Describing Species

Rating:
Summary: Describing Species: Practical Taxonomic Procedure for Biolog
Review: Although far from being a Taxonomy for the Utterly Ignorant, Judith Winston's Describing Species provides a basic and thorough grounding in the history, concepts, and procedures of describing and naming species. The book is intended for [graduate] students, scholars, and researchers -- systematic biologists, palaeontologists, molecular biologists, biochemists, ecologists, et al. -- who want, or need, to research and publish taxonomic descriptions, and as such is not for those who have little to no knowledge of such matters. Although it does to some extent cover systematics as such, at least enough to provide a framework, it concentrates on taxonomy (that part of systematics that is concerned with description, naming, and classification of organisms) and is designed to be used as "a desk reference and guide to nomenclatural procedure and taxonomic writing", to use Winston's description from her preface, in the context of a course in systematics, or as a supplement to a systematics textbook. It even has a chapter ("Visiting Collections: What to Expect and How to Behave") on how to approach, and get along with, professional researchers -- a chapter that, mutatis mutandis, would be generally applicable to any student in any field. It walks the reader through the processes of diagnosis, description, writing, and publication, giving enough background and explanation to put each step in context of the larger picture (a why-to as opposed to merely a how-to, in other words), all in a professional yet informal style that makes the book very accessible as a whole -- even I, not a scientist but a thorough-going humanist (a stranger in a strange land, so to speak) seeking to increase my knowledge and understanding, found it comprehensible, albeit by no means easy. In addition, it offers many bibliographies for those who wish to delve more deeply. In short, with the caveat that (a) I am not a biologist and (b) this book is not for the utter neophyte, I would commend this book to the attention of those whose interest is professional or would-be professional, as well as to those who are interested in the field but are for whatever reason beyond the "for Dummies" (TM) level.

Rating:
Summary: A good primer for "Describing Species"
Review: With the current biodiversity crisis and the need to describe the majority of the diversity of species on earth, this is an especially timely addition to the literature on alpha taxonomy (describing new species) which is approachable to the nonspecialist. Being an ecologist who must occasionally put pen to new species discovered in the course of field work, I would have loved to have had this book available while I was in graduate school.

Without too much depth, Winston walks (at times seeming to literally hold one's hand) non-taxonomists through the process of not only describing species that are new to science, but also the critical steps to ensure that the organism you are describing is actually new to science. Winston stresses the pitfalls of making this disastrous mistake as well as the intricacies of working with specialists at museums and universities who are necessary collaborators, at one level or another.

Two complaints with the book are a number of typographic errors, especially with incorrect articles (a, an, the) and that I think Winston could have more strongly stressed (1) the importance of examining material directly before deciding that something is indeed new and (2) the importance of complete synonymy (researching all the possible names that a particular species [or higher taxon] may have had in the past). This is hard work and is usually not as good as it should be to be useful for future researchers.

Having visited a number of museums during the course of my work, I have found the curatorial staffs as well as the curators to be extremely helpful but I believe that they will all be appreciative if every nonspecialist who walks through their door has already read and mulled over the advice and procedures in Winston's book. Overall, a clear guide to a sometimes confusing and daunting task.