funny names

[Richard Petit]

Rudy:

There are several web sites listing odd names.  Just google for: biological
nomenclature curiosities.

One of my favorites in Mollusca is the "trivalved" freshwater mollusk that
Audubon invented and described to the idiot Rafinesque who drew it and named
it.  He later reprinted his figure and named it again so that this imaginary
creature has two generic and two specific names.

The Zoo. Record has a few errors of its own.  I once spent months searching
for a Serbian work listed in the Zoo. Rec. for 1925 with the author shown as
Dukooizen.  Finally I found that this was a rather improper transliteration
of Lukovic.

For "fun" names the prize goes to one introduced by my late friend Joe
Houbrick. For a group of small species allied to Bittium he introduced the
genus Ittybittium.

Dick
r.e.petit at att.net