Warning: bird name issue
I must comment on a bird name point illustrated by this issue of Gang-gang. There is a report about the ‘Australian Little (Black-backed) Bittern’. I sympathise with writers and editors who find
this kind of thing necessary. We are entering a new age of English name duplication where different policies and preferences collide.
From an Australian viewpoint, the new species is the Australian representative of a species group known as ‘Little Bitterns’, with our subspecies being split relatively recently. So it is, to us,
the Australian Little Bittern. However from a global perspective the name ‘Little Bittern’ belongs to a species that occurs in Europe, Asia and Africa, and the global namers do not want to add an adjective, which would be needed if there were more than one
‘Little Bittern’. Hence IOC invents ‘Black-backed Bittern’ for the Australian species, and inflicts it on Australian users of that list.
The same thing has happened with ‘Gull-billed Tern’. To us, the new species is ‘Australian Gull-billed Tern’, but the IOC retains ‘Gull-billed Tern’ for the widespread species and has invented
‘Australian Gull’ for our species. To add to the confusion, both species are recorded in Australia, as Gull-billed Tern and Australian Gull (the familar Gull-billed Tern).
It is too much to hope that any single bird group is going to reach agreement on a single set of names, let alone a joint approach with other groups. We are going to see a lot more of ‘One name
(second name) (maybe third name)’ so get used to it. I hope no-one will ask which is the right name.
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Subject: [Canberrabirds] Fwd: February Gang-gang newsletter now available
