What’s in a bird’s name? It shouldn’t be a human, ornithologists say

Birds probably don’t identify with the names we assign them, but those names often matter quite a lot to us. And lately, they have been coming under scrutiny.

There is a growing realization that many of the people whom various bird species are named for played problematic roles in history. For example, McCown’s Longspur, a small ground-feeding bird found throughout Colorado, is named after a Confederate general.

Now, the American Ornithological Society has undertaken a project to change the English names of birds named after people.

“We’re only talking about the bird’s common names in English that are found in North America,” said Christy Carello, Ph.D., a professor in the Department of Biology at Metropolitan State University of Denver. The birds’ scientific genus and species Latin names will remain unchanged, she said.

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As many as 152 bird species will eventually be renamed, ideally using descriptive terms, she said. “I really embrace the idea of ‘Let’s make it easier on all those people that are birdwatchers these days and give these birds descriptive names,’” she said.

Names that reference a bird’s appearance or habitat would be quite helpful to birdwatchers seeking to identify a species, Carello said. “There are 11 sparrows in North America that are named after a person,” she said. “All those sparrows are hard enough to distinguish.”

The practice of naming bird species after the person who first described them dates to the 18^th and 19^th centuries, she said, but a modern-day reckoning is shining an unflattering light on who they were as people. Many of them were well-to-do “gentleman scientists.”

“They had the privilege to be able to do this,” Carello said. “With many of them, there was family money.”

Other species were named for explorers: There’s a Lewis’ woodpecker and a Clark’s nutcracker. “It was honoring these historical figures,” she said. “At the time, it seemed like a good idea.” Steller’s jay, Wilson’s warbler and Cooper’s hawk are among the more than 500 bird species that have been identified in Colorado, she said.

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Now, Carello said, “We have so much more awareness of these issues. They might have been naturalists; they might have contributed so much to the understanding we have today and even contributed to conservation. Unfortunately, in their interactions with other people, they might not have been to the character level that we would expect today.”

A prime example was John James Audubon, the naturalist whose gorgeously illustrated “Birds of America” helped set the stage for the scientific study of North American birds. Several bird species are named for him, as is the National Audubon Society, which was founded 54 years after his death.

“He owned and sold slaves,” Carello said. “He desecrated Indigenous people’s burial sites. He was a deeply flawed person. We’re talking about someone who just did horrible things.”

When the National Audubon Society was founded in 1905, “The idea behind it was that John James Audubon was this prominent figure who went out and watched birds here in North America and did these beautiful sketches,” Carello said. “He inspired people to take on conservation issues.”

The American Ornithological Society’s renaming process “isn’t going to happen all at once,” she said. “They’re going to start with a subset of birds,” she said. “Every bird is going to have a committee assigned to it. You can imagine a committee trying to decide on one name.”

Although it is likely to take some time to complete, she supports the initiative. “It was a good decision,” she said. “I think actually most people are OK with it. I spend a lot of time with a lot of birders, and they get it.”