxx <t4c1x@xxxxxxxx>; obol@xxxxxxxxxxxxx <obol@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
Subject: [obol] Re: condor ?
Hi Jeff – I’m very interested in where you read that? Do you have a reference?
Hope all is well.
Stay safe.
Rob
--
Robert C. Faucett
Collections Manager
Ornithology
Burke Museum
Box 353010
University of Washington
Seattle, WA 98195-3010
Office: 206-543-1668
Cell: 206-619-5569
Fax: 206-685-3039
rfaucett@xxxxxx<mailto:rfaucett@xxxxxx>
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From: <obol-bounce@xxxxxxxxxxxxx> on behalf of Rick Mark
<rick.mark1217@xxxxxxxxx>
Reply-To: "rick.mark1217@xxxxxxxxx" <rick.mark1217@xxxxxxxxx>
Date: Wednesday, April 1, 2020 at 10:06 AM
To: Jeff Gilligan <jeffgilligan10@xxxxxxxxx>
Cc: "t4c1x@xxxxxxxx" <t4c1x@xxxxxxxx>, "shawneenfinnegan@xxxxxxxxx"
<obol@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
Subject: [obol] Re: condor ?
I see that John Bull, well known among New York State birders, died in 2006 at
age 92.
https://www.nytimes.com/2006/08/15/nyregion/15bull.html<https://nam12.safelinks.protection.outlook.com/?url=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.nytimes.com%2F2006%2F08%2F15%2Fnyregion%2F15bull.html&data=02%7C01%7C%7C21a9802212aa481c7e5808d7d6607aae%7C84df9e7fe9f640afb435aaaaaaaaaaaa%7C1%7C0%7C637213582164909491&sdata=YtpZhDv9MKrqvfq4L91llZsJkcai4%2FCFtiI%2FaZcSDQE%3D&reserved=0>
On Apr 1, 2020, at 9:58 AM, Jeff Gilligan
<jeffgilligan10@xxxxxxxxx<mailto:jeffgilligan10@xxxxxxxxx>> wrote:
Have read that just the number of condors that were collected for museums (and
personal collections) was a major cause in the rapid decline of the species.
Jeff Gilligan
On Apr 1, 2020, at 9:15 AM, Rick Mark
<rick.mark1217@xxxxxxxxx<mailto:rick.mark1217@xxxxxxxxx>> wrote:
Hi,
I have done a fair amount of David Douglas research over the years. It’s been a
while and I had forgotten that he shot condors.
I just found this, which may be the source of the original question:
Volume 43, Number 2, 2012
THE CALIFORNIA CONDOR
IN NORTHWESTERN NORTH AMERICA
BRIAN E. SHARP, Ecological Perspectives, P. O. Box 111, Fossil, Oregon 97830;
ecoperspectives@xxxxxxxxx<mailto:ecoperspectives@xxxxxxxxx>
https://www.westernfieldornithologists.org/archive/V43/WB-43(2)-Sharp.pdf<https://nam12.safelinks.protection.outlook.com/?url=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.westernfieldornithologists.org%2Farchive%2FV43%2FWB-43(2)-Sharp.pdf&data=02%7C01%7C%7C21a9802212aa481c7e5808d7d6607aae%7C84df9e7fe9f640afb435aaaaaaaaaaaa%7C1%7C0%7C637213582164919485&sdata=ixnU1R5zCQ%2BOm5LK%2BLp6Ra0LaS3mHO4zxUvpGirqWUc%3D&reserved=0>
Which says (page 58):
Douglas (1829) encountered condors as far north as the Canadian border, as far
south as the Umpqua River, and collected five specimens, including two while on
an Indian-escorted excursion to Larch Mountain in September 1825 (Douglas
1829), related to me in astonishing detail in a native oral history passed down
for 180 years (Ken Kachia Smith, Wasco elder, Corbett, Oregon, pers. comm.
2006).
And (page 63):
None of the four specimens David Douglas sent to London are extant (he
discarded a head-shot fifth specimen), and only one specimen from the Pacific
Northwest, collected on the Willamette River near Oregon City in April 1835
(Townsend 1848), still exists. This Townsend gave or sold to J. J. Audubon, who
presented it to Spencer Baird, secretary of the Smithsonian Institution; it is
now in the National Museum of Natural History (catalog number 78005), its
location mislabeled “the Columbia” (C. Angle, Smithsonian Institution, pers.
comm.) and misreported as “mouth of the Columbia” (Baird et al. 1858).
Ah, I see now (page 81), the reference to the Council of the Horticultural
Society and the Zoological Society. This article doesn’t say where those
societies are located, but Douglas took his instructions from London and sent
(or carried) his specimens back to England, so I don’t think he’s referring to
Washington, D.C. So this author seems to be saying that the specimens sent to
London no longer exist.
On a side note, be aware that Douglas’s journals have some notable errors. He
describes the sugar pine tree as being about three times larger than the
typical sugar pine. He greatly miscalculates the height of some mountains. At
other points in the Douglas story, his biographers misinterpret a passage in
one of his letters to make it sound as if he thought the Umpqua Valley was only
60 miles from the San Francisco Bay (he knew the actual distance).
Note his description of the condor here. This sounds more like a turkey vulture
to me. It would not surprise me at all to learn that Douglas was seeing turkey
vultures and calling them condors. (Page 82):
23 Oct–4 Nov 1826, Umpqua River: Douglas’ journal for February 1827, in a
periodic summary of what he knew about the occurrence of condors, stated “great
numbers seen by myself on the Umpqua river” (Douglas 1959:241), though his
actual daily journal for that period did not mention condors. Details included,
“Feeds on all putrid animal matter and are so ravenous they will eat until they
are unable to fly.... Their flight is swift but steady, to appearance seldom
moving the wings; keep floating along with the points of the wings curved
upwards. Of a blackish-brown with a little white under the wing; head of deep
orange color; beak of a sulphur-yellow; neck, a yellowish-brown varying in
tinge....” (Douglas 1959).
And on a final note, about 40 years ago when I was living in eastern
Pennsylvania, my then-wife and I found a hybrid flicker dead in our yard after
an April snowstorm. I forget the details, but the bird was a mixture of yellow-
and red-shafted. We took the bird to the Natural History Museum in NYC, where
we met with a curator named John Bull. Bull said hybrid flickers were common in
the Midwest, but I think he said this was the first reported so far to the
east. Bull gave us a little behind-the-scenes tour of the museum. At one point,
he opened a drawer full of California condor specimens, remarking: “We have
more condors in our drawers than exist in the wild.” (Or something to that
effect.)
Rick Mark
On Mar 31, 2020, at 8:54 PM, t4c1x@xxxxxxxx<mailto:t4c1x@xxxxxxxx> wrote:
Among the early Oregon records for California Condor reported in Birds of
Oregon are two collected by Douglas near Multnomah Falls and presented by the
Council of the Horticultural Society to the Zoological Society museum. Are
these specimens still in existence at that museum? If so, at what location?
Darrel
