[WikiEN-l] naming convention for birds and others

[Ray Saintonge]

Further to my previous expressions on the subject, i recently added the 
following to another user's talk page.

    The Style Manual for Biological Journals as "Prepared by the
    Committee on Form and Style of the Conference of Biological Editors
    of the American Institute of Biological Sciences" states at page 68,
    "Generic names used as vernacular names are neither italicized nor
    capitalized" Since an other authoritative source has indicated that
    capitalization is usually done among ornithologists (though it is
not a rule) I will leave birds alone ... for now.

What exactly does that mean. "Generic names" - doesn't that mean "names 
of a genus". So, for instance, if you use the generic name Gorilla as 
the common name, "gorilla", you don't have to capitalize it. It seems to 
me that while in a normal sentence, the word "gorilla" should not be 
capitalized, it ought to be capitalized when it is referring to the 
species as a whole. And that your reference doesn't seem to be referring 
to what you think it is referring to.

    A rereading of the item that I quoted does give some support for
    your interpretation. The sentence is repeated on the next page with
    the single change of "vernacular" to "common".(I've since won
    another much thicker book about writing style in biology, but it
    might not get to me for another couple weeks.) The Latin species
    name is never capitalized anyway. Capitals and single quotes are
    used, however, for cultivars. This may give support for a similar
    practice for dog breeds, but I'm not yet ready to take a stand on
    that. A little later the book gives examples and particular rules
    relating to insects, plants and bacteria. For birds it refers us to
    the American Ornithologists Union's check-list of North American
    birds, but gives no examples. It is silent about mammals and other
vertebrates.

    The Globe and Mail Style Book directs lower case for all animals,
    including birds, except when what would otherwise be a common name
    is involved. It is more direct than most general style manuals when
    dealing with this, and that gives some weight when we are concerned
with a work of general knowledge such as Wikipedia.

    The other point that favors lower case is the general rule in titles
to lower case all words unless there is a good reason to the contrary.

    The next source is an online one at
    http://www.biology.ualberta.ca/courses.hp/biol335/Lecture8-9.html I
quote

    *  capitalization:
          * unless the common name includes a proper name (e.g., person's name or place name), most common names are not capitalized
                * however, there are exceptions for certain groups of organisms. One obvious exception is that the common names of birds are now usually capitalized
                * e.g. white-tailed deer vs Atlantic salmon vs Richardson's ground squirrel vs Great Horned Owl vs Englemann spruce vs balsam poplar vs Rocky Mountain juniper
          * for vertebrates and probably other groups of organisms, there are international committees that recommend on common names in each language
                * e.g. the sparrow hawk is now the American Kestrel

    Note the word "usually" in regards to birds. The practice follows
    the American Ornithologists Union but is by no means universal. I am
    at least prepared to concede the matter in regards to capitalizing
bird names, in the absence of further evidence.

    There is no such list for mammals, and apparently none for other
vertebrates, but I have not explored these others.

    The Alaska Department of Fish and Game Writer's Guide at
    http://www.cf.adfg.state.ak.us/geninfo/download/adfguide/wrtrguid.pdf
    supports lower case for all species, including birds where it does
note that its view is contrary to that of the Ornithological Union.

     From the publication The Prairie Naturalist at
    http://www.fhsu.edu/biology/pn/pnstylerules.htm we have "Common
    names of organisms are not capitalized except for proper nouns or
    adjectives that are part of the name, e.g., green-winged teal,
American coot, Cooper's hawk."

    The Newsletter of the Baltimore Bird Club at
    http://baltimorebirdclub.org/cn/cn0010.html states,
    "Many birding publications follow an unofficial convention for
    capitalization of bird names. I have chosen to follow this
    convention in Chip Notes because it makes the name stand out and it
    honors the objects of our devotion. If you would follow these
    "rules" in your submissions it would save a lot of time. The "rules"
run something like this:

    * All non-hyphenated parts of a bird's name are capitalized.
    * The hyphenated parts that are a type of bird are also capitalized.
    * The hyphenated parts that are NOT themselves a type of bird, such as "-bellied" or "-tailed," are not capitalized.

A good illustration of all these principles is "Yellow-crowned 
Night-Heron."

Based on all of the above I reach the conclusion that all common names 
of life forms should be lower cased, with the possible exception of birds.

Eclecticology