Andy Adcock
Worst person on Birdforum
Great stuff, I look forward to catching up when I get home.
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Lynx joins with Cornell (1 Viewer)
- Thread starter Andy Adcock
- Start date
Great stuff, I look forward to catching up when I get home.
Jono Irvine
Well-known member
I sent an email to Eliot Miller at the Cornell Lab on Sunday to ask him about the taxonomy that will be used by eBird following the import of IBC & HBW Alive material and it seems, for the time being, eBird will continue to follow Clements.
His reply:
In short, we've been working to carefully map the two taxonomies together. So, the import should work well, and taxonomic concepts from HBW should map to their correct one in eBird (e.g., if HBW Species x is a subspecies in eBird in many cases it will come in as Species y x). Additionally, we might some day be able to display things in different taxonomies, like you suggest, but the species pages and your lists themselves will be displayed and calculated with eBird taxonomy.
He also directed me to a new info page on Macaulay Library website, which he says he hasn't sent out yet, so I won't link to it directly here, but in the FAQ section it states:
Will taxonomy change?
The IBC follows the taxonomy in the Handbook of the Birds of the World (HBW) and BirdLife International Checklist of the Birds of the World. The Cornell Lab of Ornithology follows Clements. During the transition, we will apply the Clements taxonomy to your observations, which will result in some name changes, but we have painstakingly matched species from the two taxonomies so your observations won’t be lost. Every “species” in HBW will have a corresponding taxonomic entity in the Clements.
So, it seems Clements it is, like it or lump it (if you'll excuse the pun)!
Cheers,
Jono
His reply:
In short, we've been working to carefully map the two taxonomies together. So, the import should work well, and taxonomic concepts from HBW should map to their correct one in eBird (e.g., if HBW Species x is a subspecies in eBird in many cases it will come in as Species y x). Additionally, we might some day be able to display things in different taxonomies, like you suggest, but the species pages and your lists themselves will be displayed and calculated with eBird taxonomy.
He also directed me to a new info page on Macaulay Library website, which he says he hasn't sent out yet, so I won't link to it directly here, but in the FAQ section it states:
Will taxonomy change?
The IBC follows the taxonomy in the Handbook of the Birds of the World (HBW) and BirdLife International Checklist of the Birds of the World. The Cornell Lab of Ornithology follows Clements. During the transition, we will apply the Clements taxonomy to your observations, which will result in some name changes, but we have painstakingly matched species from the two taxonomies so your observations won’t be lost. Every “species” in HBW will have a corresponding taxonomic entity in the Clements.
So, it seems Clements it is, like it or lump it (if you'll excuse the pun)!
Cheers,
Jono
The 'don't count this on my list' button is WIP... important for monitoring escapes etc as is new escapes protocol.
AFAIK anything rejected by reviewers should still be included on your personal totals:
https://help.ebird.org/customer/en/...ird-review-and-data-quality-process?b_id=1928
Help here in case folks have other questions:
https://help.ebird.org/?b_id=1928
Andy Adcock
Worst person on Birdforum
It seems that my original suspicion was right then, Amertican nomenclature, despite being labelled 'anti American' when I made the suggestion.
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Kirk's reply is spot on:
Although I'd add to the issue of field identification that many subspecies are likely undiagnosable and hence invalid in the first instance.
Expect one global taxonomy eventually, with the big players all in talks at the moment. Then you can be anti-globalisation too...
lewis20126
Well-known member
RSPB to veto Scottish Crossbill lump again? Might struggle trying to convince Cornell as easily as they managed to convince Birdlife!
cheers, a
I think you are misunderstanding Andy. Taxonomy is different from nomenclature. eBird allows you to choose either British or American nomenclature for common names, e.g. "Grey Plover" or "Black-bellied Plover". But it doesn't allow you to choose a different taxonomy; I think he is just saying that in some instances taxonomic difference will require using different names than in other taxonomies.
In any event, there is no such thing as "American" taxonomy. Both Clements and one of the founders of the IOC, Frank Gill, are Americans.
Nutcracker
Stop Brexit!
That's one where I'd support anyone who lumps this fraud taxon :brains:
dalat
...
Thanks a lot for the info!
So the HBW alive species entries will be sorted along the Clements/ebird list in future... understandable that they choose this way in this planned merger.
But I still find this a bit surprising, after Lynx just invested so much effort in updating the entire HBW alife along the new HBW/Birdlife list, including quite detailed info on the taxonomic decisions. The two big volumes of the illutstrated checklist are a nice work and go along extremely well with the web-based HBW alive, but that value will reduce now if books and web-version use different taxonomies. Perhaps that's why the books are discounted now.
Andy Adcock
Worst person on Birdforum
I have no issue with a global taxonomy as long as it's not totally America centric but there's little doubt it will be.
Andy Adcock
Worst person on Birdforum
I follow the IOC and use Adam's amazing Scythebill programme Jim, that won't change unless they 'merge' with Cornell too.
Andy Adcock
Worst person on Birdforum
How do they have a veto?
It's always been a question as to whether there is a 'Scottish' Crossbill, it's range isn't well understood and AFAIK, there's no protection work being done and it's only threatened by being derecognised.
What does America-centric (America First?) mean?
If you want funds to do conservation then having an endemic species threatened with global extinction is helpful. That said there are a million other reasons why Caledonian pinewoods deserve urgent conservation action. But flagship species matter.
http://ec.europa.eu/environment/nature/conservation/wildbirds/threatened/l/loxia_scotica_en.htm
Acid test is what is accepted in eBird, check date range.
https://ebird.org/map/ivbwoo?neg=tr...=1-12&bmo=1&emo=12&yr=range&byr=1940&eyr=2019
Andy Adcock
Worst person on Birdforum
Still not sure how they have the power of veto against any listing authority?
How will they oppose it, they'd have to provide conclusive evidence that Scotbill isn't just one part of the range of a very variable species. Birds matching the physical criteria for the species have been found as far South as Derbyshire I believe?
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DMW
Well-known member
If the ebird admins had a sense of humour they would put the dreaded "Specific locations are not available for this taxon. See our Sensitive Species page for more information" message, together with a few pixellated purple squares somewhere in Louisiana.
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