The Zoologist/4th series, vol 3 (1899)/Issue 701/Ornithological Meeting at Serajevo, Bosnia

by W.L. Distant (Ed.)

 

ORNITHOLOGICAL MEETING AT SERAJEVO, BOSNIA.^[1]

 

From the 25th to 28th September last there was held in Serajevo, the capital of Bosnia, under the auspices of the Local Government of Bosnia, an Ornithological Meeting, which has especially discussed questions of Phænology.^[2] The Meeting was attended by sixty-four members, of whom there were thirty from Hungary, eighteen from Bosnia, nine from Austria, six from Germany, and one from Italy.

During the meeting, which was presided over by Professor R. Blasius, of Brunswick, the following communications were made:—

O. Reiser (Serajevo): On the Ornithological Researches of the Serajevo Museum in the Balkan Peninsula.

O. Herman (Budapest): Report on the present status of Phænology, and on the activity of the Hungarian Ornithological Central Office.

Rev. T. Hegyfoky (Turkeve, Hungary): On the relations between Phænology and Meteorology.

Dr. L. Lorenz von Liburnau (Vienna): Report on the organization and activity of the Austrian Commission for Ornithological Observations, and on the results obtained by the observations of Migratory Birds in the years 1897-98 in Austria.

Gaston Gaal (Csaszta, Hungary): The great abundance of the Swallow (Hirundo rustica) during the year 1898 in Hungary.

Steph. Chernel (Köszeg, Hungary): On the utility and injuriousness of Birds judged upon positive basis.

Prof. H. Nitsche (Tharaudt, Germany): The distribution of the Common Heron in Saxony.

Prof. T. Knotek (Serajevo): On the dates of the migration of Birds as hitherto known from Bosnia and Herzegovina.

Very interesting and instructive for the members of this meeting were the collections in the Museum of Serajevo, by which the fauna of the Balkan Peninsula is richly represented, and which comprise about eight thousand skins of birds from all parts of the peninsula. These skins have been collected since 1887, and mostly by the indefatigable O. Reiser, Custos of the Museum.

 

1. For this report we are indebted to the good offices of Dr. G. Horvath, the Natural History Director of the "Museum National Hongrois" at Budapest.
2. This word is seldom used, and we have been informed by a very high authority that it may be defined as "Observational Biology," and as applied to birds, as it is here, may be taken to mean the study or science of observations on the appearance of birds.—(Ed.)