1.
Dorset
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Dorset /ˈdɔːrsᵻt/ is a county in South West England on the English Channel coast. The ceremonial county comprises the county, which is governed by Dorset County Council. Covering an area of 2,653 square kilometres, Dorset borders Devon to the west, Somerset to the north-west, Wiltshire to the north-east, the county town is Dorchester which is in the south. After the reorganisation of government in 1974 the countys border was extended eastward to incorporate the Hampshire towns of Bournemouth. Around half of the lives in the South East Dorset conurbation. The county has a history of human settlement stretching back to the Neolithic era. The Romans conquered Dorsets indigenous Celtic tribe, and during the early Middle Ages, the first recorded Viking raid on the British Isles occurred in Dorset during the eighth century, and the Black Death entered England at Melcombe Regis in 1348. During the Second World War, Dorset was heavily involved in the preparations for the invasion of Normandy, the former was the sailing venue in the 2012 Summer Olympics, and both have clubs or hire venues for sailing, Cornish pilot gig rowing, sea kayaking and powerboating. Dorset has a varied landscape featuring broad elevated chalk downs, steep limestone ridges, over half the county is designated as an Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty. Three-quarters of its coastline is part of the Jurassic Coast Natural World Heritage Site due to its geological and it features notable landforms such as Lulworth Cove, the Isle of Portland, Chesil Beach and Durdle Door. Agriculture was traditionally the major industry of Dorset but is now in decline, there are no motorways in Dorset but a network of A roads cross the county and two railway main lines connect to London. Dorset has ports at Poole, Weymouth and Portland, and an international airport, the county has a variety of museums, theatres and festivals, and is host to one of Europes largest outdoor shows. It is the birthplace of Thomas Hardy, who used the county as the setting of his novels. Dorset derives its name from the county town of Dorchester, the Romans established the settlement in the 1st century and named it Durnovaria which was a Latinised version of a Common Brittonic word possibly meaning place with fist-sized pebbles. It is first mentioned in the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle in AD845 and in the 10th century the countys archaic name, the first human visitors to Dorset were Mesolithic hunters, from around 8000 BC. The first permanent Neolithic settlers appeared around 3000 BC and were responsible for the creation of the Dorset Cursus, from 2800 BC onwards Bronze Age farmers cleared Dorsets woodlands for agricultural use and Dorsets high chalk hills provided a location for numerous round barrows. During the Iron Age, the British tribe known as the Durotriges established a series of forts across the county—most notably Maiden Castle which is one of the largest in Europe. The Romans arrived in Dorset during their conquest of Britain in AD43, Maiden Castle was captured by a Roman legion under the command of Vespasian, and the Roman settlement of Durnovaria was established nearby
2.
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
3.
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
4.
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
5.
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
6.
Anseriformes
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In fact, these living species are all included in Anatidae except for the three screamers and the magpie goose. All species in the order are highly adapted for an aquatic existence at the water surface, the males, except for the screamers, also have a penis, a trait that has disappeared in Neoaves. All are web-footed for efficient swimming, the earliest known Anseriform is the recently discovered Vegavis, which lived during the Cretaceous period. It is thought that the Anseriformes originated when the original Galloanserae split into the two main lineages, the extinct dromornithids may possibly represent early offshoots of the anseriform line, if they arent stem-Galliformes instead, and so maybe Gastornis. The ancestors of the Anseriformes developed the characteristic bill structure that they still share, the prehistoric wading presbyornithids were even more bizarre. The Anseriformes and the Galliformes are the most primitive neognathous birds, Anatidae systematics, especially regarding placement of some odd genera in the dabbling ducks or shelducks, is not fully resolved. See the Anatidae article for information, and for alternate taxonomic approaches. Some unusual groups, such as the extinct Gastornithidae and Dromornithidae, are found to be at the base of the Anseriformes family tree. Anatidae is traditionally divided into subfamilies Anatinae and Anserinae, the Anatinae consists of tribes Anatini, Aythyini, Mergini and Tadornini. The higher-order classification below follows a phylogenetic analysis performed by Angolin,2007, Mikkos Phylogeny Archive, the clade Somaterini has a single genus Somateria. List of Anseriformes by population Agnolin, F. Brontornis burmeisteri Moreno & Mercerat, un Anseriformes gigante del Mioceno Medio de Patagonia, revista del Museo Argentino de Ciencias Naturales. Clarke, J. A. Tambussi, C. P. Noriega, erickson, G. M. & Ketcham, R. A. Definitive fossil evidence for the extant avian radiation in the Cretaceous, & Zusi, R. L. Higher-order phylogeny of modern birds based on comparative anatomy. Zoological Journal of the Linnen Society, murray, P. F. & Vickers-Rich, P. Magnificent Mihirungs, The Colossal Flightless Birds of the Australian Dreamtime
7.
Anatidae
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The Anatidae are the biological family of birds that includes ducks, geese, and swans. The family has a distribution, occurring on all the worlds continents. These birds are adapted for swimming, floating on the water surface, the family contains around 146 species in 40 genera. They are generally herbivorous, and are monogamous breeders, a number of species undertake annual migrations. A few species have been domesticated for agriculture, and many others are hunted for food, five species have become extinct since 1600, and many more are threatened with extinction. The ducks, geese, and swans are small- to large-sized birds with a broad, diving species vary from this in being rounder. Extant species range in size from the cotton pygmy goose, at as little as 26.5 cm and 164 g, to the trumpeter swan, the wings are short and pointed, and supported by strong wing muscles that generate rapid beats in flight. They typically have long necks, although varies in degree between species. The legs are short, strong, and set far to the back of the body, combined with their body shape, this can make some species awkward on land, but they are stronger walkers than other marine and water birds such as grebes or petrels. They typically have webbed feet, though a few such as the Nene have secondarily lost their webbing. The bills are made of keratin with a thin and sensitive layer of skin on top. For most species, the shape of the bill tends to be flattened to a greater or lesser extent. These contain serrated lamellae which are well defined in the filter-feeding species. Their feathers are excellent at shedding water due to special oils, many of the ducks display sexual dimorphism, with the males being more brightly coloured than the females. The swans, geese, and whistling-ducks lack sexually dimorphic plumage, anatids are vocal birds, producing a range of quacks, honks, squeaks, and trumpeting sounds, depending on species, the female often has a deeper voice than the male. Anatids are generally herbivorous as adults, feeding on various water-plants, although some also eat fish, molluscs. One group, the mergansers, are primarily piscivorous, and have serrated bills to help catch fish. In a number of species, the young include a proportion of invertebrates in their diets
8.
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
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Anatinae
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The Anatinae are a subfamily of the family Anatidae. Its surviving members are the ducks, which feed mainly at the surface rather than by diving. The other members of the Anatinae are the extinct moa-nalo, a young, there has been much debate about the dabbling ducks systematical status and which ducks belong to the Anatinae. As understood here, the subfamily contains only the dabbling ducks and their close relatives, alternatively, the Anatinae are considered to include most ducks, and the dabbling ducks form a tribe Anatini within these. The classification as presented here more appropriately reflects the uncertainty about the interrelationships of the major lineages of Anatidae. The dabbling duck group, of worldwide distribution, was delimited in a 1986 study to include eight genera, however, Salvadoris teal is almost certainly closely related to the pink-eared duck, and other genera are likewise of unresolved affiliation. The peculiar marbled duck, formerly assigned to the dabbling ducks, is thought to be a diving duck or even a distinct subfamily. This group of ducks has been so named because its members feed mainly on vegetable matter by upending on the surface, or grazing. These are mostly gregarious ducks of freshwater or estuaries and these birds are strong fliers and northern species are highly migratory. Compared to other types of duck, their legs are placed more towards the centre of their bodies and they walk well on land, and some species feed terrestrially. Puddle ducks, as they are called, generally feed on the surface of the water or feed on very shallow bottoms. They are not equipped to dive down several feet like their diving counterparts, the most prominent difference between puddle ducks and divers are the size of the feet. A puddle ducks feet are smaller because they do not need the extra propulsion to dive for their forage. Another distinguishing characteristic of puddle ducks when compared to diving ducks is the way in which take flight when spooked or are on the move. Puddle ducks spring straight up from the water, but diving ducks need to gain momentum to take off, so they must run across the water a short distance to gain flight. Traditionally, most ducks were assigned to either the shelducks, the ducks, and the dabbling and diving ducks. However, the perching ducks turned out to be an assemblage of various tropical waterfowl that happened to evolve the ability to perch well in their forested habitat. Several of these, such as the Brazilian teal, were assigned to the Anatinae
10.
Odysseus
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Odysseus, also known by the Latin name Ulysses, was a legendary Greek king of Ithaca and the hero of Homers epic poem the Odyssey. Odysseus also plays a key role in Homers Iliad and other works in that same epic cycle. Husband of Penelope, father of Telemachus, and son of Laërtes and Anticlea, Odysseus is renowned for his brilliance, guile, and versatility and he is most famous for the Odyssey, ten eventful years he took to return home after the decade-long Trojan War. The name has several variants, in Greek the character was called Olysseus, Oulixeus, Oulixes, hence, there may originally have been two separate figures, one called something like Odysseus, the other something like Ulixes, who were combined into one complex personality. The etymology of the name is unknown, ancient authors linked the name to the Greek verbs odussomai to be wroth against, to hate, or to oduromai to lament, bewail. Homer in references and puns, relates it to various forms of this verb and it has also been suggested that the name is of non-Greek origin, probably not even Indo-European, with an unknown etymology, R. S. P. Beekes has suggested a Pre-Greek origin. In Book 19 of the Odyssey, where Odysseuss early childhood is recounted, Euryclea tries to guide him to naming the boy Polyaretos, for he has much been prayed for. Autolycus apparently in a sardonic mood, decided to give the child a name that would commemorate his own experience in life. Because I got odium upon myself before coming here, let the childs name be Odysseus to signify this. The pun was prophetic as well as commemorative, Odysseus often receives the patronymic epithet Laertiades, son of Laërtes. In the Iliad and Odyssey there are several epithets used to describe Odysseus and his name and stories were adopted into Etruscan religion under the name Uthuze. Hence, Odysseus was the great-grandson of the Olympian god Hermes, according to the Iliad and Odyssey, his father is Laertes and his mother Anticlea, although there was a non-Homeric tradition that Sisyphus was his true father. The rumor went that Laertes bought Odysseus from the conniving king, Odysseus is said to have a younger sister, Ctimene, who went to Same to be married and is mentioned by the swineherd Eumaeus, whom she grew up alongside, in Book 15 of the Odyssey. Homers Iliad and Odyssey portray Odysseus as a hero, but the Romans. In Virgils Aeneid, written between 29 and 19 BC, he is referred to as cruel Odysseus or deceitful Odysseus. Turnus, in Aeneid ix, reproaches the Trojan Ascanius with images of rugged, forthright Latin virtues, declaring, You shall not find the sons of Atreus here, nor need the frauds of sly Ulysses fear. While the Greeks admired his cunning and deceit, these qualities did not recommend themselves to the Romans, who possessed a rigid sense of honour. His attempts to avoid his sacred oath to defend Menelaus and Helen offended Roman notions of duty, the majority of sources for Odysseus pre-war exploits—principally the mythographers Pseudo-Apollodorus and Hyginus—postdate Homer by many centuries
11.
Plumage
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Plumage refers both to the layer of feathers that cover a bird and the pattern, colour, and arrangement of those feathers. The pattern and colours of plumage differ between species and subspecies, and may vary with age classes, within species there can be different colour morphs. The placement of feathers on a bird are not haphazzard, but rather emerge in organized, overlapping rows and groups, most birds moult, usually before and after breeding, resulting in a breeding or nuptial plumage and a basic plumage. Many ducks and some species such as the red junglefowl have males wearing a bright nuptial plumage while breeding. The painted buntings juveniles have two inserted moults in their first autumn, each yielding plumage like an adult females, the first starts a few days after fledging replacing the juvenile plumage with an auxiliary formative plumage, the second a month or so later giving the formative plumage. Abnormal plumages include a variety of conditions, albinism, total loss of colour, is rare, but partial loss of colours is more common. Some species are polymorphic, having two or more colour variants. A few species have special types of polymorphism, as in the male ruff which has an assortment of different colours around the head, hen feathering is an inherited plumage character in domestic fowl controlled by a single gene. Plumology is the name for the science that is associated with the study of feathers, almost all species of birds moult at least annually, usually after the breeding season, known as the pre-basic moult. This resulting covering of feathers, which will last either until the breeding season or until the next annual moult, is known as the basic plumage. Many species undertake another moult prior to the season known as the pre-alternate moult. The alternate plumage is brighter than the basic plumage, for the purposes of sexual display. The Humphrey-Parkes terminology requires some attention to detail to name moults, many ducks have bright, colourful plumage, exhibiting strong sexual dimorphism. However, they moult into a dull plumage after breeding in mid-summer and this drab, female-like appearance is called eclipse plumage. When they shed feathers to go into eclipse, the ducks become flightless for a period of time. Although mainly found in the Anatidae, a few species, including related red junglefowl, most fairywrens. There are hereditary as well as variations in plumage that are rare. Melanism refers to an excess of black or dark colours, erythromelanism or erythrism is the result of excessive reddish brown erythromelanin deposition in feathers that normally lack melanin
12.
American wigeon
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The American wigeon, also baldpate, is a species of dabbling duck found in North America. This species is classified with the other wigeons in the dabbling duck genus Anas and it is the New World counterpart of the Eurasian wigeon. Anas is the Latin for duck and americana refers to America, the American wigeon is a medium-sized bird, it is larger than a teal, but smaller than a pintail. In silhouette, the wigeon can be distinguished from other dabblers by its head, short neck. It is 42–59 cm long, with a 76–91 cm wingspan and this wigeon has two adult molts per year and a juvenile molt in the first year, as well. The breeding male is a bird with a mask of green feathers around its eyes. This white patch gives the wigeon its other name, baldpate. In flight, drakes can be identified by the white shoulder patch on each wing. These white patches flash as the bank and turn. In non-breeding plumage, the looks more like the female. The hens are less conspicuous, having primarily gray and brown plumage. Both sexes have a blue bill with a black tip, a white belly. The wing patch behind the speculum is gray and they can be distinguished from most ducks, apart from Eurasian wigeon, by shape. However, that species has a head and all grey underwing. The head and neck coloring of the female is different as opposed to the Eurasian wigeon and it nests on the ground, near water and under cover. It lays 6–12 creamy white eggs, flocks will often contain American coots. The American wigeon is a species, and in the field can often be identified by their distinctive calls. Drakes produce a three note whistle, while hens emit hoarse grunts and quacks, the male whistle makes a wheezy whoee-whoe-whoe, whereas the female has a low growl qua-ack
