Since we're on the topic of moonwatching, I thought I'd send a link to the Lowery and Newman paper that Andrew mentioned a few weeks ago. Here's a direct link to the paper: http://elibrary.unm.edu/sora/Auk/v083n04/p0547-p0586.pdf
and here you can search the ornithological literature for more papers that might be of interest: http://elibrary.unm.edu/sora/search.php You could search for George Lowery (in the Author box) and Migration (in the keyword box) and find the above paper, plus a few others. Note that nearly 1400 bird students and astronomers participated in the study by moon-watching over four nights in October of 1952!! Hey Chris, what's the NFC list membership up to? We may need to do a little recruiting- but I bet we could round up enough folks to make a go of it! Good Birding and Reading David ____________________________________________________ David A. La Puma, Ph.D. Dept. of Ecology, Evolution, & Natural Resources Online Teaching Portfolio: http://www.woodcreeper.com/teaching Lockwood lab: http://rci.rutgers.edu/~jlockwoo Websites: http://www.woodcreeper.com http://badbirdz2.wordpress.com Photos: http://www.flickr.com/photos/woodcreeper On Thu, Aug 20, 2009 at 5:41 PM, Andrew Farnsworth < [email protected]> wrote: > FYI - I think there was a 1950 paper too, though I cannot remember. . .When > everyone is ready, it is high time that we replicate Lowery and Newman > (1966). With today's technology for synthesizing information, we could do > it in a much more timely and large scale manner, AND we could combine it > with FC and radar data in a way not possible in the 60s. . . > > Best, > Andrew > > On Tue, Aug 18, 2009 at 07:20, Ted Floyd <[email protected]> wrote: > >> Hi, all. >> >> I was recently contacted by somebody who's preparing an obituary for >> William A. Rense, a leading solar physicist of the 20th century. Here's >> one of his publications: >> >> Rense, W.A. 1946. Astronomy and ornithology. Popular Astronomy >> 54(2):55-73. >> >> The article presents all the calculations necessary for "moonwatching," >> that is, for determining the number of birds on nocturnal migration >> within a given volume of sky. And, interestingly, this article precedes >> by several month's George Lowery's famous 1946 paper on the same topic >> (Auk 63:175-211). Lowery and Rense were colleagues, actually, so this >> isn't a disputed-priority thing. But it's interesting how we remember >> the famous Lowery paper, not the original Rense article. (Even though >> Rense's appeared in a relatively high-profile venue. Auk... Popular >> Astronomy... Please.) In a sense, this is also a tribute to Lowery's >> commendable interdisciplinary outlook on science and nature. >> >> What's also cool about the Rense article is that it reminds us that all >> of this had basically been worked out 40+ years earlier, during a >> brief--and virtually completely forgotten--"golden age" of research on >> nocturnal migration. Moonwatching techniques are well described in >> papers published in 1902 (Bull. Wisc. Nat. Hist. Soc.), 1906 (Popular >> Astronomy), and again in 1906 (Auk). >> >> (During that brief period of serious professional interest in the topic, >> there is an intriguing paper--by one Henry H. Kopman--on, among other >> things, the flight calls of wood-warblers. Farnsworth in a previous >> life...) >> >> Anyhow, I thought some folks would be interested. I'll let y'all know >> when the Rense obit. is published. >> >> Best, >> Ted >> >> >> >> >> >> >> ------------------------------- >> >> Ted Floyd >> Editor, Birding >> >> ------------------------------- >> >> Please support the American Birding Association: Click on >> http://www.goodsearch.com/?charityid=884482 to search the internet. >> >> Check out the American Birding Association on FaceBook: >> http://www.facebook.com/group.php?gid=22934255714 >> >> Check out the American Birding Association on Twitter: >> http://twitter.com/abaoutreach >> >> Please visit the website of the American Birding Association: >> http://www.aba.org >> >> -- >> NFC-L List Info: >> http://www.NortheastBirding.com/NFC_WELCOME >> http://www.NortheastBirding.com/NFC_RULES >> -- >> > > -- NFC-L List Info: http://www.NortheastBirding.com/NFC_WELCOME http://www.NortheastBirding.com/NFC_RULES http://www.mail-archive.com/[email protected]/maillist.html --
