Charles Walter De Vis
Encyclopedia
Charles Walter de Vis known as Devis before about 1882, was an English
England
England is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. It shares land borders with Scotland to the north and Wales to the west; the Irish Sea is to the north west, the Celtic Sea to the south west, with the North Sea to the east and the English Channel to the south separating it from continental...

 zoologist and ornithologist. Initially a cleric
Clergy
Clergy is the generic term used to describe the formal religious leadership within a given religion. A clergyman, churchman or cleric is a member of the clergy, especially one who is a priest, preacher, pastor, or other religious professional....

, he gave up his ecclesiastical functions to devote himself to science, initially in England then after 1870 in Australia
Australia
Australia , officially the Commonwealth of Australia, is a country in the Southern Hemisphere comprising the mainland of the Australian continent, the island of Tasmania, and numerous smaller islands in the Indian and Pacific Oceans. It is the world's sixth-largest country by total area...

.

He was a founder member of the Royal Society of Queensland
Royal Society of Queensland
The Royal Society of Queensland was formed in Queensland, Australia in 1884, with royal patronage granted in 1885.The aim of the Society is "Increasing awareness of natural sciences in Queensland"....

 of which he served as president in 1888-1889, and founder member and first vice-president of the Royal Australasian Ornithologists Union
Royal Australasian Ornithologists Union
The Royal Australasian Ornithologists Union, also known as Birds Australia, was founded in 1901 to promote the study and conservation of the native bird species of Australia and adjacent regions. This makes it Australia's oldest national birding association. It is also Australia's largest...

.

His principal work concerned the fossil
Fossil
Fossils are the preserved remains or traces of animals , plants, and other organisms from the remote past...

 birds of Queensland
Queensland
Queensland is a state of Australia, occupying the north-eastern section of the mainland continent. It is bordered by the Northern Territory, South Australia and New South Wales to the west, south-west and south respectively. To the east, Queensland is bordered by the Coral Sea and Pacific Ocean...

 (Darling Downs) and southern Australia (Cooper Creek
Cooper Creek
Cooper Creek is one of the most famous and yet least visited rivers in Australia. It is sometimes known as the Barcoo River from one of its tributaries and is one of three major Queensland river systems that flow into the Lake Eyre Basin...

), but he also described a number of extant bird species
Species
In biology, a species is one of the basic units of biological classification and a taxonomic rank. A species is often defined as a group of organisms capable of interbreeding and producing fertile offspring. While in many cases this definition is adequate, more precise or differing measures are...

. In fact, he was more successful at the latter, because due to insufficient knowledge of stratigraphy
Stratigraphy
Stratigraphy, a branch of geology, studies rock layers and layering . It is primarily used in the study of sedimentary and layered volcanic rocks....

 and evolution
Evolution
Evolution is any change across successive generations in the heritable characteristics of biological populations. Evolutionary processes give rise to diversity at every level of biological organisation, including species, individual organisms and molecules such as DNA and proteins.Life on Earth...

, he - like many ornithologists of his time - mistook subfossil
Subfossil
Subfossil refers to remains whose fossilization process is not complete, either for lack of time or because the conditions in which they were buried were not optimal for fossilization....

 remains of extant birds for the remains of extinct prehistoric species.

Among species he described were the White-winged Robin
White-winged Robin
The White-winged Robin is a species of bird in the family Petroicidae.-Distribution and habitat:The White-winged Robin is found in Indonesia and Papua New Guinea. Its natural habitat is subtropical or tropical moist montanes...

 in 1890, and the Frill-necked Monarch
Frill-necked Monarch
The Frill-necked Monarch is a species of songbird in the Monarchidae family. It is endemic to the rainforests of the northern Cape York Peninsula...

in 1895.

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