July2001]
Reviews
815
Anheuser-Busch
Natural Resources
Building,Columbia, zoogeographical entity within which can be found
Missouri65211,USA.E-maihmillspaughj@missouri.
edu most of the European bird species.... "Names in
Finnish, Estonian, and Hungarian are omitted becausethey are not Indo-Europeanlanguages.Names
LITERATURE CITED
from languageswritten with different alphabetcharKENWARD,R. E. 1987. Wildlife Radio Tagging: acters, such as Cyrillic, Hebrew, and Greek, are
with Roman characters.
Equipment,Field Techniquesand Data Analysis. transliterated
Academic Press, London.
The first volume proceedsspeciesby species,with
KENWARD, R. E., AND K. H. HODDER. 1996. RANGES
eachaccountconsistingof a list of names,givenlanV. An Analysis System for BiologicalLocation guage by language,arranged in a geographicalseData. Institute of TerrestrialEcology,Wareham, quence more or less from the northwest (British
Isles) to the south and east. All names that the author
United Kingdom.
MANLY, B. E J., L. L. MCDONALD, AND D. L. THOMAS. could discoverare presentedalongwith information
1993. ResourceSelectionby Animals: Statistical on the countiesor provincesin which eachname,no
Designand Analysisof Field Studies.Chapman matter how local, is used. The amount of detail is
and Hall, London.
staggering.The section on names for the Magpie
RIVEST, L. P., S. COUTURIER,AND H. CREPEAU.1998.
(Picapica),for example,comprises13 pages,of which
Statisticalmethodsfor estimatingcaribouabun- more than 6 deal only with namesused in Germany.
dance using postcalving aggregationsdetected
Being Swiss, with an interest in etymology,Desby radio telemetry.Biometrics54:865-876.
fayes naturally has several languagesat his comSWIHART,R. K., AND N. A. SLADE.1997. On testing mand and haswritten his bookusingmorethan one.
for independenceof animal movements.Journal In the species accounts,explanatory remarks are
of Agricultural, Biological,and Environmental generally in French,exceptfor namesfrom the BritStatistics 2:48-63.
ish Isles, for which English is used. Remarks about
WHITE,G. C., AND R. A. GARROTT.
1990.Analysis of German names seem to be in either German or EnWildlife Radio-tracking Data. Academic Press, glish. Definitions in Volume Two may be in either
San Diego, California.
Englishor French.Anyonewho is linguisticallychallengedwould have considerabledifficulty using this
work, but would have little need for it in any case.
The second volume is less easily characterized.
About two-thirds of it consistsof what Desfayesrefers to ashis "paradigms" (Appendices3-14). Here,
namesor the words used in names, along with various cognates(or perhaps pseudocognates),are arThe Auk 118(3):815-816, 2001
ranged accordingto qualities, somewhatin the manner of the familiar Roget's Thesaurusof English
A Thesaurus of Bird Names: Etymology of Eu- words. The major groupingsinclude terms of chroropean Lexis Through Paradigms--Michel Desfay- matic origin (e.g. red, dark, spotted),morphological
es. 1998. Muse• Cantonal d'Histoire Naturelie, Sion,
(e.g. tall, tufted, swollen),acoustic(mostlyonomatoSwitzerland. Two volumes,1240 + 1288 pages,CD- poetic), kinetic (e.g. fly, wag, dive), and others.
ROM. ISBN 2-88426-021-8. $476 for the set or each
The ultimate subheadings are combinations of
componentcan be purchasedseparately(Volume 1, soundsused in words that DesfayesidentifiesasbeCloth, $238.00; Volume 2, Cloth, $251.00; CD-ROM,
ing related to a given quality. Thus, section3.2.54.2
$338.00).--This monumental work deals not with
is a list of words that contain the sounds"r-p" and
scientific names or "Linnaean" nomenclature, but
mean "red", including the Greek, Latin, English,
with names for birds that exist in other than the sciCzech and other words for turnip (rapys,rapa,rape,
entific
idiom--the
so-called
"common"
or "folk"
repka).The list alsocontainsa Russianword for mennamesfor birds. The first volume is a compilationof strues(repaki),Serbo-Croatian,Polish,Ukranian and
such names for all of the speciesof European and other words for linnet, robin, and whinchat (repka,
Middle Easternbirds, plus a few othersthat are al- rzepoluch,
repel,repalsic),and a Frenchword for the
most universallyknown, suchas the domesticfowl carunclesof a turkey (roupie),amongothers.
(Gallusgallus)and the Ostrich (Struthiocamelus).
UnThere are fascinatingdiversionsto be encountered
fortunately,the introductorymaterial doesnot clear- here. For example,we learn that the traditional (and
ly state or list which languages are included, but believable)derivation of "belladonna" is folk etymost of them appear in the list of abbreviations. mology,and that "mayonnaise,"accordingto DesNames for birds have been soughtin Indo-European fayes,is relatedto wordsmeaningfleckedor spotted,
languagesincluding "Iranian, Caucasian,and Ham~ and is not derived from the siegeof Port Mah6n, Miito-Semiticlanguages"because"the areacoveredby norca, as given in many etymologies. These parathese languages includes the Palaearcticregion, a digmswill be of asmuchinterestto philologistsand
816
Reviews
ethnolinguistsastheymaybe to ornithologists.
That
great erudition, maybe even genius,has been exercisedin their compilationis scarcelyto be doubted,
though I cannot shakeoff the impressionthat they
may reflect considerableidiosyncrasyas well.
[Auk, Vol. 118
tropical,and northern albatrosses.Eachof thosesections
commences
with
an overview
of the relevant
oceans,oceanography,bathymetry,and meteorology. Eachchapteris rich in historicaland geographical informationon the discoveryand explorationof
The second volume also contains various other
the many breeding islands as well as the different
lists of bird names,including thosein ancientlan- speciesthemselves.Every breeding island is dealt
guages,words for nests,eggs,and bats, terms used with individually,with mapsindicatingall breeding
in falconry,and bird namesfrom "overseasfranco- sites,and tablessummarizingbreedingpopulations.
phone countries"and Latin America.
All aspectsof albatrossbiologyare thencoveredspeThere is no index, because this would have added
ciesby species,includingbreedingecologyand popmore than 700 pages to the work. The CD-ROM, ulation dynamics,food, parasitesand disease,and
therefore,is an absolutenecessity.If, for example, predators.Those sectionsare well illustratedwith
one encountered
an unknown
word for some Euroline drawings and include examplesof most of the
peanbird and wanted to know to what speciesit ap- exciting at-sea distribution and foraging data that
plied, therewouldbe no practicalway to find it with- have only recentlybeen obtainedusingremote-sensout searchingthe text with a computer.I have little ing and satellitetracking.The speciesaccountsare
doubt that it would be found, however. Michel Desprecededby a generalintroduction(ChaptersI and
fayeshaspresented
uswith a laborof loveofsuchscope 2) dealing with issuessuchas basic anatomy,simias to leave thoughtful reviewers with a lingering larities and differences with the albatrosses' closest
sense of their own deficiencies.--StORRS L. OLSON, relatives, the petrels, and the current controversy
Departmentof Vertebrate
Zoology,NationalMuseumof over albatrossclassification.Followingthe species
Natural History,Smithsonian
Institution,Washington, accounts,Chapters13-16 review and synthesizeasD.C. 20560, USA. E-mail: [email protected]
pectsof comparativebiology (molt, flight, behavior,
and ecology),and the text concludeswith two chapters on human
TheAuk 118(3):816, 2001
Albatrosses--W.
L. N.
Tickell.
2000.
Pica
Press
(Helm Information Ltd.), Sussex,United Kingdom.
488 pp., 52 colorplates+ text figures.ISBN 1-87340394-1. Cloth $60.00.--W. L. N. (Lance) Tickell can truly be consideredone of the fathersof albatrossresearch. In 1958, he started banding Wandering
Albatrosseson Bird Island, South Georgia, and that
formed the nucleus of the long-term population
study of that specieswhich continuesto this day. I
still rememberthe thrill, some30 years later, of encounteringsome of the birds Lancehad banded as
adults when I too was fortunateenoughto work on
Bird Island (even though those particular birds
might have been only abouthalfway throughtheir
remarkablelives!).The book Albatrosses
representsa
superb,and fitting, conclusionto Tickell'smorethan
30 yearsof professionalinvolvementwith thesemagnificentbirds, and it providesthe most comprehensive, comparative account of the albatross family
currently available.
The bulk of the book, 10 chaptersin all, detail each
of the 13 speciesor sub-speciesof albatross,organized from a geographicalperspective:the southern,
relations
and
attitudes
towards
al-
batrosses,includinga fine collectionof albatrosspoetry. The book also containsa substantialappendix,
with a checklist,morphologicalmeasurements,
egg
size,diet, agingcriteria,behavior,and populationestimates for all breeding locations,togetherwith an
extensivebibliography(with references
up to andincluding 1999).
In general,the book is very well produced,and the
text is well written and highly readable.The general
reader (includingnonornithologists)will find much
of interesthere (and theyshouldnot be put off by the
openingof the Introductory chapterin which "cladistic," "trinomials," and "mitochondrial cytochromeb" appear in rapid successionwithout explanationor definition!).Forme,thehighlightsof the
book includedthe "PhotographicSection"with color photographsof eachspecies(many takenby the
authorhimself),and the line drawingsby RobinPrytherch, which superbly and delightfully illustrate
many of the albatross'complexcourtshipbehaviors.
However, the text is also sufficiently detailed and
comprehensiveenough to be of great value to the
professionalbiologist (especially for the detailed
populationdata). The book will perhapsbe mostoften visited as a referencetext rather than beingread
coverto cover.Albatrosses
would makea fine gift for
any amateurornithologistand shouldbe onthebook
shelf of all seabirdbiologists.--ToNYD. WILLIAMS,
Department
of Biological
Sciences,
SimonFraserUniversity, Burnaby,BritishColumbia,VSA 1S6, Canada.Email:[email protected]