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Royal College of Physicians

The Royal College of Physicians of London, commonly referred to simply as the Royal College of Physicians (RCP), is a British professional membership body dedicated to improving the practice of medicine, chiefly through the accreditation of physicians by examination. Founded by royal charter from King Henry VIII in 1518, as the College of Physicians, the RCP is the oldest medical college in England.

The RCP's home in Regent's Park is one of the few post-war buildings to be listed at Grade I. In 2016 it was announced that the RCP was to open new premises in Liverpool at The Spine, a new building in the Liverpool Knowledge Quarter. The Spine opened in May 2021.

History

The college was incorporated as "the President and College or Commonalty of the Faculty of Physic in London" when it received a royal charter in 1518, affirmed by Act of Parliament in 1523. It is not known when the name "Royal College of Physicians of London" was first assumed or granted. It came into use after the charter of 1663, and was used to make reference to the college in the Medical Act 1858. It was legally authorised as the college's corporate name by the Royal College of Physicians of London Act 1960, the function of which was primarily to move the premises of the college outside the cities of London or Westminster to Regent's Park).

The college was based at three sites in the City of London near St Paul's Cathedral, before moving to Pall Mall East (overlooking Trafalgar Square), and then to its current location in Regent's Park.

The first Harveian Librarian was Christopher Merret, a fellow of the college and a friend of Harvey. He was set up with a lifetime appointment that compensated him with room and board and a small stipend. In 1666, the Great Fire of London destroyed many of the rooms and most of the books, so they tried to break the contract with Merret, but he fought them at the King's Court, claiming it was a lifetime appointment. He eventually lost the case, was expelled from the Fellowship, had to seek private lodgings and return the books he had rescued from the fire.

The college became the licensing body for medical books in the late seventeenth century, and sought to set new standards in learning through its own system of examinations. The college's tradition of examining continues to this day and it is still perhaps how the college is best known to the general public.

The Royal College of Physicians celebrated its 500-year anniversary in 2018.

Membership
The MRCP(UK) postnominal is used by doctors who have passed the examinations for the Diploma of Membership of the Royal Colleges of Physicians of the United Kingdom, which are held jointly by all of the UK Royal Colleges of Physicians. Holders of the MRCP(UK) may also become "Collegiate Members" of the London College (using the additional post-nominal MRCP(Lond)) and/or of the other two UK colleges. Affiliate membership of the Royal College of Physicians is a similar level of membership as collegiate membership, but is awarded to senior doctors without MRCP(UK). Both Collegiate Members and Affiliate Members may be considered for advancement to fellowship of the college.

The college also has associate, medical student, and foundation doctor levels of membership.

Fellowship
Fellows of the Royal College of Physicians (who use the post-nominal FRCP) are elected mostly from the general membership (collegiate or affiliate), but also occasionally from among the members of the more specialised faculties within the Royal Colleges of Physicians, e.g. Occupational Medicine (MFOM), Pharmaceutical Medicine (MFPM), and Forensic and Legal Medicine (MFLM), etc. There are also fellows who are elected de jure (usually medical experts from other countries) and honoris causa (dignitaries, members of the Royal Family, etc.).

Physicians from the Royal College of Physicians published a series of works containing biographical entries of the fellows called Munk's Roll.

Library
The library aims to support the learning and information needs of the members, students, and staff of the college. The unique collections may also used for research by members of the public. An enquiry service provides information on the current role and functions of the RCP as well as its history. The library holds books on a range of subjects including:
 * history of medicine
 * genealogy
 * health and social policy
 * medical education

Rare book collections
The Royal College of Physicians has had a library collection since its foundation in 1518, although most of the original books were destroyed during the Great Fire of London in 1666. The rare books and special collections are diverse in coverage, reflecting the collecting habits of earlier fellows and the need to provide the broad educational base considered suitable for physicians. The rare books are normally available to the general public, by appointment, Monday to Friday 10 am – 5 pm.

Books and journals—new and old—display a continuum of change and development in the RCP's specialties, as well as in the medical profession. Highlights include:
 * approximately 130 books printed before 1502, including some of the earliest printings of the classical medical texts by Greek, Roman and Arabic doctors
 * books belonging to and annotated by the Elizabethan astrologer and occultist John Dee
 * approximately 3,000 books, dated up to 1688, in the Dorchester collection, on a variety of subjects including architecture, science and travel
 * over 4,500 tracts from the 17th to the 19th century covering a wide range of subjects, both medical and scientific
 * the Evan Bedford collection, which includes almost every significant text in the history of cardiology up to 1970

Highlights of the 20th-century collection include:
 * books relating to the history of the RCP's specialties
 * biographies of fellows and prominent figures in medicine
 * books relating to the formation of the National Health Service (NHS) and its continuing history
 * books relating to the history of hospitals in the UK
 * books relating to medical ethics and the status and role of the physician
 * every item published by the RCP, including reports and pamphlets.

The book collections are displayed in regularly changing exhibitions.

In December 2020 the college's Board of Trustees (BoT) discussed in detail the RCP's financial position, which, like so many charities, had been impacted significantly by the COVID-19 pandemic. All aspects of RCP activity had come under review and a range of cost reduction and income generation options considered, including the possible sale of non-medical books from its collection. The BoT recognised that this had caused concern for some quarters of the membership and agreed to delay such a sale for the immediate future.

Museum collections

The museum collections at the Royal College of Physicians relate to the history of the college, and the history of the Physician's profession. They help to place the history and development of medicine and health care in its widest context. The collections include: portraits, silver, medical instruments, the Symons Collection, commemorative medals and anatomical tables.

The collection of c. 250 portraits provides a pictorial and sculptural record of presidents, Fellows and other physicians associated with it from its foundation in 1518 to the present day. It includes pieces by well-known artists, such as a bust of Baldwin Hamey Junior (1600–1676) by Edward Pierce and one of Richard Mead (1673–1754) by Louis François Roubiliac. There are portraits, such as that of Richard Hale (1670–1728) by Jonathan Richardson. In 1964 a volume on the Portraits of the college was published by Gordon Wolstenholme in which they were described by David Piper.

The silver collection has few pieces pre-dating the Great Fire of London (1666) because of a robbery during the previous year. Baldwin Hamey's inkstand bell and William Harvey's whalebone demonstration rod, tipped with silver, are two that survive. Many pieces of silver are used to this day for formal occasions in the college. Special objects include the President's staff of office, the caduceus and the silver-gilt College mace.

The college also owns six 17th-century anatomical tables, probably made by drying and mounting the actual blood vessels and nerves of the human body onto blocks of wood and then varnishing them. They would have been used as a teaching aid for teaching anatomy, because it was difficult to obtain cadavers for dissection.

The Symons Collection of medical instruments is displayed within the college building. It began as a collection of objects relating to self-care in Georgian times and expanded to include items that would have been used by physicians when treating patients, mostly in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries.

The collections can be searched via an online catalogue and items on display are open to the general public Monday to Friday 9 am – 5 pm. The Royal College of Physicians is a member of the London Museums of Health & Medicine.

Archives
The archive collections date back to the foundation of the Royal College of Physicians in 1518 and include the original Royal charter granted by King Henry VIII. The activities of the college are preserved in official minutes and other institutional records dating from the 16th century to the present.

Over 200 collections of personal papers reflect the experiences of practitioners and patients over the last 500 years. These collections include items dating back to the 13th century which relate to the history of medicine and science in Europe.

In the 19th century, William Munk, a fellow with a keen interest in medical biography started collection information about all the physicians who had either been licensed by the College or became a member. After years of research the resulting biographies were compiled into 3 volumes which included everyone who was a member of, or licensed by the college up to 1825. These volumes, published between 1861 and 1878 were the start of a series, known as Munk's Roll after the original compiler. Later volumes focussed on fellows and the series is now online with regular updates ensuring there is a biography for every past fellow from 1518 to the present.

The archive continues to collect records that demonstrate the developing roles of physicians, including oral recordings of practitioners reflecting on their lives and careers. The collections can be searched via an online catalogue, and are available to the general public by appointment. The 'Voices of medicine' oral histories are available to listen to via the library catalogue.

Facility

The college is located in St. Andrews Place, which is at the north end of the road running up the east side of Regent's Park, Park Square East. The college's previous headquarters, on Pall Mall East/Trafalgar Square, is now Canada House, part of the Canadian high commission in London. The college had a number of other locations prior to Pall Mall East, in the City of London.

The current College building was designed by architect Sir Denys Lasdun, opening in 1964 and has since been recognised as a building of national importance: it is a Grade I listed building, one of a very select band of post-war buildings sharing this distinction. Lasdun's use of mosaic clad concrete was extremely influential on many later public buildings. An interesting feature of the building was a 'Moving Wall', weighing five tons (5080 kg) and capable of being hydraulically lifted ten feet (3050 mm) to unite or sub-divide a hall of sixty-two feet (18.9 m) width, which was the interior width of the building. The hydraulic equipment and the steel framework for the Moving Wall were produced by Merryweather & Sons Ltd of Greenwich, hydraulic engineers. Although better known for fire fighting equipment it was not the company's first installation of this kind.

Publications
The college publishes two peer-reviewed medical journals. Clinical Medicine and Future Healthcare Journal. In addition, it publishes regular reports, clinical guidelines, policy papers and online resources. Occupational and Environmental Medicine is the official journal of the Faculty of Occupational Medicine.

Commentary is the membership magazine. It is published every 2 months.

Faculties
The Royal College of Physicians hosts six training faculties: the Faculty of Forensic and Legal Medicine, the Faculty for Pharmaceutical Medicine, the Faculty of Occupational Medicine the Faculty of Public Health, the Faculty of Sport and Exercise Medicine and the Faculty of Physician Associates.

Forensic and Legal Medicine
The Faculty of Forensic and Legal Medicine (FFLM) was established as a faculty of the RCP in 2006 to develop and maintain the highest possible standards of competence and professional integrity in forensic and legal medicine. The specialty covers professionals working in three related disciplines: forensic medical practitioners (forensic physicians, forensic nurses and paramedics, forensic pathologists, sexual assault examiners, and child physical and sexual assault examiners); medico-legal advisers; and medically qualified coroners. The FFLM holds a number of exams for professionals working in Forensic and Legal Medicine. It is recognised as the authoritative body for the purpose of consultation in matters of educational or public interest concerning forensic and legal medicine.

Pharmaceutical Medicine
The Faculty of Pharmaceutical Medicine (FPM) of the royal colleges of physicians of the UK (Edinburgh, Glasgow and London) aims to advance the science and practice of pharmaceutical medicine by working to develop and maintain competence, ethics and integrity and the highest professional standards in the specialty for the benefit of the public.

Occupational Medicine
The Faculty of Occupational Medicine was inaugurated as a specialist faculty of the RCP in 1978. The FOM is the professional and educational body for occupational medicine in the UK and seeks to ensure the highest standards in the practice of occupational medicine.

Public Health
The Faculty of Public Health (FPH) is a joint faculty of the three royal colleges of physicians of the United Kingdom (London, Edinburgh and Glasgow). It is a membership organisation for nearly 4,000 public health professionals across the UK and around the world. Its role is to improve the health and wellbeing of local communities and national populations.

Sport and Exercise Medicine
The Faculty of Sport and Exercise Medicine (FSEM) UK is the governing body for the specialty of sport and exercise medicine (SEM) in the UK. It is an intercollegiate faculty of the RCP and the Royal College of Surgeons of Edinburgh.

Physician Associates
The Faculty of Physician Associates was founded in 2015 with the collaboration of the RCP and the UK Association of Physician Associates (UKAPA). The Faculty is the professional membership body for physician associates in the UK, and sets standards for the education and training of physician associates, publishes the PA national curriculum and oversees the running of the PA national certification examinations. It oversees the PA managed voluntary register.

On 13 March 2024 the RCP held an Extraordinary General Meeting, the third in its history, to debate the issue of physician associates and their role, scope of practice, and regulation. The controversy resulted in the resignation of the College's President in June 2024.

Lecture series
The college holds an annual lecture, commonly referred to as the Lumleian Lectures, which were named in honour of Lord Lumley and established as part of the Lumleian Trust. The trust and lectures were established in 1582 by Richard Caldwell, a former president of the college. The subject matter of the lectures was initially in surgery, which was later changed to in medicine. The first lecture was given by Richard Forster, and the lectures continue to today.

Once a year, traditionally on St Luke's Day (18th October), a Fellow is appointed to deliver the Harveian Oration to the assembled college in memory of William Harvey. The oration seeks to honour the founders and benefactors of the college and encourage a spirit of experimentation amongst the members.

Other annual lectures are the Bradshaw Lecture, the Croonian Lecture, the Goulstonian Lecture, the Fitzpatrick Lecture, and the Milroy Lectures.

Awards
The Bisset Hawkins Medal is a triennial award founded in 1899 in honour of Francis Bisset Hawkins, a fellow of the college, to recognise work done in the preceding ten years in advancing sanitary science or promoting public health. The Baly Medal is a biennial award, founded by a gift from Frederick Daniel Dyster (1809?–93) received in 1866, confirmed by deed 1930 – in memory of William Baly: £400 to provide a gold medal for the person deemed to have most distinguished himself in the science of physiology, especially during the previous two years.

title: Royal College of Physicians


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Fea's petrel

The Fea's petrel (Pterodroma feae) is a small seabird in the gadfly petrel genus, Pterodroma. It was previously considered to be a subspecies of the soft-plumaged petrel (P. mollis), but they are actually not closely related at all. However, P. feae is very closely related to Zino's petrel and Desertas petrel, two other species recently split from P. mollis. The gadfly petrels are named for their speedy weaving flight, as if evading horseflies. The flight action is also reflected in the genus name Pterodroma, from Ancient Greek pteron, "wing" and dromos, " runner". This species is named after the Italian zoologist Leonardo Fea (1852-1903).

Taxonomy and systematics
The first known recording of the "soft-plumaged petrel" appears to have been in October 1768 off the coast of West Africa during Captain Cook's first voyage. While no description was published at the time, a drawing of the specimen produced by Sydney Parkinson can be recognised as the form breeding on the Cape Verde Islands. This specimen was later described as a distinct species by the Italian zoologist Tommaso Salvadori in 1900 with the binomial name Oestrelata feae, named after the Italian ornithologist Leonardo Fea and was later reclassified again as Pterodroma feae.

The gadfly petrels in the genus Pterodroma are seabirds of temperate and tropical oceans. Many are little-known and poorly studied, and their often similar appearance has meant that the taxonomy of the group has been rather fluid. The forms breeding in Macaronesia on Madeira, Bugio in the Desertas Islands, and in the Cape Verde archipelago were long considered to be subspecies of the southern hemisphere soft-plumaged petrel P. mollis, but differences in size, vocalisations, breeding behaviour and mitochondrial DNA analysis showed that the northern birds are not closely related to P. mollis, and that the Bermuda petrel or cahow may be the closest relative of the Macaronesian birds. Sangster recommended establishing Zino's petrel on Madeira and Fea's petrel on the Desertas and Cape Verde as full species, and the species split was accepted by the Association of European Rarities Committees (AERC) in 2003. More recently, some authorities have further split Fea's petrel, separating the Desertas Islands breeding birds from those in the Cape Verde archipelago.

Sangster estimated that the two Macaronesian species diverged at the end of the Early Pleistocene, 850,000 years ago, although the methodology used to establish this time scale has subsequently been questioned. An analysis of feather lice from Fea's petrels Pterodroma feae deserti from Bugio Island and Zino's petrels from the Madeiran mainland showed that there were marked differences between the two seabirds in terms of the parasites they carried, suggesting that they have long been isolated, since lice can normally only be transferred through physical contact in the nest. The species on Zino's petrel are most similar to those of the Bermuda petrel, whereas Fea's petrel's lice are like those of Caribbean and Pacific Pterodromas. This suggests that despite the close physical proximity of the two species of gadfly petrel found in the Madeiran archipelago, they may have arisen from separate colonisations of mainland Madeira and, later, the Desertas Islands.

Description
This long-winged petrel is 33–36 cm in length with an 86–94 cm wingspan. It has a grey back and wings, with a dark "W" marking across the wings. The undersides of the wings are dark and the belly is white. It has a fast impetuous flight. It picks planktonic food items from the ocean surface. This species is very similar to the Zino's petrel, but is larger and has a thicker black bill.

As all three species in the Pterodroma feae/madeira/desertae complex were once believed to be subspecies of a single species: Pterodroma mollis, the extreme difficulty in telling them apart is easily understood. A summary of data from a morphological study sheds light on the issue: In terms of ratios:
 * In overall size feae is closer to deserta and both are bigger than madeira (wing length - f:262, d: 264, m: 248; tarsus - f:34.7, d: 35.2, m: 32.7).
 * Bill length once again similar in feae and deserta and both larger than madeira (f:29.0, d: 28.6, m: 26.3).
 * Bill depth by far biggest in deserta, lowest in madeira, and intermediate in feae (f:11.9, d: 12.9, m: 10.5).
 * (Bill length/wing length) (f:11.1%, d: 10.8%, m: 10.6%) is rather similar in the three taxa.
 * (Bill length/bill depth) (f: 2.44, d: 2.22, m: 2.53) is lowest in deserta, and highest in madeira. In feae it is intermediate, but more than twice closer to madeira than to deserta.

Distribution and habitat
It breeds on four islands of Cape Verde in the eastern Atlantic Ocean: Fogo, Santo Antão, São Nicolau and Santiago.

Breeding
This seabird is strictly nocturnal at the breeding sites to avoid predation by gulls. Like most petrels, its walking ability is limited to a short shuffle to the burrow. This endangered species nests in colonies in burrows in spring and autumn. It lays a single white egg.

license: Creative Commons - Attribution Share-Alike - https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/

title: Fea's petrel


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Zino's petrel

Zino's petrel (Pterodroma madeira) or the freira, is a species of small seabird in the gadfly petrel genus, endemic to the island of Madeira. This long-winged petrel has a grey back and wings, with a dark "W" marking across the wings, and a grey upper tail. The undersides of the wings are blackish apart from a triangle of white at the front edge near the body, and the belly is white with grey flanks. It is very similar in appearance to the slightly larger Fea's petrel, and separating these two Macaronesian species at sea is very challenging. It was formerly considered to be a subspecies of the soft-plumaged petrel, P. mollis, but they are not closely related, and Zino's was raised to the status of a species because of differences in morphology, calls, breeding behaviour and mitochondrial DNA. It is one of Europe's most endangered seabirds, with breeding areas restricted to a few ledges high in the central mountains of Madeira.

Zino's petrel nests in burrows which are visited only at night, when they give their haunting calls. The single white egg is incubated by both adults, one sitting during the day while the other feeds on fish and squid at sea. Eggs, chicks and adults have been subject to predation by introduced cats and rats, and in the past have been taken for food by local shepherds. Predator control, and other measures such as the removal of grazing animals that trample the burrows, have enabled the population to recover to 65–80 breeding pairs; the species remains listed as endangered on the IUCN Red List. However, conservation efforts had a major setback in August 2010 when fires killed three adults and 65 percent of the chicks. The population eventually recovered and was stable at 160 individuals by 2018.

Taxonomy
The gadfly petrels in the genus Pterodroma are seabirds of temperate and tropical oceans. Many are little-known, and their often similar appearance have caused the taxonomy of the group to be rather fluid. The forms breeding in Macaronesia on Madeira, Bugio in the Desertas Islands, and in the Cape Verde archipelago were long considered to be subspecies of the Southern Hemisphere soft-plumaged petrel, P. mollis, but mitochondrial DNA analysis, and differences in size, vocalisations, breeding behaviour, showed that the northern birds are not closely related to P. mollis, and that the Bermuda petrel or Cahow may be the closest relative of the Macaronesian birds. Ornithologist George Sangster recommended establishing Zino's petrel on Madeira and Fea's petrel on the Desertas and Cape Verde as full species, and the species split was accepted by the Association of European Rarities Committees (AERC) in 2003.

Nunn and Zino estimated that the two Macaronesian species diverged at the end of the Early Pleistocene, 850,000 years ago. An analysis of feather lice taken from Fea's petrels, Pterodroma feae deserti, from Bugio Island, and from Zino's petrels from the Madeiran mainland showed that there were marked differences between the two seabirds in terms of the parasites they carried, suggesting that they have long been isolated since lice can normally only be transferred through physical contact in the nest. The species on Zino's petrel are most similar to those of the Bermuda petrel, whereas Fea's petrel's lice are like those of Caribbean and Pacific Pterodroma species. This suggests that despite the close physical proximity of the two species of gadfly petrel found in the Madeiran archipelago, they may have arisen from separate colonisations of mainland Madeira and, later, the Desertas Islands. Although their reproductive isolation has allowed the separate evolutionary development of the two species, genetic evidence shows the three Macaronesian petrels are each other's closest relatives.

The petrels breeding in the high central mountains of Madeira were first recorded in 1903 by German naturalist and priest Ernst Johann Schmitz, who failed to realise that they were different from the Fea's petrels he had seen in the Desertas. The species was formally described as a race of soft-plumaged petrel by Australian amateur ornithologist Gregory Mathews in 1934. Following the recognition of the Madeiran birds as a full species, they were named after the British ornithologist, Paul Alexander Zino, who was instrumental in their conservation during the latter half of the twentieth century. The genus name Pterodroma is derived from Greek πτερον, pteron, "a wing", and δρομος, dromos, "running", and refers to the bird's swift erratic flight. The specific madeira refers to the island on which it breeds. The Portuguese name Freira means "nun"; the inhabitants of Curral das Freiras (Nun's Valley) near the breeding site claimed that the nocturnal wailing of the petrels in the breeding season were the calls of the suffering souls of the nuns. The sisters had taken refuge in the valley from attacks on the island by French pirates in 1566 that lasted for 15 days.

Pterodroma petrel remains dated between 60,000 and 25,000 years BP were found in two cave sites in Gibraltar. They consist of a more abundant form similar in size to Zino's, and a larger, less common type. It is uncertain whether they represent the site of a former breeding colony, or are the result of a seabird wreck in which storms blow birds inland. They do suggest, however, that members of the genus were formerly more widespread.

Description
This long-winged petrel is 32 - 34 cm long with an 80 - 86 cm, and an average weight of 290 g (10.3 in). It has a grey, grey wings with a dark "W" marking across them, and a grey upper tail. The undersides of the wings are blackish, apart from a triangle of white at the front edge near the body, and the is white with grey. The head has a mottled whitish-brown, a dark cap, and a dark spot below and behind the brown eye. The is black and the legs are flesh pink, the colour continuing onto the first third of the feet, the rest of the toes and webs being black-brown. It gives the general impression of a small Cory's or great shearwater, with a fast flight; in strong winds it shears high above the surface with angled wings. Nothing is known of the fresh juvenile or the moult sequence, and age assessment is currently not feasible.

This species is very similar in appearance to the Fea's petrel, but is smaller. The size difference and lighter flight may not be apparent at sea, especially with lone birds, but a recent study helped to clarify other useful features. Zino's has a diagnostically small, delicate, often rather long and slender bill, which may be obvious in the most slender-billed examples, which are probably mostly females, but can be difficult to determine in larger-billed, probably adult male, birds. Another useful feature is a large whitish panel on the. The wing panel is exclusive to Zino's but is only shown by 15% of the birds. Zino's has a more rounded wing tip, but P. feae deserti sometimes shows a rounded wing tip, so this feature is not diagnostic. Previously suggested criteria such as head, upper wing and flank patterns were found to be inconclusive. Off the eastern United States and the Azores, both Macaronesian petrels are easily distinguished from the larger Bermuda petrel by that species', which are uniformly dark but for a pale grey.

This species at its breeding sites gives a long mournful call like the hooting of a tawny owl, and a much less frequent sound like the whimpering of a pup. It is silent at sea. The breeding calls are very similar to those of Fea's petrel, and Bretagnolle's analysis of the calls of the soft-plumaged petrel complex led him to suggest in 1995 only a two-way species split, with the northern forms madeira, feae and deserti all as subspecies of Fea's petrel.

"Snowy-winged petrel"
The Hadoram Shirihai expeditions to the Madeira archipelago in 2008, 2009, and 2010 each had sightings of a Pterodroma petrel (possibly the same bird) with largely white underwings, but upper wings like Zino's or Fea's. This plumage does not correspond to any known Pterodroma species. It may have been an unusual variant of Zino's but this is unlikely since no similar bird has been seen amongst the more than 100 caught at the nest. It may alternatively be a single aberrant individual, a hybrid or an unknown taxon from Madeira or elsewhere. No conclusion is possible on current knowledge.

Distribution and habitat
Zino's petrel is endemic to the main island of Madeira, where it breeds on inaccessible and well-vegetated ledges in the central mountains between Pico do Arieiro and Pico Ruivo. The typical ledge plants are endemic hemicryptophytes and chamaephytes, but grasses may also be present. It nests at heights above 1650 m. It was formerly more widespread, since subfossil remains have been found in a cave in eastern Madeira, and on nearby Porto Santo Island. The breeding ledges have to be inaccessible to introduced goats so that they remain rich in endemic flora. The vegetation ensures that there is sufficient earth on the ledges to allow the birds to burrow and make their nests, and trampling by grazing animals reduces the soil cover.

This petrel is only present in Madeiran waters during the breeding season. Its distribution at sea during the rest of the year is poorly known due to the rarity of the species and the difficulty of separating it from other Pterodroma petrels at sea. Birds identified as either Zino's or Fea's have been recorded from both sides of the North Atlantic, and in Ireland and Britain there has been a large increase in the number of reports, perhaps because global warming brings increasing numbers of tropical species into temperate waters. The timing of the reports, mainly in late spring and summer in the western North Atlantic, and in late summer and early autumn in the east, has suggested that birds follow a clockwise route around the North Atlantic after leaving their breeding sites. However, the few birds that have been identified with certainty have all been Fea's. Zino's petrel may have a similar strategy since preliminary results from geolocation studies indicate widespread dispersal over the North Atlantic central ridge during the breeding season and migration towards the Brazilian coast in the non-breeding period. Pterodroma petrels have been recorded in the Canary Islands and the Azores on surprisingly few occasions; a claim of possible Zino's from South Africa is now thought to be erroneous.

Breeding
Zino's petrel breed two months earlier than the Fea's petrel on Bugio, only 50 km away. The birds return from sea to their breeding grounds in late March or early April and courting occurs over the main breeding area during the late evening and early morning hours. The nest is a shallow burrow or old rabbit tunnel up to 140 cm long in thick soil on vegetated ledges. The length of the burrow is related to the age of the pair that uses it, young birds making shorter tunnels, which are extended in subsequent years. The oval white egg is laid from mid-May to mid-June in a chamber at the end of the burrow and for 51–54 days, each parent alternating between sitting on the nest and feeding at sea. The young fledge about 85 days later in late September and October. This petrel is strictly nocturnal at the breeding sites to avoid predation by gulls. It stays 3 - 5 km offshore during the day, coming to land in darkness. It calls from about 30 minutes after nightfall until dawn, including on moonlit nights.

This species mates for life and pairs return to the same burrow year after year. The single egg is not replaced if lost. This is a long-lived species: one individual was observed to return to its burrow for ten consecutive years, and the lifespan is estimated to be about 16 years. The age of first breeding is unknown but assumed to be four or more years. Despite the proximity of their breeding sites, Zino's and Fea's petrels have never been found at each other's nesting areas, and Zino's is not known to hybridise with any other species.

Feeding
Zino's petrel, like its relatives, feed on small squid and fish. The vomited stomach contents of one bird contained cephalopods, the bioluminiscent fish Electrona risso and small crustaceans. Like other small petrels, Zino's does not normally follow ships.

Predators and parasites
Their nocturnal approach to the breeding sites means that Zino's petrels avoid the attentions of gulls or diurnal raptors, and the only owl on the island, the barn owl, is a rodent hunter. Other than bats, there are no native land mammals on Madeira, although there are a number of introduced species, two of which will take birds or chicks. These are brown rats and feral domestic cats. Even the high mountain nest sites of the Zino's petrel are not safe from these adaptable predators, ten adults being killed by cats in 1990. Feather lice found on Zino's petrels include Trabeculus schillingi, Saemundssonia species and an unnamed species of Halipeurus.

Conservation status
Zino's petrel has a very restricted range on the mountaintops of a single island and is one of Europe’s most endangered seabirds. The birds, already confined to a limited area when discovered, were thought to be extinct by the mid-twentieth century. Two freshly fledged juveniles were found within the walls of the governor's palace in Funchal in the early 1940s, presumably attracted there by lights, but the species was not seen again until 1969. In 1969, Paul Zino played a tape of Fea's petrel from Bugio to a shepherd from Curral das Freiras; he immediately recognised the call and led the researchers to the remaining nesting area. Predation by introduced rats meant that breeding success in the small population was low, and no young at all fledged in 1985. The Freira Conservation Project was founded in 1986 with the aim of increasing the population of Zino's petrel by controlling rats and human interference; the control was extended to cats after the mass predation of 1990.

There are now 130–160 known individuals (65–80 breeding pairs) confirmed to breed on just six ledges. There may be some disturbance from visitors at night and from the construction of a NATO radar station on the summit of Mount Arieiro, and in the longer term climate change may have an adverse effect, since all nests are within 1,000 m of the top of the highest mountain in the breeding area. Formerly, shepherds collected nestlings for food, and egg collectors have raided burrows. Currently, the main threats continue to be predation of eggs and chicks by rats, and of nesting adults by feral cats, although at much reduced levels due to trapping.

Zino's petrel is protected under the EU's Wild Birds Directive, and its breeding sites lie within the Parque Natural da Madeira national park. Following the purchase of about 300 ha of land around the main breeding site, all livestock has been removed from the breeding areas, allowing the vegetation to recover, although breeding still only occurs on ledges that were never accessible to grazing animals. The research and predator control by the Freira Conservation Project and the national park which started in 1986 was expanded in 2001 with additional EU funding. The increase in productivity (29 chicks fledged in 2004) meant that this species was downgraded from critically endangered to endangered on the IUCN Red List in 2004. Its population appeared to be stable or increasing slightly up to the summer of 2010.

A disaster struck the colony on 13 August 2010, when a forest fire swept through the breeding site killing three adults and 25 of the 38 chicks. The fire destroyed the vegetation and several nesting burrows. Conservation action to protect the 13 remaining chicks included removing dead birds and burnt vegetation, reinforcing the surviving nests, and setting poison bait for rats around the now exposed nest sites. The action plan also included the provision of artificial burrows, seed dispersal to help the vegetation recover, and the use of anti-erosion materials. By 2018, the colony had recovered and was stable at 160 adults.

title: Zino's petrel


text:
Seán O'Casey

Seán O'Casey (Seán Ó Cathasaigh ; born John Casey; 30 March 1880 – 18 September 1964) was an Irish dramatist and memoirist. A committed socialist, he was the first Irish playwright of note to write about the Dublin working classes.

Early life
O'Casey was born at 85 Upper Dorset Street, Dublin, as John Casey, the son of Michael Casey, a mercantile clerk (who worked for the Irish Church Missions), and Susan Archer. His parents were Protestants and he was a member of the Church of Ireland, baptised on 28 July 1880 in St. Mary's parish, confirmed at St John the Baptist Church in Clontarf, and an active member of St. Barnabas' Church on Sheriff Street until his mid-20s, when he drifted away from the church. There is a church called 'Saint Burnupus' in his play Red Roses For Me.

O'Casey's father died when Seán was just six years of age, leaving a family of thirteen. The family lived a peripatetic life thereafter, moving from house to house around north Dublin. As a child, he suffered from poor eyesight, which interfered somewhat with his early education, but O'Casey taught himself to read and write by the age of thirteen.

He left school at fourteen and worked at a variety of jobs, including a nine-year period as a railwayman on the GNR. O'Casey worked in Eason's for a short while, in the newspaper distribution business, but was sacked for not taking off his cap when collecting his wage packet.

From the early 1890s, O'Casey and his elder brother, Archie, put on performances of plays by Dion Boucicault and William Shakespeare in the family home. He also got a small part in Boucicault's The Shaughraun in the Mechanics' Theatre, which stood on the site of what was to be the Abbey Theatre.

Politics
As his interest in the Irish nationalist cause grew, O'Casey joined the Gaelic League in 1906 and learned the Irish language. At this time, he Gaelicised his name from John Casey to Seán Ó Cathasaigh. He also learned to play the Uilleann pipes and was a founder and secretary of the St. Laurence O'Toole Pipe Band. He joined the Irish Republican Brotherhood, and became involved in the Irish Transport and General Workers Union, which had been established by Jim Larkin to represent the interests of the unskilled labourers who inhabited the Dublin tenements. He participated in the Dublin lock-out but was blacklisted and could not find steady work for some time.

In March 1914, he became General Secretary of Larkin's Irish Citizen Army, which would soon be run by James Connolly. On 24 July 1914 he resigned from the ICA, after his proposal to ban dual membership in both the ICA and the Irish Volunteers was rejected.

One of his first satirical ballads, "The Grand Oul' Dame Britannia", was published in The Workers' Republic on 15 January 1916 under his penname An Gall Fada. ""Ah, what is all the fuss about?", says the grand old dame Britannia, "Is it us you are trying to live without?", Says the grand old dame Britannia. "Shut your ears to the Sinn Féin lies, you know every Gael for England dies," "And you'll have Home Rule 'neath the clear blue skies." Says the grand old dame Britannia."

- Seán Ó Cathasaigh

After the Easter Rising

In 1917, his friend Thomas Ashe died in a hunger strike and it inspired him to write. He wrote two laments: one in verse and a longer one in prose. Ballads authored around this time by O'Casey featured in the two editions of Songs of the Wren, published by Fergus O'Connor in 1918; these included "The Man from the Daily Mail", which, along with "The Grand Oul' Dame Britannia", became Irish rebel music staples. A common theme was opposition to the possible introduction of conscription in Ireland by the British government during World War I.

He spent the next five years writing plays. In 1918, when both his sister and mother died (in January and September, respectively), the St Laurence O'Toole National Club commissioned him to write the play The Frost in the Flower. He had been in the St Laurence O'Toole Pipe Band and played on the hurling team. The club declined to put the play on out of fear that its satirical treatment of several parishioners would cause resentment. O'Casey then submitted the play to the Abbey Theatre, which also rejected it but encouraged him to continue writing. Eventually, O'Casey expanded the play to three acts and retitled it The Harvest Festival.

Abbey Theatre
O'Casey's first accepted play, The Shadow of a Gunman, was performed at the Abbey Theatre in 1923. This was the beginning of a relationship that was to be fruitful for both theatre and dramatist but which ended in some bitterness.

The play deals with the impact of revolutionary politics on Dublin's slums and their inhabitants, and is understood to be set in Mountjoy Square, where he lived during the 1916 Easter Rising. It was followed by Juno and the Paycock (1924) and The Plough and the Stars (1926). The former deals with the effect of the Irish Civil War on the working class poor of the city, while the latter is set in Dublin in 1916 around the Easter Rising. Both plays deal realistically with the rhetoric and dangers of Irish patriotism, with tenement life, self-deception, and survival; they are tragi-comedies in which violent death throws into relief the blustering masculine bravado of characters such as Jack Boyle and Joxer Daly in Juno and the Paycock and the heroic resilience of Juno herself or of Bessie Burgess in The Plough and the Stars. Juno and the Paycock became a film directed by Alfred Hitchcock.

The Plough and the Stars was not well received by the Abbey audience and resulted in scenes reminiscent of the riots that greeted J. M. Synge's The Playboy of the Western World in 1907. There was a riot reported on the fourth night of the show. His depiction of sex and religion offended even some of the actors, who refused to speak their lines. The full-scale riot occurred partly because the play was thought to be an attack on the men in the rising and partly in protest in opposition to the animated appearance of a prostitute in Act 2. W. B. Yeats got onto the stage and roared at the audience: "You have disgraced yourselves again." The takings of the play were substantial compared with the previous week. O'Casey gave up his job and became a full-time writer.

After the incident, even though the play was well liked by most of the Abbey goers, Liam O'Flaherty, Austin Clarke and F. R. Higgins launched an attack against it in the press. O'Casey believed it was an attack on Yeats, that they were using O'Casey's play to berate Yeats.

In 1952 he appeared in a play by Irish playwright Teresa Deevy, The Wild Goose, in which he played the part of Father Ryan. O'Casey was involved in numerous productions with the Abbey; these can be found in the Abbey Archives.

England
While in London to receive the Hawthornden Prize and supervise the West End production of Juno and the Paycock, O'Casey fell in love with Eileen Carey. The couple were married in 1927 and remained in London until 1938, when they moved to Totnes.

In 1928, W. B. Yeats rejected O'Casey's fourth play, The Silver Tassie for the Abbey. It was an attack on imperialist wars and the suffering they cause. The Abbey refused to perform it. The premier production was funded by Charles B. Cochran, who took only eighteen months to put it on stage. It was put on at the Apollo Theatre but lasted for only twenty-six performances. It was directed by Raymond Massey, starred Charles Laughton and with an Act II set design by Augustus John. George Bernard Shaw and Lady Gregory had a favourable opinion of the show.

Denis Johnston, who knew O'Casey and spent time with him in London in the 1920s, is certain that the Abbey was right not to stage The Silver Tassie: "Its expressionist second act was at that time far beyond the scope of the Abbey Theatre." A year later Johnston's own The Old Lady Says "No!" was similarly rejected, for the same reason. Nevertheless O'Casey's resentment over this persisted for many years.

The plays O'Casey wrote after this included the darkly allegorical Within the Gates (1934), which is set within the gates of a busy city park based on London's Hyde Park. Although it was highly controversial, Eugene O'Neill responded positively to it. The play was originally going to be a film script for Alfred Hitchcock. O'Casey's widow described it in her memoir, Sean (1971):"Originally he had imagined it as a film in which everything, from flower-beds to uniforms, would be stylised. Beginning at dawn and ending at midnight, to the soft chime of Big Ben in the distance, it would be 'geometrical and emotional, the emotions of the living characters to be shown against their own patterns and the patterns of the Park.' Having got so far, he wrote to Alfred Hitchcock, and when Hitchcock and his wife dined with us Sean explained his ideas to an apparently responsive hearer. Hitchcock and he talked excitedly. They parted on the same terms, with the prospect of another immediate meeting, and Sean never heard again."

The play was unsuccessful in Northern Ireland and was not produced in the south until 2010. In the autumn of 1934, O'Casey went to the United States to visit the New York City production of Within the Gates, which he admired greatly. It was directed by actor Melvyn Douglas and starred Lillian Gish. This is when he befriended Eugene O'Neill, Sherwood Anderson and George Jean Nathan.

The Star Turns Red (1940) is a four-act political allegory in which the Star of Bethlehem turns red. The story follows Big Red (who was based on O'Casey's friend, James Larkin) who is a trade-union leader. The union takes over the unnamed country despite the ruthless efforts of the Saffron Shirts, a fascist organisation openly supported by the Roman Catholic hierarchy of the country. It was staged by the Unity Theatre in London during 1940 (later, in 1978 by the Abbey in Dublin).

Purple Dust (1943) follows two wealthy, materialistic English stockbrokers who buy an ancient Irish mansion and attempt to restore it with their wrong notions of Tudor customs and taste. They try to impose upon a community with vastly different customs and lifestyles that are much closer to ancient Gaelic ways and are against such false values.

The Englishmen set their opposing standards against those represented by the men employed to renovate the house. In the resulting confrontation the English are satirised and in the end disappointed when a symbolic storm destroys their dream of resettling the old into the present. The hint that is enforced by the conclusion is that the little heap of purple dust that remains will be swept away by the rising winds of change, like the residue of pompous imperialism that abides in Ireland. The show has been compared to Shaw's John Bull's Other Island, which was one of O'Casey's favourites, but aside from a few similarities, there are no real grounds for comparison.

He also wrote Red Roses for Me (1943), which saw him move away from his early style in favour of more expressionistic means and overtly socialist content to his writing. It went up at Dublin's Olympia Theatre (which was the first one produced in Ireland in seventeen years). It would move on to London in 1946, where O'Casey himself was able to see it. This was the first show of his own he saw since Within The Gates in 1934.

Oak Leaves and Lavender (1945) is a propaganda play commemorating the Battle of Britain and Britain's heroism in the anti-Nazi crusade. It takes place in a manor with shadowy 18th-century figures commenting on the present.

These plays have never had the same critical or popular success as the early trilogy. After the Second World War he wrote Cock-a-Doodle Dandy (1949), which is perhaps his most beautiful and exciting work. From The Bishop's Bonfire (1955) O'Casey's late plays are studies on the common life in Ireland, "Irish microcosmos", like The Drums of Father Ned (1958).

His play The Drums of Father Ned was supposed to go up at the 1958 Dublin Theatre Festival, but the Catholic Archbishop of Dublin, John Charles McQuaid, refused to give his blessing (it has been assumed because works of both James Joyce and O'Casey were in the festival). After Joyce's play was quietly dropped, massive changes were required for The Drums of Father Ned, a devious way to get O'Casey to drop. After this, Samuel Beckett withdrew his mime piece in protest.

Later life
In 1959, O'Casey gave his blessing to a musical adaptation of Juno and the Paycock by American composer Marc Blitzstein. The musical, retitled Juno, was a commercial failure, closing after only 16 Broadway performances. It was also panned by some critics as being too "dark" to be an appropriate musical, a genre then almost invariably associated with light comedy. However, the music, which survives in a cast album made before the show opened, has since been regarded as some of Blitzstein's best work. Although endorsed by the then 79-year-old O'Casey, he did not contribute to the production or even see it during its brief run. Despite general agreement on the brilliance of the underlying material, the musical has defied all efforts to mount any successful revival.

Also in 1959, George Devine produced Cock-a-Doodle Dandy at the Royal Court Theatre and it was also successful at the Edinburgh International Festival and had a West End run.

His eightieth birthday occurred in 1960, and to celebrate, David Krause and Robert Hogan wrote full-length studies. The Mermaid Theatre in London launched the "O'Casey Festival" in 1962, which in turn made more theatre establishments put on his works, mostly in Britain and Germany. It is in the late years that O'Casey put his creative energy into his six-volume Autobiography.

On 18 September 1964 at the age of 84, O'Casey died of a heart attack, in Torquay, Devon. He was cremated at the Golders Green Crematorium.

In 1965, his autobiography Mirror in My House (the umbrella title under which the six autobiographies he published from 1939 to 1956 were republished, in two large volumes, in 1956) was turned into a film based on his life called Young Cassidy. The film was directed by Jack Cardiff (and John Ford) featuring Rod Taylor (as O'Casey), Flora Robson, Maggie Smith, Julie Christie, Edith Evans and Michael Redgrave.

Personal life
O'Casey was married to Irish actress Eileen Carey Reynolds (1903–1995) from 1927 to his death. The couple had three children: two sons, Breon and Níall (who died in 1957 of leukaemia), and a daughter, Shivaun.

Archival collection
In 2005, David H. Greene donated a collection of letters he received from O'Casey from 1944 to 1962 to the Fales Library at New York University. Also in the collection are two letters written by Eileen O'Casey and one letter addressed to Catherine Greene, David Greene's spouse.

O'Casey's papers are held in the New York Public Library, the Cornell University Library, the University of California, Los Angeles Library System, the University of London Library, the National Library of Ireland, Colby College, Boston College and the Fales Library.

Works

 * Lament for Thomas Ashe (1917), as Seán Ó Cathasaigh
 * The Story of Thomas Ashe (1917), as Seán Ó Cathasaigh
 * Songs of the Wren (1918), as Seán Ó Cathasaigh
 * More Wren Songs (1918), as Seán Ó Cathasaigh
 * The Harvest Festival (1918)
 * The Story of the Irish Citizen Army (1919), as Seán Ó Cathasaigh
 * The Shadow of a Gunman (1923)
 * Kathleen Listens In (1923)
 * Juno and the Paycock (1924)
 * Nannie's Night Out (1924)
 * The Plough and the Stars (1926)
 * The Silver Tassie (1927)
 * Within the Gates (1934)
 * The End of the Beginning (1937)
 * A Pound on Demand (1939)
 * The Star Turns Red (1940)
 * Red Roses for Me (1942)
 * Purple Dust (1940/1945)
 * Oak Leaves and Lavender (1946)
 * Cock-a-Doodle Dandy (1949)
 * Hall of Healing (1951)
 * Bedtime Story (1951)
 * Time to Go (1951)
 * The Wild Goose (1952)
 * The Bishop's Bonfire: A Sad Play within the Tune of a Polka (1955)
 * Mirror in My House (two volumes, 1956, reissued as Autobiographies, 1963 and since; combining the six books of memoirs listed next)
 * I Knock at the Door (1939)
 * Pictures in the Hallway (1942)
 * Drums Under the Window (1945)
 * Inishfallen, Fare Thee Well (1949)
 * Rose and Crown (1952)
 * Sunset and Evening Star (1954)
 * The Drums of Father Ned (written 1957, staged 1959)
 * Behind the Green Curtains (1961)
 * Figuro in the Night (1961)
 * The Moon Shines on Kylenamoe (1961)
 * Niall: A Lament (1991)

Awards and recognition

 * (1926) – Hawthornden Prize for Juno and the Paycock
 * (1949) – Newspaper Guild of New York's "Page One Award" for I Knock at the Door, Pictures in the Hallway, Drums under the Windows, and Inishfallen, Fare Thee Well
 * Order of the British Empire (declined)
 * (1960) – Durham University Honorary Degree (declined)
 * (1960) – University of Exeter Honorary Degree (declined)
 * (1961) – Trinity College, Dublin Honorary Degree (declined)

Legacy
In Dublin, a foot bridge on the Liffey is named after him.

title: Seán O'Casey


text:
Black-capped petrel

The black-capped petrel (Pterodroma hasitata), also known as the diablotín, is a small seabird native to the West Indies in the genus Pterodroma. It is a long-winged petrel with a grey-brown back and wings, with a white nape and rump. Underparts are mainly white apart from a black cap (that in some individuals extends to cover the eye) and some dark underwing markings. It picks food items such as squid from the ocean surface.

Description
The black-capped petrel is large compared to other gadfly petrels, with a length of about 16 inches (40.5 cm) and 37 inches (94 cm) wingspan. The most similar species within its range is the Bermuda petrel, which is smaller and has a narrower white rump patch and an extensive gray cowl. The great shearwater is also superficially similar. The critically endangered or possibly extinct Jamaica petrel (P. caribbaea) was a related dark form. The local Spanish name, Diablotín, means "little devil" because of its night-time habits and odd-sounding mating calls, which suggested to locals the presence of evil spirits in the dark. The petrel will occasionally utter other croaks and sounds while foraging at sea.

The black-capped petrel is nocturnal on its breeding grounds, possibly to avoid predation by gulls, hawks or crows. Like most petrels, its walking ability is limited to a short shuffle to the nest burrow.

Taxonomy
There are two variants of the black-capped petrel; a dark or black-faced form, and a light or white-faced form. Genetic evidence of divergence suggests that these two color morphs represent distinct breeding populations. However, it is unclear whether these populations represent separate species or subspecies. Intermediate birds showing features of both populations are known to exist.

Range
Although this seabird once bred on steep mountainsides of the Greater Antilles, only three confirmed breeding areas remain in the high mountains of Hispaniola (in Sierra de Bahoruco and Valle Nuevo National Park in the Dominican Republic, and Massif de la Selle and Massif de la Hotte in Haiti). In 2015, birds were also confirmed nesting on a second island (Dominica), which had long been suspected given historical nesting there. A mountain peak where it formerly bred in Haiti (and another in Dominica) is still named "Mont Diablotin" in reference to the "little devil" moniker.

The warm waters of the Gulf Stream serve as the primary foraging area for this species. Most birds during the non-breeding season are concentrated off the United States coast between Florida and North Carolina, though they have been known to wander far to the north and east toward Europe. The species has been seen year-round in the Gulf Stream. The birds that visit these waters during the breeding season either represent non-breeders or are making long foraging trips away from the nest. The black-capped petrel is almost strictly pelagic away from the breeding grounds and is known to join loose flocks with other seabirds such as shearwaters and terns.

Nesting
Like other gadfly petrels, the black-capped petrel nests in burrows in remote highland areas of islands. These burrows are typically located on forested cliffs, and are very difficult to locate. They visit burrows at night, so as to avoid detection by predators. Eggs are typically laid in January, which will subsequently hatch sometime in March. Fledglings will then depart the nest in either June or July.

Conservation
The species, once abundant in the Caribbean, has declined significantly and is now one of the most endangered seabirds in the North Atlantic along with the Bermuda petrel. In the early 20th century, there was speculation that the black-capped petrel was extinct or nearing extinction, but more current population estimates range from 2,000 to 4,000 individuals. In 1963, an expedition led by David Wingate discovered 11 breeding colonies in Haiti. Most of the threats facing the black-capped petrel are on its nesting grounds, where causes for its demise include habitat loss, introduced predators, and direct harvesting by humans. Human predation appears to have become more limited in scope than in historic times, due in part to the species' current scarcity. Deforestation from wildfires and direct human use have likely decreased the amount of suitable nesting habitat available to the black-capped petrel. This is especially true in Haiti, which has suffered severe loss of forest cover in recent years.

Current conservation plans for the petrel largely involve preserving forest cover around known nesting areas as well as monitoring and searching for burrows. There are also concerns that hydrocarbon exploration off of the Southeast United States could negatively affect the species' continued survival. In 2018, the US Fish and Wildlife Service proposed listing the black-capped petrel as threatened. On 1 May 2023, a new 30-day comment period was opened due to concerns that threats to the species are greater than previously assessed.

title: Black-capped petrel


text:
Jamaican petrel

The Jamaican petrel (Pterodroma caribbaea) is a small possibly extinct seabird in the gadfly petrel genus, Pterodroma. It is related to the black-capped petrel (P. hasitata).

Conservation
This species was last collected in 1879, and was searched for without success between 1996 and 2000. However, it cannot yet be classified as extinct because nocturnal petrels are notoriously difficult to record, and it may still occur on Dominica and Guadeloupe. If it is extinct, the most likely cause is due to predation by introduced mongooses and rats.

Parasites
Several species of lice are known to have parasitized the Jamaica and black-capped petrels. If the former is extinct, one of these lice, the phtilopterid Saemundssonia jamaicensis may be coextinct, as it has not been found on other birds.

title: Jamaican petrel


text:
John Lewis Partnership

The John Lewis Partnership plc (JLP) is a British company that operates John Lewis & Partners department stores, Waitrose supermarkets, its banking and financial services, and other retail-related activities. The public limited company is owned by a trust on behalf of all its employees – known as partners – and a bonus, akin to a share of the profit, is paid to employees. John Lewis has around 80,800 partners/employees as of 2020. JLP Group was the third-largest UK non-traded company by sales in The Sunday Times Top Track 100 for 2016. The chain's image is upmarket, and its customers are likely to be more affluent consumers. It was a member of the International Association of Department Stores from 2004 to 2010.

The Partnership also supplied the Ocado web supermarket with Waitrose own-brand foods and John Lewis own-brand non-food items such as furniture. This arrangement expired in September 2020, when Marks & Spencer began a new £750 million contract with Ocado.

1860s origins
John Lewis opened a drapery shop at 132 Oxford Street, London, in 1864. Born in Shepton Mallet in Somerset in 1836, he had been apprenticed at 14 to a linen draper in Wells. He came to London in 1856 and worked as a salesman for Peter Robinson, an Oxford Street draper, rising to be his silk buyer. In 1864, he declined Robinson's offer of a partnership, and rented his own premises on the north side of Oxford Street, on part of the site now occupied by the department store which bears his name. There he sold silk and woollen cloth and haberdashery. His retailing philosophy was to buy good quality merchandise and sell it at a modest 'mark up'. Although he carried a wide range of merchandise, he was less concerned about displaying it and never advertised it. His skill lay in sourcing the goods he sold, and most mornings he would go to the City of London, accompanied by a man with a hand barrow. Later he would make trips to Paris to buy silks.

Lewis spurned holidays and games and devoted himself entirely to the business, which was successful. He invested the money he made from it in residential and small retail properties, many of which he never visited. He expanded the Oxford Street business by renting neighbouring properties on Oxford Street and then along Holles Street, and gradually moved into other classes of merchandise: first the new area of ready-made women's apparel, and later children's wear and furniture. He never held 'sales', saying that he was intent on building a sound, permanent business.

In 1884, aged 48, Lewis married Eliza Baker, a schoolmistress with a university education, who was 18 years his junior. They set up home in a mansion on the edge of Hampstead Heath, for which Lewis made up the name Spedan Tower after his aunt, Ann Speed, and when Eliza bore a son in 1885, he was called John Spedan Lewis. A second son, Oswald Lewis, was born in 1887. After Westminster School, both sons joined Lewis in the business, and he gave each of them a quarter share of it on their twenty-first birthdays.

1900s family disagreements
There was constant quarrelling between Lewis and his sons. By 1909, Oswald wanted out, and Lewis senior reluctantly agreed to buy back Oswald's quarter share of the business for £50,000 (equivalent to about £4.5 million in 2010). Oswald went to read Law at Oxford, qualified as a barrister, and became a cavalry officer in 1914. He was injured and discharged in 1916, whereupon he accepted an invitation from his father to rejoin the business.

Lewis had several run-ins with Lord Howard de Walden, his Oxford Street landlord, and in 1903 he spent three weeks in Brixton Prison for defying a court order obtained by de Walden. In 1911, de Walden sued him for libel. Lewis was found guilty, but the jury awarded damages of just a farthing.

In 1906, Lewis bought a controlling interest in the Sloane Square-based business Peter Jones Limited, the eponymous founder of which had died the previous year. Lewis walked from Oxford Street with the £20,000 purchase price in banknotes.

1910s
In the next 13 years, the Peter Jones business was unprofitable – no dividends were paid to Lewis and the external shareholders –  and in desperation, in 1914 Lewis appointed his son Spedan as chairman of Peter Jones. This gave Spedan Lewis complete control, and he decided that the underlying problem was that the staff had no incentive to do a good day's work because their own interests were not in line with those of the business. He shortened their working day and instituted a system of commission for each department, paying selling staff amounts based on turnover. He held regular meetings at which staff could air any grievances directly with him. In 1916, after a disagreement with his father, Spedan Lewis exchanged his 25% interest in the Oxford Street business for Lewis's shares in Peter Jones Limited. He made improvements in staff conditions, including granting a third week's paid holiday each year. He had hot and cold running water installed in the staff bedrooms over the shop. In 1918, he started publishing a fortnightly newspaper telling staff how the business was faring. In 1919, he instituted a staff council meeting, the first decision of which was that staff should be paid weekly instead of four-weekly. The business prospered: there was a profit of £20,000 in 1920. Spedan Lewis's radical idea was that the profits generated by the business should not be paid solely to shareholders as a reward for their capital. Shareholders should receive a reasonable but limited return, and labour should be the recipient of the excess. His concept of 'fairer shares' involved sharing gain, knowledge, and power. In 1920, Spedan started distributing Peter Jones preference shares to staff, who were referred to as Partners.

1920s
The early 1920s were not successful for Peter Jones. Dividends on preference shares, many of which were held by employees, were not paid. In 1924, there was a reconciliation between John Lewis and Spedan Lewis. Trade at Oxford Street had fared better, and John Lewis made a cash injection into the Sloane Square business.

In 1925, Spedan Lewis devised the slogan 'never knowingly undersold' at Peter Jones. Intended mainly as a control on sourcing merchandise, it also meant that customers could shop knowing that they were not paying more at Peter Jones than they could buy identical goods for at other stores. This principle, which was refined several times, most notably to exclude retailers who trade only online and to include extended insurance and delivery charges when comparing prices, was honoured until August 2022, when it was replaced with a general commitment to providing competitive value on their own-label merchandise.

By 1926, Lewis senior was 90, Spedan was impatient to gain control of John Lewis in Oxford Street so that he could implement his radical ideas there, and Oswald again wanted out. Without telling their father, Spedan took out a bank loan and bought out Oswald's inheritance. After going around the world, Oswald embarked on a political career, becoming Conservative Party MP for Colchester in 1929, and holding the seat until 1945. Spedan Lewis became the sole owner in the Oxford Street business after John Lewis died aged 92 in 1928.

In 1929, Spedan Lewis signed a deed of settlement, which transferred shares in John Lewis & Co. Limited and Peter Jones Limited to trustees. The profits of the combined business would be distributed to its employees, either as cash or as fixed-interest stock in the new company: John Lewis Partnership Limited.

1930s expansion
In 1933, JLP started acquiring other retail businesses, buying Jessop & Son of Nottingham, and Lance & Lance of Weston-super-Mare. In 1934, it acquired Knight & Lee in Southsea, and Tyrrell & Green in Southampton. It also started rebuilding Peter Jones to a modern design. In 1937, it bought Waitrose, which operated ten counter-service grocery shops in London and the home counties.

1940s and the Second World War
The biggest acquisition came in 1940 when JLP paid £30,000 for Selfridge Provincial Stores Limited, which owned 16 shops: John Barnes in Hampstead, Blinkhorn & Son in Gloucester and Stroud, Bon Marché in Brixton, Buckleys in Harrogate, A H Bull in Reading, Caleys in Windsor, Cole Brothers in Sheffield, Holdrons in Peckham, Jones Brothers in Holloway, George Henry Lee in Liverpool, Pratts in Streatham, Quin & Axten in Brixton, Robert Sayle in Cambridge, Thomsons in Peterborough and Trewin Brothers in Watford, substantially increasing the size of the business.

The Second World War took its toll, and several stores were damaged by bombing, notably the 'west house' of John Lewis in Oxford Street (on the west side of Holles Street), which was lost completely in September 1940.

1950s
In 1950, Spedan Lewis executed a second deed of settlement, which passed ownership of JLP to trustees to hold for the benefit of those who worked in the business. He continued to manage it as if he were still the owner, saying in 1957 that it was necessary to concentrate management in one pair of hands.

Spedan Lewis also retained for himself the right to choose his successor when he retired on his 70th birthday in 1955. He had originally intended that Michael Watkins, his right-hand man for many years, would succeed him as chairman, but Watkins died in 1950. Spedan asked his son, Edward Lewis, if he would fill the role, but he declined. Spedan appointed a loyal, long-serving lieutenant, Bernard Miller, but expressed the hope that in due course Edward would succeed Miller as chairman. In the event, Miller was succeeded by Peter Lewis, the son of Oswald Lewis.

In 1953 JLP sold several small stores but acquired two large ones: Heelas in Reading and Bainbridge in Newcastle upon Tyne. The rebuilt store on Oxford Street was reopened in 1960, and the sculpture Winged Figure by Barbara Hepworth was added in 1963.

2000s
The group saw considerable expansion from 2000 and 2015, with John Lewis stores increasing from 25 to 43 and Waitrose branches increasing from 126 to 336. To fund this expansion, net debt increased from under £1 billion to £3.6 billion over that period. The group made its first-ever half-year operating loss of £26 million in the first half of 2019. During the COVID-19 pandemic 16 loss-making John Lewis stores were closed.

To accommodate national advertising, in 2002, the company began the process of renaming department stores not branded as John Lewis (Tyrrell & Green, Heelas, etc.) with the nationally recognisable name. Peter Jones in London remains the sole exception to this policy. The company experimented with smaller format stores, adding 12 At Home shops and 2 Convenience-driven stores, alongside 3 more full-line department stores (Leeds, Stratford, Birmingham).

John Lewis faced a series of strikes in 2012 and 2013 by cleaners, who had been outsourced, regarding pay.

Senior leadership
The company is overseen by the Chairman, who is responsible for the overall success of the business. In March 2023, a Chief Executive was hired for the first time, responsible for day-to-day operations of the Partnership as delegated by the Chairman.

Chairmen

 * 1) John Spedan Lewis (1929–1955)
 * 2) Sir Bernard Miller (1955–1972)
 * 3) Peter Lewis (1972–1993)
 * 4) Sir Stuart Hampson (1993–2007)
 * 5) Sir Charlie Mayfield (2007–2020)
 * 6) Dame Sharon White (since February 2020)
 * 7) Jason Tarry (designate)

In October 2023, it was reported that Dame Sharon White will not seek an extension to her existing five-year term, which ends in February 2025.

Chief Executives

 * 1) Nish Kankiwala (since March 2023)

Employee representation within JLP
The highest level of the JLP's democratic structure is the Partnership Council, a directly elected body of 58 Partners who both represent opinions from across the Partnership and hold the Chairman to account for their running of the business. Partnership Councillors are company insiders with voting rights, and the only body within the company's governance structures with the power to remove the Chairman from office. Biannually the Council conducts a "Holding to Account" session where the Chairman fields questions from representatives in an open meeting, following which a vote is held which indicates whether or not Councillors support the Chairman's leadership and the progress of the business.

Further to this structure, the Partnership Council elects three directors to the "Partnership Board". The three Elected Directors join the Chairman, Deputy Chairman, Executive Director Finance, and two further Non-Executive Directors to form the Partnership Board. The Council also elects three individuals to act as Trustees of the John Lewis Partnership.

Employees of JLP usually receive an annual bonus, akin to a share of the profit. It is calculated as a percentage of salary, with the same percentage awarded to all employees. The bonus is dependent on the profitability of JLP each year, varying historically between 5% and 20% of Partners' annual salaries, but falling to 3% in 2019 in light of tough trading conditions. The annual bonus dropped to 2% in 2020 and it was confirmed that no bonus would be paid in 2021 in light of the COVID-19 pandemic. This was the first time since 1953 that the bonus had not been paid. The bonus returned in 2022 paid at a rate of 3%.

In 1999, in response to a fall in profits, there were calls from some employees for the business to undertake an initial public offering and float on the stock market. If this had gone through, each employee stood to receive a windfall averaging £100,000. A company-wide ballot was held regarding the matter which did not approve the proposals.

In 2023, the early stages of a plan to sell shares were explored but no action was taken.

John Lewis & Partners
In 2012, the John Lewis division operated 30 full-line department stores, one John Lewis Click and Commute at St Pancras railway station, one John Lewis convenience store at Heathrow Airport, 10 John Lewis at Home Stores, and a web store. The stores are in a mixture of city centre and out-of-town shopping centre locations. The flagship Oxford Street store in London remains the largest John Lewis outlet in the UK.

'John Lewis at Home' stores cater for areas which have no large John Lewis department store near them. The first store opened in Poole in October 2009. They are around a third the size of a normal department store, and have both Home and Electrical departments with services such as a cafe and 'click and collect' also available. A new 'flexible format' store was trialled in Exeter in 2012, with a full line of stock in a smaller physical store, relying heavily on 'click and collect' or next day delivery, both in-store and to homes.

Peter Jones
Peter Jones is a large department store in central London. It is a store of JLP and is located on Sloane Square, at the junction of King's Road and Sloane Street, in the Chelsea district, close to the Belgravia and Knightsbridge districts. Peter Jones was founded as an independent store but was bought by John Lewis, owner of the eponymous store in Oxford Street, in 1905. In 1929 Lewis's son, John Spedan Lewis, who then owned both businesses, combined them into a single business.

Waitrose & Partners
JLP also owns Waitrose & Partners, an upmarket supermarket chain that had 332 branches and 78,000 employees as of early 2021. Waitrose trades mainly in London and the south of England, and was originally formed by Wallace Waite, Arthur Rose, and David Taylor. The company was taken over by JLP in 1937.

John Lewis Finance
In June 2004, JLP launched their own credit card, branded Partnership Card, provided by HSBC UK. The card was launched to complement the existing John Lewis and Waitrose account cards. It was announced in May 2022 that the white-label agreement with HSBC would end later that year, with new and existing Partnership Card accounts migrated to a reshaped service run by British financial services company NewDay.

The company has provided insurance products since it launched Greenbee in October 2006. Later, the Greenbee brand was retired and the services rebranded John Lewis Finance. Initially, it offered home, travel, wedding and events insurance as well as a travel and tickets service. It subsequently expanded to offer other services including car insurance and policies for second homes. John Lewis Finance later branched out into providing pet insurance, as well as creating John Lewis Investments, in partnership with Nutmeg.

In October 2021, John Lewis Finance released a home insurance advertisement showing a boy in make-up and a dress vandalising his house. The advertisement was banned by the Financial Conduct Authority as misleading, because the insurance plan did not include deliberate damage, as portrayed.

Telecoms
John Lewis offered broadband and home telephone services via a white-label agreement with Plusnet. The service closed to new customers in October 2022 and, following this, to existing customers when they reached the end of their contract.

Manufacturing
JLP currently operates one manufacturing business, Herbert Parkinson, in Darwen, Lancashire. This company, established as a weaver of jacquard fabrics in 1934, was acquired by the Partnership in 1953. Herbert Parkinson currently produces John Lewis own-brand fabrics and curtains as well as filled furnishing products such as cushions and pillows. The company operates a wholesale business to outside customers in addition to supplying John Lewis branches.

Until September 2007, the Partnership also owned two further textile production businesses: Carlisle-based printer Stead McAlpin (founded c. 1875, 200 workers) and Haslingden, Lancashire-based weaver J. H. Birtwistle.

The manufacture and sale of furnishing textiles was organised by the business Cavendish Textiles, produced under the trade name of 'Jonelle' from 1937, dropped in 2000 in favour of 'John Lewis'. Designers included many associated with Heal's, such as Lucienne Day and Pat Albeck, as well as Jacqueline Groag.

Ocado
John Lewis Partnership helped finance the creation of Ocado, an independent online supermarket, and later transferred its interest to its pension fund, which owned 29% of Ocado. The pension fund fully divested itself of its final 10.4% share ownership in February 2011 for £152 million, which represented a total profit from the company's investment in Ocado of about £220 million. In September 2020, the Partnership's relationship with Ocado came to an end.

title: John Lewis Partnership


text:
Common grackle

The common grackle (Quiscalus quiscula) is a species of large icterid bird found in large numbers through much of North America. First described in 1758 by Carl Linnaeus, the common grackle has three subspecies. Adult common grackles have a long and dark bill, pale yellow eyes, and a long tail. Adults often have an iridescent appearance on their head, especially males. Common grackles can be found widely across North America east of the Rocky Mountains.

Taxonomy
The common grackle was first described in 1758 by Carl Linnaeus in the tenth edition of Systema Naturae, as Gracula quiscula. It was assigned to the genus Quiscalus by French ornithologist Louis Pierre Vieillot in his 1816 Dictionnaire d'histoire naturelle.

Three subspecies are recognized:

 * the Florida grackle (Q. q. quiscula) (Linnaeus 1758), the nominate subspecies
 * the purple grackle (Q. q. stonei) (Chapman, 1935)
 * the bronzed grackle (Q. q. versicolor) (Vieillot, 1816)

Description

Adult common grackles measure from 28 to 34 cm in length, span 36 - 46 cm across the wings, and weigh 74 - 142 g. Common grackles are less sexually dimorphic than larger grackle species, but the differences between the sexes can still be noticeable. The male, which averages 122 g, is larger than the female, at an average of 94 g. Adults have a long, dark bill, pale yellowish eyes, and a long tail; their feathers appear black with purple, green, or blue iridescence on the head, and primarily bronze sheen in the body plumage. Adult females, beyond being smaller, are usually less iridescent; their tails in particular are shorter, and unlike the males, do not keel (display a longitudinal ridge) in flight and are brown with no purple or blue gloss. Juveniles are brown with dark brown eyes.

When grackles are in a group, they are referred to as a "plague".

Distribution and habitat
The breeding habitat is open and semiopen areas across North America east of the Rocky Mountains. The nest is a well-concealed cup in dense trees (particularly pine) or shrubs, usually near water; sometimes, the common grackle nests in cavities or in man-made structures. It often nests in colonies, some being quite large. Bird houses are also a suitable nesting site. Four to seven eggs are in a clutch.

This bird is a permanent resident in much of its range. Northern birds migrate in flocks to the Southeastern United States. The distribution of the common grackle is largely explained by annual mean temperature, and the species has expanded its range by greater than three-fold since the last glacial maximum, approximately 22,000 years ago.

Foraging and diet
The common grackle forages on the ground, in shallow water, or in shrubs; it may steal food from other birds. It is omnivorous, eating insects, minnows, frogs, eggs, berries, seeds, grain, and even small birds and rodents. Grackles at outdoor eating areas often wait eagerly until someone drops some food. They rush forward and try to grab it, often snatching food out of the beak of another bird. Grackles prefer to eat from the ground at bird feeders, making scattered seed an excellent choice of food for them. Grackles can be regularly seen foraging for insects, especially after a lawn trimming.

Grackles have a unique adaptation in the keel within their bill which allows them to crack and cut hard nuts or kernels. The keel projects downward from the horny palate and is sharper and more abrupt anterior. It extends below the level of the tomium and is used in a sawing motion to score open acorns or dried kernels. Larger adductor muscles within their jaw compared to those of other icterids make this adaptation even more useful for opening hard seeds and acorns.

Along with some other species of grackles, the common grackle is known to practice "anting", rubbing insects on its feathers possibly to apply liquids such as formic acid secreted by the insects.

Vocals
The grackle's song is particularly harsh, especially when these birds, in a flock, are calling. Songs vary from year-round chewink chewink to a more complex breeding season ooo whew, whew, whew, whew, whew call that gets faster and faster and ends with a loud crewhewwhew! It also occasionally sounds like a power line buzzing. The grackle can also mimic the sounds of other birds or even humans, though not as precisely as the mockingbird, which is known to share its habitat in the Southeastern United States.

Breeding
In the breeding season, males tip their heads back and fluff up feathers to display and keep other males away. This same behavior is used as a defensive posture to attempt to intimidate predators. Male common grackles are less aggressive toward one another, and more cooperative and social, than the larger boat-tailed grackle species.

Relationship with humans
The range of this bird expanded west as forests were cleared. In some areas, it is now considered a pest by farmers because of its large numbers and fondness for grain. Despite a currently robust population, a recent study by the National Audubon Society of data from the Christmas Bird Count indicated that populations had declined by 61% to a population of 73 million from historic highs of over 190 million birds. As a result, it is now classified by the IUCN as Near Threatened.

Unlike many birds, the common grackle benefits from the expansion of human populations due to its resourceful and opportunistic nature. Common grackles are considered to be a serious threat to crops by some, and are notoriously difficult to control; this usually requires the use of hawks or similar large birds of prey.

Proposed magnetoreceptivity
Though the exact mechanism is poorly understood, several studies have examined the ability of the common grackle to interpret the Earth's magnetic field—or in this case, the variability of it. The common grackle (like most of its Quiscalus relatives) has been found to be attuned to a dynamic magnetic field to a scientifically significant degree.

Book

 * Peer, B. D., and E. K. Bollinger. 1997. Common Grackle (Quiscalus quiscula). In The Birds of North America, No. 271 (A. Poole and F. Gill, eds.). The Academy of Natural Sciences, Philadelphia, PA, and The American Ornithologists' Union, Washington, D.C.

Thesis

 * Eyer LE. Ph.D. (1954). A LIFE-HISTORY STUDY OF THE BRONZED GRACKLE, QUISCALUS QUISCULA VERSICOLOR (VIELLOT). Michigan State University, United States, Michigan.
 * Ficken RW. Ph.D. (1960). BEHAVIOR OF THE COMMON GRACKLE, QUISCALUS QUISCULA (LINNAEUS). Cornell University, United States, New York.
 * Howe HF, 2nd. Ph.D. (1977). ASPECTS OF PARENTAL INVESTMENT AND SEX-RATIO ADJUSTMENT IN THE COMMON GRACKLE. University of Michigan, United States, Michigan.
 * Huntington CE. Ph.D. (1952). THE SUBSPECIES OF THE PURPLE GRACKLE QUISCALUS QUISCULA. Yale University, United States, Connecticut.
 * Maccarone AD. Ph.D. (1985). USE OF FORAGING SUBSTRATES BY STARLINGS AND COMMON GRACKLES IN RELATION TO FOOD AVAILABILITY (BEHAVIORAL, COMMUNAL ROOSTING, NEW JERSEY). Rutgers The State University of New Jersey - Newark, United States, New Jersey.
 * Maxwell GR, II. Ph.D. (1965). LIFE HISTORY OF THE COMMON GRACKLE, QUISCALUS QUISCULA (LINNAEUS). The Ohio State University, United States, Ohio.
 * Stepney PHR. Ph.D. (1979). COMPETITIVE AND ECOLOGICAL OVERLAP BETWEEN BREWER'S BLACKBIRD AND THE COMMON GRACKLE, WITH CONSIDERATION OF ASSOCIATED FORAGING SPECIES. University of Toronto (Canada), Canada.
 * Walley WW. Ph.D. (1965). THE ABSORPTION, METABOLISM, AND ELIMINATION OF DDT IN THE COMMON GRACKLE,QUISCALUS QUISCULA. Mississippi State University, United States, Mississippi.
 * Welker GW. Ph.D. (1962). HELMINTH PARASITES OF THE COMMON GRACKLE QUISCALUS QUISCULA VERSICOLOR VIEILLOT IN INDIANA. The Ohio State University, United States, Ohio.
 * Yang SY. Ph.D. (1968). HYBRIDIZATION IN THE GRACKLE QUISCALUS QUISCULA IN LOUISIANA. The University of Texas at Austin, United States, Texas.

Articles
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 * Bartel KE. (1971). Common Grackle Nest Banding Down in 1971. Inland Bird Banding News. vol 43, no 4. pp. 102–106.
 * Bouvier JM. (1974). The Occupation of an American Robin Nest by a Common Grackle. Canadian Field Naturalist. vol 88, no 4. pp. 483–484.
 * Brackbill H. (1976). Mourning Dove Common Grackle Cleaning Bills. Wilson Bulletin. vol 88, no 4.
 * Bradley JE & Dronen NOJ. (1979). Some Helminth Parasites of the Common Grackle Quiscalus-Quiscula of Southern Texas USA. Proceedings of the Helminthological Society of Washington. vol 46, no 1. pp. 149–150.
 * Brian DP, Homan HJ & Spencer GS. (2001). Infrequent cowbird parasitism in common grackles revisited: New records from the Northern Great Plains. The Wilson Bulletin. vol 113, no 1. p. 90.
 * Buck OD, Cooper CL & Crites JL. (1975). HELMINTH PARASITES OF COMMON GRACKLE (QUISCALUS-QUISCULA-VERSICOLOR) IN CENTRAL OHIO. Journal of Parasitology. vol 61, no 2. pp. 380–380.
 * Buck OD, Cooper CL & Crites JL. (1975). Helminth Parasites of the Common Grackle Quiscalus-Quiscula-Versicolor in Central Ohio. Journal of Parasitology. vol 61, no 2.
 * Caccamise DF, Lyon LA & Fischl J. (1983). Seasonal Patterns in Roosting Flocks of Starlings Sturnus-Vulgaris and Common Grackles Quiscalus-Quiscula. Condor. vol 85, no 4. pp. 474–481.
 * Campbell RW & Sirk GP. (1969). Common Grackle Sighted at Vancouver British-Columbia. Murrelet. vol 50, no 3.
 * Clark CC, Clark L & Clark L. (1990). "Anting" Behavior by Common Grackles and European Starlings. The Wilson Bulletin. vol 102, no 1. p. 167.
 * Clayton DH & Vernon JG. (1993). Common grackle anting with lime fruit and its effect on ectoparasites. Auk. vol 110, no 4. pp. 951–952.
 * Cooper CL & Crites JL. (1974). Helminth Parasites of the Common Grackle Quiscalus-Quiscula-Versicolor from South Bass Island Ohio USA. Proceedings of the Helminthological Society of Washington. vol 41, no 2. pp. 233–237.
 * Cooper CL, Madden JE & Crites JL. (1975). Arthropod Parasites of the Common Grackle in Ohio USA. Journal of Medical Entomology. vol 12, no 2.
 * Davidson AH. (1994). Common grackle predation on adult Passerines. Wilson Bulletin. vol 106, no 1. pp. 174–175.
 * Dubois CA. (1969). Grackle Anting with a Mothball Quiscalus-Quiscula. Auk. vol 86, no 1.
 * Duszynski DW & Box ED. (1978). The Opossum Didelphis-Virginiana as a Host for Sarcocystis-Debonei from Cowbirds Molothrus-Ater and Grackles Cassidix-Mexicanus Quiscalus-Quiscula. Journal of Parasitology. vol 64, no 2. pp. 326–329.
 * Elder DH. (2004). Common grackle anting with moth ball. Ontario Birds. vol 22, no 2. pp. 97–98.
 * Erskine AJ. (1971). Some New Perspectives on the Breeding Ecology of Common Grackles Quiscalus-Quiscula. Wilson Bulletin. vol 83, no 4. pp. 352–370.
 * Farris J, Fleming M & Smith K. (1977). Helminths of the Common Grackle Quiscalus-Quiscula in Faulkner County Arkansas USA. Arkansas Academy of Science Proceedings. vol 31, no 11.
 * Fisk EJ. (1970). Common Grackle Kills Cedar Waxwing in Air. Wilson Bulletin. vol 82, no 4.
 * Granath WOJ. (1981). Eufilaria-Hibleri New-Species Nematoda Filarioidea from the Common Grackle Quiscalus-Quiscula-Versicolor. Proceedings of the Helminthological Society of Washington. vol 48, no 1. pp. 17–23.
 * Gray DA & Hagelin JC. (1996). Song repertoires and sensory exploitation: Reconsidering the case of the common grackle. Animal Behaviour. vol 52, no 4. pp. 795–800.
 * Helleiner FM. (1972). Common Grackle at Rankin Inlet Keewatin District. Canadian Field Naturalist. vol 86, no 1.
 * Hester RL, Rank RG & Johnson AA. (1981). Immune Response of the Common Grackle to Filarial Infection of the Brain with Chandlerella-Quiscali. Arkansas Academy of Science Proceedings. vol 35, no 12.
 * Hickman S. (1981). Evidence for Aerodynamic Advantages of Tail Keeling in the Common Grackle Quiscalus-Quiscula. Wilson Bulletin. vol 93, no 4. pp. 500–505.
 * Homan HJ, Linz GM & Bleier WJ. (1994). Effect of crop phenology and habitat on the diet of common grackles (Quiscalus quiscula). American Midland Naturalist. vol 131, no 2. pp. 381–385.
 * Homan HJ, Linz GM, Bleier WJ & Carlson RB. (1996). Colony-site and nest-site use by Common Grackles in North Dakota. The Wilson Bulletin. vol 108, no 1. p. 104.
 * Howe HF. (1976). Egg Size Hatching Asynchrony Sex and Brood Reduction in the Common Grackle. Ecology. vol 57, no 6. pp. 1195–1207.
 * Howe HF. (1977). Sex Ratio Adjustment in the Common Grackle. Science. vol 198, no 4318. pp. 744–746.
 * Howe HF. (1978). Initial Investment Clutch Size and Brood Reduction in the Common Grackle Quiscalus-Quiscula. Ecology. vol 59, no 6. pp. 1109–1122.
 * Howe HF. (1979). Evolutionary Aspects of Parental Care in the Common Grackle Quiscalus-Quiscula. Evolution. vol 33, no 1 PART 1. pp. 41–51.
 * Huizinga HW & Granath WOJ. (1984). Seasonal Prevalence of Chandlerella-Quiscali Onchocercidae Filarioidea in Brain of the Common Grackle Quiscalus-Quiscula-Versicolor. Proceedings of the Helminthological Society of Washington. vol 51, no 2. pp. 191–195.
 * Jackson J. (1985). The Dunking Habit of Common Grackles Quiscalus-Quiscula Insight Learning or Innate Behavior?. American Birds. vol 39, no 3. pp. 261–262.
 * Kloek GP & Casler CL. (1972). The Lung and Air Sac System of the Common Grackle. Auk. vol 89, no 4. pp. 817–825.
 * Laporte P. (1974 ). Common Grackle Kills a Barn Swallow. Wilson Bulletin. vol 86, p. 4.
 * Larue CT & Ellis DH. (1992). The Common Grackle in Arizona First Specimen Record and Notes on Occurrence. Western Birds. vol 23, no 2. pp. 84–86.
 * Lenington S & Scola R. (1982). Competition between Red-Winged Blackbirds Agelaius-Phoeniceus and Common Grackles Quiscalus-Quiscula. Wilson Bulletin. vol 94, no 1. pp. 90–93.
 * Maxwell GR, II. (1970). Pair Formation Nest Building and Egg Laying of the Common Grackle in Northern Ohio. Ohio Journal of Science. vol 70, no 5. pp. 284–291.
 * Maxwell GR, II, Nocilly JM & Shearer RI. (1976). Observations at a Cavity Nest of the Common Grackle and an Analysis of Grackle Nest Sites. Wilson Bulletin. vol 88, no 3. pp. 505–507.
 * Maxwell GR, II & Putnam LS. (1972). Incubation Care of Young and Nest Success of the Common Grackle Quiscalus-Quiscula in Northern Ohio. Auk. vol 89, no 2. pp. 349–359.
 * Moore WS & Dolbeer RA. (1989). The Use of Banding Recovery Data to Estimate Dispersal Rates and Gene Flow in Avian Species Case Studies in the Red-Winged Blackbird and Common Grackle. Condor. vol 91, no 2. pp. 242–253.
 * Parkes KC. (1999). Head color in bronzed Common Grackles, Quiscalus quiscula versicolor. Western Birds. vol 30, no 3.
 * Peer BD & Bollinger EK. (1997). Explanations for the infrequent Cowbird parasitism on Common Grackles. The Condor. vol 99, no 1. p. 151.
 * Pitts D. (1974). Nesting Failure in a Common Grackle Colony. Migrant. vol 45, no 3. pp. 71–72.
 * Prescott KW. (1971). Severe Foot Pox in Common Grackle and Red-Winged Blackbirds. Ontario Bird Banding. vol 7, no 2. pp. 54–55.
 * Prescott KW. (1972). Severe Foot Pox in Common Grackle and Red-Winged Blackbirds. Ontario Bird Banding. vol 8, no 2. pp. 36–37.
 * Prud Homme-Cyr J, McNeil R & Cyr A. (1976). 1st Quebec Canada Record of Quiscalus-Quiscula-Stonei New-Record the Purple Race of the Common Grackle. Canadian Field Naturalist. vol 90, no 2.
 * Rod JP. (1971). Abnormal Bill in Common Grackle. Iowa Bird Life. vol 41, no 2. pp. 60–61.
 * Ryff AJ. (1974). Predatory Behavior of the Common Grackle. Jack Pine Warbler. vol 52, no 4. pp. 193–194.
 * Snelling JC. (1968). Overlap in Feeding Habits of Redwinged Blackbirds and Common Grackles Nesting in a Cattail-M Marsh Diet Insects Human Interference Quiscalus-Quiscula Agelaius-Phoeniceus. Auk. vol 85, no 4. pp. 560–585.
 * Spero VM & Pitts TD. (1984). Use of Wood Duck Nest Boxes by Common Grackles Quiscalus-Quiscula. Journal of Field Ornithology. vol 55, no 4. pp. 482–483.
 * Stanley JG & Rabalais FC. (1971). Helminth Parasites of the Red-Winged Blackbird Agelaius-Phoeniceus and Common Grackle Quiscalus-Quiscula in Northwestern Ohio. Ohio Journal of Science. vol 71, no 5. pp. 302–303.
 * Summers SD. (1977). A Common Grackle Record for Oregon USA. Western Birds. vol 8, no 4.
 * Twedt DJ. (1984). Pellet Casting by Common Grackles Quiscalus-Quiscula. Wilson Bulletin. vol 96, no 3. pp. 470–471.
 * West GC, Funke ERR & Hart JS. (1968). Power Spectral Density and Probability Analysis of Inst Electro Myograms in Shivering Birds Grosbeak Grackle Hesperiphona-Vespertina Quiscalus-Quiscula. Canadian Journal of Physiology & Pharmacology. vol 46, no 5. pp. 703–706.
 * Zink RM, Rootes WL & Dittmann DL. (1991). Mitochondrial DNA Variation Population Structure and Evolution of the Common Grackle Quiscalus-Quiscula. Condor. vol 93, no 2. pp. 318–329.

title: Common grackle


text:
User:WolfgangPeters

WolfgangPeters

title: User:WolfgangPeters