[wisb] Re: Thayer's gull---no sightings
- From: John Idzikowski <idzikoj@xxxxxxx>
- To: gseegert@xxxxxxxxx
- Date: Wed, 9 Nov 2011 16:03:59 -0600 (CST)
Erik's recent photos of Thayer's gull reminded me that , If my memory is
correct, the paper that resulted in it being elevated to specific status has
been discredited or is at least highly suspicious. If that is correct, has
anyone followed up with any published papers supporting (or refuting) the
specific status of Thayer's gull?
Greg Seegert, who is looking for definitive info showing that Thayer's is not
just an east-west clinal variation of Iceland gull
_______
See-
http://www.ofo.ca/reportsandarticles/thayer.php
for some perspective about the one species idea
and then especially-
http://aves.net/birdnews/litreview-xthgulls.htm
Many now consider Thayer's as a good biological species that began to
interbreed with glaucoides Iceland (also a good species) as it moved east,
perhaps as the last glaciers receded. Kumlien's Gull, displaying a large degree
of variation forms the now clinal, stable "hybrid swarm" with lighter birds
found more to the east (more like glaucoides), especially on Baffin Is and
darker birds as well as "good" Thayer's found due north of Wisconsin breeding
in the far north of Hudson Bay (and elsewhere)- all forms freely interbreeding.
We have many photos of these dark Kumlien's/light Thayer's from winter. See the
evidence for 1,2 or 3 species-
http://web2.puc.edu/Faculty/Floyd_Hayes/californiakumlieni/taxonomy.html
The field work that would be needed to help answer this problem is considered
to be nearly impossible to carry out considering the remoteness of many of
these gull colonies and the inaccessibility of nests. For birders it can be
totally futile to try to put a name on some birds that have both Kumlien's and
Thayer's characters. Steve Howell has somewhat arbitrarily used the amount of
dark pigment on the tip of p5- Kumlien's has none and Thayer's does. So perhaps
the best approach is to stick to a criteria for a good Thayer's- everything
else is a Kumlien's. It is often best for someone crazy enough to get into
gulls to just study and photograph the wide range of variation of this complex
that we see in the Midwest.
John I
Milwaukee
Original Message -----
From: "Greg Seegert" <gseegert@xxxxxxxxx>
To: wisbirdn@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
Sent: Wednesday, November 9, 2011 2:23:19 PM
Subject: [wisb] Thayer's gull---no sightings
Wisbirders
Erik's recent photos of Thayer's gull reminded me that , If my memory is
correct, the paper that resulted in it being elevated to specific status has
been discredited or is at least highly suspicious. If that is correct, has
anyone followed up with any published papers supporting (or refuting) the
specific status of Thayer's gull?
Greg Seegert, who is looking for definitive info showing that Thayer's is not
just an east-west clinal variation of Iceland gull
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