THE AUSTRALIAN MUSEUM is not only a fantastic showplace of the amazing story of life on earth, both past and present, it’s also a centre for education, discovery and science.

Much of this science is based on work done on a vast array of specimens which are stored in what can be described as a “warehouse of samples, skins & skeletons” which is part of the museum but not open to the public except by arrangement and some sort of valid requirement. The entire facility has recently undergone a total makeover, creating an excellent series of storage facilities, laboratories and offices. I dropped in today with my birding buddy Nic Bishop – a regular volunteer at the Australian Museum – who helps out in the Bird department’s specimen store.

Type specimens

Nic took me into one of the storage rooms, filled with the new compactus system. Here, there are hundreds of shelves, full of what are called “skins” – the preserved remains of birds which have had their entrails and most of their skeletons removed. It’s the standard method for presenting and preserving birds for study. Nic opened a draw, full of birds of paradise. “These”, he announced “are the type specimens.”. A “type” specimen is the first collected specimen which is used by a scientist to describe the species. A “species” can not really be considered a “species” unless it has a type specimen. It’s a sad truth, that at least one bird must die in order for it to be properly described and then stored for future examination, against its description.

The Western Parotia type specimen. Inset the marvellous structural colouring of this bird's breast, which undergoes shimmering colour changes as you move it relative to the light. © 2009 Ricki Coughlan.

There’s not many times in my life where my level of excitement has reached a point where I haven’t got words, but at this point, I found myself dancing and shaking on the spot whilst squealing with delight. I could only compare this with what the religious among us would call “a moment of religious ecstasy”. It was a moment in which so many huge concepts came together and engulfed my consciousness and reason that my mind exploded with a dozen racing thoughts at once. Not only was I gazing upon some of the most fantastic creatures to found on the planet, but these were the ones which marked the very beginning of our understanding of these species.

The type specimen of Goldies Bird of Paradise, an exquisite species. © 2009 Ricki Coughlan.

And what species they were: The Western Parotia, famous for its amazing “hoola” courtship dance on a number of David Attenborough DVDs; Goldie’s Bird of Paradise, with its flame like plumes of the finest and most gorgeous filaments; a hybrid Astrapia, with amazing tail plumage, only matched by the dazzle of it’s throat and chest plumage. There were many others lined out there, sad in their inanimate state for sure, but also somehow triumphant in their presence even in death.

A hybird Astrapia: even in death, a truly magnificent creature. © 2009 Ricki Coughlan.

The type specimen of the Crimson Rosella. © 2009 Ricki Coughlan.

NEXT, IT WAS PARROTS. I held in my hands the type specimen for the Crimson Rosella. Can you imagine my goosebumps! When this species was first described it was on the basis of the very bird that I was now holding in my hand!

The barrage of birds continued as I lifted the skin of the type specimen for the Ground Parrot out of the tray. Then, Nic handed me a tiny, almost hummingbird-sized bundle of green. To me this species is almost “grail-like”: a member of the Micropsittini tribe, a pygmy parrot, from the forests of New Guinea. This tiny species, the Yellow-capped Pygmy-parrot, is extraordinary. Only just larger than my thumb, its diet is unique among parrots, as it dines on lichens which grow on tree trunks. There’s never been a decent image captured of this bird in the wild and it takes considerable effort to simply just see one. I am planning a trip to New Guinea and it is the hope that I might observe the micro, or pygmy parrots which is my main driving enthusiasm for the trip. Here I was now holding this tiny, rare and fascinating type specimen in my hand, I was rendered speechless once again.

The Yellow-capped Pygmy-parrot type specimen. This species is hardly larger than my thumb (inset). © 2009 Ricki Coughlan.

NOW, MANY OF YOU may think this is all rather ghoulish and doesn’t have much to do with what you love about birds and birding. However, please consider that without these skins and the collection in the Australian Museum, we would know only a tiny fraction of what we currently know of Australian birds. There is a massive amount of information stored in these skins which help scientists do a great deal of work.

Gone are the days when scientists regularly shot numbers of birds for museum collections as the bulk of specimens obtained in recent years are donated, upon being found after meeting their demise one way or another. Whilst I am personally not in favour of shooting birds for study, the collection forms a conundrum for me because of its enormous value to science. We should never underestimate the value of the skins, skeletons, eggs and pickles which comprises the museum’s collection.

The extinct Eskimo Curlew. © 2009 Ricki Coughlan

Nic then pulled out a large white box made of corflute and set it on a table. “You’ll like this”, he said. When he opened the box, I didn’t know whether to laugh or cry. Before me was a pair of mounted Eskimo Curlew. Gorgeous, somewhat the dimensions of the Little Curlew and nicely mounted. I announced that this was a tick for me and it was legitimate, because this is the only way that you can possibly see this species, as it no longer exists. To see such a glorious creature, its DNA swiped from the story of nature by man’s foolishness, and now rendered only as a stuffed pile of feathers was a very sad sight indeed and if I’d been on my own, I would have cried long and loud.

Nic next brought out another famous extinct species: The Passenger Pigeon. Perhaps the most numerous vertebrate that has ever existed and now it too, due to man’s stupidity, is only available for viewing as a relatively ugly bunch of stuffed feathers. Yes, from the specimen you could imagine that it may have been a wonderful and impressive species in real life, but now, it was just sad. Last, Nic brought out a Paradise Parrot a truly stunning species and also, no more.

The extinct Passenger Pigeon, a sad representation of what must have been a magnificent species in life. © 2009 Ricki Coughlan.

LOOKING AT THESE BIRDS, I got a strong inkling of what people of the future are going to think about us. To some extent they wont know what they are missing, just as we cannot know what it must have really felt like to see the “sky blackened for day after day as the flock of Passenger Pigeons passed overhead”, and when they realise this, the taste will only be all the more bitter. The anger at the arrogance, peerless self interest and utter lack of intelligence on the part of a population which collectively shares the guilt for the passing of this species and is clearly too stupid for words, will surely be flamed. It is a fact that the rate of loss of species on this planet is now 1,000 times greater than it has ever been in the determinable past and this is almost totally due to the actions of man. That’s 1000 times more rapidly than when the Dinosaurs vanished. These figures come to us prior to the worst effects of global warming unfolding. All the indicators point to us causing this to accelerate massively through the effects of global warming and sooner than we think.

Putting the agonies of extinction and contemplation of the climate catastrophe aside, we can at least know that the study of birds is going to be even better served in this country by the excellent new facilities which I observed in the Australian Museum today. I certainly felt a strong sense that they got it 100% right after having visited and look forward to returning soon.

Until next time . . . happy birding

Filed under:
Conservation, Global Warming, Ornithology by Ricki