A very long time ago I decided that words do not have meaning, rather, people put meaning to words. Then a number of years back I read a piece about that very subject. That observer also felt as I did. Therefore, it was confirmed that people do put meaning to words. So what does that have to do with birding? Well.

A few decades ago a controversy arose over the terms phase and morph. Although there are other fine examples, since full adult individuals may appear notably unlike each other, the Red-tailed Hawk was, and is to this day, the subject bird in such discussions.

It was concluded that a darker than usual adult Red-tail Hawk was not showing a phase, such as a dark phase, since it was not, at that age, going through a phase. Instead, the term morph became the proper terminology. On a bird walk it is common for the birders to concur that the hawk drifting overhead is a dark morphed Red-tail.

Recently we heard, twice in the field and once around a lunch table, that morph is out of favor because the bird is not going to morph into another form. Further, we even heard that it should be referenced once again as phase.

The latter makes no sense – it certainly is not a phase, for as stated above it is not going to phase into another phase. Further, morph is short for morphology, that is, what the bird looks like. So it too is not in the process of morphing, for it has gone through all it's morphing.

Now the term morph, too, has been rejected for some unknown reason. The preferred terminology has become color variation. Well, does that mean the term reverse-dimorphism should be changed to reverse-color-variation? What, then, does an observer say, “That Red-tail has a color variation.” Well of course it does!

I think these folks ran out of something to write about. However, it gives us that very same chance - just as we’re doing here.

The Red-tail Hawks, which are again nesting in the trees across from Cummings Valley Elementary School, we describe as a classic morphed male and the female as a light morph (Pale Female).

Whatever, phase, morph, color variation – just as whether you say Pile-eated or Pill-eated Woodpecker - use whatever you wish; I’ll know what you mean. We’ll use morph, and pile-eated, and you’ll know what I mean.

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