That is true, but I feel like the names of birds, or at least the common names are subject to change. The scientific name is really their to solidify the species more than the multiple names people give certain birds.
I love your renames for both the COHA and SSHA, so much more descriptive and interesting than their current common names.
I’ve done the same thing, I love that the scientific name for “House Finch”, somewhat translates to “Mexican Bloodfinch”.
I’d target confusing or misleading names. I’d rename red-bellied woodpecker to “red-capped woodpecker”. And the name for Connecticut warbler would have to go too, not sure what I’d rename it.
Many plants already have a lot of common names and you can just choose to use one over the other. For example, I think “Spreading thistle” is a better name than “Canada thistle” and I think “Japanese creeper” is a better name than “Boston ivy”, because these plants are not native to Canada and Boston, respectively, but the second one is native to Japan. One thing I like about iNaturalist is that it often seems to use the “better” name even in the cases like with these species, where the more misleading name is in widespread use.
If you gave me broad leeway I’d probably ditch “honorary” species names and replace them with more descriptive name, especially in the cases where you have many ones named after the same person, e.g. Swainson’s thrush, Swainson’s warbler, Swainson’s hawk.
These honorary names bother me for several reasons. One, they’re not descriptive and thus they make it harder to learn and remember the species, because, unlike most common names, they don’t contain any useful information about ID, habitat, or range. Two, they’re almost always named for western people, and as such I think they are kind of monuments to western colonialism/imperialism and perhaps also classism. Like, no offense to William John Swainson, he’s an important English ornithologist and naturalist, and he also overcame some interesting obstacles in life, and is kinda a fascinating guy, and I see the desire to recognize him. But at the same time, we western europeans (I am mostly of western European heritage) did so much to erase and destroy Native American culture, some intentionally and some unintentionally, and it just seems wrong on a moral/ethical level for us to be honoring people from our own culture, on a continent where we so thoroughly eradicated the native cultures. If we’re going to honor anyone at all in the naming of species, I’d rather it be in the form of using names for these species from Native American languages, for the languages indigenous to the same ranges as these species, to honor those people. And, even setting aside any of the issues with native American people, I don’t like the idea of honorific names because they always seem tainted by classism: it’s usually people of higher socioeconomic status who get into positions of prominence in science, and Swainson is certainly no exception. Since I believe in the inherent worth of all human beings, I dislike these honorary names on ideological grounds.
It can be interesting to look at common names in other languages to see how they divide things up differently than in English. For example, French sensibly divides gulls into goélands (large gulls, e.g. Ring-billed and other Larus) and mouettes (small gulls, e.g. Bonaparte’s). French also uses the same word for several things which have completely different names in English, such as Grey Catbird, Brown Thrasher, and Northern Mockingbird, which literally translate back to English as Cat Mocker, Russet Mocker, and Polyglot Mocker, respectively. On the other hand, French could really use a word equivalent to English “Owl”, instead of splitting them up into hiboux, chouettes, harfangs (a borrowing from Swedish, “harfang des neiges” is literally “Hare-catcher of the Snows”, or Snowy Owl), nyctales, chevêches, effraies (“effraie des clochers” is literally “Bell-tower Frightener”, or Barn Owl), and probably others I’ve missed.
I’ve also noticed that French often has common names for birds which are closer to the scientific names, perhaps because French naturalists were often the ones who created the scientific names. E.g. “parulines” are from Parulidae, “pics”, are from Picidae, and so on.
Are there any other bilingual or polyglot naturalists out there with fun examples of this kind of thing?
It’s cool that there’re different words for gulls! In Russian now there’s no system of dividing them (other than gulls/kittiwakes), but some species has own names like “клуша” (sloppy woman, laying hen) for LBBG, “бургомистр” (burgomaster) for Glaucous, “хохотунья” (laughter in female gender) for Caspian and “sea dove/small pigeon” for Slender-billed. And it’s a trend for all common names, people liked creating one word for an animal or plant other than combination of words.
Half of finches could be called “реполов” - on who eats burdock, while there’s no tradition in calling any Fringillidae the equivalent of “finch” as in English, but similar situation can be seen in Tringa where every member can be called “улит” that probably once was the name for at least most of them and now seen only in T. nebularia (большой/greater улит). The problem is that most of old common names are not in use for many decades, e.g. jay name that is used now is “сойка” (from word close to “shine”, though it’s hardly understandable now) while there also was “кареза” now no root words of it are used and without the disctionary it’s not possible to say what does it mean (perky/moody man). Name for Barn Owls “сипуха” is from the verb “to hiss/hoarse”.
Parallels can be seen between names for hawks, Goshawk is called “тетеревятник” that can be roughly translated as “black grouser” and sparrowhawk is “перепелятник”-“quailer”.
The interesting example is Tussilago farfara that is called “мать-и-мачеха” - mother-and-stepmother, that makes reference to colder smooth upperside of leaves and warmer hairy underside.
Well in Herpetology they recently merged the Oregon Alligator Lizard (Elgaria multicarinata scincicauda) as a junior synonym of the California Alligator Lizard (Elgaria m. multicarinata) and instead of just leaving the common name as California Alligator Lizard, they call it “Forest Alligator Lizard” - http://www.californiaherps.com/lizards/pages/e.m.multicarinata.html
However it also found in Oak Savannah and Grassland, while it’s close relative - Elgaria coerulea - is much more restricted to forest habitat.
Personally I think calling the subspecies “Forest Alligator Lizard” is stupid and very misleading about its habitat.
Just call it a California Alligator Lizard and note that the Oregon subspecies is no longer valid.
Lol, that’s funny. Glad it’s fixed though! Thank you!
I would switch the scientific names of the brown bear (Ursus arctos) with the polar bear (Ursus maritimus.) Mostly because of what they sound like in English, arctos sounds more for something in the artic, but in Latin they make sense.
There might be more information available but, at least on Wikipedia, Parthenocissus tricuspidata is said to be native to “eastern Asia in Korea, Japan, and northern and eastern China”. With that in mind, I wouldn’t think naming the species after the region’s main colonial/imperial power of the 20th century fits very well with the rest of what you wrote. ;)
Perhaps illustrating what you mentioned - and I know your comment was meant in good faith - while ‘Japanese creeper’ may be more accurate than ‘Boston ivy’, having a westerner choose which name is best to call an East Asian species also takes away agency from local groups and can lead to unintentional issues like this. Several common species here (native/indigenous to Korea) are or have been called ‘Japanese X’ and I’ve heard people ask, “Why do we have to call it Japanese if it’s always been here in Korea?”.
Interesting to hear that French has so many words for ‘owl’. There are two terms used in Korean, with 부엉이 applying to ‘eared owls’ and 올배미 applying to Stringiformes in general and ‘non-eared owls’ in common speech.
Korean also lacks a word for all octopuses, with 낙지 referring to smaller octopuses (Octopus minor in particular) and 문어 referring to larger octopuses ( Enteroctopus dofleini in particular).
Going in the other direction, alligators and crocodiles are both commonly called 악어 in Korean. Similarly, both turtles and tortoises are covered by 거북 but soft-shell turtles (the two Pelodiscus species in particular) have their own name, 자라.
Sometimes names make sence talking distribution, but I like scientific one more, e.g. Podarcis tauricus that is Crimean Lizard in Russian and in Latin but in English it’s Balkan Wall Lizard.
That is very interesting. The gull’s name in Dutch is (Grote) burgemeester, so I guess the name is somehow borrowed from there. The name means ‘Mayor’ (literally: master of citizens), so I wonder why this name is given to a gull. All the other gull names in Dutch are ‘normal’, the other exception being Iceland Gull - that one is called the Little Mayor (Kleine burgemeester).
The other thing I wonder about is why the Russian name is a loanword from Dutch: While its natural breeding range includes Siberia, in The Netherlands itself it is only a rare visitor 
Wikipedia says it’s because they nest near bird colonies and take “tribute” of eggs and pulls from them like a mayor. http://web.archive.org/web/20180322020621/http://www.minpriroda-rb.ru/content/animal_world/kadastr_animal.php?ELEMENT_ID=33973
But if both lighter-coloured species are called that maybe there’s another reason.
https://ru.wiktionary.org/wiki/бургомистр
In New Zealand, Mayors typically have a ceremonial chain of office (worn around the neck) and often have ceremonial robes, perhaps the reference is to an aspect of plumage that gives such an appearance (with Russian/Dutch ceremonial garb)
for example of NZ garb: https://www.odt.co.nz/news/dunedin/dcc/its-official-aaron-hawkins-sworn-mayor
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actually, could it also be a reference to hair colour?.. Mayors in early times being older and grey haired? A stretch :)
That’s because “arctos” is “bear” and “the arctic” is “HERE BE BEARS!”
Northern Leopard Frog - Rana pipiens (Lithobates if you accept the genus change that appears to have paraphyletic issues) - was described by a German naturalist based upon specimens sent to him with field notes. He called it “Pipfrosch” for “Peeping Frog” based upon field notes for the peeping mating call.
However, the peeping mating call was actually being made by Spring Peepers, not Northern Leopard Frogs. So… the pipiens part of Rana pipiens was named after sloppy field notes.
I don’t understand this. Are you saying Korean people use english common names for plants in Korea? I would have assumed you’d use a Korean name, regardless of what name english speakers on the other side of the world might choose?
lol, I wouldn’t change it though, just because that is too cool a story to lose!
There are Korean common names for local species, true. I was responding to a post that looked to be saying:
1 Boston creeper should be renamed to Japanese ivy
2 It’s awkward for people from colonial powers to assign names to non-local flora and fauna.
I was attempting to point out that changing the name as in 1, especially based on geographical location when it seems unclear if the species actually originates in Japan, also appears to involve 2, which the original post advised against.
My first (?) post in this thread quotes a Korean Forestry Service publication concerning the English names of Korean plants and how several thousand new English names were created for Korean plants, illustrating that it is an issue that receives attention here. Additionally, there’s some politicking between Japan and Korea in regards to the English names of things (due to English being the current lingua franca), with certain decisions made by Japan during their colonial rule in the Korean peninsula helping, in part, to drive those initiatives.
Of course, if we’re talking about scientific/binomial names, those are ones that individuals the world over will be using.
Oh, there is such a long list of names (both common and scientific) that I’d love to change. For one, I call Amphicarpaea bracteata “ground bean” as opposed to American hog peanut, which is a derogatory name against the indigenous peoples who regularly ate it. It is not a peanut, and nor is it only good for hogs to eat. I’d also change the common name of Carya glabra from pignut hickory to glabrous hickory for similar reasons, and I don’t think I would change the name of C. glabra without also changing the name of C. cordiformis, which is generally called bitternut hickory, and sometimes pignut hickory as well, to yellowbud hickory, a much more descriptive name considering that it is the only tree within its range with Sulphur yellow buds.