Boros István (szerk.): A Magyar Természettudományi Múzeum évkönyve 8. (Budapest 1957)

Horváth, L.: Bird-banding by the Hungarian Natural History Museum in 1950-1956

ANNALES HISTORICO-NATURALES MUSEI NATIONALIS HUNGARICI Tomus VIII. Series nova 1957 Bird-Banding by the Hungarian Natural History Museum in 1950—1956 By L. HORVÁTH, Budapest The Hungarian Natural History Museum took its part in bird-banding researches since 1950. The Zoological Department of the Museum suffered very heavy losses during the events of October, 1956, when, among others, also the Ornithological Collection was completely annihilated, together with its special library and the inventory books. The reference book, however, containing the data of our home bird-bandings was not kept in the Collection at the time of the catastrophe, and it escaped the overall destruction. This fortunate circumstance proffers the possibility to give an account of the bandings and the reports. Unfortunately, the list of birds banded abroad and found in Hungary was destroyed, with the resultant impossibility to publish any data in this regard. The Natural History Museum banded 2.030 birds during the 7 years indicated in the title. Of these, 44 were found or came to our knowledge. Birdbanding, with reference to the fact that it was never one of the main tasks of our Museum, was not intensive ; it was partly done in connection with our normal collecting trips for the usual Museum purposes when the dates or localities of these excursions were suitable for this kind of work, or it was partly carried out by the voluntary undertaking of research associates. I have especially to emphasize the work of K. Warga, research associate of the Hungarian Ornithological Institute, who, as a pensioned worker, was also the associate of the Natural History Museum for 2 years and who did regular and very numerous bandings during this period. More than half of the 2.030 birds, that is, some 1.100 birds were banded by him. The other research associates of the Natural History Museum, partaking in bird-banding, were the following : K. A m b r u s, dr. P. B e r e t z k, dr. I. Homoki-Nagy, B. Kiss, L. Sándorfi, J. Szimandl, G. Topái, I. Tóth, G y. Tusnádi, and L. Vértes. It is my agreeable duty to thank them all also in this place. I myself have not banded more than 100 and then some birds on the Hortobágy of the Great Hungarian Plains. All other banding was done in the close vicinity of the Capital, in the marshes of the Kisbalaton (46° 40', 17° 15') and in the alkaline lakes called Szegedi Fehértó (46° 20', 20° 05'). The list below gives the banded and found species, with their specimen numbers.