1.
Algonquin Provincial Park
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Algonquin Provincial Park is a provincial park located between Georgian Bay and the Ottawa River in Southern Ontario, Canada, mostly within the Unorganized South Part of Nipissing District. Established in 1893, it is the oldest provincial park in Canada, additions since its creation have increased the park to its current size of about 7,653 square kilometres. For comparison purposes, this is one and a half times the size of Prince Edward Island or about a quarter of the size of Belgium. The park is contiguous with several smaller, administratively separate provincial parks that protect important rivers in the area, resulting in a larger total protected area. Its size, combined with its proximity to the urban centres of Toronto and Ottawa, makes Algonquin one of the most popular provincial parks in the province. Highway 60 runs through the south of the park, while the Trans-Canada Highway bypasses it to the north, over 2,400 lakes and 1,200 kilometres of streams and rivers are located within the park. Some notable examples include Canoe Lake and the Petawawa, Nipissing, Amable du Fond, Madawaska and these were formed by the retreat of the glaciers during the last ice age. The park is considered part of the border between Northern Ontario and Southern Ontario, the park is in an area of transition between northern coniferous forest and southern deciduous forest. This unique mixture of forest types, and the variety of environments in the park, allows the park to support an uncommon diversity of plant. It is also an important site for wildlife research, Algonquin Park is the only designated park within the province of Ontario to allow industrial logging to take place within its borders. In the 19th century, the industry harvested the large white pine and red pine trees to produce lumber for domestic and American markets. The loggers were followed by numbers of homesteaders and farmers. Even at that time, however, the beauty was recognized by nature preservationists. To manage these conflicting interests, the Ontario Government appointed a commission to inquire into and report on the matter. The act to establish Algonquin Park was drawn up in 1892 by this five member Royal Commission, made up of Alexander Kirkwood, James Dickson, Archibald Blue, Robert Phipps, and Aubrey White. The commissioners remarked in their report, the experience of older countries had shown that the wholesale. Only licenses to cut pine would be issued, the commissioners had recommended that when the hardwood was mature, it too should be cut. Researchers believe that smoke from a forest fire in Algonquin Park was responsible for New Englands Dark Day of May 19,1780 and this is based on investigations into scar marks which are left in the growth rings of trees that survive forest fires
2.
Conservation status
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The conservation status of a group of organisms indicates whether the group still exists and how likely the group is to become extinct in the near future. Various systems of conservation status exist and are in use at international, multi-country, the IUCN Red List of Threatened Species is the best known worldwide conservation status listing and ranking system. Also included are species that have gone extinct since 500 AD, when discussing the IUCN Red List, the official term threatened is a grouping of three categories, critically endangered, endangered, and vulnerable. Widespread and abundant taxa are included in this category, Data deficient – Not enough data to make an assessment of its risk of extinction Not evaluated – Has not yet been evaluated against the criteria. The Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora aims to ensure that trade in specimens of wild animals. Many countries require CITES permits when importing plants and animals listed on CITES, in the European Union, the Birds and Habitats Directives are the legal instruments that evaluate the conservation status within the EU of species and habitats. NatureServe conservation status focuses on Latin America, United States, Canada, and it has been developed by scientists from NatureServe, The Nature Conservancy, and the network of natural heritage programs and data centers. It is increasingly integrated with the IUCN Red List system and its categories for species include, presumed extinct, possibly extinct, critically imperiled, imperiled, vulnerable, apparently secure, and secure. The system also allows ambiguous or uncertain ranks including inexact numeric ranks, NatureServe adds a qualifier for captive or cultivated only, which has a similar meaning to the IUCN Red List extinct in the wild status. The Red Data Book of the Russian Federation is used within the Russian Federation, in Australia, the Environment Protection and Biodiversity Conservation Act 1999 describes lists of threatened species, ecological communities and threatening processes. The categories resemble those of the 1994 IUCN Red List Categories & Criteria, prior to the EPBC Act, a simpler classification system was used by the Endangered Species Protection Act 1992. Some state and territory governments also have their own systems for conservation status, in Belgium, the Flemish Research Institute for Nature and Forest publishes an online set of more than 150 nature indicators in Dutch. In Canada, the Committee on the Status of Endangered Wildlife in Canada is a group of experts that assesses and designates which wild species are in danger of disappearing from Canada. Under the Species at Risk Act, it is up to the federal government, in China, the State, provinces and some counties have determined their key protected wildlife species. There is the China red data book, in Finland, a large number of species are protected under the Nature Conservation Act, and through the EU Habitats Directive and EU Birds Directive. In Germany, the Federal Agency for Nature Conservation publishes red lists of endangered species, india has the Wild Life Protection Act,1972, Amended 2003 and the Biological Diversity Act,2002. In Japan, the Ministry of Environment publishes a Threatened Wildlife of Japan Red Data Book, in the Netherlands, the Dutch Ministry of Agriculture, Nature and Food Quality publishes a list of threatened species, and conservation is enforced by the Nature Conservation Act 1998. Species are also protected through the Wild Birds and Habitats Directives, in New Zealand, the Department of Conservation publishes the New Zealand Threat Classification System lists
3.
Least Concern
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A least concern species is one which has been categorized by the International Union for Conservation of Nature as evaluated but not qualified for any other category. As such they do not qualify as threatened, near threatened, species cannot be assigned the Least Concern category unless they have had their population status evaluated. That is, adequate information is needed to make a direct, or indirect, since 2001 the category has had the abbreviation LC, following the IUCN2001 Categories & Criteria. However, around 20% of least concern taxa in the IUCN database use the code LR/lc, prior to 2001 least concern was a subcategory of the Lower Risk category and assigned the code LR/lc or. While least concern is not considered a red listed category by the IUCN, the number of animal species listed in this category totals 14033. There are also 101 animal subspecies listed and 1500 plant taxa, there are also two animal subpopulations listed, the Australasian and Southern African subpopulations of spiny dogfish. No fungi or protista have the classification, though only four species in those kingdoms have been evaluated by the IUCN, humans qualify for this category, and in 2008 were formally assessed as such by the IUCN
4.
IUCN Red List
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The IUCN Red List of Threatened Species, founded in 1964, is the worlds most comprehensive inventory of the global conservation status of biological species. The International Union for Conservation of Nature is the main authority on the conservation status of species. A series of Regional Red Lists are produced by countries or organizations, the IUCN Red List is set upon precise criteria to evaluate the extinction risk of thousands of species and subspecies. These criteria are relevant to all species and all regions of the world, the aim is to convey the urgency of conservation issues to the public and policy makers, as well as help the international community to try to reduce species extinction. Major species assessors include BirdLife International, the Institute of Zoology, the World Conservation Monitoring Centre, collectively, assessments by these organizations and groups account for nearly half the species on the Red List. The IUCN aims to have the category of every species re-evaluated every five years if possible, the 1964 IUCN Red List of Threatened Plants used the older pre-criteria Red List assessment system. Plants listed may not, therefore, appear in the current Red List, IUCN advise that is best to check both the online Red List and the 1997 plants Red List publication. The 2006 Red List, released on 4 May 2006 evaluated 40,168 species as a whole, plus an additional 2,160 subspecies, varieties, aquatic stocks, on 12 September 2007, the World Conservation Union released the 2007 IUCN Red List of Threatened Species. Russ Mittermeier, chief of Swiss-based IUCNs Primate Specialist Group, stated that 16,306 species are endangered with extinction,188 more than in 2006, the Red List includes the Sumatran orangutan in the Critically Endangered category and the Bornean orangutan in the Endangered category. The study shows at least 1,141 of the 5,487 mammals on Earth are known to be threatened with extinction, and 836 are listed as Data Deficient. The Red List of 2012 was released 19 July 2012 at Rio+20 Earth Summit, nearly 2,000 species were added, the IUCN assessed a total of 63,837 species which revealed 19,817 are threatened with extinction. With 3,947 described as endangered and 5,766 as endangered. At threat are 41% of amphibian species, 33% of reef-building corals, 30% of conifers, 25% of mammals, the IUCN Red List has listed 132 species of plants and animals from India as Critically Endangered. Extinct – No known individuals remaining, extinct in the wild – Known only to survive in captivity, or as a naturalized population outside its historic range. Critically endangered – Extremely high risk of extinction in the wild, Endangered – High risk of extinction in the wild. Vulnerable – High risk of endangerment in the wild, near threatened – Likely to become endangered in the near future. Does not qualify for a more at-risk category, widespread and abundant taxa are included in this category. Data deficient – Not enough data to make an assessment of its risk of extinction, Not evaluated – Has not yet been evaluated against the criteria
5.
Taxonomy (biology)
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Taxonomy is the science of defining groups of biological organisms on the basis of shared characteristics and giving names to those groups. The exact definition of taxonomy varies from source to source, but the core of the remains, the conception, naming. There is some disagreement as to whether biological nomenclature is considered a part of taxonomy, the broadest meaning of taxonomy is used here. The word taxonomy was introduced in 1813 by Candolle, in his Théorie élémentaire de la botanique, the term alpha taxonomy is primarily used today to refer to the discipline of finding, describing, and naming taxa, particularly species. In earlier literature, the term had a different meaning, referring to morphological taxonomy, ideals can, it may be said, never be completely realized. They have, however, a value of acting as permanent stimulants. Some of us please ourselves by thinking we are now groping in a beta taxonomy, turrill thus explicitly excludes from alpha taxonomy various areas of study that he includes within taxonomy as a whole, such as ecology, physiology, genetics, and cytology. He further excludes phylogenetic reconstruction from alpha taxonomy, thus, Ernst Mayr in 1968 defined beta taxonomy as the classification of ranks higher than species. This activity is what the term denotes, it is also referred to as beta taxonomy. How species should be defined in a group of organisms gives rise to practical and theoretical problems that are referred to as the species problem. The scientific work of deciding how to define species has been called microtaxonomy, by extension, macrotaxonomy is the study of groups at higher taxonomic ranks, from subgenus and above only, than species. While some descriptions of taxonomic history attempt to date taxonomy to ancient civilizations, earlier works were primarily descriptive, and focused on plants that were useful in agriculture or medicine. There are a number of stages in scientific thinking. Early taxonomy was based on criteria, the so-called artificial systems. Later came systems based on a complete consideration of the characteristics of taxa, referred to as natural systems, such as those of de Jussieu, de Candolle and Bentham. The publication of Charles Darwins Origin of Species led to new ways of thinking about classification based on evolutionary relationships and this was the concept of phyletic systems, from 1883 onwards. This approach was typified by those of Eichler and Engler, the advent of molecular genetics and statistical methodology allowed the creation of the modern era of phylogenetic systems based on cladistics, rather than morphology alone. Taxonomy has been called the worlds oldest profession, and naming and classifying our surroundings has likely been taking place as long as mankind has been able to communicate
6.
Animal
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Animals are multicellular, eukaryotic organisms of the kingdom Animalia. The animal kingdom emerged as a clade within Apoikozoa as the group to the choanoflagellates. Animals are motile, meaning they can move spontaneously and independently at some point in their lives and their body plan eventually becomes fixed as they develop, although some undergo a process of metamorphosis later in their lives. All animals are heterotrophs, they must ingest other organisms or their products for sustenance, most known animal phyla appeared in the fossil record as marine species during the Cambrian explosion, about 542 million years ago. Animals can be divided broadly into vertebrates and invertebrates, vertebrates have a backbone or spine, and amount to less than five percent of all described animal species. They include fish, amphibians, reptiles, birds and mammals, the remaining animals are the invertebrates, which lack a backbone. These include molluscs, arthropods, annelids, nematodes, flatworms, cnidarians, ctenophores, the study of animals is called zoology. The word animal comes from the Latin animalis, meaning having breath, the biological definition of the word refers to all members of the kingdom Animalia, encompassing creatures as diverse as sponges, jellyfish, insects, and humans. Aristotle divided the world between animals and plants, and this was followed by Carl Linnaeus, in the first hierarchical classification. In Linnaeuss original scheme, the animals were one of three kingdoms, divided into the classes of Vermes, Insecta, Pisces, Amphibia, Aves, and Mammalia. Since then the last four have all been subsumed into a single phylum, in 1874, Ernst Haeckel divided the animal kingdom into two subkingdoms, Metazoa and Protozoa. The protozoa were later moved to the kingdom Protista, leaving only the metazoa, thus Metazoa is now considered a synonym of Animalia. Animals have several characteristics that set apart from other living things. Animals are eukaryotic and multicellular, which separates them from bacteria and they are heterotrophic, generally digesting food in an internal chamber, which separates them from plants and algae. They are also distinguished from plants, algae, and fungi by lacking cell walls. All animals are motile, if only at life stages. In most animals, embryos pass through a stage, which is a characteristic exclusive to animals. With a few exceptions, most notably the sponges and Placozoa and these include muscles, which are able to contract and control locomotion, and nerve tissues, which send and process signals
7.
Chordate
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Chordates are deuterostomes, as during the embryo development stage the anus forms before the mouth. They are also bilaterally symmetric coelomates, in the case of vertebrate chordates, the notochord is usually replaced by a vertebral column during development, and they may have body plans organized via segmentation. There are also additional extinct taxa, the Vertebrata are sometimes considered as a subgroup of the clade Craniata, consisting of chordates with a skull, the Craniata and Tunicata compose the clade Olfactores. Of the more than 65,000 living species of chordates, the worlds largest and fastest animals, the blue whale and peregrine falcon respectively, are chordates, as are humans. Fossil chordates are known from at least as early as the Cambrian explosion, Hemichordata, which includes the acorn worms, has been presented as a fourth chordate subphylum, but it now is usually treated as a separate phylum. The Hemichordata, along with the Echinodermata, form the Ambulacraria, the Chordata and Ambulacraria form the superphylum Deuterostomia, composed of the deuterostomes. Attempts to work out the relationships of the chordates have produced several hypotheses. All of the earliest chordate fossils have found in the Early Cambrian Chengjiang fauna. Because the fossil record of early chordates is poor, only molecular phylogenetics offers a prospect of dating their emergence. However, the use of molecular phylogenetics for dating evolutionary transitions is controversial and it has also proved difficult to produce a detailed classification within the living chordates. Attempts to produce family trees shows that many of the traditional classes are paraphyletic. While this has been known since the 19th century, an insistence on only monophyletic taxa has resulted in vertebrate classification being in a state of flux. Although the name Chordata is attributed to William Bateson, it was already in prevalent use by 1880, ernst Haeckel described a taxon comprising tunicates, cephalochordates, and vertebrates in 1866. Though he used the German vernacular form, it is allowed under the ICZN code because of its subsequent latinization, among the vertebrate sub-group of chordates the notochord develops into the spine, and in wholly aquatic species this helps the animal to swim by flexing its tail. In fish and other vertebrates, this develops into the spinal cord, the pharynx is the part of the throat immediately behind the mouth. In fish, the slits are modified to form gills, a muscular tail that extends backwards behind the anus. This is a groove in the wall of the pharynx. In filter-feeding species it produces mucus to gather food particles, which helps in transporting food to the esophagus and it also stores iodine, and may be a precursor of the vertebrate thyroid gland
8.
Bird
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Birds, a subgroup of Reptiles, are the last living examples of Dinosaurs. Birds live worldwide and range in size from the 5 cm bee hummingbird to the 2.75 m ostrich. They rank as the class of tetrapods with the most living species, at ten thousand. Birds are the closest living relatives of crocodilians, the fossil record indicates that birds evolved from feathered ancestors within the theropod group of saurischian dinosaurs. True birds first appeared during the Cretaceous period, around 100 million years ago, Birds, especially those in the southern continents, survived this event and then migrated to other parts of the world while diversifying during periods of global cooling. Primitive bird-like dinosaurs that lie outside class Aves proper, in the broader group Avialae, have been found dating back to the mid-Jurassic period, around 170 million years ago. Birds have wings which are more or less developed depending on the 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 evolved for swimming. Many species annually migrate great distances, Birds are social, communicating with visual signals, calls, and bird songs, and participating in such social behaviours as cooperative breeding and hunting, flocking, and mobbing of predators. The vast majority of species are socially monogamous, usually for one breeding season at a time, sometimes for years. Other species have breeding systems that are polygynous or, rarely, Birds produce offspring by laying eggs which are fertilised through sexual reproduction. They are usually laid in a nest and incubated by the parents, most birds have an extended period of parental care after hatching. Some birds, such as hens, lay eggs even when not fertilised, songbirds, parrots, and other species are popular as pets. Guano is harvested for use as a fertiliser, Birds prominently figure throughout human culture. About 120–130 species have become extinct due to human activity since the 17th century, human activity threatens about 1,200 bird species with extinction, though efforts are underway to protect them. Recreational birdwatching is an important part of the ecotourism industry, the first classification of birds was developed by Francis Willughby and John Ray in their 1676 volume Ornithologiae. Carl Linnaeus modified that work in 1758 to devise the taxonomic classification system currently in use, Birds are categorised as the biological class Aves in Linnaean taxonomy. Phylogenetic taxonomy places Aves in the dinosaur clade Theropoda, Aves and a sister group, the clade Crocodilia, contain the only living representatives of the reptile clade Archosauria
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Passerine
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A passerine is any bird of the order Passeriformes, which includes more than half of all bird species. A notable feature of passerines compared to other orders of Aves is the arrangement of their toes, sometimes known as perching birds or, less accurately, as songbirds, the passerines form one of the most diverse terrestrial vertebrate orders, with over 5,000 identified species. It has roughly twice as many species as the largest of the mammal orders and it contains more than 110 families, the second-most of any order of tetrapods. The passerines contain several groups of parasites such as the viduas, cuckoo-finches. Most passerines are omnivorous, while the shrikes are carnivorous, the order is divided into three suborders, Tyranni, Passeri, and the basal Acanthisitti. Oscines have the best control of their syrinx muscles among birds, producing a range of songs and other vocalizations. Most passerines are smaller than members of other avian orders. The heaviest and altogether largest passerines are the thick-billed raven and the races of common raven. The superb lyrebird and some birds-of-paradise, due to long tails or tail coverts, are longer overall. The smallest passerine is the short-tailed pygmy tyrant, at 6.5 cm and 4.2 g, the foot of a passerine has three toes directed forward and one toe directed backward, called anisodactyl arrangement. This arrangement enables the birds to perch upon vertical surfaces, such as trees. The toes have no webbing or joining, but in some cotingas, the hind toe joins the leg at the same level as the front toes. The passeriformes have this toe arrangement in common with hunting birds like eagles, the leg arrangement of passerine birds contains a special adaptation for perching. This enables passerines to sleep while perching without falling off and this is especially useful for passerine birds that develop nocturnal lifestyles. Most passerine birds develop 12 tail feathers, although the superb lyrebird has 16, certain species of passerines have stiff tail feathers, which help the birds balance themselves when perching upon vertical surfaces. Some passerines, specifically in the family Ploceidae, are known for their elaborate sexual ornaments. A well-known example is the long-tailed widowbird, the chicks of passerines are altricial, blind, featherless, and helpless when hatched from their eggs. Hence, the chicks require extensive parental care, vinous-throated parrotbill has two egg colours, white and blue
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Corvidae
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Corvidae is a cosmopolitan family of oscine passerine birds that contains the crows, ravens, rooks, jackdaws, jays, magpies, treepies, choughs, and nutcrackers. In common English, they are known as the family, or, more technically. The genus Corvus, including the jackdaws, crows, and ravens and their total brain-to-body mass ratio is equal to that of great apes and cetaceans, and only slightly lower than in humans. They are medium to large in size, with feet and bills, rictal bristles. Corvids are found worldwide except for the tip of South America, the majority of the species are found in tropical South and Central America, southern Asia and Eurasia, with fewer than 10 species each in Africa and Australasia. The genus Corvus has re-entered Australia in relatively recent geological prehistory, with five species, several species of raven have reached oceanic islands, and some of these species are now highly threatened with extinction or have already gone extinct. Over the years, much disagreement has arisen on the evolutionary relationships of the corvid family. What eventually seemed clear was that corvids are derived from Australasian ancestors, other lineages derived from these ancestors evolved into ecologically diverse, but often Australasian groups. In the late 1970s and throughout the 1980s, Sibley and Ahlquist united the corvids with other taxa in the Corvida, the corvids constitute the core group of the Corvoidea, together with their closest relatives. They are also the group of the Corvida, which includes the related groups, such as Old World orioles. Clarification of the interrelationships of the corvids has been achieved based on analysis of several DNA sequences. The jays and magpies do not constitute monophyletic lineages, but rather seem to split up into an American and Old World lineage, and these are not closely related among each other. The position of the magpie, which has always been a major enigma, is even less clear than before. Likewise, the Humes ground jay is in fact a member of the tit family Paridae, the known prehistoric corvid genera appear to be mainly of the New World and Old World jay and Holarctic magpie lineages, Miocorvus Miopica Miocitta Corvidae gen. et sp. indet. Protocitta Corvidae gen. et sp. indet, - probably belongs in an extant genus Henocitta In addition, there are numerous fossil species of extant genera since the Mio–Pliocene, mainly European Corvus. Corvids are large to very large passerines with a robust build, strong legs, the sexes are very similar in color and size. Corvids have strong, stout bills and large wingspans, the family includes the largest members of the passerine order. The smallest corvid is the dwarf jay, at 41 g and 21.5 cm, the largest corvids are the common raven and the thick-billed raven, both of which regularly exceed 1,400 grams and 65 cm
11.
Binomial nomenclature
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Such a name is called a binomial name, a binomen, binominal name or a scientific name, more informally it is also called a Latin name. The first part of the name identifies the genus to which the species belongs, for example, humans belong to the genus Homo and within this genus to the species Homo sapiens. The formal introduction of system of naming species is credited to Carl Linnaeus. But Gaspard Bauhin, in as early as 1623, had introduced in his book Pinax theatri botanici many names of genera that were adopted by Linnaeus. Although the general principles underlying binomial nomenclature are common to these two codes, there are differences, both in the terminology they use and in their precise rules. Similarly, both parts are italicized when a binomial name occurs in normal text, thus the binomial name of the annual phlox is now written as Phlox drummondii. In scientific works, the authority for a name is usually given, at least when it is first mentioned. In zoology Patella vulgata Linnaeus,1758, the original name given by Linnaeus was Fringilla domestica, the parentheses indicate that the species is now considered to belong in a different genus. The ICZN does not require that the name of the person who changed the genus be given, nor the date on which the change was made, in botany Amaranthus retroflexus L. – L. is the standard abbreviation used in botany for Linnaeus. – Linnaeus first named this bluebell species Scilla italica, Rothmaler transferred it to the genus Hyacinthoides, the ICN does not require that the dates of either publication be specified. Prior to the adoption of the binomial system of naming species. Together they formed a system of polynomial nomenclature and these names had two separate functions. First, to designate or label the species, and second, to be a diagnosis or description, such polynomial names may sometimes look like binomials, but are significantly different. For example, Gerards herbal describes various kinds of spiderwort, The first is called Phalangium ramosum, Branched Spiderwort, is aptly termed Phalangium Ephemerum Virginianum, Soon-Fading Spiderwort of Virginia. The Latin phrases are short descriptions, rather than identifying labels, the Bauhins, in particular Caspar Bauhin, took some important steps towards the binomial system, by pruning the Latin descriptions, in many cases to two words. The adoption by biologists of a system of binomial nomenclature is due to Swedish botanist and physician Carl von Linné. It was in his 1753 Species Plantarum that he first began using a one-word trivial name together with a generic name in a system of binomial nomenclature. This trivial name is what is now known as an epithet or specific name
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Carl Linnaeus
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Carl Linnaeus, also known after his ennoblement as Carl von Linné, was a Swedish botanist, physician, and zoologist, who formalised the modern system of naming organisms called binomial nomenclature. He is known by the father of modern taxonomy. Many of his writings were in Latin, and his name is rendered in Latin as Carolus Linnæus, Linnaeus was born in the countryside of Småland, in southern Sweden. He received most of his education at Uppsala University. He lived abroad between 1735 and 1738, where he studied and also published a first edition of his Systema Naturae in the Netherlands and he then returned to Sweden, where he became professor of medicine and botany at Uppsala. In the 1740s, he was sent on journeys through Sweden to find and classify plants. In the 1750s and 1760s, he continued to collect and classify animals, plants, and minerals, at the time of his death, he was one of the most acclaimed scientists in Europe. The philosopher Jean-Jacques Rousseau sent him the message, Tell him I know no man on earth. The German writer Johann Wolfgang von Goethe wrote, With the exception of Shakespeare and Spinoza, Swedish author August Strindberg wrote, Linnaeus was in reality a poet who happened to become a naturalist. Among other compliments, Linnaeus has been called Princeps botanicorum, The Pliny of the North and he is also considered as one of the founders of modern ecology. In botany, the abbreviation used to indicate Linnaeus as the authority for species names is L. In older publications, sometimes the abbreviation Linn. is found, Linnæus was born in the village of Råshult in Småland, Sweden, on 23 May 1707. He was the first child of Nicolaus Ingemarsson and Christina Brodersonia and his siblings were Anna Maria Linnæa, Sofia Juliana Linnæa, Samuel Linnæus, and Emerentia Linnæa. One of a line of peasants and priests, Nils was an amateur botanist, a Lutheran minister. Christina was the daughter of the rector of Stenbrohult, Samuel Brodersonius, a year after Linnæus birth, his grandfather Samuel Brodersonius died, and his father Nils became the rector of Stenbrohult. The family moved into the rectory from the curates house, even in his early years, Linnæus seemed to have a liking for plants, flowers in particular. Whenever he was upset, he was given a flower, which calmed him. Nils spent much time in his garden and often showed flowers to Linnaeus, soon Linnæus was given his own patch of earth where he could grow plants
13.
10th edition of Systema Naturae
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The 10th edition of Systema Naturae is a book written by Carl Linnaeus and published in two volumes in 1758 and 1759, which marks the starting point of zoological nomenclature. In it, Linnaeus introduced binomial nomenclature for animals, something he had already done for plants in his 1753 publication of Species Plantarum, before 1758, most biological catalogues had used polynomial names for the taxa included, including earlier editions of Systema Naturae. The first work to consistently apply binomial nomenclature across the kingdom was the 10th edition of Systema Naturae. Names published before that date are unavailable, even if they would otherwise satisfy the rules, during Linnaeus lifetime, Systema Naturae was under continuous revision. The Animal Kingdom, Animals enjoy sensation by means of an organization, animated by a medullary substance, perception by nerves. They have members for the different purposes of life, organs for their different senses and they all originate from an egg. Their external and internal structure, their anatomy, habits, instincts. The list has been broken down into the six classes Linnaeus described for animals, Mammalia, Aves, Amphibia, Pisces, Insecta. These classes were created by studying the internal anatomy, as seen in his key. Warm, red blood Viviparous, Mammalia Oviparous, Aves Heart with 1 auricle,1 ventricle, cold, red blood Lungs voluntary, Amphibia External gills, Pisces Heart with 1 auricle,0 ventricles. Linnaeus described mammals as, Animals that suckle their young by means of lactiferous teats, in external and internal structure they resemble man, most of them are quadrupeds, and with man, their natural enemy, inhabit the surface of the Earth. The largest, though fewest in number, inhabit the ocean and they are areal, vocal, swift and light, and destitute of external ears, lips, teeth, scrotum, womb, bladder, epiglottis, corpus callosum and its arch, and diaphragm. They breathe by means of gills, which are united by a bony arch, swim by means of radiate fins. Many of them are without a head, and most of them without feet. They are principally distinguished by their tentacles, by the Ancients they were not improperly called imperfect animals, as being destitute of ears, nose, head, eyes and legs, and are therefore totally distinct from Insects. In addition to repeating the species he had listed in his Species Plantarum. The species from Species Plantarum were numbered sequentially, while the new species were labelled with letters, new plant species described in the 10th edition of Systema Naturae include, The original 1758 Systema Naturae Linnaeus 1758 Classification of Animals on the Taxonomicon
14.
Subspecies
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In biological classification, subspecies is either a taxonomic rank subordinate to species, or a taxonomic unit in that rank. A subspecies cannot be recognized independently, a species will either be recognized as having no subspecies at all or at least two, 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, 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 to recognize a subspecies or not, the differences between subspecies are usually less distinct than the differences between species. In zoology, the International Code of Zoological Nomenclature accepts only one rank below that of species, other groupings, infrasubspecific entities do not have names regulated by the ICZN. Such forms have no official ICZN status, though they may be useful in describing altitudinal or geographical clines, pet breeds, transgenic animals, etc. While the scientific name of a species is a binomen, the name of a subspecies is a trinomen - a binomen followed by a subspecific name. A tigers binomen is Panthera tigris, so for a Sumatran tiger the trinomen is, for example, names published before 1992 in the rank of variety are taken to be names of subspecies. In botany, subspecies is one of many ranks below that of species, such as variety, subvariety, form, the subspecific name is preceded by subsp. or ssp. as Schoenoplectus californicus ssp. tatora. A botanical name consists of at most three parts, an infraspecific name includes the species binomial, and one infraspecific epithet, such as subspecies or variety. For example, Motacilla alba alba is the subspecies of the white wagtail. The subspecies name that repeats the name is referred to in botanical nomenclature as the subspecies autonym. When zoologists disagree over whether a population is a subspecies or a full species. A subspecies is a rank below species – the only recognized rank in the zoological code. Botanists and mycologists have the choice of ranks lower than subspecies, such as variety or form, in biological terms, rather than in relation to nomenclature, a polytypic species has two or more subspecies, races, or more generally speaking, populations that need a separate description. These are separate groups that are distinct from one another and do not generally interbreed. These subspecies, races, or populations, can be named as subspecies by zoologists, a monotypic species has no distinct population or races, or rather one race comprising the whole species. A taxonomist would not name a subspecies within such a species, monotypic species can occur in several ways, All members of the species are very similar and cannot be sensibly divided into biologically significant subcategories
15.
Family (biology)
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In biological classification, family is one of the eight major taxonomic ranks, it is classified between order and genus. A family may be divided into subfamilies, which are intermediate ranks above the rank of genus. In vernacular usage, a family may be named one of its common members, for example, walnuts and hickory trees belong to the family Juglandaceae. What does or does not belong to a family—or whether a family should be recognized at all—are proposed and determined by practicing taxonomists. There are no rules for describing or recognizing a family. Taxonomists often take different positions about descriptions of taxa, and there may be no broad consensus across the community for some time. Some described taxa are accepted broadly and quickly, but others only rarely, if at all, the naming of families is codified by various international codes. In zoological nomenclature, the names of animals end with the suffix -idae. The concept of rank at time was not yet settled, and in the preface to the Prodromus Magnol spoke of uniting his families into larger genera. Carolus Linnaeus used the word familia in his Philosophia botanica to denote groups of plants, trees, herbs, ferns, palms. He used this term only in the section of the book. In zoology, the family as an intermediate between order and genus was introduced by Pierre André Latreille in his Précis des caractères génériques des insectes. He used families in some but not in all his orders of insects, families can be used for evolutionary, palaeontological and generic studies because they are more stable than lower taxonomic levels such as genera and species
16.
Deciduous
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In a more general sense, deciduous means the dropping of a part that is no longer needed or falling away after its purpose is finished. In plants it is the result of natural processes, in botany and horticulture, deciduous plants, including trees, shrubs and herbaceous perennials, are those that lose all of their leaves for part of the year. In some cases leaf loss coincides with winter—namely in temperate or polar climates, in other parts of the world, including tropical, subtropical, and arid regions, plants lose their leaves during the dry season or other seasons, depending on variations in rainfall. The converse of deciduous is coniferous, where foliage is shed on a different schedule from deciduous trees, plants that are intermediate may be called semi-deciduous, they lose old foliage as new growth begins. Other plants are semi-evergreen and lose their leaves before the growing season. Many deciduous plants flower during the period when they are leafless, the absence of leaves improves wind transmission of pollen for wind-pollinated plants and increases the visibility of the flowers to insects in insect-pollinated plants. This strategy is not without risks, as the flowers can be damaged by frost or, in dry season regions, leaf drop or abscission involves complex physiological signals and changes within plants. The process of photosynthesis steadily degrades the supply of chlorophylls in foliage, the brightest leaf colors are produced when days grow short and nights are cool, but remain above freezing. These other pigments include carotenoids that are yellow, brown, anthocyanin pigments produce red and purple colors, though they are not always present in the leaves. Rather, they are produced in the foliage in late summer, parts of the world that have showy displays of bright autumn colors are limited to locations where days become short and nights are cool. In other parts of the world, the leaves of deciduous trees simply fall off without turning the bright colors produced from the accumulation of anthocyanin pigments, the beginnings of leaf drop starts when an abscission layer is formed between the leaf petiole and the stem. This layer is formed in the spring during active new growth of the leaf, the cells are sensitive to a plant hormone called auxin that is produced by the leaf and other parts of the plant. The elongation of cells break the connection between the different cell layers, allowing the leaf to break away from the plant. It also forms a layer that seals the break, so the plant does not lose sap, in the spring, these proteins are used as a nitrogen source during the growth of new leaves or flowers. Plants with deciduous foliage have advantages and disadvantages compared to plants with evergreen foliage, evergreens suffer greater water loss during the winter and they also can experience greater predation pressure, especially when small. Losing leaves in winter may reduce damage from insects, repairing leaves, removing leaves also reduces cavitation which can damage xylem vessels in plants. This then allows deciduous plants to have xylem vessels with larger diameters, the deciduous characteristic has developed repeatedly among woody plants. Trees include maple, many oaks and nothofagus, elm, aspen, Deciduous shrubs include honeysuckle, viburnum, and many others
17.
Pinophyta
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The Pinophyta, also known as Coniferophyta or Coniferae, or commonly as conifers, are a division of vascular land plants containing a single class, Pinopsida. They are gymnosperms, cone-bearing seed plants, all extant conifers are perennial woody plants with secondary growth. The great majority are trees, though a few are shrubs, examples include cedars, Douglas firs, cypresses, firs, junipers, kauri, larches, pines, hemlocks, redwoods, spruces, and yews. As of 1998, the division Pinophyta was estimated to contain eight families,68 genera, although the total number of species is relatively small, conifers are ecologically important. They are the dominant plants over large areas of land, most notably the taiga of the Northern Hemisphere, boreal conifers have many wintertime adaptations. The narrow conical shape of northern conifers, and their downward-drooping limbs, many of them seasonally alter their biochemistry to make them more resistant to freezing. While tropical rainforests have more biodiversity and turnover, the conifer forests of the world represent the largest terrestrial carbon sink. Conifers are of economic value for softwood lumber and paper production. The earliest conifers in the record date to the late Carboniferous period, possibly arising from Cordaites. Pinophytes, Cycadophytes, and Ginkgophytes all developed at this time, an important adaptation of these gymnosperms was allowing plants to live without being so dependent on water. Other adaptations are pollen and the seed, which allows the embryo to be transported and developed elsewhere, Conifers appear to be one of the taxa that benefited from the Permian–Triassic extinction event, and were the dominant land plants of the Mesozoic. They were overtaken by the plants, which first appeared in the Cretaceous. They were the food of herbivorous dinosaurs, and their resins and poisons would have given protection against herbivores. Reproductive features of modern conifers had evolved by the end of the Mesozoic era, Conifer is a Latin word, a compound of conus and ferre, meaning the one that bears cone. A descriptive name in use for the conifers is Coniferae. Alternatively, descriptive botanical names may also be used at any rank above family and this means that if conifers are considered a division, they may be called Pinophyta or Coniferae. As a class they may be called Pinopsida or Coniferae, as an order they may be called Pinales or Coniferae or Coniferales. Conifers are the largest and economically most important component group of the gymnosperms, the division Pinophyta consists of just one class, Pinopsida, which includes both living and fossil taxa
18.
Acorn
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The acorn, or oak nut, is the nut of the oaks and their close relatives. It usually contains a seed, enclosed in a tough, leathery shell. Acorns are 1–6 cm long and 0. 8–4 cm broad, Acorns take between 6 and 24 months to mature, see List of Quercus species for details of oak classification, in which acorn morphology and phenology are important factors. Acorns play an important role in forest ecology when oaks are the dominant species or are plentiful, the volume of the acorn crop may vary wildly, creating great abundance or great stress on the many animals dependent on acorns and the predators of those animals. Acorns, along with nuts, are termed mast. Wildlife that consume acorns as an important part of their diets includes birds, such as jays, pigeons, some ducks, small mammals that feed on acorns include mice, squirrels and several other rodents. Large mammals such as pigs, bears, and deer also consume large amounts of acorns, in Spain, Portugal and the New Forest region of southern England, pigs are still turned loose in dehesas in the autumn, to fill and fatten themselves on acorns. Heavy consumption of acorns can, on the hand, be toxic to other animals that cannot detoxify their tannins, such as horses. The larvae of moths and weevils also live in young acorns. Acorns are attractive to animals because they are large and thus efficiently consumed or cached, Acorns are also rich in nutrients. Percentages vary from species to species, but all acorns contain large amounts of protein, carbohydrates and fats, as well as the calcium, phosphorus and potassium. Total food energy in an acorn also varies by species, but all well with other wild foods. Acorns also contain bitter tannins, the amount varying with the species, since tannins, which are plant polyphenols, interfere with an animals ability to metabolize protein, creatures must adapt in different ways to use the nutritional value acorns contain. Animals may preferentially select acorns that contain fewer tannins, when the tannins are metabolized in cattle, the tannic acid produced can cause ulceration and kidney failure. Animals that cache acorns, such as jays and squirrels, may wait to consume some of these acorns until sufficient groundwater has percolated through them to leach out the tannins, other animals buffer their acorn diet with other foods. Many insects, birds, and mammals metabolize tannins with fewer ill effects than do humans, species of acorn that contain large amounts of tannins are very bitter, astringent, and potentially irritating if eaten raw. This is particularly true of the acorns of American red oaks, the acorns of white oaks, being much lower in tannins, are nutty in flavor, this characteristic is enhanced if the acorns are given a light roast before grinding. Tannins can be removed by soaking chopped acorns in several changes of water, being rich in fat, acorn flour can spoil or molder easily and must be carefully stored
19.
Arthropod
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An arthropod is an invertebrate animal having an exoskeleton, a segmented body, and jointed appendages. Arthropods form the phylum Arthropoda, which includes the insects, arachnids, myriapods, arthropods are characterized by their jointed limbs and cuticle made of chitin, often mineralised with calcium carbonate. The arthropod body plan consists of segments, each with a pair of appendages, the rigid cuticle inhibits growth, so arthropods replace it periodically by moulting. Their versatility has enabled them to become the most species-rich members of all guilds in most environments. They have over a million described species, making up more than 80% of all described living species, some of which. Arthropods range in size from the microscopic crustacean Stygotantulus up to the Japanese spider crab, arthropods primary internal cavity is a hemocoel, which accommodates their internal organs, and through which their haemolymph – analogue of blood – circulates, they have open circulatory systems. Like their exteriors, the organs of arthropods are generally built of repeated segments. Their nervous system is ladder-like, with paired ventral nerve cords running through all segments and their heads are formed by fusion of varying numbers of segments, and their brains are formed by fusion of the ganglia of these segments and encircle the esophagus. The respiratory and excretory systems of arthropods vary, depending as much on their environment as on the subphylum to which they belong, arthropods also have a wide range of chemical and mechanical sensors, mostly based on modifications of the many setae that project through their cuticles. Aquatic species use internal or external fertilization. Almost all arthropods lay eggs, but scorpions give birth to live young after the eggs have hatched inside the mother, arthropod hatchlings vary from miniature adults to grubs and caterpillars that lack jointed limbs and eventually undergo a total metamorphosis to produce the adult form. The level of care for hatchlings varies from nonexistent to the prolonged care provided by scorpions. The evolutionary ancestry of arthropods dates back to the Cambrian period, the group is generally regarded as monophyletic, and many analyses support the placement of arthropods with cycloneuralians in a superphylum Ecdysozoa. Overall however, the relationships of Metazoa are not yet well resolved. Likewise, the relationships between various groups are still actively debated. Arthropods contribute to the food supply both directly as food, and more importantly indirectly as pollinators of crops. Some species are known to spread disease to humans, livestock. The word arthropod comes from the Greek ἄρθρον árthron, joint, and πούς pous, i. e. foot or leg, arthropods are invertebrates with segmented bodies and jointed limbs
20.
Gleaning (birds)
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This behavior is contrasted with hawking insects from the air or chasing after moving insects such as ants. Gleaning, in birds, does not refer to foraging for seeds or fruit, many birds make use of multiple feeding strategies, depending on the availability of different sources of food and opportunities of the moment. Foliage gleaning, the strategy of gleaning over the leaves and branches of trees and shrubs, can involve a variety of styles, some birds, such as the common chiffchaff of Eurasia and the Wilsons warbler of North America, feed actively and appear energetic. Some will even hover in the air near a twig while gleaning from it, other birds are more methodical in their approach to gleaning, even seeming lethargic as they perch upon and deliberately pick over foliage. This behavior is characteristic of the warbler and many vireos. Another tactic is to hang upside-down from the tips of branches to glean the undersides of leaves, tits such as the familiar black-capped chickadee are often observed feeding in this manner. Some birds, like the ruby-crowned kinglet and red-eyed vireo of North America use a combination of these tactics, gleaning birds are typically small with compact bodies and have small, sharply pointed bills. These features are seen in gleaning birds that are not closely related. Birds such as the aforementioned piculet are specialized for gleaning the bark of trees, as are nuthatches, woodcreepers and this requires strong legs and feet on the part of the nuthatch and piculet, while birds that face upwards tend to have stiff tail feathers to prop them up. Birds often specialize in a niche, such as a particular stratum of forest or type of vegetation. The Javan white-eye is a bird of coastal scrub and mangroves, further specialization within a habitat is associated with behaviors and morphological adaptations. The related common firecrest is very similar in size and shape, but slightly bulkier, having a very small bill seems to be good for taking tiny prey from the surfaces of leaves, and small-billed birds such as the blue tit forage in broad-leafed woodlands. The long-billed gnatwren and speckled spinetail of Central and South America, the ash-browed spinetail of South America specializes in gleaning among epiphytes on moss-covered tree branches. Many hummingbirds take small insects from flowers while probing for nectar, the Puerto Rican emerald is one such hummingbird. Found only on the island of Puerto Rico, the female subsists on insects and spiders, hummingbirds and other gleaners are also sometimes attracted to the sap wells created by sapsuckers. Sapsuckers, which are in the family, drill small holes in living tree branches to get the sap flowing. The sap and the insects it attracts are then consumed, and rufous hummingbirds have been observed to follow the movements of sapsuckers, in Central and South America, foliage-gleaners such as the red-faced spinetail and buff-throated foliage-gleaner are also examples of birds that glean clusters of dead leaves. Crevice-gleaning is a niche particular to dry and rocky habitats, adaptations for crevice-gleaning are similar to that of bark-gleaning
21.
Hawking (birds)
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Hawking is a feeding strategy in birds involving catching flying insects in the air. The term usually refers to a technique of sallying out from a perch to snatch an insect and this technique is called “flycatching” and some birds known for it are several families of “flycatchers”, Old World flycatchers, monarch flycatchers, and tyrant flycatchers. Other birds, such as swifts, swallows, and nightjars, many birds have a combined strategy of both hawking insects and gleaning them from foliage. The various methods of taking insects have been categorized as, gleaning, snatching, hawking, pouncing and pursuing, in hawking behavior, a bird will watch for prey from a suitable perch. When it spies potential prey, the bird will fly swiftly from its perch to catch the insect in its bill and this maneuver is also called a sally. Sometimes the prey will attempt to escape and this can result in a pursuit before returning to the perch. Depending on the species of bird, there are variations on this behavior. Many birds make use of a variety of tactics, a similar pattern is seen in Great Britain, where there are but two flycatchers, the spotted flycatcher and the pied flycatcher. The spotted flycatcher is the specialist, and tends to return to the same perch after each sally, the pied flycatcher is more of a generalist, gleaning as well as flycatching, and changes perches often. Birds with the name flycatcher are not the ones to engage in flycatching behavior. For example, Lewiss woodpecker feeds by flycatching, some honeyeaters of Australasia employ hawking and gleaning as feeding tactics. Bee-eaters catch bees in a manner and return to the perch to remove the sting before consuming. Furthermore, many small owls take insect prey on the wing, examples include the western screech owl of North America, continuous aerial feeding is a different way of hawking insects. It requires long wings and skillful flying, as in nightjars, swallows, swifts are the masters of aerial feeding, they can fly for hours without perching. Swallows, though similar to swifts in shape, are unrelated to swifts, swallows feed in a similar manner to swifts, but less continuously, as they dont glide as much and they stop to perch for a while between bouts of aerial feeding. When swallows fly higher to go after smaller insects, they adjust their style to glide more. Birds of the nightjar family employ a variety of moves for catching insects, the common nighthawk of North America flies in swift-like fashion on its long, slender, pointed wings. The common poorwill, on the hand, flies low and perches low to the ground
22.
Altricial
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In biology, altricial species are those in which the young are incapable of moving around on their own soon after hatching or being born. The word is derived from the Latin root alere, meaning to nurse, to rear, or to nourish and indicates the need for young to be fed, species whose young are immediately or quickly mobile are called precocial. Altricial young are born helpless and require care for a amount of time. Among birds, these include herons, hawks, woodpeckers, owls, cuckoos, among mammals, marsupials and most rodents are altricial. Cats, dogs, and humans are some of the best-known altricial organisms, for example, with ground-nesting birds such as ducks or turkeys, the young are ready to leave the nest in one or two days. Among mammals, most ungulates are precocial, being able to walk almost immediately after birth, beyond the precocial are the superprecocial animals, such as the megapode birds, which hatch with full flight feathers. Different animals employ different precocial and altricial strategies, there is no distinction between the two states, and a wide range of intermediate states. The ability of the parents to obtain nutrition and contribute to the pre-natal and post-natal development of their young appears to be associated. Precocial birds are able to provide protein-rich eggs and thus their young hatch in the fledgling stage – able to protect themselves from predators and the females have less involvement post-natal. Altricial birds are able to contribute nutrients in the pre-natal stage, their eggs are smaller. This may be related to r/K selection, however, this association fails with a number of cases, in the case of mammals it has been suggested that large adult body sizes favor production of large, precocious young, which develop with a long gestation period. Large young may be associated with long lifespan, extended reproductive period and it has been suggested that altricial strategies in mammals may be favoured if there is a selective advantage to mothers that are capable of resorbing embryos in early stages of development. Some niches require young to be precocial for survival, such as cetaceans, restricted to water, in birds, the terms Aves altrices and Aves precoces was introduced by Carl Jakob Sundevall and the terms nidifugous and nidicolous by Lorenz Oken in 1816. The two strategies result in different brain sizes of the newborns compared to adults, precocial animals brains are large at birth relative to their body size, hence their ability to fend for themselves. However, as adults, their brains are not much bigger or more able, altricial animals brains are relatively small at birth, thus their need for care and protection, but their brains continue to grow. As adults, altricial animals end up with larger brains than their precocial counterparts. Thus the altricial species have a skill set at maturity. Precocial Parental investment The altricial-precocial spectrum in birds
23.
England
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England is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. It shares land borders with Scotland to the north and Wales to the west, the Irish Sea lies northwest of England and the Celtic Sea lies to the southwest. England is separated from continental Europe by the North Sea to the east, the country covers five-eighths of the island of Great Britain in its centre and south, and includes over 100 smaller islands such as the Isles of Scilly, and the Isle of Wight. England became a state in the 10th century, and since the Age of Discovery. The Industrial Revolution began in 18th-century England, transforming its society into the worlds first industrialised nation, Englands terrain mostly comprises low hills and plains, especially in central and southern England. However, there are uplands in the north and in the southwest, the capital is London, which is the largest metropolitan area in both the United Kingdom and the European Union. In 1801, Great Britain was united with the Kingdom of Ireland through another Act of Union to become the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland. In 1922 the Irish Free State seceded from the United Kingdom, leading to the latter being renamed the United Kingdom of Great Britain, the name England is derived from the Old English name Englaland, which means land of the Angles. The Angles were one of the Germanic tribes that settled in Great Britain during the Early Middle Ages, the Angles came from the Angeln peninsula in the Bay of Kiel area of the Baltic Sea. The earliest recorded use of the term, as Engla londe, is in the ninth century translation into Old English of Bedes Ecclesiastical History of the English People. According to the Oxford English Dictionary, its spelling was first used in 1538. The earliest attested reference to the Angles occurs in the 1st-century work by Tacitus, Germania, the etymology of the tribal name itself is disputed by scholars, it has been suggested that it derives from the shape of the Angeln peninsula, an angular shape. An alternative name for England is Albion, the name Albion originally referred to the entire island of Great Britain. The nominally earliest record of the name appears in the Aristotelian Corpus, specifically the 4th century BC De Mundo, in it are two very large islands called Britannia, these are Albion and Ierne. But modern scholarly consensus ascribes De Mundo not to Aristotle but to Pseudo-Aristotle, the word Albion or insula Albionum has two possible origins. Albion is now applied to England in a poetic capacity. Another romantic name for England is Loegria, related to the Welsh word for England, Lloegr, the earliest known evidence of human presence in the area now known as England was that of Homo antecessor, dating to approximately 780,000 years ago. The oldest proto-human bones discovered in England date from 500,000 years ago, Modern humans are known to have inhabited the area during the Upper Paleolithic period, though permanent settlements were only established within the last 6,000 years
24.
Mark Catesby
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Mark Catesby was an English naturalist. Between 1729 and 1747 Catesby published his Natural History of Carolina, Florida and the Bahama Islands and it included 220 plates of birds, reptiles and amphibians, fish, insects, and mammals, as well as plants. Catesby was born on 24 March 1682/83 and baptized at Castle Hedingham and his father, John Catesby, was a lawyer and gentleman farmer. The family owned a farm and house, Holgate, in Sudbury, an acquaintance with the naturalist John Ray led to Catesby becoming interested in natural history. He studied natural history in London before going to stay with his sister, Elizabeth Catesby Cocke, in Williamsburg, the death of his father, nine years earlier, had left Catesby enough to live on. Elizabeth was the wife of Dr. William Cocke, who had been a member of the Council, according to family lore, Elizabeth married Dr. Cocke, against the wishes of her parents, before emigrating to Virginia. After his stay in Williamsburg, Catesby visited the West Indies in 1714, Catesby had collected seeds and botanical specimens in Virginia, which he had sent to a Hoxton nurseryman Thomas Fairchild. This made his name known to scientists in England. Catesby settled in Charlestown, and traveled to parts of eastern North America. Many of these specimens were sent to Hans Sloane in London at the Chelsea Physic Garden, Catesby returned to England in 1726. Catesby spent the next seventeen years preparing his Natural History, publication was financed by an interest-free loan from one of the fellows of the Royal Society, the Quaker Peter Collinson. Catesby was the first to use folio-sized coloured plates in natural history books and he learnt how to etch the plates himself. The first eight plates had no backgrounds, but from then on Catesby included plants with his animals and he completed the first volume in 1731, and in February 1733 he was elected a fellow of the Royal Society. The second volume was completed in 1743, and in 1746–1747 he produced a supplement from material sent to him by friends in America, particularly John Bartram. On 5 March 1747, Catesby read a paper entitled Of birds of passage to the Royal Society in London, Mark Catesby married Elizabeth Rowland on 2 October 1747. He died just before Christmas 1749 on Saturday 23 December in his house behind St Lukes Church, Old Street, Catesbys Hortus britanno-americanus. was published posthumously in 1763, and a second edition, entitled Hortus Europae americanus. was issued in 1767. Carolus Linnaeus included much of the information from Catesbys Natural History in Linnaeuss 10th edition of Systema Naturae, list of wildlife artists Jackson, Christine E. Bird Etchings, the illustrators and their books, 1655-1855. Ithaca, Cornell University Press ISBN 0-8014-9684-5 Walters, Michael A Concise History of Ornithology, London, Christopher Helm ISBN 1-873403-97-6 Wiatt, Alex L
25.
Systema Naturae
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Systema Naturae is one of the major works of the Swedish botanist, zoologist and physician Carl Linnaeus and introduced the Linnaean taxonomy. The first edition was published in 1735, the tenth edition of this book is considered the starting point of zoological nomenclature. In 1766–1768 Linnaeus published the much enhanced 12th edition, the last under his authorship, another again enhanced work in the same style and entitled Systema Naturae was published by Johann Friedrich Gmelin between 1788 and 1793. Since at least the early 1900s zoologists commonly recognized this as the last edition belonging to this series and it was also officially regarded by the International Commission on Zoological Nomenclature in Opinion 296 as the 13th edition of Systema Naturae. Linnaeus published the first edition of Systema Naturae in the year 1735, as was customary for the scientific literature of its day, the book was published in Latin. In it, he outlined his ideas for the classification of the natural world, dividing it into the animal kingdom, the plant kingdom. Linnaeuss Systema Naturae lists only about 10,000 species of organisms, Linnaeus developed his classification of the plant kingdom in an attempt to describe and understand the natural world as a reflection of the logic of Gods creation. His sexual system, where species with the number of stamens were treated in the same group, was convenient. Linnaeus believed in Gods creation, and that there were no deeper relationships to be expressed and he is frequently quoted to have said. The classification of animals was more natural, for instance, humans were for the first time placed together with other primates, as Anthropomorpha. As a result of the popularity of the work, and the number of new specimens sent to him from around the world, Linnaeus kept publishing new and it grew from eleven very large pages in the first edition to 2,400 pages in the 12th edition. In this same edition, he introduced two-part names for animal species, the system eventually developed into modern Linnaean taxonomy, a hierarchically organized biological classification. After Linnaeus health declined in the early 1770s, publication of editions of Systema Naturae went in two directions, another Swedish scientist, Johan Andreas Murray issued the Regnum Vegetabile section separately in 1774 as the Systema Vegetabilium, rather confusingly labelled the 13th edition. Meanwhile, a 13th edition of the entire Systema appeared in parts between 1788-1793 and it was as the Systema Vegetabilium that Linnaeus work became widely known in England following translation from the Latin by the Lichfield Botanical Society, as A System of Vegetables. In his Imperium Naturæ, Linnaeus established three kingdoms, namely Regnum Animale, Regnum Vegetabile and Regnum Lapideum. This approach, the Animal, Vegetable and Mineral Kingdoms, survives today in the popular mind, notably in the form of parlour games, Is it animal. The classification was based on five levels, kingdom, class, order, genus, while species and genus was seen as God-given, the three higher levels were seen by Linnaeus as constructs. The concept behind the set ranks being applied to all groups was to make a system that was easy to remember and navigate, Linnaeuss work had a huge impact on science, it was indispensable as a foundation for biological nomenclature, now regulated by the Nomenclature Codes
26.
France
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France, officially the French Republic, is a country with territory in western Europe and several overseas regions and territories. The European, or metropolitan, area of France extends from the Mediterranean Sea to the English Channel and the North Sea, Overseas France include French Guiana on the South American continent and several island territories in the Atlantic, Pacific and Indian oceans. France spans 643,801 square kilometres and had a population of almost 67 million people as of January 2017. It is a unitary republic with the capital in Paris. Other major urban centres include Marseille, Lyon, Lille, Nice, Toulouse, during the Iron Age, what is now metropolitan France was inhabited by the Gauls, a Celtic people. The area was annexed in 51 BC by Rome, which held Gaul until 486, France emerged as a major European power in the Late Middle Ages, with its victory in the Hundred Years War strengthening state-building and political centralisation. During the Renaissance, French culture flourished and a colonial empire was established. The 16th century was dominated by civil wars between Catholics and Protestants. France became Europes dominant cultural, political, and military power under Louis XIV, in the 19th century Napoleon took power and established the First French Empire, whose subsequent Napoleonic Wars shaped the course of continental Europe. Following the collapse of the Empire, France endured a succession of governments culminating with the establishment of the French Third Republic in 1870. Following liberation in 1944, a Fourth Republic was established and later dissolved in the course of the Algerian War, the Fifth Republic, led by Charles de Gaulle, was formed in 1958 and remains to this day. Algeria and nearly all the colonies became independent in the 1960s with minimal controversy and typically retained close economic. France has long been a centre of art, science. It hosts Europes fourth-largest number of cultural UNESCO World Heritage Sites and receives around 83 million foreign tourists annually, France is a developed country with the worlds sixth-largest economy by nominal GDP and ninth-largest by purchasing power parity. In terms of household wealth, it ranks fourth in the world. France performs well in international rankings of education, health care, life expectancy, France remains a great power in the world, being one of the five permanent members of the United Nations Security Council with the power to veto and an official nuclear-weapon state. It is a member state of the European Union and the Eurozone. It is also a member of the Group of 7, North Atlantic Treaty Organization, Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development, the World Trade Organization, originally applied to the whole Frankish Empire, the name France comes from the Latin Francia, or country of the Franks
27.
Charles Lucien Bonaparte
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Charles Lucien Jules Laurent Bonaparte, 2nd Prince of Canino and Musignano, was a French biologist and ornithologist. Lucien and his wife had children, including Cardinal Lucien Bonaparte. Bonaparte was the son of Lucien Bonaparte and Alexandrine de Bleschamp, born in Paris, he was raised in Italy. On 29 June 1822, he married his cousin, Zénaïde, soon after the marriage, the couple left for Philadelphia in the United States to live with Zénaïdes father, Joseph Bonaparte. Before leaving Italy, Carlo had already discovered a new to science, the moustached warbler. On arrival in the United States, he presented a paper on this new bird, Bonaparte then set about studying the ornithology of the United States and updating Wilsons American Ornithology. The revised edition was published between 1825 and 1833, in 1824, Bonaparte tried to get the then unknown John James Audubon accepted by the Academy of Natural Sciences, but this was opposed by the ornithologist George Ord. At the end of 1826, Bonaparte and his family returned to Europe and he visited Germany, where he met Philipp Jakob Cretzschmar, and England, where he met John Edward Gray at the British Museum, and renewed his acquaintance with Audubon. In 1828, the family settled in Rome, in Italy, he was the originator of several scientific congresses, and lectured and wrote extensively on American and European ornithology and other branches of natural history. Between 1832 and 1841, Bonaparte published his work on the animals of Italy and he had also published Specchio Comparativo delle Ornithologie di Roma e di Filadelfia, presenting a comparison between birds of the latitude of Philadelphia and Italian species. He created the genus Zenaida, after his wife, for the mourning dove and he was elected a member of the American Antiquarian Society in 1845. In 1849, he was elected to the Roman Assembly and participated in the creation of the Roman Republic and he participated in the defense of Rome against the 40,000 French troops sent by his cousin Louis Napoleon. He left Rome after the Republican army was defeated in July 1849 and he landed at Marseilles, but was ordered to leave the country by Louis Napoleon. He reaffirmed his political beliefs the following year in naming Wilsons bird-of-paradise in honor of the republican idea and he travelled to England, attending the meeting of the British Association in Birmingham. He then visited Sir William Jardine in southern Scotland, Charles then began work on preparing a methodical classification of all the birds in the world, visiting museums across Europe to study the collections. In 1850, he was allowed to return to France and made Paris his home for the rest of his life, in 1854, he became director of the Jardin des Plantes. In 1855, he was made a member of the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences. He published the first volume of his Conspectus Generum Avium before his death, Bonaparte also studied amphibians and reptiles, and is the author of Vipera ursinii, commonly known as Orsinis viper
28.
Hugh Edwin Strickland
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Hugh Edwin Strickland was an English geologist, ornithologist, naturalist, and systematist. Strickland was born at Reighton, in the East Riding of Yorkshire. of Boynton, in 1827 he was sent as a pupil to Thomas Arnold, a family friend. As a boy he acquired a taste for natural history which dominated his life and he received his early education from private tutors and in 1829 entered Oriel College, Oxford. He attended the lectures of John Kidd and the geological lectures of William Buckland. He graduated B. A. in 1831, and proceeded to M. A. in the following year and he married Catherine Dorcas Maule Jardine, the daughter of Sir William Jardine, in 1845. She drew many of the illustrations for Illustrations to Ornithology, using her initials, returning to his home at Cracombe House, near Tewkesbury, he began to study the geology of the Vale of Evesham, communicating papers to the Geological Society of London. He also gave attention to ornithology. Becoming acquainted with Roderick Murchison he was introduced to William John Hamilton and accompanied him in 1835 on a journey through Asia Minor, the Thracian Bosporus and the island of Zante. Hamilton afterwards published the results of this journey and of his subsequent excursion to Armenia in Researches in Asia Minor, Pontus, after his return in 1836 Strickland brought before the Geological Society several papers on the geology of the districts he had visited in southern Europe and Asia. With Murchison he read before the Geological Society an important paper On the Upper Formations of the New Red Sandstone System in Gloucestershire, Worcestershire and Warwickshire, in other papers he described the Bristol Bone-bed near Tewkesbury and the Ludlow Bone-bed of Woolhope. He was author likewise of ornithological memoirs communicated to the Zoological Society, the Annals and Magazine of Natural History and he also drew up the report, in 1842, of a committee appointed by the British Association to consider the rules of zoological nomenclature. This report is the earliest formal codification of the principle of priority, for this society Strickland corrected, enlarged and edited the manuscript of Agassiz for the Bibliographia Zoologiae et Geologiae. In 1845 he edited with J. Buckman a second and enlarged edition of Murchisons Outline of the Geology of the neighbourhood of Cheltenham. In 1846 he settled at Oxford, and two later he issued in conjunction with Alexander Gordon Melville a work on The Dodo. In 1850 he was appointed deputy reader in geology at Oxford during the illness of Buckland, in the following year, after attending the meeting of the British Association at Hull, he went to examine the cuttings on the Manchester Sheffield & Lincolnshire Railway near Retford. There he was knocked down and killed by a train, on a track he stepped out of the way of a goods train and was hit by an express coming in the opposite direction. He was buried at Deerhurst church near Tewkesbury, where a window was erected. His Ornithological Synonyms was published in 1855 and his collection of 6,000 birds went to Cambridge in 1867
29.
Greek language
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Greek is an independent branch of the Indo-European family of languages, native to Greece and other parts of the Eastern Mediterranean. It has the longest documented history of any living language, spanning 34 centuries of written records and its writing system has been the Greek alphabet for the major part of its history, other systems, such as Linear B and the Cypriot syllabary, were used previously. The alphabet arose from the Phoenician script and was in turn the basis of the Latin, Cyrillic, Armenian, Coptic, Gothic and many other writing systems. Together with the Latin texts and traditions of the Roman world, during antiquity, Greek was a widely spoken lingua franca in the Mediterranean world and many places beyond. It would eventually become the official parlance of the Byzantine Empire, the language is spoken by at least 13.2 million people today in Greece, Cyprus, Italy, Albania, Turkey, and the Greek diaspora. Greek roots are used to coin new words for other languages, Greek. Greek has been spoken in the Balkan peninsula since around the 3rd millennium BC, the earliest written evidence is a Linear B clay tablet found in Messenia that dates to between 1450 and 1350 BC, making Greek the worlds oldest recorded living language. Among the Indo-European languages, its date of earliest written attestation is matched only by the now extinct Anatolian languages, the Greek language is conventionally divided into the following periods, Proto-Greek, the unrecorded but assumed last ancestor of all known varieties of Greek. The unity of Proto-Greek would have ended as Hellenic migrants entered the Greek peninsula sometime in the Neolithic era or the Bronze Age, Mycenaean Greek, the language of the Mycenaean civilisation. It is recorded in the Linear B script on tablets dating from the 15th century BC onwards, Ancient Greek, in its various dialects, the language of the Archaic and Classical periods of the ancient Greek civilisation. It was widely known throughout the Roman Empire, after the Roman conquest of Greece, an unofficial bilingualism of Greek and Latin was established in the city of Rome and Koine Greek became a first or second language in the Roman Empire. The origin of Christianity can also be traced through Koine Greek, Medieval Greek, also known as Byzantine Greek, the continuation of Koine Greek in Byzantine Greece, up to the demise of the Byzantine Empire in the 15th century. Much of the written Greek that was used as the language of the Byzantine Empire was an eclectic middle-ground variety based on the tradition of written Koine. Modern Greek, Stemming from Medieval Greek, Modern Greek usages can be traced in the Byzantine period and it is the language used by the modern Greeks, and, apart from Standard Modern Greek, there are several dialects of it. In the modern era, the Greek language entered a state of diglossia, the historical unity and continuing identity between the various stages of the Greek language is often emphasised. Greek speakers today still tend to regard literary works of ancient Greek as part of their own rather than a foreign language and it is also often stated that the historical changes have been relatively slight compared with some other languages. According to one estimation, Homeric Greek is probably closer to demotic than 12-century Middle English is to modern spoken English, Greek is spoken by about 13 million people, mainly in Greece, Albania and Cyprus, but also worldwide by the large Greek diaspora. Greek is the language of Greece, where it is spoken by almost the entire population
30.
John James Audubon
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John James Audubon was an American ornithologist, naturalist, and painter. He was notable for his extensive studies documenting all types of American birds and his major work, a color-plate book entitled The Birds of America, is considered one of the finest ornithological works ever completed. Audubon was born in Les Cayes in the French colony of Saint-Domingue on his fathers sugarcane plantation and he was the son of Lieutenant Jean Audubon, a French naval officer from the south of Brittany, and his mistress Jeanne Rabine, a 27-year-old chambermaid from Les Touches, Brittany. They named the boy Jean Rabin and his mother died when the boy was a few months old, as she had suffered from tropical disease since arriving on the island. His father already had an number of mixed-race children, some by his mulatto housekeeper. Following Jeanne Rabins death, Jean Audubon renewed his relationship with Sanitte Bouffard and had a daughter by her, Bouffard also took care of the infant boy Jean. The senior Audubon had commanded ships, during the American Revolution, he had been imprisoned by Britain. After his release, he helped the American cause and he had long worked to save money and secure his familys future with real estate. In 1791 he arranged for his natural children Jean and Muguet, the children were raised in Couëron, near Nantes, France, by Audubon and his French wife Anne Moynet Audubon, whom he had married years before his time in Saint-Domingue. In 1794 they formally adopted both his children to regularize their legal status in France. They renamed the boy Jean-Jacques Fougère Audubon and the girl Rose, when Audubon, at age 18, boarded ship in 1803 to immigrate to the United States, he changed his name to an anglicized form, John James Audubon. From his earliest days, Audubon had an affinity for birds, I felt an intimacy with them. bordering on frenzy must accompany my steps through life. His father encouraged his interest in nature, He would point out the elegant movement of the birds, and he called my attention to their show of pleasure or sense of danger, their perfect forms and splendid attire. He would speak of their departure and return with the seasons, in France during the chaotic years of the French Revolution and its aftermath, the younger Audubon grew up to be a handsome and gregarious man. He played flute and violin, and learned to ride, fence, a great walker, he loved roaming in the woods, often returning with natural curiosities, including birds eggs and nests, of which he made crude drawings. His father planned to make a seaman of his son, at twelve, Audubon went to military school and became a cabin boy. He quickly found out that he was susceptible to seasickness and not fond of mathematics or navigation, after failing the officers qualification test, Audubon ended his incipient naval career. He was cheerfully back on solid ground and exploring the fields again, in 1803, his father obtained a false passport so that Audubon could go to the United States to avoid conscription in the Napoleonic Wars
31.
Connecticut
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Connecticut is the southernmost state in the New England region of the northeastern United States. Connecticut is also often grouped along with New York and New Jersey as the Tri-State Area and it is bordered by Rhode Island to the east, Massachusetts to the north, New York to the west, and Long Island Sound to the south. Its capital city is Hartford, and its most populous city is Bridgeport, the state is named for the Connecticut River, a major U. S. river that approximately bisects the state. The word Connecticut is derived from various anglicized spellings of an Algonquian word for long tidal river, Connecticut is the third smallest state by area, the 29th most populous, and the fourth most densely populated of the 50 United States. It is known as the Constitution State, the Nutmeg State, the Provisions State, and it was influential in the development of the federal government of the United States. Connecticuts center of population is in Cheshire, New Haven County, Connecticuts first European settlers were Dutch. They established a small, short-lived settlement in present-day Hartford at the confluence of the Park, initially, half of Connecticut was a part of the Dutch colony New Netherland, which included much of the land between the Connecticut and Delaware rivers. The first major settlements were established in the 1630s by England, the Connecticut and New Haven Colonies established documents of Fundamental Orders, considered the first constitutions in North America. In 1662, the three colonies were merged under a charter, making Connecticut a crown colony. This colony was one of the Thirteen Colonies that revolted against British rule in the American Revolution, the Connecticut River, Thames River, and ports along the Long Island Sound have given Connecticut a strong maritime tradition which continues today. The state also has a history of hosting the financial services industry, including insurance companies in Hartford. As of the 2010 Census, Connecticut features the highest per-capita income, Human Development Index, and median household income in the United States. Landmarks and Cities of Connecticut Connecticut is bordered on the south by Long Island Sound, on the west by New York, on the north by Massachusetts, and on the east by Rhode Island. The state capital and third largest city is Hartford, and other cities and towns include Bridgeport, New Haven, Stamford, Waterbury, Norwalk, Danbury, New Britain, Greenwich. Connecticut is slightly larger than the country of Montenegro, there are 169 incorporated towns in Connecticut. The highest peak in Connecticut is Bear Mountain in Salisbury in the northwest corner of the state, the highest point is just east of where Connecticut, Massachusetts, and New York meet, on the southern slope of Mount Frissell, whose peak lies nearby in Massachusetts. At the opposite extreme, many of the towns have areas that are less than 20 feet above sea level. Connecticut has a maritime history and a reputation based on that history—yet the state has no direct oceanfront
32.
Florida
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Florida /ˈflɒrᵻdə/ is a state located in the southeastern region of the United States. It is bordered to the west by the Gulf of Mexico, to the north by Alabama and Georgia, to the east by the Atlantic Ocean, Florida is the 22nd-most extensive, the 3rd-most populous, and the 8th-most densely populated of the U. S. states. Jacksonville is the most populous municipality in the state and is the largest city by area in the contiguous United States, the Miami metropolitan area is Floridas most populous urban area. The city of Tallahassee is the state capital, much of the state is at or near sea level and is characterized by sedimentary soil. The climate varies from subtropical in the north to tropical in the south, the American alligator, American crocodile, Florida panther, and manatee can be found in the Everglades National Park. It was a location of the Seminole Wars against the Native Americans. Today, Florida is distinctive for its large Cuban expatriate community and high population growth, the states economy relies mainly on tourism, agriculture, and transportation, which developed in the late 19th century. Florida is also renowned for amusement parks, orange crops, the Kennedy Space Center, Florida has attracted many writers such as Marjorie Kinnan Rawlings, Ernest Hemingway and Tennessee Williams, and continues to attract celebrities and athletes. It is internationally known for golf, tennis, auto racing, by the 16th century, the earliest time for which there is a historical record, major Native American groups included the Apalachee, the Timucua, the Ais, the Tocobaga, the Calusa and the Tequesta. Florida was the first part of the continental United States to be visited and settled by Europeans, the earliest known European explorers came with the Spanish conquistador Juan Ponce de León. Ponce de León spotted and landed on the peninsula on April 2,1513 and he named the region La Florida. The story that he was searching for the Fountain of Youth is a myth, in May 1539, Conquistador Hernando de Soto skirted the coast of Florida, searching for a deep harbor to land. He described seeing a wall of red mangroves spread mile after mile, some reaching as high as 70 feet. Very soon, many smokes appeared along the whole coast, billowing against the sky, the Spanish introduced Christianity, cattle, horses, sheep, the Spanish language, and more to Florida. Both the Spanish and French established settlements in Florida, with varying degrees of success, in 1559, Don Tristán de Luna y Arellano established a settlement at present-day Pensacola, making it the first attempted settlement in Florida, but it was abandoned by 1561. Spain maintained tenuous control over the region by converting the tribes to Christianity. The area of Spanish Florida diminished with the establishment of English settlements to the north, the English attacked St. Augustine, burning the city and its cathedral to the ground several times. Florida attracted numerous Africans and African-Americans from adjacent British colonies who sought freedom from slavery, in 1738, Governor Manuel de Montiano established Fort Gracia Real de Santa Teresa de Mose near St
33.
Crest (feathers)
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The crest is a prominent feature exhibited by several bird and other dinosaur species on their heads. The crest is made up of feathers, a long rachis with barbs on either side. These are plumulaceous feathers, meaning that they are soft and bendable, in birds, these semiplumes are common along the head, neck, and upper back, and may be used for buoyancy and sensing vibrations. Crests on birds are used for display purposes. Cockatoos and cockatiels possess crests which may be raised or lowered at will, crests can be recumbent or recursive, depending on the species. The recumbent crest has feathers that are straight and lie down flat on the head until the bird fans them out to where they stand up. The white cockatoo, for example, possesses a recumbent crest, many recursive crests also feature brilliant colors. The sulphur-crested cockatoo has a recursive crest, and the Major Mitchells cockatoo possesses a prominent recursive crest, some birds, like the galah, or rose-breasted cockatoo, have modified crests, which has features of both recumbent and recursive types. Many domesticated bird species have crest feathers and these structures are known to have two origins, selective breeding or mutations. Crest feathers in birds include a wide range of variations in form across species. The underlying molecular and genetic mechanisms that are responsible for crest feather formation in domesticated species are not well-understood. As such, crest feathers are widely studied in research and other related biological disciplines
34.
Flight feather
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The primary function of the flight feathers is to aid in the generation of both thrust and lift, thereby enabling flight. The flight feathers of birds have evolved to perform additional functions, generally associated with territorial displays. In some species, these feathers have developed into long showy plumes used in courtship displays. Tiny serrations on the edge of their remiges help owls to fly silently. Even flightless birds still retain flight feathers, though sometimes in modified forms. The moult of their feathers can cause serious problems for birds. Different species have evolved different strategies for coping with this, ranging from dropping all their feathers at once to extending the moult over a period of several years. Remiges are located on the side of the wing. Ligaments attach the long calami firmly to the bones. Corresponding remiges on individual birds are symmetrical between the two wings, matching to an extent in size and shape, though not necessarily in pattern. They are given different names depending on their position along the wing, primaries are connected to the manus, these are the longest and narrowest of the remiges, and they can be individually rotated. These feathers are important for flapping flight, as they are the principal source of thrust. The mechanical properties of primaries are important in supporting flight, most thrust is generated on the downstroke of flapping flight. However, on the upstroke, the primaries are separated and rotated, the flexibility of the remiges on the wingtips of large soaring birds also allows for the spreading of those feathers, which helps to reduce the creation of wingtip vortices, thereby reducing drag. The barbules on these feathers, friction barbules, are specialized with large lobular barbicels that help grip, species vary somewhat in the number of primaries they possess. The number in non-passerines generally varies between 9 and 11, but grebes, storks and flamingos have 12, and ostriches have 16, while most modern passerines have ten primaries, some have only nine. Those with nine are missing the most distal primary which is very small. The outermost primaries—those connected to the phalanges—are sometimes known as pinions, secondaries are connected to the ulna
35.
Pigment
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A pigment is a material that changes the color of reflected or transmitted light as the result of wavelength-selective absorption. This physical process differs from fluorescence, phosphorescence, and other forms of luminescence, many materials selectively absorb certain wavelengths of light. Materials that humans have chosen and developed for use as pigments usually have properties that make them ideal for coloring other materials. A pigment must have a high tinting strength relative to the materials it colors and it must be stable in solid form at ambient temperatures. For industrial applications, as well as in the arts, permanence, pigments that are not permanent are called fugitive. Fugitive pigments fade over time, or with exposure to light, pigments are used for coloring paint, ink, plastic, fabric, cosmetics, food, and other materials. Most pigments used in manufacturing and the arts are dry colorants. This powder is added to a binder, a neutral or colorless material that suspends the pigment. A distinction is made between a pigment, which is insoluble in its vehicle, and a dye, which either is itself a liquid or is soluble in its vehicle. A colorant can act as either a pigment or a dye depending on the vehicle involved, in some cases, a pigment can be manufactured from a dye by precipitating a soluble dye with a metallic salt. The resulting pigment is called a lake pigment, the term biological pigment is used for all colored substances independent of their solubility. In 2006, around 7.4 million tons of inorganic, organic, asia has the highest rate on a quantity basis followed by Europe and North America. By 2020, revenues will have risen to approx, the global demand on pigments was roughly US$20.5 billion in 2009, around 1. 5-2% up from the previous year. It is predicted to increase in a growth rate in the coming years. The worldwide sales are said to increase up to US$24.5 billion in 2015, pigments appear the colors they are because they selectively reflect and absorb certain wavelengths of visible light. White light is an equal mixture of the entire spectrum of visible light with a wavelength in a range from about 375 or 400 nanometers to about 760 or 780 nm. When this light encounters a pigment, parts of the spectrum are absorbed by the molecules or ions of the pigment, in organic pigments such as diazo or phthalocyanine compounds the light is absorbed by the conjugated systems of double bonds in the molecule. Some of the inorganic pigments such as vermilion or cadmium yellow absorb light by transferring an electron from the ion to the positive ion
36.
Interference (wave propagation)
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In physics, interference is a phenomenon in which two waves superpose to form a resultant wave of greater, lower, or the same amplitude. Interference effects can be observed with all types of waves, for example, light, radio, acoustic, surface water waves or matter waves. If a crest of a wave meets a crest of wave of the same frequency at the same point. If a crest of one wave meets a trough of another wave, constructive interference occurs when the phase difference between the waves is an even multiple of π, whereas destructive interference occurs when the difference is an odd multiple of π. If the difference between the phases is intermediate between two extremes, then the magnitude of the displacement of the summed waves lies between the minimum and maximum values. Consider, for example, what happens when two identical stones are dropped into a pool of water at different locations. Each stone generates a circular wave propagating outwards from the point where the stone was dropped, when the two waves overlap, the net displacement at a particular point is the sum of the displacements of the individual waves. At some points, these will be in phase, and will produce a maximum displacement, in other places, the waves will be in anti-phase, and there will be no net displacement at these points. Thus, parts of the surface will be stationary—these are seen in the figure above, prime examples of light interference are the famous Double-slit experiment, laser speckle, optical thin layers and films and interferometers. Dark areas in the slit are not available to the photons. Thin films also behave in a quantum manner, the above can be demonstrated in one dimension by deriving the formula for the sum of two waves. Suppose a second wave of the frequency and amplitude but with a different phase is also traveling to the right W2 = A cos where ϕ is the phase difference between the waves in radians. Constructive interference, If the phase difference is a multiple of pi. Interference is essentially a redistribution process. The energy which is lost at the interference is regained at the constructive interference. One wave is travelling horizontally, and the other is travelling downwards at an angle θ to the first wave, assuming that the two waves are in phase at the point B, then the relative phase changes along the x-axis. Constructive interference occurs when the waves are in phase, and destructive interference when they are half a cycle out of phase. Thus, a fringe pattern is produced, where the separation of the maxima is d f = λ sin θ
37.
Structural coloration
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Structural coloration is the production of colour by microscopically structured surfaces fine enough to interfere with visible light, sometimes in combination with pigments. For example, peacock feathers are pigmented brown, but their microscopic structure makes them also reflect blue, turquoise, and green light. Structural coloration was first observed by English scientists Robert Hooke and Isaac Newton, Young described iridescence as the result of interference between reflections from two or more surfaces of thin films, combined with refraction as light enters and leaves such films. The geometry then determines that at certain angles, the light reflected from both surfaces interferes constructively, while at other angles, the light interferes destructively, different colours therefore appear at different angles. Some cuts of meat also show structural coloration due to the exposure of the arrangement of the muscular fibres. Many of these photonic mechanisms correspond to elaborate structures visible by electron microscopy, in plants, brilliant colours are produced by structures within cells. In his 1704 book Opticks, Isaac Newton described the mechanism of the other than the brown pigment of peacock tail feathers. Thomas Young extended Newtons particle theory of light by showing that light could behave as a wave. He showed in 1803 that light could diffract from sharp edges or slits, Colours of the latter kind are often spoken of as structural colours, they are caused by the structure of the coloured surfaces. The metallic lustre of the feathers of birds, such as the humming birds, is due to the presence of excessively fine striae upon the surface of the feathers. Structural coloration is caused by interference effects rather than by pigments, Colours are produced when a material is scored with fine parallel lines, formed of one or more parallel thin layers, or otherwise composed of microstructures on the scale of the colours wavelength. Structural coloration is responsible for the blues and greens of the feathers of birds, as well as many butterfly wings. These are often iridescent, as in peacock feathers and nacreous shells such as of pearl oysters and this is because the reflected colour depends on the viewing angle, which in turn governs the apparent spacing of the structures responsible. Structural colours can be combined with pigment colours, peacock feathers are pigmented brown with melanin, iridescence, as explained by Thomas Young in 1803, is created when extremely thin films reflect part of the light falling on them from their top surfaces. The rest of the light goes through the films, and a part of it is reflected from their bottom surfaces. The two sets of reflected waves travel back upwards in the same direction, when the waves are one or more whole wavelength apart – in other words at certain specific angles, they add, giving a strong reflection. At other angles and phase differences, they can subtract, giving weak reflections, the thin film therefore selectively reflects just one wavelength – a pure colour – at any given angle, but other wavelengths – different colours – at different angles. So, as a structure like a butterflys wing or birds feather moves
38.
Texas
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Texas is the second largest state in the United States by both area and population. Other major cities include Austin, the second most populous state capital in the U. S. Texas is nicknamed the Lone Star State to signify its former status as an independent republic, and as a reminder of the states struggle for independence from Mexico. The Lone Star can be found on the Texan state flag, the origin of Texass name is from the word Tejas, which means friends in the Caddo language. Due to its size and geologic features such as the Balcones Fault, although Texas is popularly associated with the U. S. southwestern deserts, less than 10 percent of Texas land area is desert. Most of the centers are located in areas of former prairies, grasslands, forests. Traveling from east to west, one can observe terrain that ranges from coastal swamps and piney woods, to rolling plains and rugged hills, the term six flags over Texas refers to several nations that have ruled over the territory. Spain was the first European country to claim the area of Texas, Mexico controlled the territory until 1836 when Texas won its independence, becoming an independent Republic. In 1845, Texas joined the United States as the 28th state, the states annexation set off a chain of events that caused the Mexican–American War in 1846. A slave state before the American Civil War, Texas declared its secession from the U. S. in early 1861, after the Civil War and the restoration of its representation in the federal government, Texas entered a long period of economic stagnation. One Texan industry that thrived after the Civil War was cattle, due to its long history as a center of the industry, Texas is associated with the image of the cowboy. The states economic fortunes changed in the early 20th century, when oil discoveries initiated a boom in the state. With strong investments in universities, Texas developed a diversified economy, as of 2010 it shares the top of the list of the most Fortune 500 companies with California at 57. With a growing base of industry, the leads in many industries, including agriculture, petrochemicals, energy, computers and electronics, aerospace. Texas has led the nation in export revenue since 2002 and has the second-highest gross state product. The name Texas, based on the Caddo word tejas meaning friends or allies, was applied by the Spanish to the Caddo themselves, during Spanish colonial rule, the area was officially known as the Nuevo Reino de Filipinas, La Provincia de Texas. Texas is the second largest U. S. state, behind Alaska, though 10 percent larger than France and almost twice as large as Germany or Japan, it ranks only 27th worldwide amongst country subdivisions by size. If it were an independent country, Texas would be the 40th largest behind Chile, Texas is in the south central part of the United States of America. Three of its borders are defined by rivers, the Rio Grande forms a natural border with the Mexican states of Chihuahua, Coahuila, Nuevo León, and Tamaulipas to the south
39.
Arid
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A region is arid when it is characterized by a severe lack of available water, to the extent of hindering or preventing the growth and development of plant and animal life. Environments subject to arid climates tend to lack vegetation and are called xeric or desertic, most arid climates surround the equator, these places include most of Africa and parts of South America, Central America and Australia. The distribution of aridity observed at any one point in time is largely the result of the circulation of the atmosphere. The latter does change significantly over time through climate change, for example, temperature increase across the Nile Basin over the next 30–40 years could change the region from semi-arid to arid, resulting in a significant reduction in agricultural land. In addition, changes in use can result in greater demands on soil water. Durrenberger, R. W. Arid Climates, article in The Encyclopedia of Climatology, p. 92-101, Edited by J. E. Oliver and R. W. Fairbridge, Van Nostrand Reinhold Company, New York, ISBN 0-87933-009-0. J Aridity Indexes, article in The Encyclopedia of Climatology, p. 102-107, Edited by J. E. Oliver and R. W. Fairbridge, Van Nostrand Reinhold Company, New York, blue Peace for the Nile Report,2009, Strategic Foresight Group
40.
Habitat
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A habitat is an ecological or environmental area that is inhabited by a particular species of animal, plant, or other type of organism. The term typically refers to the zone in which the organism lives and it is the natural environment in which an organism lives, or the physical environment that surrounds a species population. Every organism has certain habitat needs for the conditions in which it will thrive, habitat types include polar, temperate, subtropical and tropical. The terrestrial vegetation type may be forest, steppe, grassland, the word habitat has been in use since about 1755 and derives from the Latin third-person singular present indicative of habitāre, to inhabit, from habēre, to have or to hold. Habitat can be defined as the environment of an organism. It is similar in meaning to a biotope, an area of environmental conditions associated with a particular community of plants. Generally speaking, animal communities are reliant on specific types of plant communities, some plants and animals are generalists, and their habitat requirements are met in a wide range of locations. The small white butterfly for example is found on all the continents of the world apart from Antarctica and its larvae feed on a wide range of Brassicas and various other plant species, and it thrives in any open location with diverse plant associations. Disturbance is important in the creation of biodiverse habitats, in the absence of disturbance, a climax vegetation cover develops that prevents the establishment of other species. Lightning strikes and toppled trees in tropical forests allow species richness to be maintained as pioneering species move in to fill the gaps created. Similarly coastal habitats can become dominated by kelp until the seabed is disturbed by a storm, another cause of disturbance is when an area may be overwhelmed by an invasive introduced species which is not kept under control by natural enemies in its new habitat. Terrestrial habitat types include forests, grasslands, wetlands and deserts, within these broad biomes are more specific habitats with varying climate types, temperature regimes, soils, altitudes and vegetation types. Many of these habitats grade into each other and each one has its own communities of plants. A habitat may suit a particular species well, but its presence or absence at any particular location depends to some extent on chance, on its dispersal abilities, freshwater habitats include rivers, streams, lakes, ponds, marshes and bogs. Although some organisms are found across most of these habitats, the majority have more specific requirements, similarly, aquatic plants can be floating, semi-submerged, submerged or grow in permanently or temporarily saturated soils besides bodies of water. Marine habitats include brackish water, estuaries, bays, the sea, the intertidal zone. Further variations include rock pools, sand banks, mudflats, brackish lagoons, sandy and pebbly beaches, the benthic zone or seabed provides a home for both static organisms, anchored to the substrate, and for a large range of organisms crawling on or burrowing into the surface. A desert is not the kind of habitat that favours the presence of amphibians, with their requirement for water to keep their skins moist, nevertheless, some frogs live in deserts, creating moist habitats underground and hibernating while conditions are adverse
41.
Steller's jay
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The Stellers jay is a jay native to western North America, closely related to the blue jay found in the rest of the continent, but with a black head and upper body. It is also known as the long-crested jay, mountain jay and it is the only crested jay west of the Rocky Mountains. While it does not have as prominent a crest as the Blue Jay it can be found west of the Rockies especially in south east British Columbia, the Stellers jay shows a great deal of regional variation throughout its range. Blackish-brown-headed birds from the north gradually become bluer-headed farther south, the Stellers jay has a more slender bill and longer legs than the blue jay and has a much more pronounced crest. The head is blackish-brown with light streaks on the forehead. This dark coloring gives way from the shoulders and lower breast to silvery blue, the primaries and tail are a rich blue with darker barring. It occurs in coniferous forest over much of the half of North America from Alaska in the north to northern Nicaragua completely replacing the blue jay in most of those areas. Some hybridization with the blue jay in Colorado has been reported, the Stellers jay lives in coniferous and mixed woodland, but not in completely dense forest, and requires open space. It typically lives in flocks of greater than 10 individuals, in autumn, flocks often visit oak woods when acorns are ripe. The Stellers jay primarily lives in forests but can be found in many forested areas. They can be found in low to moderate elevations as high as the tree line, Stellers jays are common in residential and agricultural areas with nearby forests. Stellers jays are omnivores, their diet is about two-thirds plant matter, food is gathered from both the ground and from trees. The Stellers jays diet consists of a range of seeds, nuts, berries. Many types of invertebrates, small rodents, eggs and nestlings such as those of the marbled murrelet are also eaten, there are some accounts of them eating small reptiles, both snakes and lizards. Acorns and conifer seeds are staples during the season, these are often cached in the ground or in trees for later consumption. They exploit human-provided food sources, frequently scavenging picnics and camp sites, Stellers jays will visit feeders and prefer black-oil sunflower seeds, white striped sunflower seeds, cracked corn, shelled raw peanuts and are especially attracted to whole raw peanuts. Suet is also consumed but mostly in the winter season, the nest is usually in a conifer but is sometimes built in a hollow in a tree. Similar in construction to the blue jays nest, it tends to be a bit larger, using a number of materials or scavenged trash
42.
Pacific Ocean
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The Pacific Ocean is the largest and deepest of the Earths oceanic divisions. It extends from the Arctic Ocean in the north to the Southern Ocean in the south and is bounded by Asia and Australia in the west, the Mariana Trench in the western North Pacific is the deepest point in the world, reaching a depth of 10,911 metres. Both the center of the Water Hemisphere and the Western Hemisphere are in the Pacific Ocean, the oceans current name was coined by Portuguese explorer Ferdinand Magellan during the Spanish circumnavigation of the world in 1521, as he encountered favourable winds on reaching the ocean. He called it Mar Pacífico, which in both Portuguese and Spanish means peaceful sea, important human migrations occurred in the Pacific in prehistoric times. Long-distance trade developed all along the coast from Mozambique to Japan, trade, and therefore knowledge, extended to the Indonesian islands but apparently not Australia. By at least 878 when there was a significant Islamic settlement in Canton much of trade was controlled by Arabs or Muslims. In 219 BC Xu Fu sailed out into the Pacific searching for the elixir of immortality, from 1404 to 1433 Zheng He led expeditions into the Indian Ocean. The east side of the ocean was discovered by Spanish explorer Vasco Núñez de Balboa in 1513 after his expedition crossed the Isthmus of Panama and he named it Mar del Sur because the ocean was to the south of the coast of the isthmus where he first observed the Pacific. Later, Portuguese explorer Ferdinand Magellan sailed the Pacific East to West on a Castilian expedition of world circumnavigation starting in 1519, Magellan called the ocean Pacífico because, after sailing through the stormy seas off Cape Horn, the expedition found calm waters. The ocean was often called the Sea of Magellan in his honor until the eighteenth century, sailing around and east of the Moluccas, between 1525 and 1527, Portuguese expeditions discovered the Caroline Islands, the Aru Islands, and Papua New Guinea. In 1542–43 the Portuguese also reached Japan, in 1564, five Spanish ships consisting of 379 explorers crossed the ocean from Mexico led by Miguel López de Legazpi and sailed to the Philippines and Mariana Islands. The Manila galleons operated for two and a half centuries linking Manila and Acapulco, in one of the longest trade routes in history, Spanish expeditions also discovered Tuvalu, the Marquesas, the Cook Islands, the Solomon Islands, and the Admiralty Islands in the South Pacific. In the 16th and 17th century Spain considered the Pacific Ocean a Mare clausum—a sea closed to other naval powers, as the only known entrance from the Atlantic the Strait of Magellan was at times patrolled by fleets sent to prevent entrance of non-Spanish ships. On the western end of the Pacific Ocean the Dutch threatened the Spanish Philippines, Spain also sent expeditions to the Pacific Northwest reaching Vancouver Island in southern Canada, and Alaska. The French explored and settled Polynesia, and the British made three voyages with James Cook to the South Pacific and Australia, Hawaii, and the North American Pacific Northwest, one of the earliest voyages of scientific exploration was organized by Spain in the Malaspina Expedition of 1789–1794. It sailed vast areas of the Pacific, from Cape Horn to Alaska, Guam and the Philippines, New Zealand, Australia, and the South Pacific. Growing imperialism during the 19th century resulted in the occupation of much of Oceania by other European powers, and later, Japan, in Oceania, France got a leading position as imperial power after making Tahiti and New Caledonia protectorates in 1842 and 1853 respectively. After navy visits to Easter Island in 1875 and 1887, Chilean navy officer Policarpo Toro managed to negotiate an incorporation of the island into Chile with native Rapanui in 1888, by occupying Easter Island, Chile joined the imperial nations
43.
Hybrid (biology)
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In biology, a hybrid, also known as a cross breed, is the result of combining, through sexual reproduction, the qualities of two animals or plants of different breeds, varieties, species or genera. Hybrids are not always intermediate between their parents, but can show heterosis or hybrid vigour, often growing larger or taller than either parent, some act before fertilization, others after it. A few animal species and many plant species, however, are the result of hybrid speciation, doubling the number of chromosomes to create polyploids is important in hybrid speciation, because homoploid hybrids are rarely fertile, the polyploid hybrids are allopolyploids. Human impact on the environment has greatly increased the mixing of species, with introduced species worldwide, the genetic mixing may threaten many species with extinction, while genetic erosion in crop plants may be damaging the gene pools of many species for future breeding. Many commercially useful fruits, flowers, garden herbs and trees have been produced by hybridization, one flower, Oenothera lamarckiana, was central to early genetics research into polyploidy. The term hybrid is derived from Latin hybrida, used for such as of a tame sow and a wild boar, or the child of a freeman. The term came into use in English in the 19th century. Conspicuous hybrids are named with portmanteau words, starting in the 1920s with the breeding of tiger-lion hybrids. The cross between two different homozygous lines produces an F1 hybrid that is heterozygous, having two alleles, one contributed by each parent and typically one is dominant and the other recessive. Typically, the F1 generation is also phenotypically homogeneous, producing offspring that are all similar to each other, double cross hybrids result from the cross between two different F1 hybrids. Three-way cross hybrids result from the cross between an F1 hybrid and an inbred line, triple cross hybrids result from the crossing of two different three-way cross hybrids. Top cross hybrids result from the crossing of a top quality or pure-bred male, population hybrids result from the crossing of plants or animals in a population with those of another population. These include interspecific hybrids or crosses between different breeds. e, from the point of view of genetics, different kinds of hybrid can be distinguished as follows, A genetic hybrid carries two different alleles of the same gene. A structural hybrid results from the fusion of gametes that have differing structure in at least one chromosome, a numerical hybrid results from the fusion of gametes having different haploid numbers of chromosomes. A permanent hybrid results when only the heterozygous genotype occurs, as in Oenothera lamarckiana, from the point of view of taxonomy, hybrids differ according to their parentage, Hybrids between different subspecies are called intra-specific hybrids. Offspring resulting from interspecies mating, are called interspecific hybrids, these result in hybrid speciation. Intergeneric hybrids result from matings between different genera, such as sheep and goats. Interfamilial hybrids such as chickens and guineafowl or pheasants are reliably described but extremely rare
44.
Bird migration
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Bird migration is the regular seasonal movement, often north and south along a flyway, between breeding and wintering grounds. Migration carries high costs in predation and mortality, including from hunting by humans and it occurs mainly in the northern hemisphere, where birds are funnelled on to specific routes by natural barriers such as the Mediterranean Sea or the Caribbean Sea. More recently, Johannes Leche began recording dates of arrivals of spring migrants in Finland in 1749, threats to migratory birds have grown with habitat destruction especially of stopover and wintering sites, as well as structures such as power lines and wind farms. The Arctic tern holds the long-distance migration record for birds, travelling between Arctic breeding grounds and the Antarctic each year, shorter migrations are common, including altitudinal migrations on mountains such as the Andes and Himalayas. The timing of migration seems to be controlled primarily by changes in day length, migrating birds navigate using celestial cues from the sun and stars, the earths magnetic field, and probably also mental maps. Records of bird migration were made as much as 3,000 years ago by the Ancient Greek writers Hesiod, Homer, Herodotus and Aristotle. The Bible also notes migrations, as in the Book of Job, the author of Jeremiah wrote, Even the stork in the heavens knows its seasons, and the turtle dove, the swift and the crane keep the time of their arrival. Aristotle noted that cranes traveled from the steppes of Scythia to marshes at the headwaters of the Nile, pliny the Elder, in his Historia Naturalis, repeats Aristotles observations. Aristotle however suggested that swallows and other birds hibernated and this belief persisted as late as 1878, when Elliott Coues listed the titles of no less than 182 papers dealing with the hibernation of swallows. It was not until the end of the century that migration as an explanation for the winter disappearance of birds from northern climes was accepted. Bewick then describes an experiment which succeeded in keeping alive in Britain for several years. He concludes, These experiments have since been confirmed by. Migration is the seasonal movement, often north and south. Bird movements include those made in response to changes in food availability, habitat, sometimes, journeys are not termed true migration because they are irregular or in only one direction. Migration is marked by its annual seasonality, non-migratory birds are said to be resident or sedentary. Approximately 1800 of the worlds 10,000 bird species are long-distance migrants, many bird populations migrate long distances along a flyway. The most common pattern involves flying north in the spring to breed in the temperate or Arctic summer, of course, in the southern hemisphere the directions are reversed, but there is less land area in the far south to support long-distance migration. The primary motivation for migration appears to be food, for example, also, the longer days of the northern summer provide extended time for breeding birds to feed their young
45.
Pine
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A pine is any conifer in the genus Pinus, /ˈpiːnuːs/, of the family Pinaceae. Pinus is the genus in the subfamily Pinoideae. The Plant List compiled by the Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew and Missouri Botanical Garden accepts 126 species names of pines as current, together with 35 unresolved species, the modern English name pine derives from Latin pinus, which some have traced to the Indo-European base *pīt- ‘resin’. Before the 19th century, pines were often referred to as firs, the genus is divided into three subgenera, which can be distinguished by cone, seed, and leaf characters, Pinus subg. Pinus, the yellow, or hard pine group, generally harder wood. Ducampopinus, the foxtail or pinyon group Pinus subg, strobus, the white, or soft pine group, generally with softer wood and five needles per fascicle Most regions of the Northern Hemisphere host some native species of pines. One species crosses the equator in Sumatra to 2°S, in North America, various species occur in regions at latitudes from as far north as 66°N to as far south as 12°N. Various species have been introduced to temperate and subtropical regions of both hemispheres, where they are grown as timber or cultivated as ornamental plants in parks, a number of such introduced species have become invasive and threaten native ecosystems. Pine trees are evergreen, coniferous trees growing 3–80 m tall. The smallest are Siberian dwarf pine and Potosi pinyon, and the tallest is a 81.79 m tall ponderosa pine located in southern Oregons Rogue River-Siskiyou National Forest, the bark of most pines is thick and scaly, but some species have thin, flaky bark. The branches are produced in regular pseudo whorls, actually a very tight spiral, the spiral growth of branches, needles, and cone scales are arranged in Fibonacci number ratios. The new spring shoots are sometimes called candles, they are covered in brown or whitish bud scales and point upward at first, then turn green. These candles offer foresters a means to evaluate fertility of the soil, pines are long-lived, and typically reach ages of 100–1,000 years, some even more. The longest-lived is the Great Basin bristlecone pine, Pinus longaeva, one individual of this species, dubbed Methuselah, is one of the worlds oldest living organisms at around 4,600 years old. This tree can be found in the White Mountains of California, an older tree, now cut down, was dated at 4,900 years old. It was discovered in a grove beneath Wheeler Peak and it is now known as Prometheus after the Greek immortal, pines have four types of leaf, Seed leaves on seedlings, born in a whorl of 4–24. Juvenile leaves, which follow immediately on seedlings and young plants, 2–6 cm long, single, green or often blue-green and these are produced for six months to five years, rarely longer. Scale leaves, similar to bud scales, small, brown and non-photosynthetic, needles, the adult leaves, are green and bundled in clusters called fascicles
46.
Spruce
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A spruce is a tree of the genus Picea /paɪˈsiːə/, a genus of about 35 species of coniferous evergreen trees in the family Pinaceae, found in the northern temperate and boreal regions of the earth. Spruces are large trees, from about 20–60 m tall when mature, the needles, or leaves, of spruce trees are attached singly to the branches in a spiral fashion, each needle on a small, peg-like structure. The needles are shed when 4–10 years old, leaving the branches rough with the retained pegs, spruces are used as food plants by the larvae of some Lepidoptera species. They are also used by the larvae of gall adelgids, the word spruce entered the English language from the Polish Prusy, Prussia. DNA analyses have shown that traditional classifications based on the morphology of needle, Spruce has been found in the fossil record from the early Cretaceous,136 million years ago. Thirty-five named species of spruce exist in the world, the Plant List has 59 accepted spruce names. Beyond that, determination can become more difficult, intensive sampling in the Smithers/Hazelton/Houston area of British Columbia showed Douglas, according to Coates et al. Daubenmire, after sampling, had already recognized the importance of the 2 latter characters. Without cones, morphological differentiation among spruce species and their hybrids is more difficult, but, if an extended photoperiod is provided for Sitka spruce, seedlings become unacceptably tall by the end of the first growing season. g. Growth rhythm, shoot and root weight, and needle serration, or some combination of, Spruce seedlings are most susceptible immediately following germination, and remain highly susceptible through to the following spring. Seedlings that germinate late in the season are particularly vulnerable because they are tiny and have not had time to harden off fully. Mortality rates generally decrease sharply thereafter, but losses often remain high for some years, establishment is a subjective concept based on the idea that once a seedling has successfully reached a certain size, not much is likely to prevent its further development. Growth remains very slow for several to many years, Spruce is useful as a building wood, commonly referred to by several different names including North American timber, SPF and whitewood. Spruce wood is used for many purposes, ranging from construction work. The Wright brothers first aircraft, the Flyer, was built of spruce, because this species has no insect or decay resistance qualities after logging, it is generally recommended for construction purposes as indoor use only. Spruce wood, when left outside cannot be expected to last more than 12–18 months depending on the type of climate it is exposed to, Spruce is one of the most important woods for paper uses, as it has long wood fibres which bind together to make strong paper. The fibres are thin walled and collapse to thin bands upon drying, spruces are commonly used in mechanical pulping as they are easily bleached. Together with northern pines, northern spruces are commonly used to make NBSK, spruces are cultivated over vast areas as pulpwood
47.
Fir
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Firs are a genus of 48–56 species of evergreen coniferous trees in the family Pinaceae. They are found much of North and Central America, Europe, Asia. Firs are most closely related to the genus Cedrus, douglas firs are not true firs, being of the genus Pseudotsuga. They are large trees, reaching heights of 10–80 m tall, firs can be distinguished from other members of the pine family by the unique attachment of their needle-like leaves and by their different cones. Firs can be distinguished from members of the pine family by the unique attachment of their needle-like leaves to the twig by a base that resembles a small suction cup. The leaves are flattened, sometimes even looking like they are pressed. The leaves have two lines on the bottom, each of which is formed by wax-covered stomatal bands. In most species, the surface of the leaves is uniformly green and shiny, without stomata or with a few on the tip. Other species have the surface of leaves dull, gray-green or bluish-gray to silvery, coated by wax with variable number of stomatal bands. An example species with shiny green leaves is A. alba, the tips of leaves are usually more or less notched, but sometimes rounded or dull or sharp and prickly. The leaves of plants are usually sharper. In contrast to spruces, even large fir cones do not hang, Section Abies is found in central, south, and eastern Europe and Asia Minor. Abies alba—silver fir Abies nebrodensis—Sicilian fir Abies borisii-regis—Bulgarian fir Abies cephalonica—Greek fir Abies nordmanniana—Nordmann fir or Caucasian fir Abies nordmanniana subsp, equi-trojani—Kazdağı fir, Turkish fir Abies nordmanniana subsp. Abies grandis—grand fir or giant fir Abies grandis var. grandis—Coast grand fir Abies grandis var. idahoensis—interior grand fir Abies concolor—white fir Abies concolor subsp, concolor—Rocky Mountain white fir or Colorado white fir Abies concolor subsp. Salouenensis—Salween fir Abies pindrow—Pindrow fir Abies ziyuanensis—Ziyuan fir Section Amabilis is found in the Pacific Coast mountains in North America and Japan, Abies amabilis—Pacific silver fir Abies mariesii—Maries fir Section Pseudopicea is found in the Sino-Himalayan mountains at high altitudes. Abies delavayi—Delavays fir Abies delavayi var. nukiangensis— Abies delavayi var. motuoensis— Abies delavayi subsp, fansipanensis— Abies fabri—Fabers fir Abies fabri subsp. Abies religiosa—sacred fir Abies hickelii—Hickels fir Abies hickelii var. oaxacana—Oaxaca fir Section Nobilis Abies procera—noble fir Abies magnifica—red fir Abies magnifica var, because this genus has no insect or decay resistance qualities after logging, it is generally recommended for construction purposes as indoor use only. This wood left outside cannot be expected to last more than 12 to 18 months and it is commonly referred to by several different names, including North American timber, SPF and whitewood
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