Dictionary P-S

This section is aimed at explaining the bird and biology specific vocabulary you are likely to meet in other threads in Birdforum.

This page is divided into several sections: Dictionary A-C, Dictionary D-F, Dictionary G-L, Dictionary M-O, Dictionary P-S and Dictionary T-Z.

P

Palmation: more or less the same as webbing; see Legs and Feet. Semipalmated really means "with half palmations".

Pamprodactyl: Having all four toes on each foot pointing forwards as in the swifts. see Legs and Feet

Parapatry, parapatric: two populations that are each others neighbors, or in other words occur on opposite sides of a common border, for example being separated by a river or some other habitat difference. Often used about closely related taxons that may even have hybrid zone at the border.

Paraphyly, paraphyletic: opposite of monophyletic, which see.

Parasitise, parasitize: in the context of birds, this most often refer to Brood parasite.

Partial Albinism: This is a term that some people use a lot and some claim should not be used at all. The best usage of "partial albinism" is to describe the bird that has completely normal colors in part of its plumage but one or more feather areas that are completely white. Bare parts will be normal. See also "Leucism", "Albinism".

Patagial mark: an area along the leading edge of the underside of the wings (parts of the underwing coverts) stretching from the body to the wrist which in some hawks (such as Red-tailed Hawk) will have a contrasting darker color.

Phylogeny: The evolutionary relationship among species (or other taxonomic units). A phylogenetic analysis can be based on morphology, plumage or DNA sequences, or any combination thereof; the results are often illustrated as a phylogenetic tree. See also Clade.

Pishing: attracting birds to you using sounds made using your lips and mouth. See more here.

Polyandry, polyandrous: mating system where one female mates with several males in one mating season; often, that implies that for each male she lays 1 or more eggs that the male then incubate and thereafter raise the young without her help. Found in a number of different birds including for example Cassowary and other large, flightless birds, and in Phalaropes and other shorebirds.

Polygynous: In polygynous species the male tries to mate with more than one female during the breeding season. Male Bowerbirds for example build a bower to attract as many females as possible. The female then has to build and attend the nest alone.

Polymorphic: A polymorphic species shows multiple morphs within a population. This includes sexual variation but also variation in the same sex. E.g. the females of Black-billed Cuckoo are either black or dark brown with bars, while several Screech Owl species have red, grey and even brown morphs.

Polytypic: the opposite of monotypic. For example, the Bananaquit is divided into forty-one subspecies according to the Clements checklist.

Post-ocular: mostly in connection with the words "spot" or "stripe": many hummingbirds have a white spot behind the eye or a stripe starting behind the eye continuing diagonally backwards-down.

Preening: activity where feathers are put back in order, usually using bill and/or feet. In most groups of birds, "oils" from the uropygial glands are distributed over the feathers as part of the preening activity. When preening involves two birds, it is called mutual preening or allopreening. Preening is analogous to what in mammals is known as grooming.

Primaries: a group of flight feathers, see Wings which also explains "primary projection". The number of primaries differ among different groups of birds with gulls normally having 10, which some passerines only having 9.

Precocial: about a bird that is well developed at hatching, is able to thermoregulate and often are able to feed. The hatchlings of these birds are often able to run around soon after hatching and will most often leave the nest in less than 24 hours. See also Altricial for the opposite. Many birds hatch in a state between the extremes, so that there is a continuum rather than two clearly separated groups. See also Semi-altricial.

Pullus: original meaning seems to have been nestling, often used for any young bird that is still in downs. See also Juvenile in J

Q

Qualitative trait: something that can be scored as present or absent. For example in different subspecies of Greater Antillean Oriole, the upper rump can be yellow or black.

Quantitative trait: something that will be scored as a number. This could be the length of the bill, width of the bill, or in an oriole, the percentage of the underside that is yellow vs black.

R

Range: another word for distribution.

Ranging: some (most?) birds have the ability to separate sounds on a much finer time-scale than humans. The theory about ranging is that they use this ability to discern the extent of echoes in the sound of a singing competitor (for example from trees in the surrounding area) and thereby are able to determine the distance to the singing bird without relying on the amplitude of the song; the amplitude will vary with the orientation of the singer^[1].

Rectrices: (singular: rectrix) tail feathers, see General Anatomy. The number of tail feathers differ among species, sometimes even among closely related species like Wilson's Snipe and Common Snipe.

Remiges: (singular: remex) flight feathers of the wing, see General Anatomy.

Ring species (rassenkreis): a situation where a number of populations/subspecies exists around an area where the species does not occur (usually because the center in uninhabitable for that particular species. For example, imagine that population A interbreeds freely with the nearest members of population B even though B is somewhat changed in an important way. Likewise, B interbreeds with C, C interbreeds with D, and D interbreeds with E. But at the ends of the circle, A and E meets, and they are not able to interbreed. For this to be a classical ring species, this situation has to be established in location and the interactions between the different parts (A with B, etc) have to have been continuous through a long period. A couple of examples have been described that currently looks like ring species, but the requirement that this has been going on for a long time have not been met in any of them. The closest examples within birds are Greenish Warblers (including Two-barred Warbler and Green Warbler) and large white-headed gulls (the Herring Gull complex), but in both cases have recent studies shown that sections of the continuum has been isolated from the rest in relatively recent times.

References R

1. Morton & Stutchbury (2001): Behavioral Ecology of Tropical Birds. Academic Press. ISBN 0-12-675556-6

S

Scapulars: the feathers of the shoulder region, see Wings.

Schizochroism: see discussion under Leucism.

Secondaries: a group of flight feathers, see Wings.

Semi-altricial: birds where the hatchlings have downs and open eyes but are still dependent on their parents for everything else. See also Precocial and Altricial for two related concepts.

Semipalmated: "with half palmations", or in other words, with slight webbing between the toes.

Speciation: the process of two populations going from being one species to being two species. This can happen during a period of geographic isolation (allopatry, vicariance) or in sympatry.

Speciation in sympatry: for two species to arise in sympatry is a difficult process to prove. For this to happen, one current idea is that sexual selection would be combined with some ecologic differences for sympatric speciation to happen. One example is mentioned in Vidua.

Species: the most important unit in taxonomy, and perhaps therefore, many different definitions of the word species exists (called species concepts). A thorough discussion of the different species concepts is far beyond the scope of this dictionary. See this Birdforum thread for a short discussion and for references to several papers on the subject.

Speculum: a contrastingly colored area of the secondaries, see Wings. This designation is most commonly applied to dabbling ducks, but can also be used for parrots to mention one.

Subspecies: a geographically defined population that differs in some defined way from another population. If it is impossible to say where one population ends and the other starts (because there is a very wide gradual variation (cline)) then there really is one population and they are the same subspecies, even if the most distant birds are very different. If there, within 1100 miles is 500 miles with type A, 100 miles of gradual change, and 500 miles with type B, then you should have two subspecies. It will be obvious that there is a certain degree of personal interpretation as to when an area of mixture is narrow and stable (the two taxonomic units are different species), a little wider or unstable (the two taxa are subspecies) or a little wider yet (one subspecies). See this BirdForum thread for a discussion of the topic. In Opus, subspecies are currently listed based on Clements Checklist^[1] with occasional mention of differences of opinion in other checklists. Also notice that some taxonomist consider subspecies too loosely defined to be of any value and therefore does not recognize any.

Superspecies: a term used for a group of very closely related species that are too distinct to be subspecies of the same species, and which are more closely related with each other than with other members of the genus. The term superspecies are most frequently used about a group where the members are allopatric.

Sympatry, sympatric: about two populations that occur in the same or at least overlapping areas. See also Speciation in sympatry.

Synanthropic: about a species that is usually living in close proximity to humans. Synonymous with eusynanthropic, and opposite of exanthropic.

Syndactyl: Having the third and fourth toes on each foot joined for at least part of their length. This is found in the kingfisher family. see Legs and Feet

Synonym (abbreviation, Syn.): Two (or more) different names for the same thing. There are two important variants in ornithology:

• Nomenclatural synonym - this is where the two different names mean exactly the same bird. Thus for example when the genus Sterna was split, the Sandwich Tern was moved from Sterna to Thalasseus; the old name Sterna sandvicensis is a nomenclatural synonym of the new name Thalasseus sandvicensis.
• Taxonomic synonym - this is where the two different names mean slightly different birds, which some people might consider different, but others might consider to be the same. Birds which look like Sandwich Terns in North America are treated by some ornithologists as a different species Cabot's Tern Thalasseus acuflavidus, but others consider them the same species; for them, Thalasseus acuflavidus is a taxonomic synonym of Thalasseus sandvicensis.

References S

1. Clements, JF. 2009. The Clements Checklist of Birds of the World. 6th ed., with updates to December 2009. Ithaca: Cornell Univ. Press. ISBN 978-0801445019.

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This page is divided into several sections: Dictionary A-C, Dictionary D-F, Dictionary G-L, Dictionary M-O, Dictionary P-S and Dictionary T-Z.