Birds of Cassin

Birds of Cassin

There are a ton of birds in the world, right? Well, not so many any more. We are losing millions of birds each year to global warming, pollution and reduction of habitat that can sustain birds. More and more species are on the brink of collapse. With the dwindling nature of the bird world, here are some impressions on one of the most thoughtful ornithologists and naturalists in America. Naturalists, like Cassin, helped the rest of us understand the language and identification ready to rush in with our binoculars and bird life-lists to check them off on the way to the next pond. May this Bird Post stop all the rushing and usher in quiet and joy of the bird calls.

After spending many summers with the Prairie Trek Expeditions in New Mexico, I have gained an appreciation for the desert. It is not the dry, open country, desolation that attracts me, but the life. The wildlife is electric and royal. Take birds for example. In many states of the Southwest lives a lemon-yellow, storm-cloud gray flycatcher known as Cassin’s Kingbird. This kingbird is a prolific songster, which makes it fun to watch as it balances on a perch and flies back and forth catching insects and singing. This and many other birds were named by John Cassin, who was a major figure of nineteenth-century ornithology. He has nine birds named after him worldwide, and five from North America. Only Alexander Wilson (featured in this article Birds: Wilson’s Warbler) is as prolific as Cassin in the namesake category. Perhaps it is worthwhile to explore the life of this man, before exploring his eponymous avian fliers.[1]

The Prodigy Naturalist

Born in Delaware County, Pennsylvania, in 1813, John Cassin was a prodigy with plant and flower identification. By the age of 17 he was drawing those flowers in remarkable detail, and even identifying plant species that were missing from his botany textbook. Eventually, he combined his naturalist’s eye with the meticulous attention of a scientist, bringing a new level of rigor and scientific method to American ornithology.[2]

At the age of 20, Cassin co-created the Delaware County Institute of Science in Media, PA. Cassin moved to Philadelphia in 1834, where he joined the Academy of Natural Sciences. He was appointed as an honorary curator at the Academy. As an American naturalist with a budding interest in taxonomy, there were few better places to start your studies in the States than Philadelphia. Today known as the Academy of Natural Sciences of Drexel University, it is the oldest natural history museum in the U.S. At the time, the Academy hosted the largest collection of bird skins in existence—some 25,000—including specimens from Australia, India and Africa.

Over his career, Cassin described 193 new bird species. African birds were a particular fascination for Cassin, and today four African species, including a honeyguide and a hawk-eagle, are named for him. Eventually Cassin was appointed both vice president and corresponding secretary, during his 26 years at the Academy.

Ornithology was not yet a full-time paying job in the 1830’s. To support his wife and two children Cassin managed a lithograph company where many of his works were printed. “It is hard work, this studying foreign birds,” he wrote. “It would do very well were there no arrangement to be made for ensuring the supply of bread and butter.” Nonetheless he was prolific: his output included 3 books, some 15 articles, and reports of U.S. government expeditions abroad, some of which he accompanied.

Even while running his lithography business, Cassin become the most knowledgeable ornithologist of the mid-nineteenth century, including Alexander Wilson and John J. Audubon. Many of the specimens Cassin worked with were originally collected by Wilson on his western expeditions. Whereas his predecessors sought to describe and illustrate North America’s birds one species at a time, Cassin took a more systematic view. Aided by his encyclopedic knowledge of the Academy’s holdings, Cassin examined the ways in which birds are related to each other.

Cassin believed a scientist needed to go beyond just field observation and apply scientific rigor to their work. “It is by no means desirable to be exclusively a naturalist of the woods,” Cassin wrote. “There must be a combination of theoretical and practical acquirements.”

Cassin joined the Union Army during the Civil War, and served jail time as a prisoner of the Confederates.

Shortly after his time in prison, Cassin’s health started to fail. It seems likely that his work with bird carcasses, which were preserved with arsenic and mercury, which became a major contributors to his poor health. Cassin himself noted the toll that the toxins took on him, writing that his work meant “mortgaging myself by perpetual lease to arsenic and liver complaint.” He died in January 1869, at the age of 56. His death record lists “remittent fever” as the cause. Remittent fevers exhibit a pattern of temperature spikes which do not touch the baseline and remain 1°-2°C above normal in 24 hours. Fevers due to most infectious diseases are remittent and can prove deadly. Arsenic poisoning, ironically is believed to have felled John Townsend, a fellow Philadelpian ornithologist, who died at age 41.[3]

Cassin’s determination and insight inspired the ornithologists who followed him. George Lawrence, who had conducted surveys in the Pacific for Cassin, named a kingbird for him. William Gambel named a sooty, tennis-ball-sized auk Cassin’s Auklet. A red finch of the western mountains was named Cassin’s Finch by Spencer Fullerton Baird, the first curator of the Smithsonian Institution. Samuel Washington Woodhouse described the Cassin’s Sparrow, and Hungarian-born explorer John Xantus collected the first Cassin’s Vireo.[4]

Cassin also named newly discovered bird species in honor of his friends and colleagues. For example Cassin named Lawrence’s Goldfinch in 1850 after his colleague, George Lawrence, who was a New York businessman as well as a bird surveyor and ornithologist.[4]

A century and a half after Cassin’s death, birds as different as seabirds and sparrows still bear his name, as a reminder of his critical role he held in shaping American ornithology. Elliot Coues[5] paid tribute to Cassin’s legacy on hearing of his passing, writing in a letter to a colleague, “…many as are our American ornithologists—high as some stand in American ornithology—there is none left in all our land who can lift up the mantle that has fallen from Cassin’s shoulders.”

=============================

References & Footnotes:

[1] Five birds from North America are named in his honor: the Cassin’s auklet, Cassin’s kingbird, Cassin’s vireo, Cassin’s sparrow, and Cassin’s finch. The periodic cicada Magicicada cassini and the mineral Orthoclase Variety Cassinite are also named for him.

In 1901, the journal of the Delaware Valley Ornithological Club was renamed Cassinia in his honor.

[2] A marvelous article was written by Elizabeth Serrano entitled “The People Behind The Birds Named For People: John Cassin,” published August 28, 2019. It is heavily referenced here, as it is a fine work. Serrano does a great job of introducing the birdwatching public to early American ornithologists and naturalists like Alexander Wilson or John J. Audubon. John Cassin is the sort of character that most naturalists would miss without the resonance of the worldwide web. Elizabeth Serrano ’20 is an Animal Science major at Cornell University. Her work on this story was made possible by the Cornell Lab of Ornithology Science Communication Fund, with support from Jay Branegan (Cornell ’72) and Stefania Pittalue.

[3] Remittent Fever and Arsenic …

Arsenic is one of the prime ingredients used in preservatives to taxidermy birds that were stuffed for scientific and avian collections around the world. Taxidermists in that era struggled heavily with flesh-eating dermestid beetles and moths. To combat these insects, they used powerful toxic agents including: Alum and Salt (used as drying agents and minor curatives to draw out moisture and tighten the skin); Arsenic (a paste made of arsenic trioxide, camphor, potassium carbonate, tallow, and soap); and Mercuric Chloride (a poison dusted on the interior of the skin to kill pests). These ingredients became the global gold standard for bird preservation, and were later connected to the deaths of those, including John Cassin, who were in constant contact with animals with these preservation methods.

[4] If these ornithologists’ names Gambel, Lawrence, Baird, Woodhouse and Xantus sound familiar, it’s because of birds like Gambel’s Quail, Lawrence’s Goldfinch, Baird’s Sandpiper, Woodhouse’s Scrub-Jay, and Xantus’s Hummingbird. Gambel and Woodhouse are also noted as naturalists with trees and toads sharing his last name.

[5] Elliot Ladd Coues was an American army surgeon, historian, ornithologist, and author. He led surveys of the Arizona Territory, and later as secretary of the United States Geological and Geographical Survey of the Territories.

=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=

Appendices:

Birds Cassin named

• Philadelphia Vireo (Vireo philadelphicus). He shot it near Philadelphia in September 1842 and named it after the city, though the bird only passes through on migration. It’s believed to be his only significant personal collecting find.
• Heermann’s Gull (Larus heermanni), 1852, named for the naturalist Adolphus Heermann.
• Lawrence’s Goldfinch (Spinus lawrencei), 1850, named for his colleague George Lawrence.
• Brewer’s Sparrow (Spizella breweri), 1856. He noticed it while going through the Academy’s Clay-colored Sparrow skins.
• These are also confirmed as birds he named, though their scientific names come from my own knowledge: Rufous-crowned Sparrow (Aimophila ruficeps), White-headed Woodpecker (Dryobates albolarvatus), Hutton’s Vireo (Vireo huttoni), Black-throated Sparrow (Amphispiza bilineata), Sage Sparrow (now Bell’s Sparrow, Artemisiospiza belli), Williamson’s Sapsucker (Sphyrapicus thyroideus), Ross’s Goose (Anser rossii), and the Kauaʻi ʻŌʻō (Moho braccatus), a Hawaiian bird now extinct.
• Western Bronze-naped Pigeon (Columba iriditorques), 1856, and Yellow-spotted Barbet (Buccanodon duchaillui), 1856. Both are African birds from Paul Du Chaillu’s collections in Gabon.

Two disputed claims. The Towhee.net history credits Cassin with naming the Acorn Woodpecker and the California Towhee. However, some sources credit Swainson (1827) with the Acorn Woodpecker and Vigors (1839) with the California Towhee. Cassin may have named forms that were later merged into those species. Similarly, some sources credit him with the Wrentit. His Illustrations did include one of the first published accounts of it, but William Gambel collected and named it.

Birds that others named in Cassin’s honor

• Cassin’s Finch (Haemorhous cassinii), named for Cassin by Spencer Baird.
• Cassin’s Sparrow (Peucaea cassinii), described in 1852 by Samuel Woodhouse from a specimen he had collected near San Antonio, Texas, and sent to Cassin for embalming.
• Cassin’s Vireo (Vireo cassinii). John Xantus collected the first specimen near Fort Tejon, California.
• Cassin’s Kingbird (Tyrannus vociferans).
• Cassin’s Auklet (Ptychoramphus aleuticus).
• Cassin’s Hawk-Eagle (Aquila africana).
• Cassin’s Honeyguide (Prodotiscus insignis).
• Cassin’s Flycatcher (Muscicapa cassini).
• Cassin’s Spinetail (Neafrapus cassini). The English name (common and scientific) honoring Cassin were added later.
• Cassin’s Malimbe (Malimbus cassini). The English name (common and scientific) honoring Cassin were added later.

Works by Cassin

• Cassin, John. “Catalogue of Birds Collected at Cape Lopez, Western Africa, by Mr. P. B. Du Chaillu, in 1856, with Notes and Descriptions of New Species.” Proceedings of the Academy of Natural Sciences of Philadelphia, vol. 8, 1857, pp. 316–22.
• —. “Catalogue of Birds Collected during a Survey for a Ship Canal across the Isthmus of Darien, by Order of the Government of the United States, Made by Lieut. N. Michler, of the U.S. Topographical Engineers, with Notes and Descriptions of New Species.” Proceedings of the Academy of Natural Sciences of Philadelphia, vol. 12, 1860, pp. 132–44, 188–97.
• —. “Catalogue of Birds Collected on the Rivers Camma and Ogobai, Western Africa, by Mr. P. B. Duchaillu in 1858, with Notes and Descriptions of New Species.” Proceedings of the Academy of Natural Sciences of Philadelphia, vol. 11, 1859, pp. 54–55.
• —. “Columba unicincta, Nobis.” Proceedings of the Academy of Natural Sciences of Philadelphia, vol. 11, 1859, p. 143.
• —. “Description of a New Tanager from the Isthmus of Darien and Note on Selenidera spectabilis, Cassin.” Proceedings of the Academy of Natural Sciences of Philadelphia, vol. 10, 1858, p. 178.
• —. “Description of New Buceros, and a Notice of the Bucerus elatus, Temm., Both of Which Are in the Collection of the Academy of Natural Sciences of Philadelphia.” Proceedings of the Academy of Natural Sciences of Philadelphia, vol. 3, 1848, pp. 330–31.
• —. “Description of New Species of Birds of the Genera Parus, Linn.; Emberiza, Linn.; Carduelis, Briss.; Myiothera, Ill.; and Leuconerpes, Sw., Specimens of Which Are in the Collection of the Academy of Natural Sciences of Philadelphia.” Proceedings of the Academy of Natural Sciences of Philadelphia, vol. 5, 1850, pp. 103–06.
• —. “Descriptions of New Species of Birds of the Genera Galbula and Bucco, Briss., Specimens of Which Are in the Collection of the Academy of Natural Sciences of Philadelphia.” Proceedings of the Academy of Natural Sciences of Philadelphia, vol. 5, 1851, pp. 154–55.
• —. Illustrations of the Birds of California, Texas, Oregon, British and Russian America. Philadelphia, 1856. Illustrations of the Birds of California, Texas, Oregon, British and Russian America came out in parts from 1853 to 1855 and as a complete volume in 1856. Cassin’s bird chapters for Commodore Perry’s Japan expedition report (1856) and for James Gilliss’s U.S. Naval Astronomical Expedition to the Southern Hemisphere (1855).
• —. Mammalogy and Ornithology. United States Exploring Expedition, vol. 8, Philadelphia, 1858. Mammalogy and Ornithology, the volume for the U.S. Exploring Expedition (from the Wilkes Expedition to Oregon Territory and the Pacific Northwest).
• —. “Notes of an Examination of the Birds Composing the Family Caprimulgidae, in the Collection of the Academy of Natural Sciences of Philadelphia.” Proceedings of the Academy of Natural Sciences of Philadelphia, vol. 5, 1851, pp. 175–90.
• —. “Notes of an Examination of the Birds of the Subfamily Coerebinae.” Proceedings of the Academy of Natural Sciences of Philadelphia, vol. 16, 1864, pp. 265–75.
• —. “A Second Study of the Icteridae.” Proceedings of the Academy of Natural Sciences of Philadelphia, vol. 18, 1866, pp. 403–17.
• —. “Sketch of the Birds Composing the Genera Vireo, Vieillot, and Vireosylva, Bonaparte, with a List of the Previously Known and Descriptions of Three New Species.” Proceedings of the Academy of Natural Sciences of Philadelphia, vol. 5, 1851, pp. 149–54.
• —. “A Study of the Icteridae.” Proceedings of the Academy of Natural Sciences of Philadelphia, vol. 18, 1866, pp. 10–25.
• —. “A Third Study of the Icteridae.” Proceedings of the Academy of Natural Sciences of Philadelphia, vol. 19, 1867, pp. 45–74.
• Baird, Spencer F., et al. “Birds.” Reports of Explorations and Surveys to Ascertain the Most Practicable and Economical Route for a Railroad from the Mississippi River to the Pacific Ocean, vol. 9, Washington, 1858.

Here is a LINK to the List of Bird Names Derived from English Names