If you’ve ever spent time perusing field guides from different parts of the world, you’ll no doubt have noticed that even though some of the same birds appear in them (verified by their Latin binomials), their common names are sometimes different. Northern Harriers in the United States are, for example, Hen Harriers in England. And if you go to an older field guide, this same bird in the U.S. was once the Marsh Hawk. Then of course there’s the divergence in names between loons and divers – and don’t even get me started about tits.
Ray Reedman takes up just such topics as these in his new book Lapwings, Loons and Lousy Jacks: The How and Why of Bird Names from Pelagic Publishing. Examining the names of a variety of bird species from scientific as well as folkloric perspectives, Reedman’s book sounds just right to satisfy – as well as pique – the curiosity of those, like myself, who have long wondered at the stories behind, and reasons for, the names by which the birds around us are – and have been – known.
