Andy Adcock
Worst person on Birdforum
I've recently queried the name of what most people and all official lists, refer to as 'Oriental' Turtle Dove yet ebird seem to be alone in promoting 'Rufous', is it a push from certain quarters against the use of Oriental?I am not sure I understand you well, Mysticete. Promoting unused bird names to the detriment of lots of normal birders and for the benefit of few reviewers seems to be an illogical 'chart-ahead-of-a-horse' thinking.
About Moorhen / Common Gallinule - I think the confusion is very unlikely. The Old World form was only documented once in the Americas, and none vice versa. And any potential vargant would be surely very publicized otherwise, because of the need of detailed evidence, and therefore easily findable. Leaving aside the problem, that such rarities may be unidentifiable anyway, other than by ring or DNA evidence.
If so and I'm not sure it is, it's the unofficial renaming of species to suit a certain political class and hoping the names will stick but I stress again, I don't know if this is the case as no one answered my query, here......