[HN Gopher] First known photos of 'lost bird' captured by scient...
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First known photos of 'lost bird' captured by scientists
Author : wglb
Score : 96 points
Date : 2024-03-01 17:40 UTC (2 days ago)
(HTM) web link (phys.org)
(TXT) w3m dump (phys.org)
| valiant-comma wrote:
| I'll be honest, a picture of the bird being held by a scientist
| was not what I expected to see.
| goodcanadian wrote:
| They don't mention it in the article, but the birds were likely
| captured using mist nets
| (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mist_net). It is a standard
| technique:
|
| _In total, about 18 birds were found at three sites during the
| expedition._
| is_true wrote:
| I know nets are cheap, but, why don't use cameras instead?
| lumpa wrote:
| The nets are much more successful in capturing all sorts of
| birds at once, with little effort, even in environments
| where you wouldn't get clear line of sight for photos
| and/or for species that don't sit still for long enough.
|
| Handling the birds makes for far better identification (and
| more detailed pictures too), which is important for places
| where unknown, hard to identify or hard to detect species
| are likely to exist. It also allows taking measurements,
| banding the birds and even collecting tissue samples. So
| nets are a far better ROI for some scientific projects.
| is_true wrote:
| thanks, makes sense then
| tempodox wrote:
| Thanks, I was wondering how they got a bird to sit still
| on a hand for a photo. Not exactly common behavior for
| flappies.
| badgersnake wrote:
| That's what I'd expect to see if they'd just used an AI to
| generate the photo though.
| pvaldes wrote:
| I had the same impression. Some of the crest points of this
| bird seem to mutate into background leaves in a part of the
| photo. The eye lies in a strange place also. That photo is
| strange.
|
| ... But I can be wrong and is really easy to prove it.
|
| If they really have captured the bird, they should have taken
| some genetic material in the process. Entangled birds lose
| feathers all the time.
| HarHarVeryFunny wrote:
| At least it wasn't Darwin eating some species he just
| discovered
| HarHarVeryFunny wrote:
| Not sure why this got down voted. Maybe slightly off-topic
| (but still this is a rather invasive method of study), but it
| is true.
|
| https://www.npr.org/sections/thesalt/2015/08/12/430075644/di.
| ..
| dhosek wrote:
| Usually links to phys.org on this site are to physics articles
| so I expected the bird to be metaphorical, not literal.
| da39a3ee wrote:
| Ornithologists always use mist nets to survey birds. They are
| very widely used and rarely harm the birds when used by people
| who've learned how to use them. Their possession is controlled
| in the sorts of countries with legal systems that specify first
| world stuff like that.
| dotancohen wrote:
| Note that these birds have been lost for only two decades. So
| this is not some ancient species being recovered.
| rf15 wrote:
| Also note that this is likely not a good sign like "Oh, they're
| not extinct after all!". You may well have found their last
| survivor and that's it.
| joshuahedlund wrote:
| The article says they found 18 at 3 different sites, in a
| region of Congo that had been dangerous for the public to
| visit but had recently become safer. That does not prove a
| healthy population but it seems a step up from "last
| survivor"
| zabzonk wrote:
| also says that is "endemic" - if they haven't been seen for
| years, how do they know that? not a brilliant article, imho.
| da39a3ee wrote:
| Endemic to X means that it's geographical distribution is
| confined to X. The (original) geographical distribution of
| basically all bird species is fairly well known, due to the
| efforts of 19th and 20th century scientists and their
| collection of museum specimens. The reference work here is
| the "Peters check list", completed over the course of several
| decades in the 20C by various ornithologists.
|
| Of course, you have to check when they say "species" whether
| they're referring to a subspecies "elevated to species
| status" by dodgy "phylogeography" genetics studies.
|
| https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/James_L._Peters
| fred69 wrote:
| Anything with a name like "Red-bellied Squeaker Frog" begs for a
| video clip.
| 5555624 wrote:
| Not a video; but, a couple of pics:
| https://www.miamiherald.com/news/nation-world/world/article2...
| dang wrote:
| [stub for offtopicness]
| chriscjcj wrote:
| Lots of people tweeting about this.
| QuantumG wrote:
| He wasn't lost he was hiding!!
| rvba wrote:
| Did they capture the bird to study it? Or they just made a photo?
| fddrdplktrew wrote:
| "photoS"
|
| Anyone know where to find them?
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(page generated 2024-03-03 23:01 UTC)