How do you all remember tarantula names when everyone always shortens the genus?

mconnachan

mconnachan

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Andrea82 said:
But ..you said with a lot of phlegm...which wouldn't make it a 'k' sound.
This is getting confusing....I already checked on the Dutch Facebook page but apparently someone is hacking that page. Or my Facebook....:shifty:
I'll try to find a YouTube video with the 'ch' in it that I am talking about....
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Yeah that's what I said @Andrea82 Loch Lomond, Loch Ness, etc.
 
Vermis

Vermis

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On the theme of 'divided by a common language', I'm beginning to see the OP's point of view. Difficult as it may be to become used to scientific binomials, they are meant to be a universal, uniting system. I have the feeling that, in some small way, permanent contraction of the generic name takes it in the opposite direction. It's like an extra barrier to pierce, an extra list to memorise to ensure your admittance into 'the club'. More problematic with rare, new, or "sp. 'englishword'" species.
An example I ran into earlier (like a wall :hurting:): P. sp. 'lowland' and P. sp. 'rufus'. I hadn't heard of them before. What's P. sp. 'lowland'? Poecilotheria? Pterinochilus? Pamphobeteus? Psalmopoeus? Phormingochilus? Pelinobius? Etc. etc. Even for someone familiar with those genera, 'P' doesn't describe or place the species, beyond an assumption that it's some member of theraphosidae. (I could be reasonably sure it's not Passer or Pleuronectes or Pantholops) Rinse and repeat with P. sp. 'rufus'...
Pics were posted, and were useful to me, being fairly familiar with Poecilotheria and Pterinochilus. (For it was they) But without them, common names - maybe 'lowland ornamental' and 'rufus starburst baboon' - would have been the next best clue to identification! Mostly for the simple reason that they would probably have been typed out in full. (Sorry to that poster, don't mean to pick on you, but it's the most notable example I've seen recently)

I don't know if googling is an ideal solution. It's an option, but like permanent contraction, it kinda misses the point of binomials. An organism's scientific name has two parts for a reason. The generic name's there to be used, to help form an idea of the species according to it's phylogeny and closest relatives, before the specific name pins it down.
It's not like I'd be constantly forgetting names and wandering in a mist if people don't type out generic names every single time (that's not what I'm ranting about anyway) or that it makes things impossible to learn for newbies; but for the sake of a second or two of extra tapping, a generic name could hardly make things less clear! I mean, we ain't texting. We're on a discussion forum. (And one where folk often take a lot of time to type out, ah, 'vigorous discussions'. Like this one. :angelic:)
 
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boina

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Vermis said:
On the theme of 'divided by a common language', I'm beginning to see the OP's point of view. Difficult as it may be to become used to scientific binomials, they are meant to be a universal, uniting system. I have the feeling that, in some small way, permanent contraction of the generic name takes it in the opposite direction. It's like an extra barrier to pierce, an extra list to memorise to ensure your admittance into 'the club'. More problematic with rare, new, or "sp. 'englishword'" species.
An example I ran into earlier (like a wall :hurting:): P. sp. 'lowland' and P. sp. 'rufus'. I hadn't heard of them before. What's P. sp. 'lowland'? Poecilotheria? Pterinochilus? Pamphobeteus? Psalmopoeus? Phormingochilus? Pelinobius? Etc. etc. Even for someone familiar with those genera, 'P' doesn't describe or place the species, beyond an assumption that it's some member of theraphosidae. (I could be reasonably sure it's not Passer or Pleuronectes or Pantholops) Rinse and repeat with P. sp. 'rufus'...
Pics were posted, and were useful to me, being fairly familiar with Poecilotheria and Pterinochilus. (For it was they) But without them, common names - maybe 'lowland ornamental' and 'rufus starburst baboon' - would have been the next best clue to identification! Mostly for the simple reason that they would probably have been typed out in full. (Sorry to that poster, don't mean to pick on you, but it's the most notable example I've seen recently)

I don't know if googling is an ideal solution. It's an option, but like permanent contraction, it kinda misses the point of binomials. An organism's scientific name has two parts for a reason. The generic name's there to be used, to help form an idea of the species according to it's phylogeny and closest relatives, before the specific name pins it down.
It's not like I'd be constantly forgetting names and wandering in a mist if people don't type out generic names every single time (that's not what I'm ranting about anyway) or that it makes things impossible to learn for newbies; but for the sake of a second or two of extra tapping, a generic name could hardly make things less clear! I mean, we ain't texting. We're on a discussion forum. (And one where folk often take a lot of time to type out, ah, 'vigorous discussions'. Like this one. :angelic:)
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The P. sp. rufus is actually a Phormingochilus, not Pterinochilus...

But of course, this correction is only adding to the original point of your post. I promise to do better next time :angelic:.
 
Trenor

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Vermis said:
P. sp. 'lowland' and P. sp. 'rufus'.
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In one of those cases (P. sp. 'lowland') isn't a correct name for that species. It's a P.subfusca but since the highland form looks so different than the lowland people tack on the lowland/highland on the end of the actual name. What they should type is P.subfusca 'Lowland' or P.subfusca 'Highland' and the sp. shouldn't come into play in that case.

The other case, as I understand it, (P. sp. 'rufus') points to Phormingochilus sp. rufus which has not been officially described in the World Spider Catalog. So it gets it's genus name Phormingochilus (that they guess it belongs to) and a temp species name denoted by sp. 'X' naming usually having something to do with the location it was found but can be anything. Once it gets described it'll have a more standard name. This can get confusing when along with this sp. 'X' temp name sometimes the hobby people will tag on a hobby name as well. Such as Hapalopus sp. Colombia Large and Hapalopus sp. Colombia Small. It is also my understanding that the full genus name should always be used when the tarantula has the sp. 'X' in it's species name. Though most of times we don't.

It can be pretty tricky at times to figure out what someone is talking about based on how they type a name. It can also be confusing if you only go to the google search and jump from that right into the images. That's because google will group lots of tarantulas that are not the same in their image search because like looking images have a great search weight than name text (in the image search). It's always better to do the text search and when you have a better idea of what T your dealing with then go to the image search to see what it looks like. At least that works the best for me.

I do agree with you that typing out the full name (Poecilotheria subfusca 'Lowland') at least once in the post before using the shorthand (P.subfusca 'Lowland') for the rest of the post, when talking about the same tarantula, would make it a lot more clear which tarantula the poster was talking about. I will be the 1st to admit I almost never do this.
 
boina

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Trenor said:
In one of those cases (P. sp. 'lowland') isn't a correct name for that species. It's a P.subfusca but since the highland form looks so different than the lowland people tack on the lowland/highland on the end of the actual name. What they should type is P.subfusca 'Lowland' or P.subfusca 'Highland' and the sp. shouldn't come into play in that case.
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You can discuss that with all the German tarantula enthusiasts, and I guess even some (German) scientists. They vehemently insist that "lowland" and "highland" are two different species and "lowland" is NOT a subfusca and they get very indignant when you say otherwise. That's why I've been using the sp. "lowland".

I've no opinion on this, though, I think both positions are equally well supported/unsupported, so I'm not getting into a fight with you about this :). If you insist it's a subfusca, I'm fine with that.
 
Trenor

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boina said:
You can discuss that with all the German tarantula enthusiasts, and I guess even some (German) scientists. They vehemently insist that "lowland" and "highland" are two different species and "lowland" is NOT a subfusca and they get very indignant when you say otherwise. That's why I've been using the sp. "lowland".

I've no opinion on this, though, I think both positions are equally well supported/unsupported, so I'm not getting into a fight with you about this :). If you insist it's a subfusca, I'm fine with that.
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I've got no stake in the naming argument for this species when dealing with naming conventions. I usually go with what they have officially described in the World Spider Catalog. If I remember right they used to have them listed by two names. P.subfusca and P.bara and due to a taxonomy change the two were shown to be the same species and P.bara was merged into P.subfusca. People still wanted to keep the two color forms separate so they added the "Highland" and "Lowland" to the end. So, if they do split these back up they would likely call the lowlands P.bara since that was the scientific name it had before the merge. I've not seen anyone using just P. sp. "lowland" so that may be a EU breeder thing.. or maybe I just haven't seen it. :)

If the scientists/taxonomists felt strongly enough about them being two different species they could do their own classifying study and present evidence that key taxonomy features were different. That would warrant them being separated again. The biggest thing I have heard on differences has been the color patterns though I haven't looked much into the topic so there might be something else I'm unaware of. In the meantime, I have no plans to breed one color form to the other (regardless of the merger) just like I would not be inclined to breed some of the NA species that have different color patterns depending on where they were collected.

I don't really have a stake in that argument either way. I just go by the classifications in the WSC as that is the most definitive, up to date resource I have. I am fond of my P.subfusca 'Lowland'/P.bara/P. sp. "lowland" though. The contrasting color pattern is pretty awesome. :)
 
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Ungoliant

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Trenor said:
In one of those cases (P. sp. 'lowland') isn't a correct name for that species. It's a P.subfusca
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I hate to be "that person," but the correct abbreviation of Poecilotheria subfusca is actually P. subfusca, with a space after the period and the species name in lower-case. As with full binomials, the abbreviation should be in a different font style as well (e.g., italics). :bookworm:


Vermis said:
An example I ran into earlier (like a wall :hurting:): P. sp. 'lowland' and P. sp. 'rufus'. I hadn't heard of them before. What's P. sp. 'lowland'? Poecilotheria? Pterinochilus? Pamphobeteus? Psalmopoeus? Phormingochilus? Pelinobius? Etc. etc. Even for someone familiar with those genera, 'P' doesn't describe or place the species, beyond an assumption that it's some member of theraphosidae. (I could be reasonably sure it's not Passer or Pleuronectes or Pantholops) Rinse and repeat with P. sp. 'rufus'...
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Scientists have evidently recognized the same potential for confusion/ambiguity, as the genus name is normally written in full. (The "G. species" abbreviation can be used afterwards if you are repeatedly mentioning the same species or if you are mentioning multiple species of the same genus.)

Granted, we may not hold forum writing to the same rigorous standards as scientific writing, but when abbreviating scientific names, we should at least stick to the standard form instead of making up our own abbreviations that undermine the whole point of using scientific names (to avoid ambiguity and to help break down language barriers).

If you're a lazy typist, consider adding some of your favorite nonstandard abbreviations to auto-correct in Word. For example, all I have to type is "P cambr" to get Psalmopoeus cambridgei.
 
Trenor

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Trenor said:
In one of those cases (P. sp. 'lowland') isn't a correct name for that species. It's a P.subfusca
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Ungoliant said:
I hate to be "that person," but the correct abbreviation of Poecilotheria subfusca is actually P. subfusca, with a space after the period and the species name in lower-case. As with full binomials, the abbreviation should be in a different font style as well (e.g., italics). :bookworm:
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No worries. You are right that is the way it should be written. :bookworm: Hardly anyone one here uses the italics and some (like me) usually drops the space (as I am often lazy). :) The point I was making is there isn't a sp. in there since it is a officially described species. It is my understanding that only tarantula names that have not been officially described have the sp. in their names. I could be wrong though and maybe someone could correct me if I am.
 
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Trenor

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Ungoliant said:
If you're a lazy typist, consider adding some of your favorite nonstandard abbreviations to auto-correct in Word. For example, all I have to type is "P cambr" to get Psalmopoeus cambridgei.
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This is me at times especially on my phone where I don't have word and I'm just quick typing. :)
 
boina

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Trenor said:
The point I was making is there isn't a sp. in there since it is a officially described species. It is my understanding that only tarantula names that have not been officially described have the sp. in their names. I could be wrong though and maybe someone could correct me if I am.
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Well, not exactly. The sp. simply means the species in that specific case is not known. It's not part of any name or anything. You can pick up a tarantula in Texas and state with certainty it is an Aphonopelma sp., because you don't know what species it is, even if it turns out to be a hentzi. Aphonopelma spp. is plural: you are talking about more than one Aphonopelma species.

This is the reasoning behind the use of Poecilotheria sp. "lowland" in Europe - it only means Poecilotheria (whatever species it may be, I don't know) "lowland". Since the people in Germany consider the case about the lowland variant being a subfusca not settled they decided to prefer the sp. - meaning 'I don't know what species it is' and not 'it is undescribed'.
 
Trenor

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boina said:
Well, not exactly. The sp. simply means the species in that specific case is not known. It's not part of any name or anything. You can pick up a tarantula in Texas and state with certainty it is an Aphonopelma sp., because you don't know what species it is, even if it turns out to be a hentzi. Aphonopelma spp. is plural: you are talking about more than one Aphonopelma species.
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Yeah, I agree with you here. If I pick up a random tarantula in the wild and I don't know what species it is but I do know it's genus is Aphonopelma then it's fine to refer to it as Aphonopelma sp.

Though there is a difference between Aphonopelma sp. and Aphonopelma sp. "neuse river". Aphonopelma sp. says this is a unidentified Aphonopelma species that could be described but I don't know what it is. Aphonopelma sp. "neuse river" is a placeholder name for a species that has yet to be described or doesn't readily fit in with anything, from the area that it was collected, that has been described. It might be merged into a species that already exists or it might end up being it's own species. Till it's been studied and described/placed it uses the placeholder name.

boina said:
This is the reasoning behind the use of Poecilotheria sp. "lowland" in Europe - it only means Poecilotheria (whatever species it may be, I don't know) "lowland". Since the people in Germany consider the case about the lowland variant being a subfusca not settled they decided to prefer the sp. - meaning 'I don't know what species it is' and not 'it is undescribed'.
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Poecilotheria subfusca and Poecilotheria bara were are both described species before the study that merged them into the same species. So we do know what the species are in both cases even if you don't agree with them being merged. That's why I'm having trouble understanding the use of Poecilotheria sp. "lowland". If they separated the species back apart it would just be Poecilotheria bara (for the lowland) and Poecilotheria subfusca (for the highland) again. Which are both described species. So whats the need of sp. when referring to them? How is using that different from saying Poecilotheria subfusca "highland" or Poecilotheria subfusca "lowland"? What do they call the highland color forms over there? Poecilotheria sp. "highland" or just Poecilotheria subfusca?

I apologize for all the questions. I'm not trying to be difficult, I'm just not understanding. :)
 
boina

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Trenor said:
Though there is a difference between Aphonopelma sp. and Aphonopelma sp. "neuse river".
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No, there is no difference, sp.means species - any species - every time. Both mean a kind of Aphonopelma species. "neuse river" has no biological significance, it's not a valid name. You can decide tomorow to call it something else and nobody can question you.

Trenor said:
Poecilotheria subfusca and Poecilotheria bara were are both described species before the study that merged them into the same species. So we do know what the species are in both cases even if you don't agree with them being merged. That's why I'm having trouble understanding the use of Poecilotheria sp. "lowland".
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Poecilotheria sp. is not wrong - it cannot be wrong. It simply means it's a kind of Poecilotheria. Nobody is questioning that. I can call Acanthoscurria geniculata Acanthoscurria sp. "striped knees" and I'd still be right. Whether people understood what I'm talking about is a different question.

Trenor said:
If they separated the species back apart it would just be Poecilotheria bara (for the lowland) and Poecilotheria subfusca (for the highland) again. Which are both described species. So whats the need of sp. when referring to them? How is using that different from saying Poecilotheria subfusca "highland" or Poecilotheria subfusca "lowland"? What do they call the highland color forms over there? Poecilotheria sp. "highland" or just Poecilotheria subfusca?
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So, nobody is questioning the validity of P. subfusca (highland) as a species, therefore it's called as such. But: People are questioning whether P. sp. "lowland" is Poecilotheria subfusca, too, or a different species (P. bara). Since people don't know what species it really is they call it P. sp. - a kind of Poecilotheria. And add "lowland" just for convenience so other people will know what they are talking about. If you call it P. subfusca lowland you are making a taxonomical decision to follow one side of the argument (said publication that merged them) and the Germans are reasoning that they don't have the taxonomical knowledge to do so, so they are using simply sp.

I'm still looking for an in depth explanation of sp. on the web, but I can't find anything - it seem this question has not come up yet, unbelievable as it is ;).

Edit: Just because one study merged both highland and lowland into one species doesn't mean it's right - it may be right, or it may not. At the moment it seems to be questioned, at least by some people. You do not need to write another study to decide you do not want to follow that studies reasoning. Taxonomy is about consensus.
 
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