A zoologist asks: botanical names practice

[Richard Jensen]

I know that zoologists have a different convention for citing authors than do botanists.  For plants, we typically simply cite the author, no date is provided, e.g.,  Quercus velutina Lam., Quercus hemisphaerica Bart. ex Willd., Aquilegia vulgaris L.  If you state that your botanical nomenclature follows, say, Manual of the Vascular Plants of Texas by Correll and Johnston, or the Flora of Indiana by Deam, that should be sufficient.  I would think that
the editor would want to follow accepted practice for botanical nomenclature; my guess is he would find it unacceptable for a botanist to publish references to his favorite taxa using the botanical convention rather than the zoological convention.

On the other hand, if this is a requirement of the journal, then you might have to have a botanical co-author because someone may have to invest considerable time tracking down the dates (the dates are provided in the Flora North
America volumes, but the series is far from complete).

Cheers,

Dick

Barry Roth wrote:

> Dear Taxacomers,
>
> A colleague and I have a manuscript in submission to a zoological taxonomic journal.  In a section about the habitat of our studied animals, we briefly describe the vegetation and list prominent plant species.  The editor has requested that we provide full authors' names and dates of proposal for these plant species -- not just author/reviser abbreviations as we have done.
>
> We took the plant names and author abbreviations from the current literature on our area, including the most widely cited regional flora.  Full names and dates are not given in that literature, and I think predominant practice is not to cite them.  It would be very burdensome for us to have to comply with the editor's request and the result would add little of value to the paper.  What are list members' experience and views on this subject?  Thanks,
>
> Barry Roth
>
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--
Richard J. Jensen              | tel: 574-284-4674
Department of Biology      | fax: 574-284-4716
Saint Mary's College         | e-mail: rjensen at saintmarys.edu
Notre Dame, IN 46556    | http://www.saintmarys.edu/~rjensen