Taxacom: Standards for species identification

[Peter Uetz]

John et al.,

This is a common problem in taxonomic papers.

Packer et al. showed a few years ago that only 2% of papers in entomological journals used a combination of all 3 relevant factors for species identification, namely citing the taxon concept and identification method used, and whether any vouchers were collected (they didn’t mention photo vouchers, unfortunately). The identification method was mentioned only in less than half the papers:

Packer L. et al. (2018)
Validating taxonomic identifications in entomological research.
Insect Conservation and Diversity (2018) 11, 1–12
https://nam10.safelinks.protection.outlook.com/?url=https%3A%2F%2Fonlinelibrary.wiley.com%2Fdoi%2F10.1111%2Ficad.12284&data=05%7C01%7Ctaxacom%40lists.ku.edu%7C589837243ae043e75e6308da98d992ea%7C3c176536afe643f5b96636feabbe3c1a%7C0%7C0%7C637990357505639815%7CUnknown%7CTWFpbGZsb3d8eyJWIjoiMC4wLjAwMDAiLCJQIjoiV2luMzIiLCJBTiI6Ik1haWwiLCJXVCI6Mn0%3D%7C3000%7C%7C%7C&sdata=MHQBrrt9kfBN5un9qVtQy1kyNkZRsyDDARLLFJwjq8o%3D&reserved=0

I wonder if similar studies have been done in other taxonomic groups, outside entomology.

Peter



> On Sep 17, 2022, at 1:37 PM, John Grehan via Taxacom <taxacom at lists.ku.edu> wrote:
> 
> In reference to the paper I recently requested on a forest moth, for which
> I now have a copy, I was interested to see that the paper did not give any
> evidence for the determination of the moth species they surveyed. It goes
> to show that the problem of recognizing the value of taxonomy lies not just
> with policy makers etc,, but with fellow scientists.
> 
> This of course is not the first example by any means, but it demonstrates
> an ongoing problem. The paper was published in Ecological Entomology which
> is a publication of the Royal Society of Entomology, and one would think
> that such a mainstay organization would have effective standards of
> publication in this respect.
> 
> I have written to one of the authors asking about how they made their
> species determination.
> 
> John Grehan
> -- 


————————————————————————————————————
Peter Uetz
Center for Biological Data Science
Virginia Commonwealth University
Richmond, VA 23284
USA

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