World Bird Info

Conventions for Distribution

Under Distribution, I aim to list at least every country in which the species has ever occurred, and its abundance seasonality and breeding status in that country. And also to list any subspecies that occur in that country in their range.

A typical example (which happens to be the distribution of Rufescent Tiger-Heron Tigrisoma lineatum in Colombia) follows:

COLOMBIA<Pacific.coast.of.nChocó.&.Gulf.of.Urabá.E.across.N.lowlands.to.Guajira.Pen.; Magdalena.Valley.S.to.Antioquia{luR+};E.of.Andes.in.llanos{lfR+}[lineatum]>(lfR+luR+)

The name of the country is given in capitals, followed optionally by information on within-country distribution and subspecies in angled brackets < >. This is followed by information on abundance, seasonality and breeding status for the country in round brackets ( ). Note that where abundance, seasonality and breeding status differ in different parts of the country, information on that will be given in curly bracket { } inside the angled brackets. Subspecies' names are placed in square brackets.

The following codes are used to indicate Breeding Status, Abundance and Seasonality:

R+	Permanent Resident, Breeding
R-	Permanent Resident, Non-breeding
S+	Summer Resident, Breeding
S-	Summer Resident, Non-breeding
W+	Winter Resident, Breeding
W-	Winter Resident, Non-Breeding
M	Migrant
P	Spring Migrant
T	Autumn Migrant
V	Vagrant

# in place of + indicates a probable, but not confirmed,
breeder.

Abundance codes

In addition, an abundance code may be preceded by l, indicating locally; eg. luS+ would indicate 'locally uncommon Summer breeding resident'. Also Status codes may be followed by by ? or q. ? indicates uncertainty about the record, usually because of possible confusion with a similar species. q indicates a record that appears reliable, but which has not yet (to our knowledge) been officially accepted.

Conventions for Synonymy

I have used symbols to designate the kind of data in each record. The symbols are as follows:

! indicates a generic name
> indicates a subgeneric name
| indicates a synonym for either a generic or subgeneric name
% with capital letters, indicates a species name
# designates a subspecies name, followed by the distribution of the subspecies in { }
< indicates the citation on which a species or subspecies name is based
$ indicates a synonym for either a species or subspecies name
$~ indicates a name that has been taken to designate a subspecies, but which we do not treat as such.
Where the actual date of publication differs from the date printed in the source, following ICZN Art.22A.2,we put the actual year of publication first after the author's name, followed by the printed date in square brackets [...] in quotes. For example: Sterna elegans Gambel,1849["1848"],Proceedings of the Academy of National Science of Philadelphia,4,p.129.
We pay particular attention to the treatment of subspecies in Peters and Howard and Moore,2nd edn and 3rd edn, since these are the sources most people will go to in search of information about subspecies.

? at the beginning of a record, indicates a name about whose status there is doubt, particularly in relation to unidentifiable names.
(? ) in the middle of a subspecies name indicates that the subspecies may in fact either be a good species, or may be wrongly assigned.

Any of the above categories may be followed by a Note. The word Note ( or the abbreviation (ctd) where the Note is longer than one record, is preceded by the symbol for the record to which the Note refers. Thus a note to a species entry will have the form %Note: . One to a genus will begin: !Note . An entry with the $~ will always be followed by $~Note… indicating the sources who have treated this name as designating a subspecies.

Since this is a work in progress, I use some standard methods to indicate missing data:

A series of Xs (eg XXXXXXX) is used to indicate missing data in a reference.

A series of Y's in brackets (YYYYYYYY) indicates a record where I need to check the type locality of the name or other basis