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Protea Canary
The protea canary (''Crithagra leucoptera''), also known as the protea seedeater, white-winged seedeater or Layard's seedeater, is a small passerine bird in the finch family. Taxonomy The protea canary was formerly placed in the genus ''Serinus'' but phylogenetic analysis of mitochondrial and nuclear DNA sequences found that the genus was polyphyletic. The genus was therefore split and a number of species including the protea canary were moved to the resurrected genus ''Crithagra''. Description The protea canary is 15–16 cm in length with a large pale bill. The adult has grey-brown upperparts, a black chin, white throat and two thin buff wing bars. The underparts are buff with light streaking. The sexes are similar, but young birds are more heavily streaked below than the adults. The call of the protea canary is a trilled ''tree-lee-loo'' or a ''sweet''. The song is a loud medley of warbles and trills, with much mimicry. Distribution and habitat It is an endemic residen ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
William Matthew Hart
William Matthew Hart (1830-1908) was an Irish-born English bird illustrator and lithographer who worked for John Gould. Hart started medical training, but was unable to complete his studies for financial reasons. He began working for Gould in 1851, beginning an association that was to last thirty years. Early during this period he made the patterns for the lithographic plates for Gould's work on hummingbirds, as well as working on ''The Birds of Great Britain'' with Henry Constantine Richter. By 1870 Hart had become Gould's chief artist and lithographer. After Gould's death in 1881, Hart was employed by Richard Bowdler Sharpe of the British Museum to complete Gould's work on the birds of New Guinea and to produce illustrations for Sharpe's monograph on the birds-of-paradise The birds-of-paradise are members of the family Paradisaeidae of the order Passeriformes. The majority of species are found in eastern Indonesia, Papua New Guinea and eastern Australia. The family h ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Crithagra
''Crithagra'' is a genus of small passerine birds in the finch family (Fringillidae). They live in Africa and Arabia. The species in this genus were formerly assigned to the genus ''Serinus'', but phylogenetic analysis of mitochondrial and nuclear DNA sequences found that the genus was polyphyletic. It was therefore split into two monophyletic genera. Eight species, including the European serin (''Serinus serinus''), were retained in ''Serinus'', while the other species were assigned to the resurrected genus ''Crithagra''. The genus was introduced in 1827 by the English ornithologist William John Swainson. The type species was subsequently designated as the brimstone canary. The name comes from the classical Greek ''krithē'' for "barley" and ''agra'' for "hunting". The genus contains 37 species: *Príncipe seedeater, ''Crithagra rufobrunnea'' *São Tomé grosbeak, ''Crithagra concolor'' * African citril, ''Crithagra citrinelloides'' *Western citril, ''Crithagra frontalis'' *Sou ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Sumac
Sumac ( or ), also spelled sumach, is any of about 35 species of flowering plants in the genus ''Rhus'' and related genera in the cashew family (Anacardiaceae). Sumacs grow in subtropical and temperate regions throughout the world, including East Asia, Africa, and North America. Sumac is used as a spice, as a dye, and in medicine. Description Sumacs are dioecious shrubs and small trees in the family Anacardiaceae that can reach a height of . The leaves are usually pinnately compound, though some species have trifoliate or simple leaves. The flowers are in dense panicles or spikes long, each flower very small, greenish, creamy white or red, with five petals. The fruits are reddish, thin-fleshed drupes covered in varying levels of hairs at maturity and form dense clusters at branch tips, sometimes called sumac bobs. Sumacs propagate both by seed (spread by birds and other animals through their droppings), and by new shoots from rhizomes, forming large clonal colonies. Taxonomy ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Othonna
''Othonna'' is a genus of approximately 90 species of succulent or subsucculent perennial herbs or shrubs, with its center of diversity in the Greater Cape Floristic Region (GCFR) of South Africa but some species' ranges include southern Namibia, Angola, and Zimbabwe. The genus was established by Linnaeus in 1753 containing 14 species, however, of those original species, only four are still retained in ''Othonna'', while the others have been transferred to different genera including ''Cineraria'', ''Euryops'', ''Hertia (plant), Hertia'', ''Ligularia'', ''Senecio'', and ''Tephroseris''. The genus Othonnna is known to be monophyletic. In 2012, a new genus ''Crassothonna'' B. Nord. was erected with 13 species transferred from ''Othonna''. A complete modern taxonomic treatment of the genus is being undertaken by the Kirstenbosch National Botanical Garden, Compton Herbarium and the South African National Biodiversity Institute. The first part, a revision of the ''Othonnna bulbosa'' group ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Cup Nest
A bird nest is the spot in which a bird lays and incubates its eggs and raises its young. Although the term popularly refers to a specific structure made by the bird itself—such as the grassy cup nest of the American robin or Eurasian blackbird, or the elaborately woven hanging nest of the Montezuma oropendola or the village weaver—that is too restrictive a definition. For some species, a nest is simply a shallow depression made in sand; for others, it is the knot-hole left by a broken branch, a burrow dug into the ground, a chamber drilled into a tree, an enormous rotting pile of vegetation and earth, a shelf made of dried saliva or a mud dome with an entrance tunnel. The smallest bird nests are those of some hummingbirds, tiny cups which can be a mere across and high. At the other extreme, some nest mounds built by the dusky scrubfowl measure more than in diameter and stand nearly tall. The study of birds' nests is known as ''caliology''. Not all bird species bu ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Protea
''Protea'' () is a genus of South African flowering plants, also called sugarbushes (Afrikaans: ''suikerbos''). Etymology The genus ''Protea'' was named in 1735 by Carl Linnaeus, possibly after the Greek god Proteus, who could change his form at will, possibly because they have such a wide variety of forms. Linnaeus's genus was formed by merging a number of genera previously published by Herman Boerhaave, although precisely which of Boerhaave's genera were included in Linnaeus's ''Protea'' varied with each of Linnaeus's publications. Taxonomy The family Proteaceae to which ''Protea'' species belong is an ancient one among angiosperms. Evidence from pollen fossils suggests Proteaceae ancestors grew in Gondwana, in the Upper Cretaceous, 75–80 million years ago. The Proteaceae are divided into two subfamilies: the Proteoideae, best represented in southern Africa, and the Grevilleoideae, concentrated in Australia and South America and the other smaller segments of Gondwana that ar ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
South Africa
South Africa, officially the Republic of South Africa (RSA), is the southernmost country in Africa. It is bounded to the south by of coastline that stretch along the South Atlantic and Indian Oceans; to the north by the neighbouring countries of Namibia, Botswana, and Zimbabwe; and to the east and northeast by Mozambique and Eswatini. It also completely enclaves the country Lesotho. It is the southernmost country on the mainland of the Old World, and the second-most populous country located entirely south of the equator, after Tanzania. South Africa is a biodiversity hotspot, with unique biomes, plant and animal life. With over 60 million people, the country is the world's 24th-most populous nation and covers an area of . South Africa has three capital cities, with the executive, judicial and legislative branches of government based in Pretoria, Bloemfontein, and Cape Town respectively. The largest city is Johannesburg. About 80% of the population are Black South Afri ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Western Cape Province
The Western Cape is a province of South Africa, situated on the south-western coast of the country. It is the fourth largest of the nine provinces with an area of , and the third most populous, with an estimated 7 million inhabitants in 2020. About two-thirds of these inhabitants live in the metropolitan area of Cape Town, which is also the provincial capital. The Western Cape was created in 1994 from part of the former Cape Province. The two largest cities are Cape Town and George. Geography The Western Cape Province is roughly L-shaped, extending north and east from the Cape of Good Hope, in the southwestern corner of South Africa. It stretches about northwards along the Atlantic coast and about eastwards along the South African south coast (Southern Indian Ocean). It is bordered on the north by the Northern Cape and on the east by the Eastern Cape. The total land area of the province is , about 10.6% of the country's total. It is roughly the size of England or the St ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Polyphyletic
A polyphyletic group is an assemblage of organisms or other evolving elements that is of mixed evolutionary origin. The term is often applied to groups that share similar features known as homoplasies, which are explained as a result of convergent evolution. The arrangement of the members of a polyphyletic group is called a polyphyly .. ource for pronunciation./ref> It is contrasted with monophyly and paraphyly. For example, the biological characteristic of warm-bloodedness evolved separately in the ancestors of mammals and the ancestors of birds; "warm-blooded animals" is therefore a polyphyletic grouping. Other examples of polyphyletic groups are algae, C4 photosynthetic plants, and edentates. Many taxonomists aim to avoid homoplasies in grouping taxa together, with a goal to identify and eliminate groups that are found to be polyphyletic. This is often the stimulus for major revisions of the classification schemes. Researchers concerned more with ecology than with systema ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Richard Bowdler Sharpe
Richard Bowdler Sharpe (22 November 1847 – 25 December 1909) was an English zoologist and ornithologist who worked as curator of the bird collection at the British Museum of natural history. In the course of his career he published several monographs on bird groups and produced a multi-volume catalogue of the specimens in the collection of the museum. He described many new species of bird and also has had species named in his honour by other ornithologists including Sharpe's longclaw (''Macronyx sharpei'') and Sharpe's starling (''Poeoptera sharpii''). Biography Richard was born in London, the first son of Thomas Bowdler Sharpe. His grandfather, Reverend Lancelot Sharpe was Rector of All Hallows Staining. His father was a publisher on Skinner Street and was best known for being the publisher of ''Sharpe's London Magazine'', an illustrated periodical (weekly but monthly from 1847). His care from the age of six was under an aunt, Magdalen Wallace, widow of the headmaster at Gramm ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Mitochondrial
A mitochondrion (; ) is an organelle found in the cells of most Eukaryotes, such as animals, plants and fungi. Mitochondria have a double membrane structure and use aerobic respiration to generate adenosine triphosphate (ATP), which is used throughout the cell as a source of chemical energy. They were discovered by Albert von Kölliker in 1857 in the voluntary muscles of insects. The term ''mitochondrion'' was coined by Carl Benda in 1898. The mitochondrion is popularly nicknamed the "powerhouse of the cell", a phrase coined by Philip Siekevitz in a 1957 article of the same name. Some cells in some multicellular organisms lack mitochondria (for example, mature mammalian red blood cells). A large number of unicellular organisms, such as microsporidia, parabasalids and diplomonads, have reduced or transformed their mitochondria into other structures. One eukaryote, ''Monocercomonoides'', is known to have completely lost its mitochondria, and one multicellular organism, ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Serinus
''Serinus'' is a genus of small birds in the finch family Fringillidae found in Europe and Africa. The birds usually have some yellow in their plumage. The genus was introduced in 1816 by the German naturalist Carl Ludwig Koch. Its name is New Latin for "canary-yellow". Many species were at one time assigned to the genus but it became clear from phylogenetic studies of mitochondrial and nuclear DNA sequences that the genus was polyphyletic. This was confirmed by Dario Zuccon and coworkers in a comprehensive study of the finch family published in 2012. The authors suggested splitting the genus into two monophyletic groups, a proposal that was accepted by the International Ornithologists' Union. The genus ''Serinus'' was restricted to the European serin and seven other species while a larger clade from Africa and Arabia was assigned to the resurrected genus ''Crithagra ''Crithagra'' is a genus of small passerine birds in the finch family (Fringillidae). They live in Africa and ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
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