COMMENTS
Year: 2008
Type: article
Abstract: Having read and closely followed arguments both for and against Jones's (BZN 64: 83-86) proposal to conserve the specific names serratus Froggatt, 1898 and serrula Desneux, 1904 for an Australian and Southeast Asian (specifically Sundanian) species of Microcerotermes, respectively, I wish to offer some views as a researcher who has worked on the taxonomy and ecology of termites in the Southeast Asian region.Jones proposed to the Commission to conserve the name Microcerotermes serrula (Desneux, 1904) for a common Southeast Asian termite and to suppress the name Microcerotermes serratus (Haviland, 1898) for this species on the grounds that the name Microcerotermes serratus (Froggatt, 1898) had been used for a well-known Australian species of termite for over 100 years before Roisin & Pasteels (2000) discovered an error in precedence.The name serrula was originally proposed for the Southeast Asian species by Desneux (1904) to replace the name serratus Haviland, 1898 because it was thought that the latter name was preoccupied by the name applied to the Australian species.However, despite the journal volume having an imprinted year of publication that is a year earlier, the actual date of publication for the journal issue in which the Australian species was described has been shown by Roisin & Pasteels to be two months later than that of the Southeast Asian species.Thus, in revising the Papuan species of Microcerotermes, Roisin & Pasteels (2000) reapplied the name serratus Haviland to the Southeast Asian species (making serrula a junior synonym) and proposed the name parviceps Mjoberg, 1920, the next earliest name for the Australian species, as a replacement for the preoccupied name serratus Froggatt.Jones (BZN 64: 83-86, 65: 47-49) cites seven and thirteen valid publications in which the names Termes serrula Desneux and Termes serratus Froggatt, respectively, have been used in the 50 years preceding the publication by Roisin and Pasteels (2000).In addition, I know of five other publications in the same period that use the name serratus Froggatt (Holt & Coventry, 1982; Nkunika, 1988; Verkerk, 1990; Hadlington, 1996; Abensperg-Traun & Perry, 1998), and there are probably yet others.Two of these publications deal with termites as pests.Roisin & Pasteels and Jones (BZN 65: 47-49) both defend their views.Jones argues that the use of the name serratus for the Southeast Asian species could potentially cause confusion, as the name has always been applied to the Australian species, which is discussed in Australian texts as a pest of railway sleepers, fence posts and utility poles.Roisin and Pasteels argue that the pest status of the Australian species is overstated by Jones.They feel the Commission should uphold their decision as they exercised their unquestioned prerogative as authors to make the nomenclatural changes without reference to the Commission after concluding the species were relatively little known.Jones maintains that he is exercising his
Authors: Laurence G. Kirton, Yves Roisin, Stéphane R. Prigent, F. Christian Thompson, Neal L. Evenhuis, Thomas Pape, Adrian C. Pont, Patrick M. O'Grady, Michael Ashburner, Sergio Castrezana, Rob DeSalle, Kenneth Y. Kaneshiro, Richard T. Lapoint, Karl N. Magnacca, Therese A. Markow, Bryant F. McAllister, Alfredo Ruíz, Carlos R. Vilela, Francisca C. do Val, Pavel Štys, Stephen D. Gaimari, Shane F. McEvey, Tan Heok Hui, Rohan Pethiyagoda, Zeehan Jaafar, Peter K.L. Ng, Patrick Berrebi
Language: English
Subfield: Genetics
Domain: Life Sciences
Open Access status: green
OpenAlex ID: W161624171