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Genovesa Cactus Finch
The Genovesa cactus finch (''Geospiza propinqua'') is a species of bird in the tanager family Thraupidae. It is one of Darwin's finches, and is endemic to the Galápagos islands, Ecuador, where it is restricted to Genovesa Island. Its natural habitat is dry shrubland and it is commonly seen on the ground. Its main food source is the cactus ''Opuntia''. Taxonomy The large cactus finch is one of Darwin's finches, a group of closely related birds which evolved on the Galápagos Islands. The group is related to the ''Tiaris'' grassquits, which are found in South America and the Caribbean. An ancestral relative of those grassquits arrived on the Galápagos Islands some 2–3 million years ago, and the Española cactus finch is one of the species which evolved from that ancestor.Grant & Grant (2008), p. 25. Some taxonomic authorities, including the International Ornithologists' Union, have split the species from the Española cactus finch. Others still consider them conspecific Bi ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Robert Ridgway
Robert Ridgway (July 2, 1850 – March 25, 1929) was an American ornithologist specializing in systematics. He was appointed in 1880 by Spencer Fullerton Baird, secretary of the Smithsonian Institution, to be the first full-time curator of birds at the United States National Museum, a title he held until his death. In 1883, he helped found the American Ornithologists' Union, where he served as officer and journal editor. Ridgway was an outstanding descriptive taxonomist, capping his life work with ''The Birds of North and Middle America'' (eight volumes, 1901–1919). In his lifetime, he was unmatched in the number of North American bird species that he described for science. As technical illustrator, Ridgway used his own paintings and outline drawings to complement his writing. He also published two books that systematized color names for describing birds, ''A Nomenclature of Colors for Naturalists'' (1886) and ''Color Standards and Color Nomenclature'' (1912). Ornitholo ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Opuntia
''Opuntia'', commonly called prickly pear or pear cactus, is a genus of flowering plants in the cactus family Cactaceae. Prickly pears are also known as ''tuna'' (fruit), ''sabra'', ''nopal'' (paddle, plural ''nopales'') from the Nahuatl word for the pads, or nostle, from the Nahuatl word for the fruit; or paddle cactus. The genus is named for the Ancient Greek city of Opus, where, according to Theophrastus, an edible plant grew and could be propagated by rooting its leaves. The most common culinary species is the Indian fig opuntia (''O. ficus-indica''). Description ''O. ficus-indica'' is a large, trunk-forming, segmented cactus that may grow to with a crown of over in diameter and a trunk diameter of . Cladodes (large pads) are green to blue-green, bearing few spines up to or may be spineless. Prickly pears typically grow with flat, rounded cladodes (also called platyclades) containing large, smooth, fixed spines and small, hairlike prickles called glochids that ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Endemic Birds Of The Galápagos Islands
Endemism is the state of a species being found in a single defined geographic location, such as an island, state, nation, country or other defined zone; organisms that are indigenous to a place are not endemic to it if they are also found elsewhere. For example, the Cape sugarbird is found exclusively in southwestern South Africa and is therefore said to be ''endemic'' to that particular part of the world. An endemic species can be also be referred to as an ''endemism'' or in scientific literature as an ''endemite''. For example '' Cytisus aeolicus'' is an endemite of the Italian flora. '' Adzharia renschi'' was once believed to be an endemite of the Caucasus, but it was later discovered to be a non-indigenous species from South America belonging to a different genus. The extreme opposite of an endemic species is one with a cosmopolitan distribution, having a global or widespread range. A rare alternative term for a species that is endemic is "precinctive", which applies to s ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Geospiza
''Geospiza'' is a genus of bird in the tanager family Thraupidae. All species in the genus are endemic to the Galápagos Islands. Together with related genera, they are collectively known as Darwin's finches. Although in the past, they were classified in the bunting and American sparrow family Emberizidae, more recent studies have shown they belong in the tanager family. Taxonomy and species list The genus ''Geospiza'' was introduced in 1837 by the English ornithologist John Gould with the large ground finch as the type species. The genus name derives from the two Ancient Greek words (), meaning "earth", and (), a catch-all term for ''finch''-like birds. The member of the genus form part of a group collectively known as Darwin's finches. Although traditionally placed with the buntings and New World sparrows in the family Emberizidae, molecular phylogenetic studies have shown that Darwin's finches are members of the subfamily Coerebinae within the tanager family Thraupidae. The ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Biological Specificity
Biological specificity is the tendency of a characteristic such as a behavior or a biochemical variation to occur in a particular species. Biochemist Linus Pauling stated that "Biological specificity is the set of characteristics of living organisms or constituents of living organisms of being special or doing something special. Each animal or plant species is special. It differs in some way from all other species...biological specificity is the major problem about understanding life." Biological specificity within ''Homo sapiens'' ''Homo sapiens'' has many characteristics that show the biological specificity in the form of behavior and morphological traits. Morphologically, humans have an enlarged cranial capacity and more gracile features in comparison to other hominins. The reduction of dentition is a feature that allows for the advantage of adaptability in diet and survival. As a species, humans are culture dependent and much of human survival relies on the culture and so ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
International Ornithologists' Union
The International Ornithologists' Union, formerly known as the International Ornithological Committee, is a group of about 200 international ornithologists, and is responsible for the International Ornithological Congress and other international ornithological activities, undertaken by its standing committees. International Ornithological Congress The International Ornithological Congress series forms the oldest and largest international series of meetings of ornithologists. It is organised by the International Ornithologists' Union. The first meeting was in 1884; subsequent meetings were irregular until 1926 since when meetings have been held every four years, except for two missed meetings during and in the immediate aftermath of the Second World War. Meetings See also * '' Birds of the World: Recommended English Names'', a book written by Frank Gill Frank Gill may refer to: * Frank Gill (Australian footballer) (1908–1970), Australian rules footballer with Carlton * Fran ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Española Cactus Finch
The Española cactus finch (''Geospiza conirostris''), is a species of bird in the tanager family Thraupidae. It is one of Darwin's finches, and is endemic to the Galápagos islands, where it is restricted to Española, Genovesa, and the Darwin and Wolf Islands. This rather dark bird resembles the smaller and finer-beaked common cactus finch, but the two species do not co-inhabit any island. Its natural habitat is dry shrubland and it is commonly seen on the ground. Its main food source is the cactus '' Opuntia''. Taxonomy The Española cactus finch is one of Darwin's finches, a group of closely related birds that evolved on the Galápagos Islands. The group is related to the ''Tiaris'' grassquits, which are found in South America and the Caribbean. An ancestral relative of those grassquits arrived on the Galápagos Islands some 2–3 million years ago, and the Española cactus finch is one of the species that evolved from that ancestor.Grant & Grant (2008), p. 25. From a ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Caribbean
The Caribbean (, ) ( es, El Caribe; french: la Caraïbe; ht, Karayib; nl, De Caraïben) is a region of the Americas that consists of the Caribbean Sea, its islands (some surrounded by the Caribbean Sea and some bordering both the Caribbean Sea and the North Atlantic Ocean) and the surrounding coasts. The region is southeast of the Gulf of Mexico and the North American mainland, east of Central America, and north of South America. Situated largely on the Caribbean Plate, the region has more than 700 islands, islets, reefs and cays (see the list of Caribbean islands). Island arcs delineate the eastern and northern edges of the Caribbean Sea: The Greater Antilles and the Lucayan Archipelago on the north and the Lesser Antilles and the on the south and east (which includes the Leeward Antilles). They form the West Indies with the nearby Lucayan Archipelago (the Bahamas and Turks and Caicos Islands), which are considered to be part of the Caribbean despite not bordering the Caribbe ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Tiaris
The yellow-faced grassquit (''Tiaris olivaceus'') is a passerine bird in the tanager family Thraupidae and is the only member of the genus ''Tiaris''. It is native to the Central America, South America, and the Caribbean. Taxonomy In 1760 the French zoologist Mathurin Jacques Brisson included a description of the yellow-faced grassquit in his ''Ornithologie'' based on a specimen collected in Saint-Domingue (now Haiti). He used the French name ''Le bruant de S. Domingue'' and the Latin name ''Emberiza dominicensis''. The two stars (**) at the start of the paragraph indicates that Brisson based his description on the examination of a specimen. Although Brisson coined Latin names, these do not conform to the binomial system and are not recognised by the International Commission on Zoological Nomenclature. When in 1766 the Swedish naturalist Carl Linnaeus updated his ''Systema Naturae'' for the twelfth edition he added 240 species that had been previously described by Brisson. One ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Evolution
Evolution is change in the heritable characteristics of biological populations over successive generations. These characteristics are the expressions of genes, which are passed on from parent to offspring during reproduction. Variation tends to exist within any given population as a result of genetic mutation and recombination. Evolution occurs when evolutionary processes such as natural selection (including sexual selection) and genetic drift act on this variation, resulting in certain characteristics becoming more common or more rare within a population. The evolutionary pressures that determine whether a characteristic is common or rare within a population constantly change, resulting in a change in heritable characteristics arising over successive generations. It is this process of evolution that has given rise to biodiversity at every level of biological organisation, including the levels of species, individual organisms, and molecules. The theory of evolution by ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Shrubland
Shrubland, scrubland, scrub, brush, or bush is a plant community characterized by vegetation dominated by shrubs, often also including grasses, herbs, and geophytes. Shrubland may either occur naturally or be the result of human activity. It may be the mature vegetation type in a particular region and remain stable over time, or a transitional community that occurs temporarily as the result of a disturbance, such as fire. A stable state may be maintained by regular natural disturbance such as fire or browsing. Shrubland may be unsuitable for human habitation because of the danger of fire. The term was coined in 1903. Shrubland species generally show a wide range of adaptations to fire, such as heavy seed production, lignotubers, and fire-induced germination. Botanical structural form In botany and ecology a shrub is defined as a much-branched woody plant less than 8 m high and usually with many stems. Tall shrubs are mostly 2–8 m high, small shrubs 1–2 m high and su ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Bird
Birds are a group of warm-blooded vertebrates constituting the class Aves (), characterised by feathers, toothless beaked jaws, the laying of hard-shelled eggs, a high metabolic rate, a four-chambered heart, and a strong yet lightweight skeleton. Birds live worldwide and range in size from the bee hummingbird to the ostrich. There are about ten thousand living species, more than half of which are passerine, or "perching" birds. Birds have whose development varies according to species; the only known groups without wings are the extinct moa and elephant birds. Wings, which are modified forelimbs, gave birds the ability to fly, although further evolution has led to the loss of flight in some birds, including ratites, penguins, and diverse endemic island species. The digestive and respiratory systems of birds are also uniquely adapted for flight. Some bird species of aquatic environments, particularly seabirds and some waterbirds, have further evolved for swimming. B ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
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