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Pearly-eyed Thrasher
The pearly-eyed thrasher (''Margarops fuscatus'') is a bird in the thrasher family Mimidae. It is found on many Caribbean islands, from the Bahamas in the north to the Grenadines in the south, with an isolated subspecies on Bonaire. Description The pearly-eyed thrasher is the largest species in the Mimidae, growing to 28 to 30 cm (11 to 11.8 inches) in length. Taxonomy Its genus, ''Margarops'', is currently considered monotypic; formerly the scaly-breasted thrasher was placed in the same genus. However, ''M. fusctaus'' is now known to be closer to the ''Cinclocerthia'' tremblers. While this is not a migratory bird, considerable gene flow between populations appears to have taken place at least until fairly recently in its evolutionary history. There are four subspecies, two of which can be distinguished genetically: ''M. f. fuscatus'' (the nominate subspecies, which is found between the Greater Antilles and Antigua and Barbuda), and ''M. f. densirostris'' (oc ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Philip Lutley Sclater
Philip Lutley Sclater (4 November 1829 – 27 June 1913) was an English lawyer and zoologist. In zoology, he was an expert ornithologist, and identified the main zoogeographic regions of the world. He was Secretary of the Zoological Society of London for 42 years, from 1860–1902. Early life Sclater was born at Tangier Park, in Wootton St Lawrence, Hampshire, where his father William Lutley Sclater had a country house. George Sclater-Booth, 1st Baron Basing was Philip's elder brother. Philip grew up at Hoddington House where he took an early interest in birds. He was educated in school at Twyford and at thirteen went to Winchester College and later Corpus Christi College, Oxford where he studied scientific ornithology under Hugh Edwin Strickland. In 1851 he began to study law and was admitted a Fellow of Corpus Christi College. In 1856 he travelled to America and visited Lake Superior and the upper St. Croix River, canoeing down it to the Mississippi. Sclater wrote ab ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Subspecies
In biological classification, subspecies is a rank below species, used for populations that live in different areas and vary in size, shape, or other physical characteristics (morphology), but that can successfully interbreed. Not all species have subspecies, but for those that do there must be at least two. Subspecies is abbreviated subsp. or ssp. and the singular and plural forms are the same ("the subspecies is" or "the subspecies are"). In zoology, under the International Code of Zoological Nomenclature, the subspecies is the only taxonomic rank below that of species that can receive a name. In botany and mycology, under the International Code of Nomenclature for algae, fungi, and plants, other infraspecific ranks, such as variety, may be named. In bacteriology and virology, under standard bacterial nomenclature and virus nomenclature, there are recommendations but not strict requirements for recognizing other important infraspecific ranks. A taxonomist decides whether ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Turks And Caicos Islands
The Turks and Caicos Islands (abbreviated TCI; and ) are a British Overseas Territory consisting of the larger Caicos Islands and smaller Turks Islands, two groups of tropical islands in the Lucayan Archipelago of the Atlantic Ocean and northern West Indies. They are known primarily for tourism and as an offshore financial centre. The resident population in July 2021 was put at 57,196, making it the third-largest of the British overseas territories by population. The islands are southeast of Mayaguana in the Bahamas island chain and north of the island of Hispaniola (Haiti and the Dominican Republic). Grand Turk (Cockburn Town), the capital since 1766, is situated on Grand Turk Island about east-southeast of Miami, United States. They have a total land area of . The islands were inhabited for centuries by indigenous peoples. The first recorded European sighting of them was in 1512. In subsequent centuries, they were claimed by several European powers, with the British ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Virgin Islands
The Virgin Islands ( es, Islas Vírgenes) are an archipelago in the Caribbean Sea. They are geologically and biogeographically the easternmost part of the Greater Antilles, the northern islands belonging to the Puerto Rico Trench and St. Croix being a displaced part of the same geologic structure. Politically, the British Virgin Islands have been governed as the western island group of the Leeward Islands, which are the northern part of the Lesser Antilles, and form the border between the Caribbean Sea and the Atlantic Ocean. The archipelago is separated from the true Lesser Antilles by the Anegada Passage and from the main island of Puerto Rico by the Virgin Passage. The islands fall into three different political jurisdictions: * Virgin Islands, informally referred to as British Virgin Islands, a British overseas territory, * Virgin Islands of the United States, an unincorporated territory of the United States, * Spanish Virgin Islands, the easternmost islands of the Comm ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Puerto Rico
Puerto Rico (; abbreviated PR; tnq, Boriken, ''Borinquen''), officially the Commonwealth of Puerto Rico ( es, link=yes, Estado Libre Asociado de Puerto Rico, lit=Free Associated State of Puerto Rico), is a Caribbean island and Unincorporated territories of the United States, unincorporated territory of the United States. It is located in the northeast Caribbean Sea, approximately southeast of Miami, Florida, between the Dominican Republic and the United States Virgin Islands, U.S. Virgin Islands, and includes the eponymous main island and several smaller islands, such as Isla de Mona, Mona, Culebra, Puerto Rico, Culebra, and Vieques, Puerto Rico, Vieques. It has roughly 3.2 million residents, and its Capital city, capital and Municipalities of Puerto Rico, most populous city is San Juan, Puerto Rico, San Juan. Spanish language, Spanish and English language, English are the official languages of the executive branch of government, though Spanish predominates. Puerto Rico ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
West Indies
The West Indies is a subregion of North America, surrounded by the North Atlantic Ocean and the Caribbean Sea that includes 13 independent island countries and 18 dependencies and other territories in three major archipelagos: the Greater Antilles, the Lesser Antilles, and the Lucayan Archipelago. The subregion includes all the islands in the Antilles, plus The Bahamas and the Turks and Caicos Islands, which are in the North Atlantic Ocean. Nowadays, the term West Indies is often interchangeable with the term Caribbean, although the latter may also include some Central and South American mainland nations which have Caribbean coastlines, such as Belize, French Guiana, Guyana, and Suriname, as well as the Atlantic island nations of Barbados, Bermuda, and Trinidad and Tobago, all of which are geographically distinct from the three main island groups, but culturally related. Origin and use of the term In 1492, Christopher Columbus became the first European to record his arri ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Disjunct Distribution
In biology, a taxon with a disjunct distribution is one that has two or more groups that are related but considerably separated from each other geographically. The causes are varied and might demonstrate either the expansion or contraction of a species' range. Range fragmentation Also called range fragmentation, disjunct distributions may be caused by changes in the environment, such as mountain building and continental drift or rising sea levels; it may also be due to an organism expanding its range into new areas, by such means as rafting, or other animals transporting an organism to a new location (plant seeds consumed by birds and animals can be moved to new locations during bird or animal migrations, and those seeds can be deposited in new locations in fecal matter). Other conditions that can produce disjunct distributions include: flooding, or changes in wind, stream, and current flows, plus others such as anthropogenic introduction of alien introduced species either acciden ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Mutation
In biology, a mutation is an alteration in the nucleic acid sequence of the genome of an organism, virus, or extrachromosomal DNA. Viral genomes contain either DNA or RNA. Mutations result from errors during DNA or viral replication, mitosis, or meiosis or other types of damage to DNA (such as pyrimidine dimers caused by exposure to ultraviolet radiation), which then may undergo error-prone repair (especially microhomology-mediated end joining), cause an error during other forms of repair, or cause an error during replication (translesion synthesis). Mutations may also result from insertion or deletion of segments of DNA due to mobile genetic elements. Mutations may or may not produce detectable changes in the observable characteristics (phenotype) of an organism. Mutations play a part in both normal and abnormal biological processes including: evolution, cancer, and the development of the immune system, including junctional diversity. Mutation is the ultimate source o ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Molecular Clock
The molecular clock is a figurative term for a technique that uses the mutation rate of biomolecules to deduce the time in prehistory when two or more life forms diverged. The biomolecular data used for such calculations are usually nucleotide sequences for DNA, RNA, or amino acid sequences for proteins. The benchmarks for determining the mutation rate are often fossil or archaeological dates. The molecular clock was first tested in 1962 on the hemoglobin protein variants of various animals, and is commonly used in molecular evolution to estimate times of speciation or radiation. It is sometimes called a gene clock or an evolutionary clock. Early discovery and genetic equidistance The notion of the existence of a so-called "molecular clock" was first attributed to Émile Zuckerkandl and Linus Pauling who, in 1962, noticed that the number of amino acid differences in hemoglobin between different lineages changes roughly linearly with time, as estimated from fossil evidence. ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Fossil
A fossil (from Classical Latin , ) is any preserved remains, impression, or trace of any once-living thing from a past geological age. Examples include bones, shells, exoskeletons, stone imprints of animals or microbes, objects preserved in amber, hair, petrified wood and DNA remnants. The totality of fossils is known as the ''fossil record''. Paleontology is the study of fossils: their age, method of formation, and evolutionary significance. Specimens are usually considered to be fossils if they are over 10,000 years old. The oldest fossils are around 3.48 billion years old to 4.1 billion years old. Early edition, published online before print. The observation in the 19th century that certain fossils were associated with certain rock strata led to the recognition of a geological timescale and the relative ages of different fossils. The development of radiometric dating techniques in the early 20th century allowed scientists to quantitatively measure the ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Guadeloupe
Guadeloupe (; ; gcf, label=Antillean Creole, Gwadloup, ) is an archipelago and overseas department and region of France in the Caribbean. It consists of six inhabited islands—Basse-Terre, Grande-Terre, Marie-Galante, La Désirade, and the two inhabited Îles des Saintes—as well as many uninhabited islands and outcroppings. It is south of Antigua and Barbuda and Montserrat, north of the Commonwealth of Dominica. The region's capital city is Basse-Terre, located on the southern west coast of Basse-Terre Island; however, the most populous city is Les Abymes and the main centre of business is neighbouring Pointe-à-Pitre, both located on Grande-Terre Island. It had a population of 384,239 in 2019.Populations légales 2019: 971 Guadeloupe INSEE Like the other overseas departments, ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Montserrat
Montserrat ( ) is a British Overseas Territories, British Overseas Territory in the Caribbean. It is part of the Leeward Islands, the northern portion of the Lesser Antilles chain of the West Indies. Montserrat is about long and wide, with roughly of coastline. It is nicknamed "The Emerald Isle of the Caribbean" both for its resemblance to coastal Ireland and for the Irish diaspora, Irish ancestry of many of its inhabitants. Montserrat is the only non-fully sovereign full member of the Caribbean Community and the Organisation of Eastern Caribbean States. On 18 July 1995, the previously dormant Soufrière Hills volcano, in the southern part of the island, became active. Eruptions destroyed Montserrat's Georgian era capital city of Plymouth, Montserrat, Plymouth. Between 1995 and 2000, two-thirds of the island's population was forced to flee, primarily to the United Kingdom, leaving fewer than 1,200 people on the island in 1997 (rising to nearly 5,000 by 2016). The volcanic ac ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
