PIONEERS OF INDIAN ORNITHOLOGY - WHO LAID FOUNDATION STONE OF INDIAN ORNITHOLOGY IN INDIA

Have you heard name of the bird as Hume's lark, Jerdon's Baza, Jerdon's Leafbird, Blyth's kingfisher or Himalayan Forest Thrush (Zoothera salimalii)? If you are any way related to avifauna or ornithology then your answer should be yes.  Why their names are prefixed with name of Indian colonial administrator of British era? To know this, we have to go 200 years back in colonial British era.

      We all know Allan Octavian Hume or A O Hume (4 June 1829 – 31 July 1912)   as a founder of Indian national congress. But do you know? He is also called “Allan Octavian Hume – ‘Pope’ of South Asian Ornithology”. A notable ornithologist, Hume has been further named as also "the Father of Indian Ornithology" (Works in India 1849 to 1894) after Edward Blyth. Hume was posted in Oudh, Dehra Dun, Meerut and Etawah, as a colonial administrator and his travels spanning Nainital, Jaipur, Ajmer and Manipur, He described and named birds using English names and local Indian ones at a time when there were no journals for reference. Hume’s collection from India of over 63,000 skinned bird specimens, 18,500 eggs, 500 nests, 200 papers, 14 books and a journal of around 5,500 pages, 400 mammals, remains the single largest donation made to the British Natural History Museum from anywhere in the world. And it stays there, accessible to researchers from all over the world.

           Hume started the quarterly journal Stray Feathers in 1872. At that time the only journal for the Indian region that published on ornithology was the Journal of the Asiatic Society of Bengal. Latter it was published in 11 volumes from November1872 to 1899 and 1 index volume. Initially Hume’s interest was in game birds just sport for hunting and eating. Then from mid 1860s when he started having birds, eggs, nests and other important collections preserved by stuffing and labelling, and started making notes on observation. (Being a biologist Hume apparently had trained an Indian in taxidermy and he remained and worked with him for 12 years.) When he was in his 50s, with his interest in theosophy (Theosophy is a religion established in the United States during the late 19th century.), Hume turned vegetarian and decided to stop killing and collecting birds. Hume has 13 species and sub-species names in his honour.

A number of birds are named after Hume, including-

·        Hume's ground tit (Pseudopodoces humilis), Hume's wheatear (Oenanthe albonigra), Hume's hawk-owl (Ninox obscura), Hume's short-toed lark (Calandrella acutirostris), Hume's leaf warbler (Phylloscopus humei), Hume's whitethroat (Sylvia althaea), Hume's treecreeper (Certhia manipurensis)

          As a naturalist or birder, we come to know that, the some of the Birds are called as jerdon’s or jerdoni. Why so? They are named after, Thomas Caverhill Jerdon (12 Oct 1811 – 12 June 1872),  he was a British physician, zoologist and botanist. (works in India 1836 to 1870). He graduated as a medical student in 1829-1830 and continued medical studies before obtaining an assistant surgeonship in the East India Company's service. He was appointed on 11 September 1835 and he arrived at Madras on 21 February 1836.  He joined the East India Company as an assistant surgeon under the Madras Medical Service of the Madras Presidency and was posted to the Ganjam district of Orissa where he was responsible for the treatment of troops affected by fever and dysentery. His passion however lay elsewhere. Apart from his physician’s duties, he diligently started documenting the birds of the Eastern Ghats. This trend continued as he moved to various parts of India, especially the south, including what is now Andhra Pradesh, Ooty and Trichy. He obtained information on endemic birds through observation as well as interaction with the locals. After the Mutiny of 1857-58, he was named Surgeon-Major. Around this time, he went to Darjeeling on sick leave and spent considerable time studying the Himalayan fauna. He was a pioneering ornithologist who described numerous species of birds, Several species of plants, mammals and reptiles in India. Jerdon's most important publication was The Birds of India (1862–64), which included over 1008 species in three volumes with the second volume in two parts. These birds are named after Thomas Caverhill Jerdon-

Jerdon's Nightjar (Caprimulgus atripennis), Jerdon's Courser (Rhinoptilus bitorquatus), Jerdon's Baza (Aviceda jerdoni), Jerdon's Minivet (Pericrocotus albifrons), Jerdon's Bushlark (Mirafra affinis), Jerdon's Babbler (Chrysomma altirostre), Banasura Laughingthrush (Montecincla jerdoni), Jerdon's Bushchat (Saxicola jerdoni), Jerdon's Leafbird (Chloropsis jerdoni)

Edward Blyth (23 December 1810 – 27 December 1873) (works in India 1841 to 1863) was an English zoologist who worked for most of his life in India as a curator of zoology at the museum of the Asiatic Society of India in Calcutta. Mr. Blyth, who is rightly called the Father of Indian Ornithology before research work of A O Hume, was by far the most important contributor to our knowledge of the Birds of India. As the head of the Asiatic Society's Museum, by Collaboration with various individuals and organizations and correspondence, formed a large collection for the Society, and enriched the pages of the Society's Journal with the results of his study. Thus, he did more for the study of the birds of India than all previous writers. There can be no work on Indian Ornithology without reference to his voluminous contributions.

Avian species bearing his name include Blyth's hornbill(Rhyticeros plicatus), Blyth's leaf warbler(Phylloscopus reguloides), Blyth's hawk-eagle (Nisaetus alboniger), Blyth's olive bulbul(Iole viridescens), Blyth's parakeet(Psittacula caniceps), Blyth's frogmouth(Batrachostomus affinis), Blyth's reed warbler(Acrocephalus dumetorum), Blyth's rosefinch(Carpodacus grandis), Blyth's shrike-babbler(Pteruthius aeralatus), Blyth's tragopan (Tragopan blythii), Blyth's pipit(Anthus godlewskii) and Blyth's kingfisher(Alcedo hercules).

          Sálim Moizuddin Abdul Ali or simply Salim Ali (12 November 1896 – 20 June 1987) was an Indian ornithologist and naturalist. Also referred to as the "Birdman of India". He was the first Indian to conduct systematic bird surveys across modern India and wrote several bird books(if the ancient Indian texts are excluded) that popularized ornithology in India. He became a key figure behind the Bombay Natural History Society after 1947 and used his personal influence to garner government support for the organisation, create the Bharatpur bird sanctuary (Keoladeo National Park) and prevent the destruction of what is now the Silent Valley National Park.

      Along with the famous naturalist and wildlife conservationist Sidney Dillon Ripley he wrote the landmark ten volume Handbook of the Birds of India and Pakistan, a second edition of which was completed after his death. The book of Indian birds is a significant book published in 1941. He also produced a number of regional field guides, including The Birds of Kerala (the first edition in 1953 was titled The Birds of Travancore and Cochin), The Birds of Sikkim, The Birds of Kutch (later as The Birds of Gujarat), Indian Hill Birds and Birds of the Eastern Himalayas.

He was awarded the Padma Bhushan in 1958 and the Padma Vibhushan in 1976, India's third and second highest civilian honours respectively. Some species of birds, Salim Ali's fruit bat (Latidens salimalii), Himalayan Forest Thrush (Zoothera salimalii) and a couple of bird sanctuaries and institutions have been named after him.