Thoughts on an old bird guide
Yesterday, a friend showed me 2 copies of an old bird guide passed down to her - its title - Land Birds East of the Rockies, by Chester A. Reed. It was originally published in 1906. The copies I saw were printed in 1951 by Doubleday & Company Inc.
Considering how long ago it was first published, the illustrations were pretty good. Not good enough to separate similar sparrow or wren species or individuals with juvenile plumage, but as good as many other guides published much more recently. Its species inclusion was pretty complete for the chosen parameters.
It was those chosen parameters that made it seem odd. No water associated birds of any kind were included. No waterfowl, gulls, terns, shorebirds, waders or rails. Owls were included, but all diurnal raptors were omitted. Game birds were omitted. That left out Turkey and Bobwhite.
Two birds that were already extinct by 1906 were included - Carolina Parakeet (spelled paroquet in the book) and Ivory-billed Woodpecker. The range listed for Ivory-billed Woodpecker - "Formerly the South Atlantic States west to Texas and Oklahoma. It is hoped that 'specimens' survive in the great swamps of Louisiana, Georgia, Florida and South Carolina."
The mind set that led the author to use the word specimens where populations would have been more apropos struck me as being one of the reasons why these birds are extinct. 'Specimen' implies something dead, stuffed and sitting on a shelf. That was a goal of many at that time - to find and collect some rarity, stuff it and sit it on a shelf for bragging rights of having something rare.
As a population, we humans have come a ways in our thinking towards wildlife since 1906. There are, however, still all too many specimens among us who yearn for 1856, both in regards to what that would mean for nature and for other humans not exactly like themselves. May there come a time when that sort achieves the same status as Ivory-billed Woodpecker, existing only in memory.
