Binomial Nomenclature

Binomial Nomenclature
March 08 & March 10
I have a friend, a plant watcher as it turns out, who is forever spewing out bewildering Latin names of the plants we come across when on a hike. To many of us, the names mean little, but in a world where the names of plants and animals often can take on several colloquial names, a scientific approach is the only way to keep things straight.
I always vowed I would never become one of those people – and that a dandelion would always be a dandelion and not a Taraxacum officinale. But as I commenced to instruct a six-week bird identification course last month as one of the programs offered by Quinte Conservation, it soon became apparent that, to be a knowledgeable birder, we must have at least a basic understanding of why birds are so-named, and how the process came about. Binomial nomenclature is still barely touched on in my Bird Identification Course though, for the simple reason that I want new students to see birding as fun, and not scientific. However, it is something that some may wish to pursue to a more meaningful degree later as they get more into the hobby. Mainly my students were present for six weeks to get into the real meat and potatoes of bird identity, and that’s what we did, and had lots of fun doing it.
Binomial nomenclature is simply a term we use to identify the process of assigning two scientific names to a species – the first being the genus to which the bird belongs, the second name being the actual species. This whole process of taxonomy has been in existence since the mid 1700s, when Carl Linnaeus, a Swedish scientist established a system or hierarchy of living organisms, so that scientists all over the world could understand each other. This taxonomy is constantly evolving in response to new discoveries through DNA testing, resulting in new species being found, or conversely, some species being lumped in as one. It can become quite complicated, but the basics are really quite straightforward.
Even if a birder is interested in little more than knowing the identity of a bird in question, very few of us would not admit to being curious in knowing just where it fits into the overall scheme of living organisms. If we look at all living organisms, basic elementary school biology places these organisms in five different kingdoms, those being plants, fungi, animals, protoctisa and bacteria. Don’t worry too much about the latter two, as we would need a microscope to attempt identity. And we thought all living things were as simple as either plants or animals!
If we are looking at narrowing down a bird, for example, we must start with the animal kingdom, for that is where birds belong. Members of the animal family, or Animalia, are further divided into smaller groups called Phylum(singular) or Phyla (plural)which means a direct line of descent within that group. Birds belong to the Phylum of Chordata (animals with backbones). They are further broken down into Classes, then finally to Aves which encompasses the birds.
Birds are then separated into Orders. Songbirds belong to the Passeriformes Order, or perching birds, as opposed to birds of prey. From there, they are sub-divided even further into families, and it here where we begin to see something a little more recognizable such as the warbler family, flycatcher family or the sparrow family. Then we break it down even further by giving members of each family a genus. For example, within the thrushes, there may be up to four different genera (plural of genus) of thrushes in Ontario. The robin belongs to the genus, Turdus. But to separate the robin from other similar thrushes by the same genus, a second scientific name is assigned to the bird which identifies the specific species. Therefore, a robin is Turdus migratorius. In some cases the species’ Latin name could be derived from the person who discovered it. The Forster’s tern, for instance, is Sterna (Genus) forsteri (species).
So, the end result is that once we arrive at the birds in the classification process, we find that they fall into seven different levels in the system. And that’s not even making a dent into situations where some birds may take on different races where a species may be further divided into a sub-species. It can get very confusing, and I would be very surprised if I even have your interest at this point. But it is all important stuff, and very necessary to learn in order to have a good foundation before we begin the frustrating process of identifying the almost 400 species of birds to be found in the Quinte area.