My family WhatsApp Group has been having fun with a post on a facebook group that was formed to help people identify Australian birds. The post, titled ‘Australian Bird Names’, instructs members of the group to stop using the name ‘Bin Chicken’ to describe the Australian White Ibis:
‘Fighting or hassling comments over the use of ‘bin chicken’ will result in your comment being removed… Although many find the use of bin chicken funny, just as many don’t and it has caused continued fights within the group.’
The moderator was not taking sides here, just trying to tone down the ‘fighting and hassling’, and I sympathise with her. Leaving aside that we all know what can happen on social media when people take sides on something, the obvious question is why there was an issue to fire up the protagonists in the first place. I’m not a member of the facebook group, so I can only speculate – but I won’t let that slow me down.
The Australian White Ibis is a beautiful, graceful bird with dazzling white plumage, a black neck and head, and a long, curved, probing beak. It stalks around on equally long legs, looking stately and serene. But it has acquired grubby habits as it has adapted to life in Australian towns and cities. It uses its stature and and beak to rummage in rubbish bins, scattering garbage in all directions and eating whatever morsel was buried at the bottom. It is now a well-established urban bird, frequenting parks and beaches, or anywhere people take picnics and dispose of their leftovers. It is a classic case of avian adaptation and survival in a changing environment, a perfect example of how birds may somehow thrive despite every challenge and threat that we humans throw in their direction.
The Australian White Ibis is clearly not what it used to be. It still looks the same (although it is worth noting that many species do change in form and appearance quite rapidly faced with major habitat changes, and maybe this will happen to these Ibises) but its way of life has changed through adapting to the changing presence of humans. Perhaps it is time for a new name, and maybe ‘Bin Chicken’ is the best on offer.
So what’s the fuss all about? I’m a birder and I have met people from the core community of experts – taxonomists, ornithologists and others of that ilk – who pronounce on such matters as bird names. Some of them sit on the committees that bestow these names after much deliberation, and they conform diligently to the rules of the International Code of Zoological Nomenclature. Consistency, precedence, uniformity and precision are much valued.
All birders take pride in ‘knowing the right names’. I frequently observe the kind of tut-tutting that happens when a birder mistakenly calls a bird by the wrong name, a cardinal sin of this kind being to call a gull a ‘seagull’. No such name exists on the official taxonomic lists, although just about everyone not in this community of aficionados and know-alls uses the vernacular name when one flies screaming over their head, or raids their box of chips on the beach. In Australia, most of these seagulls/gulls are ‘properly’ called Silver Gulls but, for most purposes ‘Look out for the seagulls!’ does the job perfectly.
Vernacular bird names are often brilliant and Bin Chicken is one of the best. The name has emerged organically. It has even achieved worldwide fame for its use in episodes of the children’s TV series ‘Bluey’. It is the product of a direct connection between people going about their daily lives and the natural world around them. The name expresses good-humoured affection and admiration along with a touch of censoriousness and irritation. It perfectly describes immediately memorable features of the bird’s behaviour and appearance (well, at least it is chicken-sized, if not a look-alike). It seems spot-on as a common name, that is, a name used in spoken language as distinct from the scientific name, or binomial, which is always in Latin – Threskiornis molucca in the case of the Australian White Ibis.
I guess most of us just ignore Bin Chickens and pass them by, so ubiquitous have they become. But the very name helps make us sit up and take notice. At some point, I bet we all have stopped and looked, even marvelled, at such a creature in our midst. All of us have certainly chuckled (or tut-tutted) at their behaviour. The more this kind of thing happens, the more people may care about birds and their fate. We might even ask – ‘why are these birds frequenting city parks and beaches, not their original habitat?’ In large part the answer is because we have degraded and destroyed that habitat. So, whose fault is it that they are making such a mess around the place? And if that worries you, complain to the local council, don’t blame the birds.
So, should we propose to the august committee that bestows the proper names on Australian birds that this one be officially renamed? Leaving aside how much time and effort such a process would entail, let’s consider the case on its merits. The first problem – here the purists have a strong point – is that a ‘chicken’ is something else altogether in the avian world, so this name for an Ibis would spread confusion about the bird’s real identity. After all, it is an Ibis – it looks like, behaves like, and mates with other Ibises of the same species, not chickens. Ibises should be known, counted, respected and loved for being Ibises.
Anyway, chickens, strictly speaking, should be called Red Junglefowl (domestic type). Indeed, use of the word ‘chicken’ for any wild bird is inappropriate, as the word evolved specifically to apply to domesticated breeds, whose origin in the distant past was in the wild Junglefowl of South Asia. ‘Bin Junglefowl’ clearly doesn’t work.
From the point of view of a birder or an ornithologist, the current name for Australian White Ibis is fine, it fits the bill (no pun intended). As a birder, I am keen on consistency and accuracy in naming and identifying birds after how they look, or after the places where they live or after their habitat, and as belonging clearly to one or another species or family.
But I am also all for supporting ways to embed in common names a means of connecting with and appreciating birds as fellow inhabitants of our patch of the natural world. There are many excellent, approved Australian bird names that achieve this but which might, if they were being proposed for the first time to a contemporary naming committee, meet the same reaction as ‘Bin Chicken’ – for example, Butcherbird, Willie Wagtail and Bluebonnet. These are vernacular names that stuck, not ones obviously made up by a technical committee. Their anthropomorphism might well disqualify them in such a forum from the outset. But first and foremost each of the names connects a bird directly to a relatable aspect of its presence in our midst, in the same way that ‘Bin Chicken’ does. And the names are accessible and memorable for their alliteration as well as for what they evoke (maybe a good argument for putting a poet on the naming committee).
A Butcherbird is notorious for dissecting its prey in plain sight and impaling morsels on handy branches; its closest relative is the Australian Magpie (which, by the way, is not a member of the Corvid family, where all other Magpies belong). The Bluebonnet is a dainty, very pretty Parrot with blue headgear over its forehead. And a Willie Wagtail really does wag its tail, incessantly and furiously; but it is not a real Wagtail – it’s in the Fantail family; all other birds called Wagtail are in the Wagtail and Pipit family. But hey! so what? Those of us who need to know are not in the least bit confused by this solitary exception.
We are accustomed to many such anomalies and oddities in the list of accepted common names. While there are rules governing how the official naming bodies have chosen names for birds, these rules have evolved over time, and many pre-existing names that might not fit all the current rules have not been changed. One general rule is that long-accepted names should not be altered without exceptional reasons. So Willie Wagtail and Bluebonnet are here to stay, and Bin Chicken is a non-starter.
But to return to our ‘fighting and hassling’ bird-name-zealots and their facebook posts, I mean – get a life! The purists can live their pure lives in their own circles and communicate with latin binomials if they so wish. But let the rest of the bird-loving community have their say in their own words, especially if it helps them relate to, appreciate, and reflect on the birds around them. At the same time, especially if they are members of a facebook group specifically about identification and naming, they should have some understanding of the considerations the purists use when they bestow and use bird names.
But the name Bin Chicken is now so widely used and appreciated that no amount of finger-wagging is going to expunge it as a vernacular common name. Surely, we can all live with a bird having more than one name – you know, like a nickname and a given name. Next time you see a facebook post about Bin Chickens, just point out nicely that they are a member of the Ibis family and that another name for them is Australian White Ibis. And if you are the recipient of this post, ignore it if you want. Then, we can all move on and enjoy the birds in our own ways.
