Alvaro Patricio Jaramillo writes:


> Argentina, and I imagine Spain. As I understand there is some sort of
> list of standardized French names which was put together by French and
> Canadian ornithologists, I do not know where this was published though.

This list does exist, but I don't know where it has been published either.
It has been designed by french and french-speaking scientists.
(if anybody is interested in having more information about it, let me know, I
will try to contact friends in France that could find a copy somewhere)

Concerning the use of scientific names (Latin), I think that is the best way to
communicate. But there is still a long way to go...
As an example, I went to Scotland in the summer of 1993. As I knew that there
were many more birders there than in France, I decided to enhance my knowledge
of Latin names for these species which were not that common in France (thus I
didn't know their Latin names yet), in order to communicate easier with
English, uh sorry Scotish :-), birders there.
One day, I went to a natural area (well equipped as many of such areas in this
country) with hides and an interpretation center. Looking outside from a hide,
I saw a bird, and asked a guy of the center if this bird was common. Of course
I used the Latin name to do so, and the guy stared at me. As a consequence, I
had to learn the english names in the next two days ....

I think every one should be concerned in learning the Latin names because
- they give insight in the "nature" of the birds (e.g. when two birds are
called Woodpecker, but they have different Latin genus names, it seems to me
that it is interesting to know why they are not part of the same genus,
bringing more knowledge of these particular birds)
- that makes communication with other birders (specially foreign birders) much
easier.

--
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A bird in the bush is better than two in the hand.

Serge Le Huitouze School of Computing Science
email: serge at cs.sfu.ca Simon Fraser University
tel: (604) 291-5423 Burnaby, British Columbia
fax: (604) 291-3045 V5A 1S6 Canada