Saturday, January the 1st, 2005
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Winner of the December Audubon Bird-of-the-Month Competition (see foot of the page) was reader Pierre Sloggit, whose entry reads as follows:
I know what this bird is, it's a Taft's Guillemot. It is shown in your picture guarding the famous oyster that was thought by many to incorporate in the convolutions of its shell an image of Howard Taft, one time US President. [Pierre is, I think, using here an outmoded term for “Potus”.] This bird was only discovered in the early twentieth century and was therefore added to a supplement of Audubon's work.* It should be distinguished from Barbara's Guillemot, which of course stands guard over the head of former First Lady, Barbara Bush, who by remarkable coincidence has a facial birthmark that looks like an oyster, as well as a moustache like Howard Taft.
*Missing Guillemots and Auks: Series IX (Presidential Guillemots): Supplementary vols. CCCXI – CCCXXVIII (Great Lakes and Seaway Guillemots, Three Toed and Lesser).
Pierre wins a hallucinatory bowl of myrrh and some trinkets.