 Birds of Great Britain (1863) |
John Gould's
classic work 'The Birds of Great Britain'
(1863) - is the equivalent of John James Audubon's 'Birds
of America'. The depictions of birds are less romanticised
than
earlier artists like Audubon and give a clearer impression of the
behaviour
and habitat of each species.
However, although John Gould was the great ornithologist he was not the illustrator of these books. The images were actually created by two German artists, Wolf and Keulemans. The story is recounted in 'The Ruling Passion of John Gould' by Isabella Tree (1991) These Goldfinches are alighting on their favourite food plant - Teazle - though blue flowers show that this plant is in bloom and the seeds will not ripen for some weeks. The beak of the goldfinch has evolved to be able to specialise in feeding on teazle - which most other finches cannot exploit - the seeds being deeply buried in bristle-covered heads. |
