I apologize for the long email. On the subject of salvaging bird specimens I've pasted below something that I usually hand out at my birding classes.

Mike Donahue
Seattle's Beacon Hill

Avian specimens in museum collections are libraries of biological material and provide a wealth of information: they have tremendous value for studies on taxonomy, systematics, biogeography, distribution, geographical variation, anatomy, molt and plumage sequences, morphology, age and sex differences, migration, and timing of reproduction. Paleontologists use skeleton collections to help identify bones recovered from archeological sites, and bird specimens are used by artists and law enforcement agencies. The same specimens can be used repeatedly to answer a number of biological questions. If stored and handled properly they can last for hundreds of years.

An under appreciated value of museum collections is their role in conservation. For example, feathers can be analyzed for the presence of heavy metals and different forms of carbon and nitrogen. This provides information about the bird's environment and can be used to track changes over time. The role of DDT in egg shell thinning was established in part by examining eggs in museums that were collected prior to the use of DDT. Studies of molt have been able to identify geographic regions that may be critical during the molting period.

Why is it necessary to continue adding to museum collections?

Birds vary by season, sex, and age, often wearing more than one plumage over the course of a year. They vary geographically, and some can take several years (up to 10 in some albatrosses) before they reach plumage maturity. A large number of specimens of each species are necessary in order to adequately represent all of this variability.

Researchers use specimens from their local museums and obtain loans of specimens from other museums if necessary. Even when pooling the collection of every museum in North America, it can be difficult to find 5-10 specimens in the required categories of age and sex, major geographic regions, and in the relevant time periods, even for such common birds as Warbling Vireos and Lazuli Buntings.

A good example of this is the following anecdote from the Collection Manager of Birds at the Field Museum in Chicago: a coworker brought by a House Finch that he found dead at his house in eastern Illinois on January 20. Although the computer records showed that they had over 500 House Finches in their collection, none were from that date. It was one of only four from Illinois, one of six from east of the Mississippi River, and the only eastern specimen from the winter out of the 500 specimens in their collection.

Burke Museum researchers who wanted to use skeletal measurements to help identify the breeding localities of Common Murres that were casualties of winter oil spills only found one breeding season specimen from British Columbia in North American collections!

An adequate number of specimens to examine are required in order to determine any meaningful patterns. What was understood about Arctic Tern molt for years was based on an examination of 15 specimens, only 5 of which were in molt. A further study of 338 specimens that included 81 in molt revealed that the previous conclusions about their molt pattern were incorrect.

I studied the plumage sequence of Western Tanagers, and examined over 600 specimens, many of which were over 70 years old. Some specimen labels only had the month and year recorded. These specimens were useful for quantifying molt sequence, but not useful for quantifying molt timing, or the timing of reproduction and migration.

Many older specimens in collections have vague geographic locations recorded on the specimen tag, which makes them less valuable for some research projects. Many of these older specimens have the sex of the bird recorded on the specimen tag but do not include gonad measurements. In addition to gonad measurements being very useful for research, these measurements also provide verification of the sex. Preparators of many older specimens made determinations of the bird's sex based on plumage. When examining specimens of Barrow's Goldeneye at the Burke Museum, I found one specimen that was undoubtedly an immature male, but "female" was recorded on the specimen tag. We now know that some male waterfowl resemble females in the fall, and do not start molting into alternate plumage until early to mid-winter.

Museums specimen preparators now record such things as weight, fat content, measurements of gonads, skull ossification and bursa (which are internal characters used for aging), stomach contents, presence of a brood patch, as well as elevation, habitat, and precise locality information. Many museums are also storing tissue that is available for genetic and biochemical research.

One exciting recent innovation is the technique of preparing a spread wing along with the specimen. These spread wings make it much easier to view and measure the inner portions of the wing and facilitate studies of molt and flight mechanics.

Many museums actively trade with other museums. The Burke Museum has been working in collaboration with Soviet ornithologists for over a decade, and regularly exchange specimens with them.

The bottom line is: Don't assume that the House Finch or Fox Sparrow that hits your window is "just a common bird" and isn't valuable!

The Burke Museum of Natural History and Culture (University of Washington): Dr. Sievert Rohwer was appointed Curator of Zoology in the mid-1970s, and transformed the small bird collection at the time into one of international importance. The tissue collection has the greatest loan activity of any tissue collection and is the second largest tissue collection in the world. This museum was the first to start preparing extended wings with bird preparations and is the largest spread wing collection in the world. Their skeleton collection ranks 11th in the world. Dr. Rohwer and his graduate students have been leaders in unraveling molt and plumage sequences of western North American passerines and North Pacific seabirds.

You can read more about their collection on the web at: http://www.washington.edu/burkemuseum/zoo.html


The Slater Musuem of Natural History (University of Puget Sound):

With the appointment of Dr. Dennis Paulson as Director in 1990, the growth of their avian collection was reinvigorated. A fifth of the bird specimens in the collection have been prepared since 1990 and thus have associated spread wing preparations and much more extensive data.

You can read more about their collection on the web at:
http://www.ups.edu/x5649.xml

Directions for saving specimens:

1. Storing:

? Stuff a small piece of tissue in the mouth of the bird.

? Wrap the bird in a piece of newspaper. If the bird is large, fold the head and legs around the body to form a compact package before wrapping.

? Put the bird in a plastic bag and squeeze out the extra air.

? Specimens can be kept for months in the freezer, but a lengthy storage can cause freezer burn, which makes the specimens more difficult to prepare, and often causes damage to the gonads. So don't let them sit in your freezer for too long!

2. Recording data:

? Locality and date are the most important pieces of information to record. A useful format for recording the data is:

Locality: State, County, nearest town, location in relation to nearest town.

Date:

Your name and phone number:

Manner of collection (window kill, cat kill, road kill, etc.):

It's even better if you can record the township, section and range (from the DeLorme Atlas) or the GPS location.

3. Delivering specimens:

To deliver to the Burke Museum: call the Ornithology Division at (206) 543-1668 to arrange a time to drop it off. Another option is to attend a Washington Ornithological Society monthly meeting. Someone from the Burke usually attends to accept specimens.

To deliver to the Slater Museum: call Dr. Gary Shugart, Collections Manager, at (253) 879-3356