214 



THE CONDOR 



Vol. XX 



nomial system of list writing was not 

 adopted as a protest against the subspecific 

 or trinomial principle as such, nor in a spirit 

 of arbitrary eccentricity; but, after due con- 

 sideration, as a corrective to certain cur- 

 rent evils that all will acknowledge to exist, 

 and in the full belief that it marks an ad- 

 vance, not a retrogression in scientific rec- 

 ord. The fundamental correctness of the 

 method has not been questioned; the expedi- 

 ency of applying it to technical scientific 

 usage alone is under discussion. 



It consists in listing the species under bi- 

 nomial headings, reserving subspecific de- 

 termination for the text following. It has 

 the advantage of allowing the writer as fine 

 definition as his facilities and experience 

 warrant, and permits him to qualify when 

 in doubt, or to suspend judgment where he 

 deems expedient. It has the further advant- 

 age of making every subspecific designation 

 a conscious act of judgment and direct as- 

 sertion, discourages the unconsidered copy- 

 ing of names, and encourages original re- 

 search and the statement of viewpoint and 

 standards of judgment. It thus is flexible 

 and adapted to all uses, and is a powerful 

 psychological influence in the direction of 

 caution. 



The evils that the writer thinks it tends 

 to correct can be seen in any faunal list in 

 which subspecific designations are given 

 without the basis of their determinations 

 being made clear, or a satisfactory authority 

 being evident. A very good example of 

 this use of subspecific names occurs in a 

 list of birds of a section of one of the 

 northern prairie states, in a recent number 

 of an ornithological periodical of the high- 

 est standing. I do not wish here to criti- 

 cise either the author of this special paper, 

 or the editor of the publication in which 

 it occurs, but merely to call attention to a 

 common fault, almost universally current, 

 which could be largely corrected by the sys- 

 tem in question. 



In this list, trinomials and subspecific no- 

 menclature are used consistently through- 

 out. Among other names appear Buteo t>o- 

 realis krideri, Melospiza melodia melodia 

 and Agelaius phoeniceus phoeniceus. These 

 identifications may be correct, but in this 

 special region, the omission of mention of 

 the Eastern and Western Red-tail, the Da- 

 kota Song Sparrow, or the Northern and 

 Thick-billed Red-wing, requires for general 

 acceptance, more authority than is evident. 

 It is not clear from the context whether the 

 author has examined and compared his spe- 

 cimens himself, subjected them to the scru- 



tiny of others, or followed the common but 

 reprehensible practice of identification by 

 supposed geographical probability. If the 

 identifications were by acknowledged au- 

 thority, or followed generalized pronounce- 

 ments of authority, we would like to know 

 who that authority is. Decisions according 

 to the A. O. U. Check-List may differ seri- 

 ously from those by Mr. Ridgway, and both 

 from other authorities that could be men- 

 tioned, and until such information is fur- 

 nished, we can but withhold judgment upon 

 the statements advanced. 



If the subspecific conclusions are based 

 upon generalizations of geographic distri- 

 bution, they are worse than useless. Pur- 

 porting to be additions to our knowledge, 

 they add nothing to it either to confirm or 

 correct existing conceptions. If, as Mr. 

 Swarth says, "the value of such a list lies 

 largely in the exact subspecific determina- 

 tion of the various forms at the points at 

 which the specimens are taken", the use- 

 lessness of such determination when cor- 

 rect, is as obvious as its danger when incor- 

 rect. Geographical presumptions cannot be 

 used as evidence for testing those presump- 

 tions upon which they are founded. It is 

 clear that in this case, representative of 

 many others, trinomials are worth no more 

 than binomials, and the latter might well 

 have been substituted for them. We are 

 willing to accept the writer's statement 

 that some form of Red-tailed Hawk, Song 

 Sparrow, or Red-winged Blackbird, occurs 

 in the region treated, but the third terms in 

 the names are so much waste ink and com- 

 positing, containing potentialities for per- 

 petuating error, without the possibility of 

 correcting them. 



Subspecific designation is only warranted 

 after specimens have been duly compared 

 by competent authority with a suitable se- 

 ries of material, and then draws all its 

 value from the name of the responsible au- 

 thority. Such work is of extremely technical 

 nature, and is the field of the specialist who 

 alone is competent through experience, and 

 the possession of comparable material, to 

 make pronouncement. It is neither possible 

 nor necessary that all should be specialists, 

 and facilities should be given workers in 

 other branches of ornithology, whereby they 

 can give to the world their undoubtedly val- 

 uable results, without exceeding their legiti- 

 mate limitations. The general public natur- 

 ally follow the examples set by what they 

 deem the best scientific practice, and when 

 their models use nothing but trinomials, it 

 is natural for them to conclude that they 



