Bird Brain: Over 2,400 Questions to Test Your Bird Knowledge

19  What now Critically Endangered species received protection as early as 1504 from the Archbishop of Salzburg?

20  Which Critically Endangered passerine is confined to a 7 sq km island in the Atlantic?

2009 D

Nigel Redman – ABC

Answers: see here (#litres_trial_promo)

1  What is the principal diet of the European Bee-eater?

2  What is the principal diet of the Macaroni Penguin?

3  Which American sparrow is named after Charles Darwin’s mentor at Cambridge?

4  How many ossicles do birds have in their middle ear?

5  Which has the longer tail – Caspian Tern or Cuckoo?

6  Name two of the three species of Critically Endangered ducks that are not confined to islands?

7  For a bonus, name the third.

8  What mammal was responsible for the deaths of both Prince Ruspoli and Johan Wahlberg after whom a turaco and eagle are named?

9  Which well-known ornithologist, who died this year, wrote The Private Life of the Street Pigeon in 1979 and also recorded Witherby’s Sound Guide to British Birds with Myles North?

10  Which of the following birds does not exist: Kiwi, Pewee, Weewee, Iiwi?

11  What is a sod in Shetland?

12  What is the connection between the Silver Invicta, the Golden Olive Bumble and the (Eurasian) Jay?

13  What is the matter with a falconer’s hawk if it has craye?

14  What birds can be Broad-tailed, Pin-tailed, Shaft-tailed and Straw-tailed?

15  Which philosopher and ornithologist, born 2,393 years ago, is commemorated in the Latin name of a British seabird?

16  Who is the Director of the British Trust for Ornithology?

17  Which is the only warbler included in the Farmland Bird Index?

18  When was the Neotropical Bird Club founded?

19  Which is the only species of crane that has an increasing population trend?

20  Prior to the 2001 record of Magpie on St Martin’s, how many had previously been recorded on Scilly?

2010 A

Pete Morris – ABC

Answers: see here (#litres_trial_promo)

1  Of which American state is the Rhode Island Red the state bird?

2  In which decade did Sir Peter Scott first notice the significance of bill patterns to enable individual Bewick’s Swans to be told apart?

3  When was the Ramsar Convention on Wetlands signed? Was it 1961, 1971 or 1981?

4  In which country is Ramsar after which the International Convention on Wetlands is named?

5  In which county have both Pacific auks on the British List been recorded?

6  Where would you go to see Troglodytes troglodytes hirtensis?

7  What material did the Japanese use to make mist-nets for catching birds for food during World War II, and which were subsequently adopted in 1956 for ringing?

8  Which of the following birds does not exist: Minute Piculet, Miniature Tit-babbler, Tiny Hawk, Small Minivet?

9  What species of swan was found dead at Cellardyke from avian flu in 2006?

10  What species was it at first thought to be?

11  What species has hybridised with chickens, guineafowl, two species of goose, 41 species of duck and has also indulged in homosexual necrophilia?

12  Kakapo only breed when the fruit of which trees are superabundant?

13  ‘On a tree by a river a little tom-tit – sang “willow, titwillow titwillow …”’ comes from The Mikado by Gilbert and Sullivan. What was the tom-tit?

14  What is the title of the African Bird Club journal?

15  In 1456 what finch species was the first to be involved in singing competitions in Europe?

16  What birds can be Velvet-mantled, White-bellied, Crow-billed, Fork-tailed or Hair-crested?

17  What is ptilochronology used to measure?

18  Who wrote the foreword for either the first or the second Atlas of Breeding Birds of Britain and Ireland?

19  In which country is BANCA the BirdLife partner?

20  What is a ‘mock nightingale’ according to Gilbert White?

2010 B

James Eaton – OBC