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The term "Darwin's finches" was first applied by Percy Lowe in 1936, and popularised in 1947 by David Lack in his book Darwin's Finches. [ 7 ] [ 8 ] Lack based his analysis on the large collection of museum specimens collected by the 1905–06 Galápagos expedition of the California Academy of Sciences, to whom Lack dedicated his 1947 book.
During Darwin's travels to the Galápagos Islands, he discovered several different species of finch, living on the different islands. Darwin observed that the finches had different beaks specialized for that species of finches' diet. [11] Some finches had short beaks for eating nuts and seeds, other finches had long thin beaks for eating ...
The genus Certhidea was introduced in 1837 by the English ornithologist John Gould with the green warbler-finch as the type species. [2] [3] The name is a Latin diminutive of the genus Certhia introduced by Carl Linnaeus in 1758 for the treecreepers. [4] The members of the genus form part of a group collectively known as Darwin's finches. [5]
All species of Camarhynchus are endemic to the Galápagos Islands, and together with related genera, they are collectively known as Darwin's finches. [1] Formerly classified in the bunting and American sparrow family Emberizidae , more recent molecular genetic studies have shown it to belong in the tanager family.
The ground finches are further specialized to eat seeds of a particular size: the large ground finch (Geospiza magnirostris) is the largest species of Darwin's finch and has the thickest beak for breaking open the toughest seeds, the small ground finch (Geospiza fuliginosa) has a smaller beak for eating smaller seeds, and the medium ground ...
The Cocos finch is a member of a group collectively known as Darwin's finches. [5] Although traditionally placed with the buntings and New World sparrows in the family Emberizidae, [6] molecular phylogenetic studies have shown that Darwin's finches are members of the subfamily Coerebinae within the tanager family Thraupidae. [7]
Disruptive selection is of particular significance in the history of evolutionary study, as it is involved in one of evolution's "cardinal cases", namely the finch populations observed by Darwin in the Galápagos. He observed that the species of finches were similar enough to ostensibly have been descended from a single species.
Most of the 19 species in the family which have been recorded in the Galápagos are "Darwin's finches". Famous for inspiring Darwin in his theory of evolution, the finches have astonishingly different beaks. Saffron finch, Sicalis flaveola (I) Bananaquit, Coereba flaveola; Green warbler-finch, Certhidea olivacea (E) Gray warbler-finch ...