Monthly Archives: November 2020

So…last time, I spoke of weird scientific names, and told you that this time I would address common names.

Now, by common names, I mean those colloquial names we all use in our native tongues for organisms of all stripes. However, even in the same language, a particular species may have several different common monikers, often varying by geographic region.

E.g., I live in North Carolina, where the spider figured below is often called a “writing spider*”👇. However, it’s also called the “yellow garden spider,” “black-and-yellow argiope,” “black and yellow garden spider,” “Steeler spider,” “yellow garden orbweaver,” “black & yellow argiope,” “corn spider,” “banana spider,” “banded garden spider**👇,” “zipper spider,” “McKinley spider” and–in California, I’m told–the “golden orbweaver”—and that’s just English!

Well, then, what should we call it? I call it “Argiope aurantia,” and I suspect (and hope) that my family knows what I’m talking about…but my neighbors sure don’t.

So what is to be done? The simplest and most accurate solution is to avoid colloquial names altogether, and use only the scientific name: After all, that’s precisely why they exist, and it is no coïncidence that they’re the exact same in all languages and all countries.

Alas, that’s not going to happen.

But at least for scientific publication, the scientific name is mandatory. Except, after once identifying a well known species by its scientific name, an author can use a common name approved by the publishing organization. In this way, I could write about the “yellow garden spider, Argiope aurantia Lucas, 1833,” and from that point on merely call it the yellow garden spider.

In order for this to be consistent, though, the organization must maintain a list of “approved common names.” You may have guessed from my usage that among all those common names for Argiope aurantia, the only one acceptable in a scientific publication of the American Arachnological Society–and therefore the only one I would use in casual conversation–is “yellow garden spider.”

At this writing, that spider list recognizes common names for only 220 spiders (of over 50,000 described species), 131 mites, 48 scorpions, 3 harvestmen, 2 pseudoscorpions, and 1 vinegaroon.

The Entomological Society of America maintains its own list, 61 pages long (that’s about 2,400 species, but I’m not going to count them) of (mostly) insect common names approved for its publications (out of ca. 1 million described species).

These organizations take the recognition of common names quite seriously and have strict rules, not only for their acceptance, but for their syntax: E.g. “orbweaver” is one word (hyphens are eschewed), “leaffooted bug” takes no hyphen between the Fs, but “bug” is a separate word, as it is a “true bug”; a “sowbug” is not a bug (much less an insect) so it’s one word.

Furthermore, common names take no upper case, unless as the first word of a sentence or a proper noun: e.g. “American cockroach,” “Gertsch antmimic,” “McDaniel spider mite.”

This all matters. Well, maybe not to normal Homo sapiens, but to those of us nerds who really are concerned with knowing as closely as possible how any given critter is classified. Let’s face it: When telling your neighbor what’s climbing up his back, a “big ol’ red & black slimey, bitey-lookin’ thing” will still suffice.

*sigh*

But there are odder names! And, before I go any further, if you have any interest in this, please see the writings of Stephen B. Heard: His book, Charles Darwin’s Barnacle and David Bowie’s Spider is a delight. I learned of it from his highly entertaining and informative blog, Scientist Sees Squirrel.

Now, I confess that for most of my entomological career, I was a die-hard, stick-in-the-mud traditionalist who believed and espoused the notion that scientific names should be descriptive, e.g. Homo sapiens Linnaeus 1758. or Latrodectus mactans (Fabricius, 1775). The etymology of the former was discussed in my previous posting; the latter is interesting because the Greek Latrodectus can mean “secretly biting” and the Latin mactans can mean “slaughtering or killing.”

Oh, yeah–lest I forget–L. mactans is the spider commonly called a black widow.

I grudgingly accepted naming species for scientists, such as Messrs. Cartwright, above, and even places; e.g. the defunct cockroach pictured above is in the genus Periplaneta, the Greek roots of which can mean “all around wanderer.” The species is P. americana: not too hard to figure that one out.

But I drew the line at non-scientists or even–perish the thought–fictional characters. Until, that is, my favorite cartoonist of all time was honored by having a chewing louse*👇, Strigiphilus**👇 garylarsoni Clayton, 1990 so-named in recognition of Larson’s “…enormous contribution…made to biology through [his] cartoons.”

Cool, right?

And then I saw this spider:

This, friends, is Eriovixia gryffindori Ahmed, Khalap & Sumukha, 2016. It’s colloquially called the “Sorting Hat spider.” Definitely fictitious, right? But what a perfect name!

BTW, it could be a bit difficult to see this spider on dry leaves:

So not only have I come to accept fanciful names, I now embrace them. They stir my curiosity, and have led to many delightful hours of researching names and animals to which I would otherwise have paid no attention!

In closing, I give you the longest proposed scientific name, a bacterium eponymously named for the famed town***👇 in Wales, Llanfairpwllgwyngyllgogerychwyrndrobwllllantysiliogogogoch: Myxococcus llanfairpwllgwyngyllgogerychwyrndrobwllllantysiliogogogochensis Chambers et al., 2020 (the “ensis” on the end indicating that it is named for that town).

Next time–the dread “common name”!