A Covid19 bird foray
While many of you have been walking wetlands, bowling along beaches and hiking hills observing birds in their habitats, I have been reading about the very opposite: work on dead birds – taxidermy. The book, The birdman’s wife which you may have read as it was first published in 2016 is by birdwatcher, Melissa Ashley. With some literary reservations, I have found it a delightful book: written as if told by Elizabeth Gould, wife of John Gould, it describes her life and love of birds expressed through her painting skills. The facts are well researched and any deviation is described by the author. Some years ago I read another book (title forgotten) about the Goulds in which the recognition of the differences between the beaks of finches brought from the Galapagos by Charles Darwin was attributed to Elizabeth providing further evidence for Darwin’s Theory of Evolution. I have enjoyed the careful descriptions of birds, exotic and known, as seen through an artist’s eye and shall look more carefully at specimens in the future rather than rushing into identification. An extract from the book describes the artist at work after she had been asked by her husband to draw any species undescribed by science (at that point in time): “One afternoon I picked up a specimen that resembled an American hummingbird, with a bright yellow breast and an iridescent purple crown and throat. The tiny feathers of its wing coverts were red as blood. Its bill curved like a pared fingernail, and its feet seemed fragile as twigs. Cradled in my palm, the creature was weightless, its wings fold like a closed fan, its eyes replaced by nubs of cotton.“ She then describes her effort to represent the plumage accurately. “I experimented at my easel, discovering that adding a sprinkling of copper powder mimicked the feathers’ iridescent gleam.” This bird from a South East Asian collection was later named by Nicholas Vigors in honour of Elizabeth as Mrs Gould’s sunbird - a photo is on the link below. https://www.australiangeographic.com.au/wp-content/uploads/2019/10/mrs-goulds-sunbird-1800x1058.jpg Aethopyga gouldiae The only sunbird in Australia is the olive backed sunbird (Cinnyris jugularis) found in Queensland. As I have described, this book has taken me on an interesting journey about the Goulds, their life, their family and above all, their dedication and hard work in describing the birds of the world.
1 Comment
Rosemary
24/6/2020 09:50:07 am
This is a lovely piece Kate and the photo is spectacular. I have seen Mrs Gould's sunbird several times and each time found it absolutely breathtaking. She certainly deserves to be better known.
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