Friday Trivia #5: Spring Fling

New Ye Olde I and thee Birde #73 at The Snail’s Eye View.

Update!: Clues for the two outstanding birds in the comments…

Spring is here. Birds are coming. And it has been awhile since the last quiz. I tired something a little different last time, some rhyming fun, but now it’s back to the old standby.

Latin translations folks. Let see what you can do with these. All are long-distance migrants, mostly neotropic. You know the rules.

Let’s have some fun!

1. Hairy Flyprince
2. Illegitimate Yellowbird
3. Different Duck
4. Gold-crowned Tailwagger
5. Dusky Treedweller
6. Two-colored Quickmover
7. Pelagic Sea-nymph
8. Rice-eating Longclaw
9. Black-backed Watersidebird
10. Marine Hairtail
11. Red-capped Wormeater
12. Bloody Mudder
13. Smaller Evening-dancer
14. Beautiful Autumn-bird
15. Golden-browed Greenbird

Answers and explanations as they appear in the comments. The test begins………. NOW!

Answers
1.Myiarchus crinitus – Great Crested Flycatcher (John) – Flyprince from the greek muia-, meaning fly, and -arkhos, lord or prince. Hairy from the latin crinus, or hair, which turns to long-haired with the suffix -itus.

2.Icterus spurius – Orchard Oriole (John) – The genus icterus comes from the greek ikteros, meaning yellow, or in medical terminology, jaundiced. Spurius is obvious enough once you reliaze it, the same root as the english word “spurious”. The name is such because early descriptions of Orchard Oriole apparently resembled too closely the Baltimore Oriole, no one quite believed it was a separate species.

3.Anas discors – Blue-winged Teal (Patrick Belardo) – The genus is simple enough, Anas is just greek for “duck”. Discors resembles the english word discordant, different, from which it shares a root.

4.Seuirus aurocapillus – Ovenbird (John) – The species name is obvious. Auro- for gold (Au in the periodic table), and -capillus cause a cap goes on your head. The genus comes from the greek seio-, to shake or waggle and -oura for tail. It seems to better fit the waterthrushes that share the name, though.

5.Dendroica fusca – Blackburnian Warbler (John) – An odd fit really when one thinks of the bird. Dendroica is obvious enough, dendron- for tree and -oiktos for living in. But fuscus? A dark, dusky brown? Maybe in bad lighting.

6.Tachycineta bicolor – Tree Swallow (Patrick Belardo) – Certainly an appropriate name for the bird. The genus breaks down to tachy-, or quick, like in a tachometer, and -kinetos, as in kinetic energy. Bicolor is pretty straight forward after that.

7.Oceanites oceanicus – Wilson’s Storm-Petrel (Patrick Belardo) – While not technically a neotropical migrant, they do show up in the summer months off the eastern seaboard, sometimes even from shore. The genus comes from Okeanites, a sea-nymph mentioned in greek myth. Oceanicus is pretty clearly sea-related.

8.Dolichonyx eryzivorus – Bobolink (John) – A cool name for a cool bird. The genus comes from the greek dolikhos-, meaning long, and -onux, meaning clawed. The species name is from oryza-, from which we get the word rice, and -vorus, meaning eater. It refers to huge flocks that Bobolinks form in winter that are pretty destructive to South American rice crops.

9. Calidris melanotos – Pectoral Sandpiper (John) – Somewhat misleading, as it’s not a field mark we use at all for this bird. But melanotos comes from mela- (black) and -notos (back, also found in notochord when referring to invertebrates with a primitive spinal cord). Calidris is from the greek Kalidris, a name given to a greyish waterside bird by Aristotle himself.

10. Chaetura pelagica – Chimney Swift (John) – An interesting story. Chaetura comes from the greek khaite, flowing hair and oura, tail. It refers to the spiny feathers swifts have on their tails that help them cling to walls. Pelagica doesn’t have anything to do with the ocean, which is odd for a land bird, but is more likely a misspelling of the latin word Pelasgica, a wandering Persian tribe, referring to the bird’s travels.

11.Vermivora ruficapilla – Nashville Warbler (Patrick Belardo) – Simple enough. Ruficapilla means red-capped, even though the bird doesn’t have much of one. And Vermi-, worms, and –vora, eating, fit together nicely. One wonders, though, why the Worm-eating Warbler isn’t in this genus…

12.Limosa heamastica – Hudsonian Godwit (noflickster) – One of my favorite literal translations. The genus is from the greek for mud, limus, on which the Godwit spends most of its time in winter. The species name is from the greek haimatikos, literally bloody, like one may think the red body of a spring Hudsonian looks like. It’s the same root as we see in the word heamoglobin, the protein in our blood.

13.Chordeilas minor – Common Nighthawk (John) – An elegant name for an elegant bird. From the greek for dancing, khoreia-, and evening, -deilas, it’s certainly appropriate. Minor is pretty self-explanatory.

14.Oporornis formosa – Kentucky Warbler (noflickster) – Definitely beautiful, or formosus in latin, but just as likely in spring as it is in fall. So the genus opora-, autumn, and -ornis, bird, seems a misnomer. Perhaps it has something to do with other members of its genus, specifically the Connecticut Warbler, which is reportedly easier to find in the fall.

15.Vireo flavifrons – Yellow-throated Vireo (Patrick Belardo) – The appropriation of the genus Vireo, from the latin virescere, or “to become green”, is appropriate for a family of largely plainish greeny birds. Oddly though, the breast was skipped in favor of the brow, -frons, when placing the color, rightly golden-yellow, flavi-, for this bird.