Species names within the genus Agapornis
Part 5 – Agapornis swindernianus
By Dirk Van den Abeele
Ornitho-Genetics VZW
Published in Agapornis.info the BVA-International magazine of October 2023
Agapornis swindernianus, the big unknown within the genus Agapornis in aviculture.
Despite the fact that this species was already described for the first time in 1820 and that this bird is actually spread across a large part of the equatorial area in Africa, Agapornis swindernianus is hardly ever present in aviculture. The fact that this species is hard(er) to breed and domesticate might play a part in this. The limited presence in aviculture leads to stories about this species being extinct. The greatest nonsense which I have ever heard was that they were not only extinct but that there are also only a few rare skins available. Luckily the opposite is true. The number of skins present worldwide in various collections is amazingly large and its status in the wild is ‘LC’ or ‘Least Concern’ which indicates that their presence in the wild is not endangered. The dispersal area is also estimated to be about 3,000,000 km² [1]. An enormously large area, but it puts Agapornis swindernianus only in second place since the habitat of Agapornis pullarius is no less than 8,360,000 km2 [2].
1820. Heinrich Kuhl (1797–1821) is the first to describe Agapornis swindernianus in ‘Nova acta physico-medica Academiae Caesareae Leopoldino-Carolinae Naturae Curiosum’. According to later sources he did this based on the only skin which was found in the collection by Laugier in the museum in Paris [3]. He calls this species Psittacus swindernianus after his mentor professor Theodore van Swinderen from the University of Groningen (the Netherlands). At that time swindernianus, as was always the case for parakeets back then, was classified within the genus Psittacus.
1822. John Latham (1740-1837) describes in volume 2 of ‘A General history of birds’ a bird from the (skins) collection of a certain Mr Brogden. This bird meets the description of Agapornis swindernianus. Since this skin originated in Sierra Leone Latham called it ‘Leona Parrakeet’.
1826. James Francis Stephens (1792 – 1852) publishes part 14 of ‘General Zoology, or systematic natural history, or systematic natural History’. He writes a description of Agapornis swindernianus, albeit as Psittacula swinderniana. The same way he did for Agapornis pullarius in the same book, he uses the species name of the person who first described the species (in this case Kuhl), he only places swindernanus in the genus Psittacula. Since the grammatical gender of Psittacula is female, he correctly – for this genus – alters the species name to swinderniana.
1832. The German researcher Johann Georg Wagler (1800 – 1832) mentions in ‘Monographia Psittacorum,in Abhandlungen der Mathematisch-Physicalischen Klasse der Königlich Bayerischen Akademie der Wissenschaften‘ Agapornis swindernianus as Psittacula swindereniana.
1832. In ‘Illustrations of the Family of Psittacidae, or Parrots’, a beautiful book by Edward Lear (1812 –1888), containing illustrations of parakeets, we also find a drawing of Agapornis swindernianus. Lear himself calls this, just like Stephens in 1826, Psittacula swinderiana.
1836. Prideaux John Selby introduces the name Agapornis for the members of the family of small parrots from Africa in his book ‘The naturalist’s Library Parrots’. Fun detail, he is the first to place Agapornis swindernianus as a species within this new genus.
1837. Just as he does with Agapornis taranta William Swainson (1789-1855) introduces in his book ‘On the natural history and classification of birds’, the name Poicephalus for a genus in which he places a number of large African parakeets. He calls Agapornis swindernianus Poicephalus swindernianus.
1840. George Robert Gray (1808 –1872) was in charge of the ornithological department of the British Museum in London for 41 years. He published in 1840 ‘A list of the genera of birds’ containing an overview of all birds known at that time. He is very thorough and mentions for Agapornis swindernianus all known synonyms and proposed genera (Agapornis, Selby. Psittacus, Kuhl. Psittacula, Wagl. Poicephalus, Swains). He personally places the bird in the correct genus Agapornis but he does not call the species swindernianus as it should be but swinderniana.
1842. Hugh Edwin Strickland (1811 – 1853) publishes as a member of a specially created committee a document containing the basic rules for zoological nomenclature. These rules, which are now known as the Strickland code, state among other that if multiple names are used in one and the same taxon, only the name published first is considered to be valid. This means that all members of the genus Agapornis should be classified within this genus. For this was the first and only name given to this genus. The referrals of Psittacus and Psittacula are dropped, since these names were already used for all parakeets/parrots.
1853. The German priest/ornithologist Christian Ludwig Brehm (1787 – 1864) published between 1852 and 1854 the 15 part ’Monographie der Papageien: oder, Vollsta?ndige Naturgeschichte aller bis jetzt bekannten Papageien mit getreuen und ausgemalten Abbildungen‘. In part 8 from 1853 he describes Agapornis swindernianus under the German name Swinderns Zwergpapagei with Psittaculus Swinderianus as the Latin name. This is therefore the fifth genus (Agapornis, Selby, Psittacus, Kuhl. Psittacula, Wagl. Poicephalus, Swains) in which this bird is classified. Either the agreements put down on paper by Strickland in 1842 or the proposal by Selby from 1836 are not yet known in Germany at that time, or the author thought that a new genus would be a better fit for swindernianus. Who knows?
1854. Charles Lucien Bonaparte (1803 – 1857) describes in ‘Revue et Magasin de Zoologie pure et appliquée’ Agapornis swindernianus as Agapornis swinderniana. Just like he did in his description of Agapornis pullarius he uses the genus name correctly but makes a mistake in the name of the species. Since the grammatical gender of Agapornis is male it should be swindernianus.
1861. Carl Johann Gustav Hartlaub (1814 – 1900), a German physisist and naturalist, published the book ‘System der Ornithologie Westafricas’. In it he describes on page 169 the bird which John Latham described in 1822 as Leona Parrakeet, but then in Latin and he gave it a new, albeit Latin name: Agapornis picta. He probably suspects that this is a new species and just like Latham he does not (yet) make the connection with Agapornis swindernianus which was described by Kuhl in 1820 as Psittacus The fact that South-Africa was (wrongly) indicated as the habitat of the bird described by Kuhl, and that the habitat of the bird described by Hartlaub/Latham is Sierra Leone, will probably be the cause of this.
1868. The Polish explorer Friedrich Hermann Otto Finsch (1839 – 1917) mentions it in ‘Die Papageien, monographisch bearbeitet Agapornis swindernianus’ as Psittacula Swindereni. Again another species name is used, but all species names are based on the name of Prof. van Swinderen. It is striking that in the list of the five lovebird species known at that time
(Agapornis pullarius – [Psittacula pullaria] which he named -, Agapornis canus [Psittacula cana], Agapornis taranta [Psittacula Tarantae], Agapornis swindernianus [Psittacula Swindereni] and Agapornis roseicollis [Psittacula roseicollis]) he mentions the species name with a capital letter for Agapornis swindernianus and Agapornis taranta. This was done because at that time they reasoned that this was derived from a proper name and that this therefore should always be written with a capital letter. A line of thought which we sometimes still hear in aviculture. The guidelines are however clear: only the name of the genus must be written with a capital letter.
1870. George Robert Gray (1808 –1872) comprised ‘Hand-list of the genera and species of birds … in the British Museum’. As the title indicates, this is a listing of birds which are present in the British museum. He places the five lovebird species known at that time, just as he did in his book from 1840, within the genus Agapornis and mentions this species as Agapornis swinderniana.
1872. In Sweden Carl Jacob Sundevall (1801 –1875) published ‘Methodi naturalis avium disponendarum tentamen’ and mentions Agapornis swindernianus as Agapornis swindereniana. He uses the correct name for the genus, but adopts the species name which was introduced by Johann Georg Wagler in 1832.
1879. Carl Johann Gustav Hartlaub (1814 – 1900) published in ‘The Ibis’, an article in which he writes that the bird which he described 18 years prior, in 1861, as Agapornis picta was actually Agapornis swindernianus with a fairly high degree of certainty. Although he uses Agapornis swinderniana in the whole article there was an error in the title since this stated: ‘On Agapornis swindernaina’. Fun fact: in that article Hartlaub addresses the lack of sufficient skins of this species and mentions that Dr Felix Anton Dohrn (1840 – 1909), a German researcher and founder of ‘Stazione Zoologica’ in Naples (Italy), still has four beautiful skins of Agapornis swindernianus for sale for 60 German Marks (€31) each. Believe me, that was a nice sum of money in 1879.
1892. The second ‘International Congress of Zoology’, decided to recognize the tenth edition of ‘Systema Naturae’, from 1758 and the accompanying nomenclature as the basis for the ‘Zoological nomenclature’. From then on there were no longer any doubts that Agapornis swindernianus was the one and only correct name for this species.
1895. The German researcher and explorer Georg Anton Eugen Reichenow (1847 – 1941) describes and registers the first sub species for Agapornis swindernianus, namely Agapornis swindernianus zenkeri in ‘Ornithologische Monatsberichte as Agapornis swinderniana zenderi’. Contrary to the nominal type the neck band is more red in this sub species. Its habitat is Cameroon. Reichenow named this sub species after its discoverer Georg Zenker (1855-1922), a botanist from Leipzig. He was working as a naturalist in West-Africa. The sub species zenkeri was among the numerous botanical and zoological discoveries which he sent to Berlin.
1908. The German Professor Oscar Neumann (1867-1946) determined another sub species for Agapornis swindernianus in the ‘Bulletin of the British Ornithologists’ Club. He describes birds which were collected by Mr Camburn in the Ituri forest in Congo. These birds were owned by Baron Lionel Walter Rothschild. In the process, he discovers, probably, the lost birds discovered and described by the German explorer Emin Pasha. Because they deviate from swindernianus zenkeri he defined them as a new sub species and calls the bird Agapornis swindernianus emini, after the first name of their discoverer.
1924. In his article series ‘Types of birds at the Tring’ the German ornithologist Ernst Johann Otto Hartert (1859 -1933) also mentions Agapornis swindernianus emini and makes a few small corrections to the type description by Neumann.
1924. In ‘Systema Avium Ethiopicarum’ by William Lutley Sclater (1863 – 1944) both the nominal type and both sub species are mentioned: Agapornis swinderniana swinderniana, Agapornis swinderniana zenkeri and Agapornis swinderniana emini. Just like his father Philip Lutley Sclater did in 1860 in ‘Proceedings of the Zoological Society of London’, he still used swinderniana, instead of
1946. Hans von Boetticher (1886 – 1958) mentions Agapornis swindernianus as Agapoornis swinderniana in ‘Zoologische Anzeiger Leipzig’.
1997. In ‘Handbook of the Birds of the World’, del Hoyo, Elliott & Sargatal correct the previous taxonomists and mention correctly: A[gapornis] s[windernianus] swindernianus, A[gapornis] s[windernianus] zenkeri and A[gapornis] s[windernianus] emini. Again others, fortunately, follow their example.
As you can see, a lot of history and work preceded this. Every taxonomist at that time dreamt of getting as many new species as possible behind his name. A passion and drive on the part of these people, which has not only ensured that the knowledge of these species has expanded enormously in the last hundred years, but has also caused the inevitable misunderstandings, for cockiness is of all times. Fortunately, most taxonomists and authors today still use the correct names. Something we should expect after almost 200 years, I think.
Keep up the good work!!
Dirk
Literature:
[1] ‘Black-collared Lovebird (Agapornis swindernianus) – BirdLife species factsheet’. http://datazone.birdlife.org/species/factsheet/black-collared-lovebird-agapornis-swindernianus/refs (consulted on April 17th 2022).
[2] ‘Red-headed Lovebird (Agapornis pullarius) – BirdLife species factsheet’. http://datazone.birdlife.org/species/factsheet/red-headed-lovebird-agapornis-pullarius (consulted on April 20th 2022).
[3] G. Hartlaub, ‘On Agapornis swindernaina’, Ibis, vol. 21, nr. 1, pp. 84–86, 1879.