Janet Kear

Janet Kear OBE (13 January 1933 – 24 November 2004) was an English ornithologist and conservationist. She edited from 1980 to 1988 the journal Ibis and was from 1991 to 1995 president of the British Ornithologists' Union. She was appointed in 1993 Officer of the Order of the British Empire and was awarded in 1998 the British Ornithologists' Union's medal.

Quotes

The collection of down from the nests of Eiders was a common practice among Eskimos and, in Iceland, the wild Eider Duck is farmed. In the early 1960s there were about 200 Eider farms in Iceland holding some 250,000 nesting females, each producing an average of 19 g. of cleaned down.
- Wildfowl. Facts on File. 1985. p. 122. ISBN 9780816011520. (153 pages; photographs by Eric John Hosking)

The Florida or Mottled Duck of Florida, Texas, and Louisiana is perhaps the evolutionary link between the Mallard, and the American Black Duck.
The Mallard has been domesticated for over 2,500 years. the Romans initiated the process in Europe, and the Malays in Asia.
- Ducks of the World. Mallard Press. 1991. p. 82. ISBN 9780792456360. (216 pages)

Man's interest in consuming wildfowl, as well as in using their feathers for warmth and their fat for lighting and heating, was behind their early domestication. Two goose species were involved, the Greylag Goose and the Swan Goose, and two ducks, the Mallard and the Muscovy. Features of all wildfowl domestication include large size, a reduced number of tail and wing feathers, flightlessness, rapid maturation, an increased clutch size, long breeding season, loss of 'broodiness' (so that the technique of artificial incubation becomes necessary at an early stage), loss of aggression, a polygamous mating system, and the laying down of abdominal fat.
- "Introduction". Ducks, Geese, and Swans. Volume 1. General chapters, and Species accounts (Anhima to Salvadorina); Bird families of the world. Oxford University Press. 2005. pp. 3–13. ISBN 9780198610083. (908 pages; edited by Janet Kear; illustrated by Mark Hulme; quote from p. 6)

Kear was instrumental in WWT efforts to save the Hawaiian goose — or nene, its Polynesian name — from extinction. Over-exploitation and the introduction of the predatory mongoose to the islands had reduced an estimated 18th-century population of 25,000 to less than 30 by 1949. Three birds taken into captivity and sent to the WWT's Slimbridge, Gloucestershire, headquarters formed the basis of a captive breeding programme. Thus were 200 reintroduced to Hawaii by the WWT during the 1960s, and more than 2,200 by the early 1990s.
In the late 1970s, she moved from Slimbridge to become curator of WWT Martin Mere in the north-west, making her the first woman in charge of a regional centre. She developed it into one of the most important in the WWT chain. It now attracts up to 20,000 pink-footed geese and 1,300 whooper swans each winter, with large numbers of people enjoying the spectacle.
- Brian Unwin, (5 Dec 2004) "Obituary: Janet Kear. Ornithologist who recognised that public relations can be as vital as scientific research in preserving wetlands and wildlife". The Guardian.