Sulawesi
Sulawesi known as Celebes, is an island in Indonesia. One of the four Greater Sunda Islands, the world's eleventh-largest island, it is situated east of Borneo, west of the Maluku Islands, south of Mindanao and the Sulu Archipelago. Within Indonesia, only Sumatra and Papua are larger in territory, only Java and Sumatra have larger populations; the landmass of Sulawesi includes four peninsulas: the northern Minahasa Peninsula. Three gulfs separate these peninsulas: the Gulf of Tomini between the northern Minahasa and East peninsulas; the Strait of Makassar runs along the western side of the island and separates the island from Borneo. The name Sulawesi comes from the words sula and besi and may refer to the historical export of iron from the rich Lake Matano iron deposits; the name came into common use in English following Indonesian independence. The name Celebes was given to the island by Portuguese explorers. While its direct translation is unclear, it may be considered a Portuguese rendering of the native name "Sulawesi".
Sulawesi is the world's eleventh-largest island, covering an area of 174,600 km2. The central part of the island is ruggedly mountainous, such that the island's peninsulas have traditionally been remote from each other, with better connections by sea than by road; the three bays that divide Sulawesi's peninsulas are, from north to south, the Tomini, the Tolo and the Boni. These separate the Minahassa or Northern Peninsula, the East Peninsula, the Southeast Peninsula and the South Peninsula; the Strait of Makassar runs along the western side of the island. The island is surrounded by Borneo to the west, by the Philippines to the north, by Maluku to the east, by Flores and Timor to the south; the Selayar Islands make up a peninsula stretching southwards from Southwest Sulawesi into the Flores Sea are administratively part of Sulawesi. The Sangihe Islands and Talaud Islands stretch northward from the northeastern tip of Sulawesi, while Buton Island and its neighbours lie off its southeast peninsula, the Togian Islands are in the Gulf of Tomini, Peleng Island and Banggai Islands form a cluster between Sulawesi and Maluku.
All the above-mentioned islands, many smaller ones are administratively part of Sulawesi's six provinces. The island slopes up from the shores of the deep seas surrounding the island to a high non-volcanic, mountainous interior. Active volcanoes are found in the northern Minahassa Peninsula, stretching north to the Sangihe Islands; the northern peninsula contains several active volcanoes such as Mount Lokon, Mount Awu and Karangetang. According to plate reconstructions, the island is believed to have been formed by the collision of terranes from the Asian Plate and from the Australian Plate, with island arcs in the Pacific; because of its several tectonic origins, various faults scar the land and as a result the island is prone to earthquakes. Sulawesi, in contrast to most of the other islands in the biogeographical region of Wallacea, is not oceanic, but a composite island at the centre of the Asia-Australia collision zone. Parts of the island were attached to either the Asian or Australian continental margin and became separated from these areas by vicariant processes.
In the west, the opening of the Makassar Strait separated West Sulawesi from Sundaland in the Eocene c. 45 Mya. In the east, the traditional view of collisions of multiple micro-continental fragments sliced from New Guinea with an active volcanic margin in West Sulawesi at different times since the Early Miocene c. 20 Mya has been replaced by the hypothesis that extensional fragmentation has followed a single Miocene collision of West Sulawesi with the Sula Spur, the western end of an ancient folded belt of Variscan origin in the Late Paleozoic. Before October 2014, the settlement of South Sulawesi by modern humans had been dated to c. 30,000 BC on the basis of radiocarbon dates obtained from rock shelters in Maros. No earlier evidence of human occupation had at that point been found, but the island certainly formed part of the land bridge used for the settlement of Australia and New Guinea by at least 40,000 BCE. There is no evidence of Homo erectus having reached Sulawesi. Following Peter Bellwood's model of a southward migration of Austronesian-speaking farmers, radiocarbon dates from caves in Maros suggest a date in the mid-second millennium BC for the arrival of a group from east Borneo speaking a Proto-South Sulawesi language.
Initial settlement was around the mouth of the Sa'dan river, on the northwest coast of the peninsula, although the south coast has been suggested. Subsequent migrations across the mountainous landscape resulted in the geographical isolation of PSS speakers and the evolution of their languages into the eight families of the South Sulawesi language group. If each group can be said to have a homeland, that of the Bugis – today the most numerous group – was around lakes Témpé and Sidénréng in the Walennaé depression. Here for some 2,000 years lived the linguistic group. Despite the fact that today they are link
Bat
Bats are mammals of the order Chiroptera. Bats are more manoeuvrable than birds, flying with their long spread-out digits covered with a thin membrane or patagium; the smallest bat, arguably the smallest extant mammal, is Kitti's hog-nosed bat, 29–34 mm in length, 15 cm across the wings and 2–2.6 g in mass. The largest bats are the flying foxes and the giant golden-crowned flying fox, Acerodon jubatus, which can weigh 1.6 kg and have a wingspan of 1.7 m. The second largest order of mammals, bats comprise about 20% of all classified mammal species worldwide, with over 1,200 species; these were traditionally divided into two suborders: the fruit-eating megabats, the echolocating microbats. But more recent evidence has supported dividing the order into Yinpterochiroptera and Yangochiroptera, with megabats as members of the former along with several species of microbats. Many bats are insectivores, most of the rest are frugivores. A few species feed on animals other than insects. Most bats are nocturnal, many roost in caves or other refuges.
Bats are present throughout the world, with the exception of cold regions. They are important in their ecosystems for dispersing seeds. Bats provide humans at the cost of some threats. Bat dung has been used as fertiliser. Bats consume insect pests, they are sometimes numerous enough to serve as tourist attractions, are used as food across Asia and the Pacific Rim. They are natural reservoirs such as rabies. In many cultures, bats are popularly associated with darkness, witchcraft and death. An older English name for bats is flittermouse, which matches their name in other Germanic languages, related to the fluttering of wings. Middle English had bakke, most cognate with Old Swedish natbakka, which may have undergone a shift from -k- to -t- influenced by Latin blatta, "moth, nocturnal insect"; the word "bat" was first used in the early 1570s. The name "Chiroptera" derives from Ancient Greek: χείρ – cheir, "hand" and πτερόν – pteron, "wing"; the delicate skeletons of bats do not fossilise well, it is estimated that only 12% of bat genera that lived have been found in the fossil record.
Most of the oldest known bat fossils were very similar to modern microbats, such as Archaeopteropus. The extinct bats Palaeochiropteryx tupaiodon and Hassianycteris kumari are the first fossil mammals whose colouration has been discovered: both were reddish-brown. Bats were grouped in the superorder Archonta, along with the treeshrews and primates. Modern genetic evidence now places bats in the superorder Laurasiatheria, with its sister taxon as Fereuungulata, which includes carnivorans, odd-toed ungulates, even-toed ungulates, cetaceans. One study places Chiroptera as a sister taxon to odd-toed ungulates; the phylogenetic relationships of the different groups of bats have been the subject of much debate. The traditional subdivision into Megachiroptera and Microchiroptera reflected the view that these groups of bats had evolved independently of each other for a long time, from a common ancestor capable of flight; this hypothesis recognised differences between microbats and megabats and acknowledged that flight has only evolved once in mammals.
Most molecular biological evidence supports the view that bats form a monophyletic group. Genetic evidence indicates that megabats originated during the early Eocene, belong within the four major lines of microbats. Two new suborders have been proposed. Yangochiroptera includes the other families of a conclusion supported by a 2005 DNA study. A 2013 phylogenomic study supported the two new proposed suborders. In the 1980s, a hypothesis based on morphological evidence stated the Megachiroptera evolved flight separately from the Microchiroptera; the flying primate hypothesis proposed that, when adaptations to flight are removed, the Megachiroptera are allied to primates by anatomical features not shared with Microchiroptera. For example, the brains of megabats have advanced characteristics. Although recent genetic studies support the monophyly of bats, debate continues about the meaning of the genetic and morphological evidence; the 2003 discovery of an early fossil bat from the 52 million year old Green River Formation, Onychonycteris finneyi, indicates that flight evolved before echolocative abilities.
Onychonycteris had claws on all five of its fingers, whereas modern bats have at most two claws on two digits of each hand. It had longer hind legs and shorter forearms, similar to climbing mammals that hang under branches, such as sloths and gibbons; this palm-sized bat had short, broad wings, suggesting that it could not fly as fast or as far as bat species. Instead of flapping its wings continuously while flying, Onychonycteris alternated between flaps and
Zoological Society of London
The Zoological Society of London is a charity devoted to the worldwide conservation of animals and their habitats. It was founded in 1826. On 29 November 1822, the birthday of John Ray, “the father of modern zoology”, a meeting held in the Linnean Society in Soho Square led by Rev. William Kirby, resolved to form a "Zoological Club of the Linnean Society of London". Between 1816 and 1826 discussions between Stamford Raffles, Humphry Davy, Joseph Banks and others led to the idea that London should have an establishment similar to the Jardin des Plantes in Paris, it would house a zoological collection "which should interest and amuse the public." The society was founded in April 1826 by Sir Stamford Raffles, the Marquess of Lansdowne, Lord Auckland, Sir Humphry Davy, Robert Peel, Joseph Sabine, Nicholas Aylward Vigors along with various other nobility and naturalists. Raffles was the first chairman and president, but died after only a few months in office, in July 1826, he was succeeded by the Marquess of Lansdowne who supervised the building of the first animal houses, a parcel of land in Regent's Park having been obtained from the Crown at the inaugural meeting.
It received a Royal Charter from George IV on 27 March 1829. The purpose of the society was to create a collection of animals for study at leisure, an associated museum and library. In April 1828 the Zoological Gardens were opened to members. In 1831 William IV presented the Royal Menagerie to the Zoological Society, in 1847 the public were admitted to aid funding, Londoners soon christened the Zoological Gardens the "Zoo". London Zoo soon had the most extensive collection of animals in the world. A History of the ZSL, written by Henry Scherren, was published in 1905; the History was criticised as inadequately researched by Peter Chalmers Mitchell in 1929. As the twentieth century began, the need to maintain and research large animals in a more natural environment became clear. Peter Chalmers Mitchell conceived the vision of a new park no more than 70 miles away from London and thus accessible to the public, at least 200 acres in extent. In 1926, profiting from the agricultural depression, the ideal place was found: Hall Farm, near Whipsnade village, was derelict, held 600 acres on the Chiltern Hills.
ZSL bought the farm in December 1926 for £13,480 12s 10d. In 1928 the first animals arrived at the new Whipsnade Park – two Amherst pheasants, a golden pheasant and five red jungle fowl. Others soon followed, including muntjac deer, llamas and skunks. In 1931 Whipsnade Park was opened to the public as the world's first open zoological park. In 1960–61, Lord Zuckerman Secretary of ZSL, raised funds from two medical foundations to found laboratories as an Institute of Zoology where scientists would be employed by ZSL and undertake research. In June 2015 ZSL rebranded, taking on a new tagline - "Let's Work for Wildlife"; the new brand will be used to boost awareness in the UK and beyond of ZSL’s global conservation programmes, scientific research and wildlife education through the charity’s two zoos. The Society is a registered charity under English law; the Institute of Zoology is the scientific research division of the ZSL. It is a government-funded research institute, which specialises in scientific issues relevant to the conservation of species and their habitats.
The Institute of Zoology focuses its research on five areas: evolutionary biology, ecology, reproductive biology and wildlife epidemiology. The Institute of Zoology was graded 4 in the 1997–2001 UK Research Assessment Exercise, publishes reports annually. From the late 1980s the Institute of Zoology had been affiliated to the University of London. However, in 2000 this was replaced with a partnership with the University of Cambridge. ZSL runs ZSL London Zoo, ZSL Whipsnade Zoo and had planned to open an aquarium, Biota!. The society published the Zoological Record from 1864 to 1980, when the ZR was transferred to BIOSIS; the Society has published the Proceedings of the Zoological Society of London, now called the Journal of Zoology, since 1830. Since 1998 it has published Animal Conservation. Other publications include the International Zoo Yearbook; the society administers the following award programmes: Frink Medal Stamford Raffles Award Silver Medal Scientific Medal Marsh Award for Conservation Biology Marsh Award for Marine and Freshwater Conservation Thomson Reuters/Zoological Record Award for Communicating Zoology Prince Philip Award and Marsh Prize Charles Darwin Award and Marsh Prize Thomas Henry Huxley Award and Marsh Prize the Landseer Medal Individuals can be elected Fellows of the Zoological Society of London and therefore granted the post-nominal letters FZS.
The ZSL's Honorary Fellows include: 1975 Professor Jean Anthony, Professor Jean Dorst 1977 HRH Prince Philip, Duke of Edinburgh 1984 Professor Ernst Mayr 1988 Professor Milton Thiago de Mello 1990 Professor Knut Schmidt-Nielsen 1991 Emperor Akihito of Japan 1992 Professor Edward Wilson 1996 Professor John Maynard Smith 1997 The Hon. Miriam Rothschild 1998 Sir David Attenborough 1999 Sir Robert May 2001 Professor Patrick Bateson 2002 Professor Robert McNeill Alexander 2002 Dr William G. Conway 2003 Professor Sir Brian Follett 2004 Sir Martin Holdgate 2005 Professor Sir John Krebs, Professor Katherine Ralls, Professor Sir Brian Heap 2006 Professor Sir John Lawton 2007 Professor John Beddington 2011 Lord Moser 2012 Dr Desmond Morris 2013 Ken Sims The Council is the governing body of the ZSL. There are 15 Council members, served by the Secretary and Treasurer. Council members serve for up to five years at a time; the Presidency is
Joseph Dalton Hooker
Sir Joseph Dalton Hooker was a British botanist and explorer in the 19th century. He was a founder of Charles Darwin's closest friend. For twenty years he served as director of the Royal Botanical Gardens, succeeding his father, William Jackson Hooker, was awarded the highest honours of British science. Hooker was born in Halesworth, England, he was the second son of the famous botanist Sir William Jackson Hooker, Regius Professor of Botany, Maria Sarah Turner, eldest daughter of the banker Dawson Turner and sister-in-law of Francis Palgrave. From age seven, Hooker attended his father's lectures at Glasgow University, taking an early interest in plant distribution and the voyages of explorers like Captain James Cook, he was educated at the Glasgow High School and went on to study medicine at Glasgow University, graduating M. D. in 1839. This degree qualified him for employment in the Naval Medical Service: he joined the renowned polar explorer Captain James Clark Ross's Antarctic expedition to the South Magnetic Pole after receiving a commission as Assistant-Surgeon on HMS Erebus.
On this expedition, Hooker was granted full access to the private library of Richard Clement Moody Governor of the Falkland Islands: Hooker described the library as'excellent', developed a close friendship with Moody. In 1851 he married daughter of Darwin's mentor, John Stevens Henslow, they had four sons and three daughters: William Henslow Hooker Harriet Anne Hooker married William Turner Thiselton-Dyer Charles Paget Hooker Maria Elizabeth Hooker died aged 6. Brian Harvey Hodgson Hooker Reginald Hawthorn Hooker statistician Grace Ellen Hooker Frances Harriet Henslow's contribution to his work included translating French botanical texts which Hooker edited. After his first wife's death in 1874, in 1876 he married Lady Hyacinth Jardine, daughter of William Samuel Symonds and the widow of Sir William Jardine, they had two sons: Joseph Symonds Hooker Richard Symonds Hooker. Lady Hooker was elected a Fellow of the RSPB in 1905. Joseph Hooker died in his sleep at midnight at home, the Camp, Sunningdale in Berkshire, on 10 December 1911 after a short and minor illness.
The Dean and Chapter of Westminster Abbey offered a grave near Darwin's in the nave but insisted that Hooker be cremated before. His widow, declined the proposal and Hooker's body was buried, as he wished to be, alongside his father in the churchyard of St. Anne's Church, Kew, on Kew Green, within short distance of Kew Gardens, his memorial tablet in the church, with a motif of five plants, was designed by Matilds Smith. Hooker's first expedition, led by James Clark Ross, consisted of two ships, HMS Erebus and HMS Terror. Hooker was the youngest of the 128-man crew, he sailed on the Erebus and was assistant to Robert McCormick, who in addition to being the ship's Surgeon was instructed to collect zoological and geological specimens. The ships sailed on 30 September 1839. Before journeying to Antarctica they visited Madeira, Tenerife and Quail Island in the Cape Verde archipelago, St Paul Rocks, Trinidade east of Brazil, St Helena, the Cape of Good Hope. Hooker made plant collections at each location and while travelling drew these and specimens of algae and sea life pulled aboard using tow nets.
From the Cape they entered the Southern Ocean. Their first stop was the Crozet Islands where they set down on Possession Island to deliver coffee to sealers, they departed for the Kerguelen Islands. Hooker identified 18 flowering plants, 35 mosses and liverworts, 25 lichens and 51 algae, including some that were not described by surgeon William Anderson when James Cook had visited the islands in 1772; the expedition spent some time in Hobart, Van Diemen's Land, moved on to the Auckland Islands and Campbell Island, onward to Antarctica to locate the South Magnetic Pole. After spending 5 months in the Antarctic they returned to resupply in Hobart went on to Sydney, the Bay of Islands in New Zealand from 18 August to 23 November 1841, they left New Zealand to return to Antarctica. After spending 138 days at sea, a collision between the Erebus and Terror, they sailed to the Falkland Islands, to Tierra del Fuego, back to the Falklands and onward to their third sortie into the Antarctic; when Hooker arrived on the Falkland Islands with the expedition of Ross, he developed a close friendship with Richard Clement Moody, the Governor of the Falkland Islands.
Moody granted Hooker full use of his personal library, which Hooker described as'excellent', Hooker described Moody as'a active and intelligent young man, most anxious to improve the colony and gain every information respecting its products'. Subsequently, the Ross expedition made a landing at Cockburn Island and after leaving the Antarctic, stopped at the Cape, St Helena and Ascension Island; the ships arrived back in England on 4 September 1843. In 1845, Hooker applied for the Chair of Botany at the University of Edinburgh; this position included duties at the Royal Botanic Gardens of Scotland, so the appointment was influenced by local politicians. An unusually protracted struggle ensued, resulting in the election of the locally born and bred botanist, John Hutton Balfour; the Darwin correspondence, now public, makes clear Darwin's sense of shock at this unexpected outcome. Hooker declined a chair at Glasgow University which beca
Ferdinand Magellan
Ferdinand Magellan was a Portuguese explorer who organised the Spanish expedition to the East Indies from 1519 to 1522, resulting in the first circumnavigation of the Earth, completed by Juan Sebastián Elcano. Born into a family of the Portuguese nobility in around 1480, Magellan became a skilled sailor and naval officer and was selected by King Charles I of Spain to search for a westward route to the Maluku Islands. Commanding a fleet of five vessels, he headed south through the Atlantic Ocean to Patagonia, passing through the Strait of Magellan into a body of water he named the "peaceful sea". Despite a series of storms and mutinies, the expedition reached the Spice Islands in 1521 and returned home via the Indian Ocean to complete the first circuit of the globe. Magellan did not complete the entire voyage, as he was killed during the Battle of Mactan in the Philippines in 1521, his gift, the Santo Niño de Cebú image, remains one of his legacies during his arrival. Magellan had reached the Malay Archipelago in Southeast Asia on previous voyages traveling east.
By visiting this area again but now travelling west, Magellan achieved a nearly complete personal circumnavigation of the globe for the first time in history. The Magellanic penguin is named after him. Magellan's navigational skills have been acknowledged in the naming of objects associated with the stars, including the Magellanic Clouds, now known to be two nearby dwarf galaxies. Magellan was born in northern Portugal in around 1480, either at Vila Nova de Gaia, near Porto, in Douro Litoral Province, or at Sabrosa, near Vila Real, in Trás-os-Montes e Alto Douro Province, he was the son of Rodrigo de Magalhães, Alcaide-Mor of Aveiro and wife Alda de Mesquita and brother of Leonor or Genebra de Magalhães, wife with issue of João Fernandes Barbosa. In March 1505 at the age of 25, Magellan enlisted in the fleet of 22 ships sent to host D. Francisco de Almeida as the first viceroy of Portuguese India. Although his name does not appear in the chronicles, it is known that he remained there eight years, in Goa and Quilon.
He participated including the battle of Cannanore in 1506, where he was wounded. In 1509 he fought in the battle of Diu, he sailed under Diogo Lopes de Sequeira in the first Portuguese embassy to Malacca, with Francisco Serrão, his friend and cousin. In September, after arriving at Malacca, the expedition fell victim to a conspiracy ending in retreat. Magellan had a crucial role, saving Francisco Serrão, who had landed. In 1511, under the new governor Afonso de Albuquerque and Serrão participated in the conquest of Malacca. After the conquest their ways parted: Magellan was promoted, with a rich plunder and, in the company of a Malay he had indentured and baptized, Enrique of Malacca, he returned to Portugal in 1512. Serrão departed in the first expedition sent to find the "Spice Islands" in the Moluccas, where he remained, he married a woman from Amboina and became a military advisor to the Sultan of Ternate, Bayan Sirrullah. His letters to Magellan would prove decisive, giving information about the spice-producing territories.
After taking a leave without permission, Magellan fell out of favour. Serving in Morocco, he was wounded, he was accused of trading illegally with the Moors. The accusations were proved false, but he received no further offers of employment after 15 May 1514. On in 1515, he got an employment offer as a crew member on a Portuguese ship, but rejected this. In 1517 after a quarrel with King Manuel I, who denied his persistent demands to lead an expedition to reach the spice islands from the east, he left for Spain. In Seville he befriended his countryman Diogo Barbosa and soon married the daughter of Diogo's second wife, María Caldera Beatriz Barbosa, they had two children: Rodrigo de Magalhães and Carlos de Magalhães, both of whom died at a young age. His wife died in Seville around 1521. Meanwhile, Magellan devoted himself to studying the most recent charts, investigating, in partnership with cosmographer Rui Faleiro, a gateway from the Atlantic to the South Pacific and the possibility of the Moluccas being Spanish according to the demarcation of the Treaty of Tordesillas.
Christopher Columbus's voyages to the West had the goal of reaching the Indies and to establish direct commercial relations between Spain and the Asian kingdoms. The Spanish soon realized that the lands of the Americas were not a part of Asia, but a new continent; the 1494 Treaty of Tordesillas reserved for Portugal the eastern routes that went around Africa, Vasco da Gama and the Portuguese arrived in India in 1498. Castile urgently needed to find a new commercial route to Asia. After the Junta de Toro conference of 1505, the Spanish Crown commissioned expeditions to discover a route to the west. Spanish explorer Vasco Núñez de Balboa reached the Pacific Ocean in 1513 after crossing the Isthmus of Panama, Juan Díaz de Solís died in Río de la Plata in 1516 while exploring South America in the service of Spain. In October 1517 in Seville, Magellan contacted Juan de Factor of the Casa de Contratación. Following the arrival of his partner Rui Faleiro, with the support of Aranda, they presented their project to the Spanish king, Charles I, f
Richard Lydekker
Richard Lydekker was an English naturalist and writer of numerous books on natural history. Richard Lydekker was born at Tavistock Square in London, his father was a barrister-at-law with Dutch ancestry. The family moved to Harpenden Lodge soon after Richard's birth, he was educated at Trinity College, where he took a first-class in the Natural Science tripos. In 1874 he joined the Geological Survey of India and made studies of the vertebrate palaeontology of northern India, he remained in this post until the death of his father in 1881. His main work in India was on the Siwalik palaeofauna, he was responsible for the cataloguing of the fossil mammals and birds in the Natural History Museum. He named a variety of taxa including the golden-bellied mangabey, he was influential in the science of biogeography. In 1895 he delineated the biogeographical boundary through Indonesia, known as Lydekker's Line, that separates Wallacea on the west from Australia-New Guinea on the east, it follows the edge of the Sahul Shelf, an area from New Guinea to Australia of shallow water with the Aru Islands on its edge.
Along with Wallace's Line and Huxley's Line it indicates the definite effect of geology on the biogeography of the region, something not seen so in other parts of the world. Lydekker attracted amused public attention with a pair of letters to The Times in 1913, when he wrote on 6 February that he had heard a cuckoo, contrary to Yarrell's History of British Birds which doubted the bird arrived before April. Six days on 12 February 1913, he wrote again, confessing that "the note was uttered by a bricklayer's labourer". Letters about the first cuckoo became a tradition in the newspaper, he received the Lyell Medal from the Geological Society of London in 1902. Catalogue of the Fossil Mammalia in the British Museum, 5 vols. Catalogue of the Fossil Reptilia and Amphibia in the British Museum, 4 vols. A Manual of Palaeontology Phases of Animal Life The Royal Natural History, 6 vols. 12 sec. A Hand-book to the Marsupialia and Monotremata Life and Rock: A Collection of Zooogical and Geological Essays A Geographical History of Mammals A Hand-book to the British Mammalia A Handbook to the Carnivora: part 1: cats and mongooses The Deer of all Lands: A history of the family Cervidae and extinct Wild Oxen, Sheep & Goats of all Lands and Extinct The Wild Animals of India, Burma and Tibet The great and small game of Europe, western & northern Asia and America The New Natural History 6 vols.
Living Races of Mankind: A popular illustrated account of the customs, pursuits and ceremonies of the races of mankind throughout the world, 2 vols. with Henry Neville Hutchinson and John Walter Gregory Mostly Mammals: Zoological Essays Guide to the Gallery of Reptilia and Amphibia in the British museum Sir William Flower The Game Animals of India, Burma and Tibet Guide to the Great Game Animals in British Museum Guide to the Specimens of the Horse Family in British Museum The Game Animals of Africa A Guide to the Domesticated Animals Guide to the Whales and Dolphins A number of articles in the Encyclopædia Britannica, 1911 Animal Portraiture The Horse and its Relatives The Sheep and its Cousins Catalogue of the heads and horns of Indian big game bequeathed by A. O. Hume... to the British Museum Catalogue of the ungulate mammals in the British Museum 5 vols. Wild life of the World: a descriptive survey of the geographical distribution of animals 3 vols. Australia Wallace Line Wallacea Weber Line Media related to Richard Lydekker at Wikimedia Commons Lydekkers publications about rhinos map of Wallace's, Weber's and Lydekker's lines BDH Online versions of some Richard Lydekker publications.
Harpenden History: The Lydekkers of Harpenden Lodge — 1853–1979 Works of Richard Lydekker at Google Books
New Guinea
New Guinea is a large island separated by a shallow sea from the rest of the Australian continent. It is the world's third-largest island, after Australia and Greenland, covering a land area of 785,753 km2, arguably the largest wholly or within the Southern Hemisphere and Oceania; the eastern half of the island is the major land mass of the independent state of Papua New Guinea. The western half, referred to as either Western New Guinea or West Papua, has been administered by Indonesia since 1963 and comprises the provinces of Papua and West Papua; the island has been known by various names: The name Papua was used to refer to parts of the island before contact with the West. Its etymology is unclear; the name came from papo and ua, which means "not united" or, "territory that geographically is far away". Ploeg reports that the word papua is said to derive from the Malay word papua or pua-pua, meaning "frizzly-haired", referring to the curly hair of the inhabitants of these areas. Another possibility, put forward by Sollewijn Gelpke in 1993, is that it comes from the Biak phrase sup i papwa which means'the land below' and refers to the islands west of the Bird's Head, as far as Halmahera.
Whatever its origin, the name Papua came to be associated with this area, more with Halmahera, known to the Portuguese by this name during the era of their colonization in this part of the world. When the Portuguese and Spanish explorers arrived in the island via the Spice Islands, they referred to the island as Papua. However, the name New Guinea was used by Westerners starting with the Spanish explorer Yñigo Ortiz de Retez in 1545, referring to the similarities of the indigenous people's appearance with the natives of the Guinea region of Africa; the name is one of several toponyms sharing similar etymologies meaning "land of the blacks" or similar meanings, in reference to the dark skin of the inhabitants. The Dutch, who arrived under Jacob Le Maire and Willem Schouten, called it Schouten island, but this name was used only to refer to islands off the north coast of Papua proper, the Schouten Islands or Biak Island; when the Dutch colonized it as part of Netherlands East Indies, they called it Nieuw Guinea.
The name Irian was used in the Indonesian language to refer to the island and Indonesian province, as "Irian Jaya Province". The name was promoted in 1945 by brother of the future governor Frans Kaisiepo, it is taken from the Biak language of Biak Island, means "to rise", or "rising spirit". Irian is the name used in the Biak language and other languages such as Serui and Waropen; the name was used until 2001, when the name Papua was again used for the province. The name Irian, favored by natives, is now considered to be a name imposed by the authority of Jakarta. New Guinea is an island to the north of the Australian mainland, but south of the equator, it is isolated by the Arafura Sea to the west, the Torres Strait and Coral Sea to the east. Sometimes considered to be the easternmost island of the Indonesian archipelago, it lies north of Australia's Top End, the Gulf of Carpentaria and Cape York peninsula, west of the Bismarck Archipelago and the Solomon Islands Archipelago. Politically, the western half of the island comprises two provinces of Indonesia: Papua and West Papua.
The eastern half forms the mainland of the country of Papua New Guinea. The shape of New Guinea is compared to that of a bird-of-paradise, this results in the usual names for the two extremes of the island: the Bird's Head Peninsula in the northwest, the Bird's Tail Peninsula in the southeast. A spine of east–west mountains, the New Guinea Highlands, dominates the geography of New Guinea, stretching over 1,600 km from the'head' to the'tail' of the island, with many high mountains over 4,000 m; the western-half of the island of New Guinea contains the highest mountains in Oceania, rising up to 4,884 m high, higher than Mont Blanc in Europe, ensuring a steady supply of rain from the equatorial atmosphere. The tree line is around 4,000 m elevation and the tallest peaks contain permanent equatorial glaciers—which have been retreating since at least 1936. Various other smaller mountain ranges occur both west of the central ranges. Except in high elevations, most areas possess a warm humid climate throughout the year, with some seasonal variation associated with the northeast monsoon season.
The highest peaks on the island of New Guinea are: Puncak Jaya, sometimes known by its former Dutch name Carstensz Pyramid, is a mist-covered limestone mountain peak on the Indonesian side of the border. At 4,884 metres, Puncak Jaya makes New Guinea the world's fourth-highest landmass after Afro-Eurasia and Antarctica. Puncak Mandala located in Papua, is the second-highest peak on the island at 4,760 metres. Puncak Trikora in Papua, is 4,750 metres. Mount Wilhelm is the highest peak on the PNG side of the border at 4,509 metres, its granite peak is the highest point of the Bismarck Range. Mount Giluwe 4,368 metres is the second-highest summit in PNG, it is the highest volcanic peak in Oceania. Another major habitat featur
