After doing some more reading about our Owl of the Year, it seems that the name is becoming a bit outdated.
After genetic testing around 2010, it showed there was enough genetic diversity to split the species into 2 different ones, so now we have the Northern White Faced and (surprise surprise) the Southern White Faced Owl.
The difference is only slightly visual, with the Southern usually being a little darker and more streaky in pattern, but various birds are going to look different, and with different lighting in every photo, it’s not that easy to pick them apart that way.
With genetic testing becoming cheaper, we’re learning a lot about what we can’t observe by other methods previously available. I tried reading a scientific paper about the original results of the testing of the White Faced Scops, and all I could make is it was the % variation of their results between the 2 groups of samples was enough to recommend the species be split. It seemed very interesting how they analyze these things, so I’ll have to learn more about how people look at genetic diversity and genetic distance so I can read deeper into these things.
That was one of the concerns I had with the winner getting the icon image. If it was Snowy, I didn’t know whether to pick the girl or boy since they look different.
Even with the banner, I couldn’t decide so I told dragonfly to pick whatever so I didn’t have to decide. They picked an inside with both, so nobody had to choose after all!