Re: Bird Listing Areas

[John Penhallurick <>]

Tony,
Thanks for your comments.

As you point out, what authority to use is a tricky issue.

The RAOU Checklist does not recognise some splits that are accepted in 
Sibley and also Clements.  So if you have one authority for some lists 
and a different authority for other lists, you are going to have 
inconsistent totals.  We can't use the RAOU Checklist for the World 
List.  The simplest solution would be to follow the American Birding 
Association ans use Clements.  Personally, I would prefer to use Sibley's 
latest checklist.  Clements is not a professional ornithologist.  He 
borrowed his Family sequence from Gill and his genera and species 
sequence with very few exceptions from Sibley & Monroe(1990), and I can't 
give a lot of credibility to Clements.

John Penhallurick
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