This week’s header is a two-fer. I learned about this week’s bird, the Pacific Golden Plover, while reading about an “extreme trans-Neptunian object” (TNO) called 541132 Leleākūhonua. It was so named because it’s extremely elongated orbit around the sun reminded the people who named it of the flight of this week’s bird. The Pacific Golden Plover is another champion of migration, migrating from the top of the planet to the bottom and back again. I thought it was especially interesting that once the chicks are able to fly, the parents depart on their long journey first, leaving the chicks to grow up a bit more before they too set off, without parental help or guidance, several months later. My favorite thing that I learned about the TNO is that its orbit suggests, but does not definitively prove, the existence of an as-yet undiscovered ninth planet in our solar system.
I also found the following passage from wikipedia especially evocative: “The English description states that the name (Leleākūhonua) “compares the orbit to the flight of migratory birds and evokes a yearning to be near Earth” (in Hawaiian, me he manu i ke ala pōʻaiapuni lā, he paʻa mau nō ia i ka hui me kona pūnana i kumu mai ai – like a bird on a path circling the sun, it is forever seeking a leeward wind back toward home.)[1][18]“
Following are some links to where I got the bird photos, as well as articles on the bird and the space rock that bears its name. Have a good weekend, everyone!
Space Rock: https://tinyurl.com/3nsm5u2m
Bird: https://tinyurl.com/mv2e9c2k
Photos: https://tinyurl.com/3mdz4mhn,
