Náttúrufræðingurinn - 1984, Page 87

SUMMARY
Rare and vagrant birds
in Iceland
An introductory note on the col-
laboration between the Icelandic
Museum of Natural History and bird
observers.*
by
Ævar Petersen
Icelandic Museum of Natural History
P. O. Box 5320
125 Reykjavík
Iceland
An organized effort to collect and store
information on rare and vagrant birds in
Iceland, can be traced back to 1937. That
year Finnur Gudmundsson, later curator
at the Icelandic Museum of Natural His-
tory for 31 years, returned to Iceland upon
completing his doctoral degree in Ger-
many. He started very soon making con-
tact with naturalists in various parts of the
country. They sent him information or
specimens of rare birds, and this kind of
data has continually been collected to the
present day. The Icelandic Museum of
Natural History has also acted as a deposi-
tory for material handed in by the general
public.
The first years’ results of this docu-
mentation were published (Finnur Gud-
mundsson 1938, 1940, 1942, 1944). Since
then little detailed information on the sub-
ject has found its way into the ornithologi-
cal literature, although materials have
been accumulating to the present day.
However, the Museum has contributed in-
formation for Iceland to the “The Birds of
the Western Palearctic” and “Handbuch
der Vögel Mitteleuropas”.
To date just over 300 species of birds
have been recorded from Iceland. Only
about 70 of these are regular breeders,
while additional 15 species or so have
attempted nesting on one or more occa-
sion. Some of the latter may even be regu-
lar, albeit very rare, breeders. Approxi-
mately half of the occurring species are
rare, around 20% have been recorded only
once. Some of these are of North-Ameri-
can origin and very rare in Europe. On
average, 3—4 new species have been
added to the Icelandic list every year dur-
ing the past 45 years.
Finnur Gudmundsson died before he
was able to publish a checklist of Icelandic
birds as he had intended. The material had
grown too much over the 40-year period in
question. The present paper describes a
joint effort by a group of some 10 obser-
vers aimed at reviewing the status of vag-
rant birds in Iceland, in collaboration with
the Museum.
Altogether about 230 bird species will
be involved in this work. Plans are being
made to publish the reviews in a series of
papers. The species will be dealt with in
phylogenetic order, following Voous
(1973, 1977). Each paper will deal with a
group or groups of related species. In addi-
tion there will be papers on rare or new
breeders, and papers on species needing
more detailed treatment than is possible to
give in the general review papers. The
intention is to give as much details as
possible for individual records. The pre-
sentation of the records will be standar-
dized as much as is feasible, to facilitate
their use by readers, non-Icelandic
included. English summaries will be pro-
vided.
Since 1979 the Museum, in cooperation
with bird observers, has published annual
reports of rare birds in Iceland (Gunn-
* Rare and vagrant birds in Iceland. Report 1:
The Icelandic Museum of Natural History, PO
Box 5320, 125 Reykjavík, Iceland.
81
6