I had to look the name up since I could not believe that Cat Classification Cat Force was an actual name for a scientific panel. Now I wish it really was that name. Moving on, your post was very informative!
Yes, that’s a relatively narrow hybrid zone–one would not be able to use geography as a clue to identification in hybrid zones. This is digging around in the weeds, but…in the case of L. arthemis, the phenotypic difference between the subspecies may be due to, essentially, one gene with two alleles. So you may only see one type or the other in the contact zone–even if they’re an F1 hybrid with their genomes a 50/50 blend of the two subspecies. Since the phenotype doesn’t reveal their true nature as hybrids, the appearance of there being two subspecies occurring in sympatry within the hybrid zone may actually be an illusion of sorts.
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With the coyotes, almost all of those subspecies were invented by Merriam in the late 1800s/early 1900s based on…well…nothing really. There are no published papers that demonstrate that the groups designated as species posses any distinguishing characters. Those were they days when someone sent a specimen to a museum and if it looked a bit different they’d give it a name. You won’t find a biologist alive today that considers all the coyote subspecies valid under any definition of subspecies. They’re just historical remnants of days gone by. It’s true that the ones in the west look a bit different than the ones in the east–but there is no place in between where one suddenly changes into the other–it’s just gradual variation from place to place. It’s like grouping people by skin color–everyone would put the “dividing line” between color groups at a different place–thus it’s arbitrary.
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Mammals seem to be prone to “over-description.” Any little difference in pelage color would lead to a new subspecies or even species description. In my state (New Mexico) alone, there were seven different species – not subspecies – recognized for what is now called Ursus arctos horribilis (Grizzly Bear) based on rather small differences in skull shape or pelage. Nearly all of them were described by Merriam.
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I have multiple issues with a lot of the ssp. designations especially in the avian world. The first is that some of them seem to turn out to be invalid, Turkey Vulture, for just one example.
But my primary concern is for those avian ssp’s that are ID’d primarily based upon range. Birds have wings, and trans-oceanic travels do occur. I have a validated Short-eared Owl sighting from 600 miles EAST of Japan. I spent a lot of time at sea in my younger days, and avian hitchhikers were relatively common. Did they all survive? Of course not. But some do.
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Hi, working with butterflies I feel subspecies useful, help to find in the map natural boundaries between those populations. Also in some case, woking both morphology and DNA phylogeny, some subspecies turn into full species. More easy to move the observations if you have them all inside a same bag.
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To paraphrase Mark Twain:
“News of my uncertainty has been greatly exaggerated”
Since I was presented as having “shot down” a ssp. call and then “simply” calling the ID as Osprey,
I am here to present why I was “uncertain” (which I was not) and to state I find that the interpretation of making the ID call to species (only) [vs. ssp.] as simplification of the “Research Grade” process - to be a {pardon the naturalist pun) a “red herring”.
As it stands, the ID process is open for others to corroborate the call (add to the ID) and “simply” add more input by supporting the ssp. ID call; so I see the ID call as a fluid process to which others can join in with their need for “accuracy” at the ssp. level. I can support that. But the motivation for “accuracy” in the ID should also take into account an accurate understanding of the why the identifier made an ID call, and not speculate or assume - that they were uncertain or being obstinate. Perhaps the onus of burden of proof - or rationale to present ssp. - could explicitly be clarified by the observer in the comments. In that regard, I could be certain of their certainty.
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