Don,

Well, yeah, I just hope the picture does me justice.... (You *didn't*
scan in the FIRST photo you took of me, did you!!??)

On Wed, 2 Aug 1995, Don Baccus wrote:

> >I'm a 'lumpy' sort of person, when it comes to taxonomy.

> Yeah, I've got your picnic photo in front of me :)

> I voted for option "B" (Florida Jay, Scrub Jay, Santa Cruz Island Jay),
> though adding "Scrub" to "Florida Jay" would be OK.

I e-mailed my response to Dr (?) Remsen with my own opinions (hate having
myself limited by other folk's options... :-))

Scrub Jay - for the Florida race.

California Jay - for the western races (I know, I know... we
Northwesterners just hate giving California the credit for anything...).
Even the Oregon natives should accept that the "Scrub" jay expanded its
range into the Willamette Valley pretty recently. This range extension
is continuing even now (I assume that the fledglings are dispersing). I
see Aphelocoma jays in my neighborhood in west Olympia pretty regularly.
With the Californication of the Puget Trough, these birds should be
regulars all the way to the Fraser lowlands within *our* lifetimes. What
do we do with "Woodhouse's" Jay, though?.... even if we can't tell them
apart....

Santa Cruz Jay - Adding the extra 3 syllables to call it the "Santa Cruz
Island Scrub-Jay" is unnecessary.

BTW, if folks vote their preferences to Dr Remsen, I'd like to lobby to keep
Hyphens out of the English names. They are cumbersome to write, and add
nothing to our understanding of phylogenetic relationships. I had a
Dendrology prof at Oregon State who insisted on our using "Douglas-fir"
rather than "Douglas Fir" for Pseudotsuga menziesii. Makes as much sense
as using "Screech-owl" for Screech Owls.

Jon. Anderson
Olympia, WA
anderjda at dfw.wa.gov