It’s no secret that scientific names are hard to pronounce, see topic: Where Do I Start With Pronouncing Scientific Names? If you do try to pronounce them, which one(s) do you find most difficult and what do you end up calling them instead? Bonus points if it’s something you encounter regularly but…

Most of the genera names in Subfamily Eumeninae (Potter and Mason Wasps)

I know a lot of microorganisms and fungi have long and weird names ( Ophiognomonia clavigignenti-juglandacearum for example). Some organisms such as Cyrtodactylus australotitiwangsaensis aren’t horribly terrible to pronounce, they’re just long/weird.

Does not matter how I say it, it still won’t come over when I call it.

Ursus arctos (ssp. horribilis)–Grizzly Bear. Can never remember arctos or remember or pronounce horribilis and so say Ursus terribilis :face_with_diagonal_mouth:

I had a terrible time with Sphenosciadium capitellatum. Finally learned to pronounce it and liked to use it just because of the success I felt each time. Now it’s been transferred to Angelica. :-(

Araucaria short circuits my brain. It’s not not even that long, but there’s too many A’s and I can never remember which A has the U after and I can’t decide how the syllables should go (A-rau-CAR-i-a? Is that right?) And then Hedypnois baffled me so much I wrote a very short plea for help in my jo…

It took me the longest time to get Abudefduf.

Anaxyrus is the fairly recent name for many New World toads. I still have trouble with it although I recently learned the most accurate pronunciation is something like AN-ax-EE-rus. My preferred pronunciation is BOO-fo (Bufo), the now-replaced name.

Our white arum lily is a plague in California. Not an arum. Or a lily. But the Italian botanist Zantedeschia is so much harder to remember than ‘arum lily’ (and the aethiopica only means South of the Sahara, beyond the edge of the ‘known’ world with Here Be Dragons!)

Which Name is Hardest?

Nature Talk

anon93074988 December 10, 2022, 7:52pm 2

I just use common names. Or, in the case of every salticid “Mr/s Hoppy”.

Topic		Replies	Views
Where Do I Start With Pronouncing Scientific Names? Nature Talk question	154	14706	December 7, 2022
'Pronunciation' feature for taxonomic names Feature Requests	26	5272	July 13, 2019
Latin names -- a pronunciation and definition guide? Nature Talk	47	1037	November 28, 2025
How to campaign against the Llanfairpwll Myxococcus' name Nature Talk	65	1540	December 1, 2024
Scientific name Vs. Common name? Nature Talk question	52	5299	January 15, 2022

Which Name is Hardest?

Related topics