And what is in a name?

cmbb at sk.sympatico.ca cmbb at sk.sympatico.ca
Wed Jul 11 13:17:00 EDT 2001


I was given yesterday a report done on nest predators of the ducks of an
area on the open prairie.  A progress report done by a M.Sc. candidate.
Used statistics to prove his arguments and named the egg eating mammals in
Latin.

One of them animals  we call locally The Gopher.  Now there are gophers and
there are gophers.  According to the soon to be learned gentleman, the
gopher that was eating the birds' eggs was Spermophilus franklinii - a bushy
tailed beast with a gray face.  I was astonished that the gopher that I
loved to hate and saw all the time running around on the open plains never
looked gray-faced before and never appeared to have a bushy tail.  My
gopher - the one I love to hate - in smart Latin talk is known as
Spermophilus richardsonii.  In local argot that other one, Spermophilus
franklinii, is known as The Grey Gopher.

I like descriptive names like Mourning Dove named because of its plaintive
cooing. Or Mourning Cloak Butterfly because its folded wing on a twig looks
like a shroud.  Or rattlesnake.  It concentrates the mind.

And so should it be with butterfly names.  They should describe and
elucidate as well as be standardized.

Martin Bailey,

cmbb at sk.sympatico.ca
phone/fax   306 842-8936

102   1833 Coteau Avenue,
Weyburn, SK., Canada.
S4H 2X3




 
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