diagnosis but no prognosis

[Ron Gatrelle]

Clay Taylor wrote
CTaylor at swarovskioptik.com

> Ron -
>     Fair enough.  After taking a few Excedrin, it all makes sense,
>
>     Seriously, though, an amateur like me has no possible way of knowing
> these facts, or even WHERE to look to find them.  I'm not a serious
> entomologist and never will be, but I'm a pretty good field observer that
> relies on material published for the masses for "correct" information
> (including both common and scientific names).
>
This is very true relative to there being a dearth of in-depth information
_readily_ available to the average butterflier.  My view is that it did not
use to be this way as little as 15 years ago. The Klots/Peterson Field
Guide is still very useful - not just a classic. The people who wrote (and
still write some of) the books on butterflies were great taxonomists,
students of evolution, biogeography etc. There were MANY mentors around
then too who did not live in academic ivory towers and were always
available - Paul Grey, C.F. dos Passos, Harry Clench, J.F.G. Clarke, F.
Thorne all now passed on and some like Mather (near blind) and  Ferris
(very retired) who are still with us. Lee Miller at the AME in Sarasota.

The great knowledge has not only died off, but it was down right ignored
and what was left has been rejected in recent years. Now we are reinventing
the wheel so to speak. And my opinion is that is just what some wanted.
Bring is a whole New World Order re butterflies - new methods, new
philosophy, new terms, new names/taxonomy, everything.  It has succeeded.
I and some of the other older ones who are still around see this as a
dumbed down version of what once was - we have lived under both economies.

When I was 10 and got my first books by Holland, Comstock, etc. There was
immediate education. Immediate science. At 17 we understood the systems
(took time out for courting) and at 25 were writing scientific papers. I
described Satyroides appalachia leeuwi in 1974. My coauthor (junior author)
had a PhD in entomology and worked for the USDA (still does) and I just a
High School diploma. But in butterflies, because of the depth of
information readily available to the rank and file then and the experts as
mentors, we were on the same level. Actually, as a taxonomist, I was on the
more knowledgable level.

>     I realize that the whole "Names" thread started out as a
> venting-of-frustration exercise (albeit a very public one), but for me
there
> were some interesting nuggets of information to be sifted out of the
> rhetoric (it took a LOT of sifting).
>
Yes, there is frustration and venting. And it is public as I feel the
masses have been duped into thinking that "this" is all there is. My
opinion is that they are being short changed all around - skeletal books
that could have been written by "anyone" 20 years ago experts who are not
yet such but are moving there etc. (There is no substitute for time in
service.)

>     That's why I subscribe to this list - to hear about what butterflies
> others are seeing across the country (a too-small percentage of the total
> messages), and to learn new stuff from people that know more about the
> subject than I do.   The grandstanding, snobbery, and intolerance that
seem
> to dominate the postings oftentimes make reading them quite tedious and
> frustrating.  Let's hear more field reports, and less arguing.
>
Me too. I have been surprised since joining less than a year ago at the
scarcity of field reports (like Marks) - or great accounts (like Mary
Beth's recent observations). The tug of wars here are revealing though -
they manifest a divide. A divide that 20 years ago was non existent. So who
changed? What happened?  Twenty years ago there was absolutely no
grandstanding (whose who now), snobbery (toward lepidopterists),
intolerance ( of collectors) and I will add - no competition (factional
organizational meetings scheduled against each other).

What happened? We had all been going to school together up through the
years and grades - all was well. Then this new  kid moved into the
neighborhood and came to our school, Leps High.  He is lots bigger than us
and he is a bully, his name is...
________________




It is not as important what name you or I would put there -- it is the fact
that a name would come immediately to anyone's mind and be put there. The
Leps world will never be what is once WAS till that type of thought pattern
is gone.

Ron


 
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