[Taxacom] Describing taxa for conservation purposes

Sat Sep 4 09:21:52 CDT 2021

heya,

thankyou for sharing this. I wish I had seen this a month ago as the
current paper in press for the Global Species Lists Working Group I am
leading on Consequences of all this would have benefited from this example.
Well too late now for that I would have to add it at proof stage and thats
never a great idea.

The perception, or reality, of a conflict of interests between taxonomy and
the eventual conservation outcomes can potentially harm both taxonomy and
conservation, particularly in the light of this conflict being identified
by developers for example. Taxonomy and Conservation are both crucial
sciences but they cannot be in each other's pockets.

I wonder if these new names are properly published? I do not know if the
journal is registered with ZooBank and archived appropriately? I will need
to check this.

Definitely a case I will be hanging on to as examples for the future.

Cheers Scott

On Sat, Sep 4, 2021 at 12:47 AM Daniel Gustafsson via Taxacom <
taxacom at mailman.nhm.ku.edu> wrote:

> Hi all,
>
> I recently came across this publication:
> https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/24750263.2020.1857852
>
> In it, the authors "describe" a new subgenus for a species of North
> American squirrel (Tamiasciurus mearnsi). The driving force behind this
> seems to be that "Tamiasciurus" means "hoarder squirrel", and T. mearnsi
> doesn't hoard, so the genus name in inappropriate. They instead suggest
> "pseudotamias" (sic) as a subgenus (narrowly avoiding the already
> proposed Pseudotamia Stephens, 1829), despite also making clear that
> this species is "a descendant of T. douglasii, phylogenetically as well
> as biogeographically".
>
> Another driving force behind this new subgenus appear to be for pure
> conservation reasons. The authors spend a lot of time complaining about
> how little funds are allocated to squirrel conservation in North America
> (only 0.00001% of GDP! and that is for all small mammals, not just
> squirrels!), and the hunting policies of North American squirrels. They
> conclude:
> "Also, a wider structural change is needed in the approach of how
> taxonomy, research and conservation management are done for a more
> sustainable human-nature interaction."
>
> This comes at the heels of this confused gem:
> "Taxonomy as a field of study is rather complex and classifications
> remain widely disagreed upon and unclear. Often chaotically dominated by
> just a few players, institutions, and mindsets, this system leaves out
> the wider public. It is not sustainable, hardly meaningful, and
> certainly not scientific or democratic. This can be resolved by a more
> holistic classification system, including all
> species-/genera-interfering characteristics rather than only single ones
> (morphological appearance, genetical relations etc.). Additionally,
> increased budget assignments for small mammals, especially squirrels,
> can have a major impact on their conservation success. Higher law
> enforcement for hunting regulations can additionally strongly contribute
> to science-based management for these squirrels."
> and a few tables where they show how "taxonomy and classification
> disputes exist and affect conservation efficiency", some of which
> examples seem to have no connection to taxonomy, and many of which do
> not reference any taxonomic or phylogenetic research more recent than
> the 1990s.
>
> The part about how we should use a "holistic classification system,
> including all species-/genera-interfering characteristics" is
> particularly weird, as the only "characteristics" they use to establish
> this new subgenus are morphometrics (average body length and average
> body mass) and the differences in hoarding behaviour, while disregarding
> all genetic and other moprhological data.
>
> This is a long and rambling paper, but the essence (as far as I can
> tell) is that the authors think that more money should be spent on
> conserving a squirrel (more than 0.00001% of GDP), and the best way to
> do so is to move it to a new subgenus. I assume this subgenus is also
> available from this publication, as they do include measurements that
> purportedly separate the type species from the other two species in the
> genus (which according to the sources they cite would the form
> paraphyletic nominate subgenus).
>
> ---
>
> The same journal also published this:
> https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/11250003.2014.895060
>
> Abstract (in part):
> "While we are fully aware of the high degree of arbitrariness of
> subspecific designations, it is also a fact that taxonomic recognition
> supports conservation, because subspecies are a legal category whereas
> other designations (such as evolutionarily significant units, ESUs) are
> not. We therefore argue that the Mesola red deer should be assigned to a
> subspecies of their own, and give an official description of Cervus
> elaphus italicus nova ssp., including the designation of a holo- and a
> paratype specimen."
>
> They seem to make a much better argument than the first paper, but still
> base their decision to describe a new taxon partially on how this will
> make it easier to get funding for conservation work.
>
> ---
>
> I am wondering, does anyone know more examples like this? Where
> conservation issues are driving or influencing taxonomic decisions?
>
> --
> Dr. Daniel R. Gustafsson, Research Assistant Professor
> Institute of Zoology Guangdong Academy of Sciences, Guangzhou, China.
>
> Ask me about chewing lice!
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