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Bird Names
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00:19I used to work at the National Audubon Society.
00:22I was a lobbyist there for a little while.
00:24I helped organize bird walks with members of Congress and congressional staff.
00:28I took a lot of pride in wearing that polo that had Audubon's name on it.
00:33And as I got to know the guy, that brand on my shirt felt like a brand on my skin
00:40when I learned that he enslaved my ancestors.
00:45What's in a name?
00:46The question is really worth asking.
00:48Does changing these names now 200 years later really matter?
01:11Oh, that's a great shot.
01:13Can we go tighter on that gull?
01:24That bird has a Napoleon complex.
01:27That is the Bonaparte skull.
01:29And it's actually named after Napoleon's cousin, Charles Lucien Bonaparte.
01:34Sorry, I mixed up my old white tyrant.
01:37There are 5% of English bird names that need to be changed immediately.
01:42And of those names, the one that sticks out to me the most, Townsend's Warbler.
01:46It brings up a lot of questions.
01:47Why change these names?
01:49Who will choose the new names?
01:50Will everyone even accept 150 new bird names?
01:55I mean, 150 species is a lot of birds.
01:57This is my first time leaving the United States, and I love that it's for birds.
02:01And there are so many beautiful birds in this country, and I'm really glad that I have a local guide
02:07that can lead the way.
02:08Takei, how many birds have you managed to find this year?
02:10Oh, plenty.
02:11Arbonne's Warbler, Wilson's Warbler, hoping to get Townsend's Warbler.
02:16Townsend, while he was a celebrated ornithologist and expert on birds, was a grave robber.
02:22He is often depicted as a well-meaning naturalist, but what they conveniently omit is that he desecrated the graves
02:29of indigenous peoples,
02:30collecting skulls to dabble in a little pseudoscience, just to affirm his own racial biases.
02:38Townsend's Warbler is not the only example of that, right?
02:41There are so many birds named after problematic people.
02:44To have a little bird that has been here forever, that's so beautiful and so important in the ecosystem
02:52and there's an incredible migration and a journey, to have to hold that name and carry that around is insulting.
02:58Its name just feels so heavy.
03:02It's just named after a guy who's like kind of an asshole.
03:15There are so many birds heading that way.
03:17Let's go have a look.
03:23As a local, I bet you see a lot of Townsend's Warblers.
03:26I feel like I used to see a lot more than I do now.
03:31You know, I really feel like birds such as Townsend's Warblers are on the decline.
03:37You know, they might not be listed as endangered, but it doesn't mean that their population is not struggling.
04:05This is a good spot.
04:06I've seen them here before.
04:08Okay.
04:10All right, let's set up.
04:22They're definitely here.
04:23I can hear them.
04:27Oh, what's that?
04:29Floss alarm.
04:31Sorry.
04:31American goldfinch.
04:33Yellow.
04:34But not our guy.
04:35In all the time that I've been birding, I have never seen a Townsend's Warbler in real life.
04:41Me neither.
04:41Oh, really?
04:42Mm-mm.
04:44I have been trying to see the Townsend's Warbler for years, and I have been unsuccessful over and over.
04:52I'm optimistic, but I'm optimistic, but I'm also a realist, so I'm not getting my hopes up.
05:04You know, when you're in the car with a friend and that song comes on, and you're dying to know
05:08what it is, and you pull out the Shazam app to identify?
05:11That's what I always tell people that the Merlin app is like.
05:15It's like Shazam, but it's like Shazam, but for bird song.
05:17If there's multiple birds singing in the highlights, which ones?
05:20Yeah.
05:20That is the Kinglet.
05:22Oh, yeah.
05:23And the Chickadees.
05:26These bird names, like the hundreds and hundreds of birds that are named after these people, are they all just
05:36monsters from the 1800s?
05:38Oh, they're not all terrible people, but a lot of folks have acts.
05:43Where do you draw the line, right?
05:44And I think it's easier just to rename them all than to pick and choose.
05:49Um, you have your journal.
05:51Let me show you.
05:55So, we know Townsend's history.
05:58Who else is there?
06:00Bachman Sparrow.
06:01These adorable introverts use tools.
06:03Yes, tools.
06:04Like tiny feathery MacGyvers, prying pine cones open for snacks.
06:09Unfortunately, their name honors John Bachman.
06:12Slave owner, and a man who spent his life trying to prove scientifically and spiritually that enslaving black people was
06:19justified.
06:21Clark's Nutcracker.
06:22Every fall, these birds stash hundreds of thousands of pine seeds, then forget most of them.
06:26Their accidental gardening creates entire forests.
06:29Despite this iconic forgetfulness, they're named after William Clark, of Lewis and Clark.
06:34This guy was an enslaver and the enthusiastic executor of the infamous Indian removal policy.
06:40Hammond's Flycatcher.
06:42Totally badass.
06:43They're also territorial.
06:44And males actually get into aggressive physical fights mid-flight by locking claws or beaks while in the air.
06:53Instead of a name that says, I'm an aerial MMA fighter, they're stuck with the honorific of William Alexander Hammond.
07:00American Civil War era surgeon general who collected the skulls of non-white people to support his view that white
07:07men had superior brains and mental traits.
07:11Scott's Oriole.
07:12This bright yellow bird spends its life protecting yucca plants and building intricate nests worthy of an architectural digest cover.
07:20And yet, it's named after the guy responsible for the Trail of Tears.
07:23A genocide where thousands of indigenous people were killed or forcibly displaced.
07:27So, not only does he have this beautiful Oriole dedicated to him, there's even a monument in Washington, D.C.
07:34erected of General Winfield Scott on his horse.
07:44What's that?
07:49Oh.
07:55Come on, buddy.
07:58They say patience is a part of birding, right?
08:00Essential part of birding.
08:06It's hard to enjoy the benefits of nature when these encounters with birds serve as reminders of ancestral trauma.
08:15So, if I'm looking at the Townsend's Warbler and I'm so excited to see a Townsend's Warbler for the first
08:21time,
08:21and then in that moment where a Townsend's Warbler is right in front of me,
08:25and I think about who Townsend was, and then my heart sinks,
08:29and that joy gets tainted or stolen from me,
08:34because I knew that Townsend didn't like people who look like me.
08:39These spaces can be more inclusive and not just carved out for old white British men wearing Tilly hats.
09:15Do I see myself represented in the birding community?
09:17Everybody has a story about birds, but not everybody has space to share that story.
09:21And as an environmental educator, I felt that it was my responsibility to make space for folks to share those
09:26stories.
09:27I went through a lot of postpartum anxiety, and being outside in nature and birding really helped me through all
09:34of that.
09:34And to now be able to share birding with my daughter is one of the greatest joys of my life,
09:40and to see how happy it makes her when she sees a bird and she points it out.
09:43It's so incredible.
09:44And to give her that nature and that outdoor experience that I didn't have growing up is really, really special.
09:51So, sorry, I'm going to try not to get emotional, but it's really important.
10:00It's really important for me to know that as she's growing up,
10:06there's a safe and inclusive space for her in the birding world,
10:10for her to keep that joy that she has right now.
10:13And so for me, the significance of these bird names changing means a more inclusive future
10:21for our future little birders, like my daughter.
10:47I'm so excited to introduce you to my friend Papakia.
10:51She's from Wusaynish Nation and is using bird names to teach kids their Finchartan language.
10:57That's excellent. I can't wait to meet her.
11:00Hi.
11:01Hi, it's so nice to meet you.
11:02Pleasure.
11:03I'm Papakia.
11:04I'm Tykee.
11:05It's so nice to see you.
11:07What are you looking at?
11:08I had heard the hohualish earlier.
11:11No way, really?
11:11Yeah.
11:13That bird there is named after William Swainson.
11:16Swainson's thrush is a naturalist from the UK.
11:19It's not always been that.
11:21In the Sunshartan language, that bird, we call that the hohualish,
11:25and that's the salmonberry bird.
11:27Oh, yeah.
11:28Yeah.
11:28I've never actually even known it as its English name.
11:31What were you saying?
11:32It's the Swainson's thrush?
11:34Swainson's.
11:34But I love that you don't know its English name.
11:36That's great, honestly.
11:38Hohualish?
11:39Yeah, hohualish.
11:40Hohualish.
11:41Hohualish.
11:41So she has a specific role and job here in Husaynich, and with her song, she ripens
11:47the berries.
11:48Oh.
11:48So she'll go from shrub to shrub, and she'll add the color to each berry.
11:53And that's really important for us here, because the salmonberry, or alila, is a really staple
11:58food to our people here.
12:00It must be so exciting to hear it being like, ah, the berries, it's time, we're good to go.
12:03Yeah, it's a really exciting time.
12:05I love harvesting food, so it helps me get myself ready and prepared for the harvest season,
12:10too.
12:11Changing bird names is not a performative endeavor, not by any means.
12:16It's about improving bird names.
12:18It's about knowing better and doing better.
12:21It's the fact that these bird names connect people to the greater effort of environmental
12:26progress.
12:27When these names alienate people, we are losing allies in the collective fight for environmental
12:33progress.
12:33It's about time that we do better by birds and people.
12:36It's just this very basic part of being a human, to hear birds, to see birds, to slow
12:44down and notice a bird.
12:47I think hearing a bird is a lot like hearing your own heartbeat or hearing the Earth's heartbeat.
12:52You have to slow down and just watch.
12:56As they consider these new names, I hope that they weigh and consider, more importantly, how
13:02these names can reflect how these birds present in nature.
13:06In the UK, we have blackbirds.
13:08They're black.
13:09We have razor bills because they have a razor bill.
13:13Sparrow hawks because they're a hawk that likes to eat birds like sparrows.
13:17We have birds that are named after the things they do, the places they live, and we gave
13:24those birds, in my opinion, appropriate names.
13:27North American birds seem to have been treated like trophies.
13:30What does a Swainson such tell you about it?
13:33It tells you that a guy named William Swainson found it or had a friend who liked him enough
13:39to name a bird after him.
13:40It doesn't tell you anything.
13:42Her name is actually an onomatopoeia.
13:44It's a hawkwalish.
13:46So we named her after her song, and that's what we would hear.
13:49It's a hawkwalish, hawkwalish, hawkwalish, hawkwalish.
13:54Oh, incredible.
13:55It just makes me think that, you know, Townsend's warbler would have had a name prior to colonization
14:01that also would have, you know, represented something about it.
14:04So about its song or where it lives or the job that it does.
14:08We're still hoping to see Townsend's warbler, but I think birding isn't always about seeing
14:12the bird.
14:13Sometimes it's about sitting in what it means if you don't.
14:16And what it means if you're too late.
14:18A bird name can tell you about its habitat, its history, its sound.
14:24These are the things that we know we will lose when we say this bird's name, when we
14:29are fighting for its protection.
14:31We want the marsh wren to have a marsh to be in.
14:34We want the kingfisher to have fish.
14:37We want the seagull to have a sea to gull over.
14:41It means a lot that warblers have trees to horrible in.
14:45These names speak to the actions and speak to the habitat and history that we share with
14:51these birds.
14:52People who have watched birds for any amount of time can tell that there are less birds
14:57and you're seeing birds change their behaviors.
15:00You're seeing birds come at different times of the year.
15:03They are leaving at different times of the year.
15:05We're finding dead birds, seeing some really big changes and some really devastating things
15:12out in the field.
15:14The Eskimo curlew is a heartbreaking recent example of that.
15:19I'm not fluffing anybody's feathers on the fact that Eskimo is an offensive and outdated
15:23term that Inuit communities find derogatory.
15:26But this moniker does beg the question, what's in a name?
15:31Does an offensive bird name matter if we never see the actual bird?
15:35There have been no confirmed sightings of this species since 1963.
15:41Their voices sounded like the distant jingling of sleigh bells.
15:47But now, all you hear is the silence they left behind.
15:54And yet, they are one of the birds listed by the American Ornithological Society, whose name
15:59will soon be changing.
15:59I think a world void of birdsong, that silence would be so eerie.
16:16You talk about how the marsh wren was difficult, because it's deep in its own habitat in the marsh.
16:23What makes it difficult to get the townsend?
16:25The townsend is difficult, because they like the cover of the canopy.
16:30They don't like being near the ground very often.
16:33And so, they love that high cover.
16:35I mean, I guess when you're in the penthouse, hard to, you know, go to the basement, be with the
16:42ground dwellers.
16:43Right?
16:43You can't blame them.
16:44But that means I'm pointing my camera up towards the sky.
16:48The bird's probably going to be silhouetted against the sky, or else everything's going to be really bright,
16:55and it's not going to look very good.
16:56So, there's the artistic side to filming as well, right?
16:59You don't just want any shot.
17:00Right.
17:01You want a shot.
17:02You don't want a cloaca shot.
17:05Like, just, like, hole, like, bird hole shot.
17:08You don't want that.
17:09Exactly.
17:10You don't want that.
17:11Some people can identify birds by cloaca.
17:16Not me, but just, I was going to say, who are these people?
17:23There's a surprising silence.
17:26There's nothing.
17:27Absolutely silent.
17:28And then suddenly one starts, and then something else starts.
17:31You know, the creeper will start, and then the nuthatch starts, and then the chickadee starts.
17:35I don't know the science.
17:36I wish I could do the science behind it, if there's, like, actually evidence.
17:39But I just noticed that it just takes one or two to just kind of, like, break through the silence,
17:43and then they're all just going for it.
17:45Nature is a symphony, and we get to enjoy the orchestra.
17:53Oh, there it is.
17:55Thousand Zorbla.
17:56Thousand Zorbla.
17:57Awesome.
18:00Information menu.
18:01Sound link.
18:13Somewhere in the audience.
18:16Hello, there we go.
18:17On the other side.
18:19Hello.
18:21On the other side.
18:22Welcome home.
18:23Hello, where are you going?
18:23Right.
18:24Have you got me?
18:25You're gonna play?
18:25In the middle of the alert.
18:38It's not the first time I've gone looking for it, but it is the first time that I've
18:42had success.
18:44That's beautiful.
19:09Yeah, yeah, yeah.
19:22And there he goes.
19:24And that's a wrap.
19:26Yeah.
19:27Well done.
19:27I told you we did.
19:29Because long enough.
19:30Yeah.
19:31You have a little faith.
19:53One part of me thinks biologists who spend their whole life studying these animals should
19:57be in charge of naming the birds because they know their behaviors.
20:01And then the other part of me thinks we should just leave it up to kids.
20:03So maybe like a committee of half really smart like scientists and biologists and half five
20:11year olds.
20:14I don't know what I would rename the talents of this warbler.
20:17That would be a question for my daughter.
20:20And she would probably say black and yellow.
20:23Cue the song.
20:24Black and yellow.
20:25Black and yellow.
20:26We can't get rights to that song.
20:30It's just a question for it.
20:31Community conservation is the way that we bring back bird populations.
20:34And in order to get people from all parts of your community, they have to feel like they
20:40are included.
20:41Bird names is one way of doing that.
20:43By renaming all these species, we're just making it easier for people to get excited about birds.
20:54When I had an opportunity to work on the American Ornithological Society's English Bird Names Committee,
21:01we looked at the question of, what happens next? Who should be naming these birds next?
21:06And one of our recommendations was a group of folks from diverse backgrounds that represented north and south of the
21:14equator,
21:15different age groups, different educational backgrounds, different professions,
21:19because these are all of the folks that interact with bird names.
21:23So earlier you asked, what's in a name?
21:26It can be a compass for culture, geography, history.
21:30It could be a handshake or a slur.
21:32A name is a story.
21:34So the question we must answer now is, are we still proud of the one we're telling?
22:04Perfect.
22:07Yes.
22:18You're proud of the one we're telling you.
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