DIVE DRY WITH DR. BILL #870: WHAT IS THIS, DR. BILL?
I often get requests for the identification of a species observed by a diver friend from Facebook, ScubaBoard or one of the other dive forums I frequent. I'm a generalist and am interested in all the critters in an ecosystem and not a specialist, so sometimes it is pretty difficult. However, I view it as a puzzle for me to solve which keeps my mind as sharp as a dull carving knife.
If I'm uncertain about a species, I will usually contact a specialist to verify it. Recently Kathy Peper and John Blaser of Get Wet SCUBA posted images of a fish I don't think I've ever seen before. They said it was caught on the backside of Catalina near Cat Harbor at the Isthmus. I wondered if it might be a species from south of the border that wandered up into our waters, so I picked up my fish field guide for Mexico.
As I looked through the pages, I came across a bass that looked quite similar. It was the spotted sand or bay bass (Paralabrax maculatofasciatus), a member of the sea bass family along with the kelp or calico bass (Paralabrax clathratus) and barred sand bass (Paralabrax nebulifer). Both of its close relatives are reasonably common in the dive park. I e-mailed Dr. Milton Love, the fishiest person I know, for confirmation. He and I have co-written a few scientific papers about new species in our waters. He agreed with my determination, and said there is a population off Cat Harbor on the island's backside.
I returned from a few dives today, and there was a request from my friend Michael Bear down in Sandy Eggo. He had recently dived the wreck of the Yukon and asked me to identify a species in one of the images. This one I was familiar with. It was a zoanthid that parasitizes gorgonian soft corals, eventually killing them. I messaged Mike that it was Parazoanthus lucificum. I was a bit surprised when I couldn't find it in my field guide and learned the name had been changed (to protect the innocent?). It was now Savalia lucifica. Sigh, all those name changes have this old geezer spinning.
Last weekend, instructor Ruth Harris mentioned that she had seen what she believed was a rare and endangered white abalone (Haliotis sorenseni). She took me out to see it and I concurred on her identification, as did the National Marine Fisheries Service the following day. Now Ruth is the white ab whisperer in my book... she's found not one, not two... but three of this species. Fortunately it's common and scientific names have not changed, "just" its abundance due to over-fishing of this mollusc.
Since I'm not an ex-spurt on anything, it is really hard to keep up with all the changes in scientific names thanks largely to molecular genetics (DNA). We used to say common names were not the best to use since they varied from place-to-place and sometimes person-to-person (making them not so "common"). The scientific name was the one to use since it was specific and rarely changed. Oh, well, those days of nomenclature stability are now gone.
Years ago Dr. Adrian Wenner at UCSB explained to me about human memory. If you're an accountant, you're familiar with the acronym FILO. No, even though it is often used as a financial term it doesn't refer to the unleavened "dough" from the Middle East. It means "First In, Last Out," the first thing one hears is often lodged firmly in memory despite nomenclature changes in the future and is hard to replace in memory when things change. Of course a true scientist should always be open to new information.
Having learned many of my scientific names 40 to 50 years (or more) ago, my memory cells don't want to purge them when taxonomists come up with a new one (or revert to an older one). I try to keep abreast with these changes. That is much easier for a specialist who deals with only one taxonomic group. I deal with the entire spectrum of marine life as an ecologist.
© 2020 Dr. Bill Bushing. For the entire archived set of over 850 "Dive Dry" columns, visit my website Star Thrower Educational Multimedia (S.T.E.M.) Home Page
Image caption: Spotted sand bass and parasitic zoanthid; white abalone and confused Dr. Bill.
I often get requests for the identification of a species observed by a diver friend from Facebook, ScubaBoard or one of the other dive forums I frequent. I'm a generalist and am interested in all the critters in an ecosystem and not a specialist, so sometimes it is pretty difficult. However, I view it as a puzzle for me to solve which keeps my mind as sharp as a dull carving knife.
If I'm uncertain about a species, I will usually contact a specialist to verify it. Recently Kathy Peper and John Blaser of Get Wet SCUBA posted images of a fish I don't think I've ever seen before. They said it was caught on the backside of Catalina near Cat Harbor at the Isthmus. I wondered if it might be a species from south of the border that wandered up into our waters, so I picked up my fish field guide for Mexico.
As I looked through the pages, I came across a bass that looked quite similar. It was the spotted sand or bay bass (Paralabrax maculatofasciatus), a member of the sea bass family along with the kelp or calico bass (Paralabrax clathratus) and barred sand bass (Paralabrax nebulifer). Both of its close relatives are reasonably common in the dive park. I e-mailed Dr. Milton Love, the fishiest person I know, for confirmation. He and I have co-written a few scientific papers about new species in our waters. He agreed with my determination, and said there is a population off Cat Harbor on the island's backside.
I returned from a few dives today, and there was a request from my friend Michael Bear down in Sandy Eggo. He had recently dived the wreck of the Yukon and asked me to identify a species in one of the images. This one I was familiar with. It was a zoanthid that parasitizes gorgonian soft corals, eventually killing them. I messaged Mike that it was Parazoanthus lucificum. I was a bit surprised when I couldn't find it in my field guide and learned the name had been changed (to protect the innocent?). It was now Savalia lucifica. Sigh, all those name changes have this old geezer spinning.
Last weekend, instructor Ruth Harris mentioned that she had seen what she believed was a rare and endangered white abalone (Haliotis sorenseni). She took me out to see it and I concurred on her identification, as did the National Marine Fisheries Service the following day. Now Ruth is the white ab whisperer in my book... she's found not one, not two... but three of this species. Fortunately it's common and scientific names have not changed, "just" its abundance due to over-fishing of this mollusc.
Since I'm not an ex-spurt on anything, it is really hard to keep up with all the changes in scientific names thanks largely to molecular genetics (DNA). We used to say common names were not the best to use since they varied from place-to-place and sometimes person-to-person (making them not so "common"). The scientific name was the one to use since it was specific and rarely changed. Oh, well, those days of nomenclature stability are now gone.
Years ago Dr. Adrian Wenner at UCSB explained to me about human memory. If you're an accountant, you're familiar with the acronym FILO. No, even though it is often used as a financial term it doesn't refer to the unleavened "dough" from the Middle East. It means "First In, Last Out," the first thing one hears is often lodged firmly in memory despite nomenclature changes in the future and is hard to replace in memory when things change. Of course a true scientist should always be open to new information.
Having learned many of my scientific names 40 to 50 years (or more) ago, my memory cells don't want to purge them when taxonomists come up with a new one (or revert to an older one). I try to keep abreast with these changes. That is much easier for a specialist who deals with only one taxonomic group. I deal with the entire spectrum of marine life as an ecologist.
© 2020 Dr. Bill Bushing. For the entire archived set of over 850 "Dive Dry" columns, visit my website Star Thrower Educational Multimedia (S.T.E.M.) Home Page
Image caption: Spotted sand bass and parasitic zoanthid; white abalone and confused Dr. Bill.
