Latest taxonomic recommendations etc (1 Viewer)

[logos]

I think I shall stick to my decidedly amateur interest in recording identifiable forms...regardless of whether they be species, semi-species or sub species.

This is probably the ideal approach to take, you could find yourself inadvertently contributing to the wider taxonomic debates through rigorous fieldwork and dilligent recording!

Accept that many will have to be left at showing characteristics of...possibly of eastern origin... etc

While I accept that a fair number of individuals can never be pinned down, especilly those in which relationships are obviously clinal I'm not sure about the continued validity of the notion of 'showing characters of', at least not in many cases. Where clinally related forms are dealt with I prefer 'tending towards x or x etc...'

'Showing characters of...' sometimes seems a bit like code for 'yes it was one but I'll refrain from stating it so bluntly'!. Where does it leave us when something is split? Does it then translate to 'looked a bit like' or 'it was one, but only because it's been elevated to species status now'?

Spud

 

[Jane Turner]

'Showing characters of...' sometimes seems a bit like code for 'yes it was one but I'll refrain from stating it so bluntly'!. Where does it leave us when something is split? Does it then translate to 'looked a bit like' or 'it was one, but only because it's been elevated to species status now'?

Spud

To me it means much the same... perhaps I'd use showing characteristics of for a Chiff that was grey, had a wing bar and was pleeping, tending towards (probably in my parlance ) for a silent one, or a pleeper that didn't look quite so "good". The doubt in the former case is more about the validity status of the subspecies than the lack of observable details.

The strange thing is...and it shouldn't be so, I feel more confident claiming sub-species than species. I was really happy with my Hume's YBW in Cheshire before it was split and rather wish I could go back and take some pics now! I believe its now pended by BBRC and me!