At least for plants, it is very clear that the abbreviation is “subsp.” per Art 5 of the ICN
5A.1. For purposes of standardization, the following abbreviations are recommended: cl. (class), ord. (order), fam. (family), tr. (tribe), gen. (genus), sect. (section), ser. (series), sp. (species), var. (variety), f. (forma). The abbreviations for additional ranks created by the addition of the prefix sub-, or for nothotaxa with the prefix notho-, should be formed by adding the prefixes, e.g. subsp. (subspecies), nothosp. (nothospecies), but subg. (subgenus) not “subgen.”
It does not appear the ICZN defines its abbreviations. As such we should then follow the recommendation of the ICN as it does not contradict the ICZN.
The term “ssp.” should therefore be removed from any context in the inat codebase as it is incorrect.
My emphasis. Recomended is not the same as compulsory, so in my opinion it is not incorrect. Also, ssp. is certainly in common usage in many parts of the world, in spite of the recommended subsp.
It does seem that it is more common in zoology. “nov” is not supposed to be abbreviated in botany, hence much less references using “subsp. n.” However, even when adding those additional references its still 11000 for ssp. vs 36000 for subsp. making the case that subsp. is still used more often when describing new subspecies
Since “ssp.” is currently as-designed, this isn’t really a bug, so I’m moving it to the General category for further discussion.
You could consider submitting a Feature Request to have all plant, algal, and fungal subspecies use “subsp.” Seems like easy coding, but I’m pretty poor at guessing such things about the iNat codebase. If it’s more involved, and since “subsp.” is preferred but not mandatory in the ICN, it may not end up being accepted.
Subspecies, which are necessarily either synonymous to a population or to a species, are not used much in zoology any more. They have been almost completely eradicated in ichthyology, with subspecies being either elevated to full species if they can be distinguished from other groups, or, if they cannot, synonymized.
It is a silly taxonomical level which either conceals real diversity, or creates fake diversity where there is none.
all the more reason we should be conforming to the convention of how to abbreviate subspecies in plants, not animals, as infraspecies (of which there are multiple ranks in plants) are actually commonly used in botany, where they are of interest and importance in ecology and evolution.
ssp. was the standard for decades. subsp. is clearer, also longer and clunkier. I wouldn’t really like to see this change, but if somebody cares deeply enough to go to the trouble of changing it, I’ll just mutter a little about misplace priorities and let it go.
Subspecies (however we abbreviate them) are important, I think. Real variation in nature occurs on many different levels. Recognizing more about these relationships, rather than less, is good. I think we need to label variation at a subspecific level more often, not less, as it leaves the species, the level we talk about most, unchanged. Or could. Let’s celebrate the option of having subspecies and variety names!!
My question: does it make a difference? ssp. saves a little screen space (especially for mobile devices) and it’s pretty clear either way what it means. It’s not a different word or anything, it’s just a slightly different abbreviation for the same word. Neither one is evidently unanimously used in any field, so it’s not like it’s wrong. It’s just somewhat less common in some contexts, and more common in other contexts.
As a botanist, I learned and used ssp. for almost 30 years and have only recently been criticized for it by people that said it is supposed to be subsp. Looking at books on my shelf, some use ssp., some use subsp., and some only use var. because the authors don’t agree with the use of subspecies. Looking at online databases I also see some using ssp. and some using subsp. I prefer ssp. as it is shorter and the same number of letters as var. but I don’t think it really matters. The only potential problem I wonder about is whether databases that use multiple sources are having issues with names that use both but there are a bunch of different ways authors are abbreviated as well (or not) and many databases (like iNat) don’t even include the authors, which is probably a much bigger issue than the way subspecies is abbreviated.
if this was implemented it would just cause more confusion. A lot of people who use iNat aren’t worried about it its ‘ssp’ or ‘subsp’ it seems unnessecary to waste time on when there are more glaring issues. The majority of users are casual, if both ‘ssp’ and ‘subsp’ were included in taxa many would think they mean different things.
I also just generally see ‘ssp’ more, doesn’t seem like it needs to change..
exactly. don’t need to take up more screenspace + waste coding time and meeting time talking about if this should happen or not, staff and devs have enough on their hands lol
The main criticism that I’ve heard over the years is that the abbreviation spp. has been used in the past for the plural of sp. and is too easy to confuse with ssp.
indeed, multiple replies above in this thread have already misspelled “ssp.” as “spp.”, which really and genuinely confused me when reading them. obviously “subsp.” can still be misspelled, but there’s more room for it to still be unambiguous. even the directly equivalent misspelling “subpp.” is silly but I find it clearer to understand what it was supposed to mean.