latin names basic learning?

hi all

any links to a bit of reading on latin fish names?

i dont want to know every name under the sun
but would like to know the family names

when fish lists are posted up i end up copy/pasting
them into google to find out what they are
which is a p.i.t.a. as you can imagine

i know some through doing this so i suppose its educational
but it would be nice to know the bare basics

regards

4

fourmations wrote:

when fish lists are posted up i end up copy/pasting
them into google to find out what they are
which is a p.i.t.a. as you can imagine

ditto on that mate, think i will never learn. i'm not useless at languages, the wife teaches me russian and latvian, but you will get to recognise the family names but still have to google the specifics coz they do vary alot!

I'll dig out a site I use to know ages ago twas very good.after a while they just end up sticking in your head...things like fasciatus meaning striped etc.

is there a point to it all?, ok prehaps for use internationally as it is the only correct name but is there not a correct english translation for that name, without the aid of a search who here knows "Paracheirodon innesi" (yes i googled it). i don't bother with copying and pasting or even reading fish lists in a dead language, ignorance? maybe, but it would be more convienient to post the english translation. enlighten me or educate me with you views

Most of the african cichlids go by their latin name and only a handful have english names. To try and keep them as pure as possible i presume. I am only startin to keep africans and it was very daunting at first but now i have a few latin names for them in me head. There is no way in hell that u could no them all as there are too many but the ones that u keep in yer tank and the fish that u are interested in and research for the names eventually stick in yer brain.

Mick.....

The reason why People dealing with Living things use Binomial reference ie two names is becausa A, they describe the organism and B, People in different countries use colloquial names, common ones such as piss in the Bed, This in Latin is Taraxicum officinalis, if you were looking for piss in the Bed from say, Germany, you would be unlikely to get what you were looking for, it's a Dandelion. It makes conversations and research between different Countries much easier apart from the fact the Name gives instant information to those interested.

Kev.

stretnik wrote:

The reason why People dealing with Living things use Binomial reference ie two names is becausa A, they describe the organism and B, People in different countries use colloquial names, common ones such as piss in the Bed, This in Latin is Taraxicum officinalis, if you were looking for piss in the Bed from say, Germany, you would be unlikely to get what you were looking for, it's a Dandelion. It makes conversations and research between different Countries much easier apart from the fact the Name gives instant information to those intersted.

Kev.

Thats a damned good answer right there. Isnt there still a lot of descrepancies even with the latin names of certain fish? There are plenty of instances of different researchers giving the same fish different scientific names, alot of which are still mixed up.

Jay

Problem is there can be multiple english names for a single fish... I mean most of the english names are geared towards sales and alot of them use part of the Latin name...

There is no real point in learning all the latin names...unless your studying Ithiology or something.. For the average hobbyist google is all ya need !

Iv picked up a few latin names but there is no way i can spell them !

Edit: Well seems Latin names can be different too... Google will find any name for ya haha

Cheers Jay,

Names are arrived at based on the smallest of differences, you can go into ridiculous depth in explaining same, differences can be in something as simple as number of scales on different parts of the body and MOST Tetras are judged as Tetras because of an Adipose fin. This however, doesn't always be true as some display Adipose Fins and some can display 2 !

Flowering plants are classed, usually, but not not always on the structure of the parts of the Flower but there will always be differences from time to time so classification will always be an on going affair but it helps to Pigeon hole different types of Fish so we can have an idea what to expect when we've ordered a Fish instead of shopping blind.

Kev.

The reason why discrpancies still exist is down to different Ichtylogists not being able to settle on a name and they both agree to disagree leaving all in sundry in confusion.

Let me worsen the situation by telling you that Latin isn't the only language used in Phenome (Physical appearance )descriptions, Greek too raises it's ugly Head on the odd occasion.

Kev.

I prefer to call them 'Scientific Names' rather than 'Latin'.
Many of the names are not Latin; many are Greek in origin and then worded to look like 'Latinised' English; and some are simply latinised names of people eg Axolrodi (shove an 'I' on the end of blokes names and there you have it, it should be different if its named after a female....but then they person naming it has to know if the perosn it is named in honor of is male or female).

As for common names...as Kev mentioned, Dandelion is called many things in different cultures; and many other species may share the same name eg 'Angel Fishes'.

Scientific Names keep changing, but there are rules to those changes. Something that I feel is more important than simply stating a scientific name is to also cite previous names (or synonyms).

There can be some use in knowing what different prefix and suffixes mean.....eg 'spots', 'striped', 'hexa', 'penta', 'odon' (teeth things going on) etc
but then I sometimes wonder if Callichthys callicthys could have had a better name: it means "Beautiful fish, beautiful fish" (it is, in a way, but not that beautiful that the scientific name would help identifty it).

ian

Heres a Bird lovers link to Binomial nomenclature.

naturestuff.net/site/index.php?option=co...iew&id=388&Itemid=43

Kev.

Sorry for Hogging this but the American Indians were ahead of anyone in their naming of things like Dances with wolves etc, no two people in a Tribe held the same Name.

Toally off, well, a bit off topic, here's a neat Website containing American Indian Names.

www.snowwowl.com/swolfNAnamesandmeanings2.html

Apols if it annoys anyone.

Kev.

Here is a copy of the starting bit of a piece that I did on nomenclature on a reptile forum (with in-forum links removed)

The literature on fishkeeping goes back a long way. Many of those historic books on fish keeping where written by systematic ichthyologists or in a scholarly (for want of better word) manner or by bionomic ichthyologists.
Often, it was assumed that the reader might have similar academic interests to the author (eg wanting to know the British Museum library identification code of a particular specimen).
In many cases, that tradition has been carried forward into more recent books.....but many do not follow the same format as previously.

The off-shot of all name changes and incorrect citation of names in some recent literature may cause confusion on names.

For example....what is Zeus scalaris Lichenstein 1823?
Answer: The common freshwater Heroin fish in the family Cichlidae.

Now, here is the problem. What if I ask what is Pterophyllum scalare?
The answer might be the same because we often know the fish under that name. But really, it is not good enough.

What I should have written is what is Pterophyllum scalare (Lichenstein 1823)?
Yep, the same answer....but this time it is clear that the name P.scalare was not the original name and that the reader must be aware that some texts would have that species (or paratypes of the original holotype) under a different name.
The name of the author, Lichenstein, of the original holotype name Zeus scalaris in 1823 appears in brackets after Pterophyllum scalare to indicate that Pterophyllum scalare is not the original name of the paratypes (specimens of the species other than the holotype).

But, to add to confusion we also have synonyms.
Apart from the original holotype name of Zeus scalaris, other synonyms might include Pterophyllum eimekei Ahl 1928. If, P. eimekei is actually a paratype of the original holotype Zeus scalaris specimen (ie it is the same species), then P. eimekei should be referred to as P.scalare.
However, the synonym will still remain as Pterophyllum eimekei Ahl 1928 (note that Ahl's name will not appear in brackets in this case).

We could also argue that another heroin cichlid fish, Plaxaxoides leopaldi Goose 1963, is just a synonym of Pterophyllum dumerilii (Castelnau 1855). In such a case the former name takes priority. viz: Pterophyllum dumerilii (Castelnau 1855).
If, however, Plaxaxoides leopaldi Goose 1963 was shown to be validly different to Pterophyllum dumerilii (Castelnau 1855), and was a valid holotype, and it was moved into the genus Pterophyllum Heckel 1840 then its name would be, hypothetically, Pterophyllum leopaldi (Goose 1963)....noting the bracketed author name.

BUT...things may change in the future. Someone may decide that all heroin cichlid angelfish belong in the genus Zeus, in which case the original name and spelling of the species most commonly kept will go back to being
Zeus scalaris Lichenstein 1823 (no brackets around the author, and it will be scalaris and not scalare). This would be a case when someone decides that 'the original was correct all along'.


Confused?

Well, if one is versed in this then all you'll notice is that I've been scant on the scientific definitions (even verging to the point of being not-totally-correct) but if one is not versed on such things then this is the type of thing that one may come across in many writings on the subject.

Hence, this thread is aimed to help explain some of the confusion and place definitions against words used within fish discussions on nomenclature.

I’ll explain Holotype, Paratype, synonym, author conventions, genera conventions and things that I’ve forgotten to mention here. (AS THIS IS A COPY OFF ANOTHER FORUM, THEN I WON'T BE DOING THIS PROMISE)

It is important to spot name changes else one could be missing lots of info when doing a literature search.

I think that a different set of threads would be appropriate for specific discussion on nomenclature.

The body governing rules is the International Commission on Zoological Nomenclature (ICZN). www.iczn.org

(Plants, viruses and bacteria are governed by different conventions and codes.)

Confused? Don't go to Confused Dot Com (they can't help you)
ian

I agree that the scientific names are the only way to go.

For example, I found a wild vine growing in a woodland the other day - Bittersweet, also known as bittersweet nightshade, bitter nightshade, blue bindweed, Amara Dulcis, climbing nightshade, fellenwort, felonwood, poisonberry, poisonflower, scarlet berry, snakeberry, trailing bittersweet, trailing nightshade, violet bloom, or woody nightshade. Only one scientific name : Solanum dulcamara.

I actually find that looking up the various sponsors' lists of fish is a great way to learn the scientific names! It also helps hugely if you know what they mean - as per the examples above from Ian. Species like the old labeo bicolour or gymnocorymbus ternetzi - I could remember these because their translation made sense. Its like learning any language, it starts to fall into place after a while.

The one thing I find I can't learn from books or google is pronunciation.

Anyone any ideas on where to find a phonetic guide to pronunciation or even rules for latin / latinised names?

Jim,

I was brought up on some old books...eg Axelrod's book from the 50s, Sterba's books and Innes's original book.
Them olde books tended to have the meaning and pronounciation of names.....really great stuff.
They also cited the original name and the museum ID of the type species.

The rules for naming can be found at www.iczn.org but there is so much stuff on there to churn through.

The pronounciation often depends on whether name is greek or latin (or other) derived and also what people can get their tongues around.

I mean....did the person who named some fish actually have any friends to whom he needed to utter the name of the fish to?
Try saying Pterygoplichthys gibbiceps after being to the dentist (or on a cold day)...and even an attempt to give it the name Glyptoperichthys is only a bit better.

I think a compendium of 'well used' suffixes and pre-fixes would be a great addition here...for anyone who wants to compile it.


ianinii guisseppi millichipoides (which roughly translates to mean "by the grace of god, may god add, looking like a Myll on a Lynch by a Hope in Shropshire" or similar)