Steller's Jay Cyanocitta
stelleri
![]()
Named for German naturalist Georg Wilhelm Steller
(1709-1746) who discovered the species in 1741 on an ill-fated Russian-sponsored
expedition led by Danish explorer Vitus Bering to chart the coast of Alaska. In
one day Steller discovered this jay, a sea-eagle (haliaeetus
pelagicus), the Northern Manatee
(now extinct) and this eider--all named for him. Johann Gmelin
(1748-1804) named the jay in his honor. Pallas
named the eider.
|
Steller's Eider
Polysticta stelleri |
![]() |
The Steller-Bering party spent 4
months lost in the fog, wandering among the islands in the Bering Sea before
becoming shipwrecked. After eight months of work building a new ship from scraps
of the old one and a long, very cold winter on an island, during which Bering
died, Steller finally got back to Russia.
