Definition of "feral" relating to Colorado (or any) birds

[Leon Bright]

COBirders,

  After following the recent thread, I thought maybe my understanding that the word “feral” is used to indicate one or more wild individuals of a normally domesticated species was wrong. So I checked our Random House College Dictionary and found out that I was not wrong.  It would be nice if specialists (in any field) would create new words rather than use ones that already have a widely accepted, but different, meaning.  By the same token, why invent a word (i.e. “juvenal”) when the adjective “juvenile” is a perfectly adequate descriptor for plumage?  Ah, the vagaries of the English language, sayeth the old Spanish professor.

Leon Bright, Pueblo

 

[COBirds]

I agree - feral is a domesticated species gone wild (e.g., feral ducks, geese, pigeons, swine, horses, burros) and some form wild populations (e.g., feral pigeons - came with early settlers as food and started a feral population that is here until this day) (some can be considered invasive - e.g., swine).  Escaped/Invasive/Introduced would be appropriate for wild animals and some (e.g. Eurasian Collared-Dove, House Sparrow, European Starling, Peach-faced Lovebirds (some of the pet-trade birds get iffy but they don't seem to really be domesticated), Common Myna, etc.) have formed wild populations too, but were introduced by people. The only thing I have seen feral referred to was for Rock Pigeons.  They were brought by the early settlers in the late 1600s and are a common domesticated bird, even today, and they formed wild flocks in North America that now cover the country.  There is a wide variety of breeds today.   They can take back wild traits if escaped (just like feral swine return to black after several generations), but coloration in many flocks still show their domestic origins (not uncommon to see various colors of brown, white, etc. - same in swine).  So feral Rock Pigeons is the approprite term for that species because thier wild counterparts in Europe were not introduced, the domesticated ones were (escapes).

 

Tom Hall

Liverrmore, CO