The Yellowhammer Problem

Nature Talk
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The official State bird of Alabama, United States is Colaptes auratus. Locally, this bird is called a “Yellowhammer.” This leads to extensive confusion with the Eurasian yellowhammer (Emberiza citrinella). Often resources will provide C. auratus pictures, but use a cartoon or illustrated E. citrinella in the same publication. Sometimes, weird hybrids emerge where an illustrator tries to combine both species into one. In elementary school, my siblings were shown vidoes depicting E. citrinella, and teachers had wall posters depicting E.citrinella as our state bird.

Questions:
What can be done to fix this confusion? (particularly to remove it from state sponsored educational materials)
Can you find any other resources incorrectly referencing Alabama’s state bird?
Are there any other similar instances of confusion? (local common name also applies to a wildly different species)

Here are several inks to publications using the incorrect species

  1. https://www.birdwatchingacademy.com/alabama-state-bird/
  2. https://kids.britannica.com/kids/assembly/view/257844 (As a British resource would be easy to confuse.)
  3. https://classroomclipart.com/image/vector-clipart/state-bird-of-alabama-the-yellowhammer-clipart-18314.htm (not sure what this one is, E citrinella coloring on a cooper’s hawk??)
  4. https://kids.britannica.com/students/assembly/view/255508 (As a British resource would be easy to confuse.)
  5. https://kids.nationalgeographic.com/geography/states/article/alabama (this article and the accompanying video are linked in Alabama public educational materials.)
  6. https://10best.usatoday.com/travel/state-bird-list-usa/
  7. https://avianbirds.com/yellowhammer/ (AI generated E. citrinella alongside C. auratus)
  8. https://animalcorner.org/animals/yellowhammer/ (two photos of clearly different birds on the same page.)

A similar problem occurs when a Red-Shafted Flicker is used under the name “Yellowhammer,” at least it occurs on the same continent though.

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I have no idea how to fix any of it.
Those two species do not look alike.
Alabama has their own reason for calling their state bird “Yellowhammer”, where here in Michigan, I’ve only heard it called “Yellow-shafted Flicker”, “Yellow Flicker” or just “Flicker”.
I’ve never seen a Red-Shafted Flicker,( and understand they can interbreed), that confusion seems reasonable.
But so odd to confuse these two.

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In this case, you’d need to write to those producing the materials.

In the longer term, a basic level of ecological literacy would help to reduce this confusion. It baffles me how someone could be so ignorant of their state bird as to mix it up with a bird from an entirely different Order.

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How about change the state bird? Few will like it, but I don’t know.

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Start a campaign that shows the difference between the two species and explains which one actually occurs in AL. Great opportunity to educate the public that they actually have a state bird and it’s not the one illustrated in all these websites.

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If anyone reads newspapers anymore, find a reporter in AL who can do a story on this. Then disseminate the article to publishers, interested parties, and anyone else via social media. Surely AL has an Audubon Society chapter that could help.

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Here in California, many people either don’t realize that our state animal, the Golden Bear, is meant to depict a California Grizzly Bear (Ursus arctos californicus) or don’t know that this subspecies was driven to extinction, and that there are no longer any wild Grizzly Bears in California. I’ve talked to several people who assume that because Black Bear (Ursus americanus) is the only wild bear in California, that must be the Golden Bear.

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Great suggestions. I added two more links to the original post.