>
>Teresa Michelsen writes:
>
>> The other thing that would help me is if
>> someone would post where these come from, then maybe I could get a
>> comprehensive list for reference. That would help with postings from other
>> discussion groups like the bird ID guide.
>
>
>There is, in fact, a certain logic to these abbreviations in that they
>follow some simple rules for naming. This makes writing the abbreviations
>easy, but reading them difficult, regardless.
>
>Here are the rules as best as I can remember.
>
>(1) For one-word bird names such as Ovenbird, the first four letters
> make up the abbreviation, OVEN.
>(2) For two-word names such as Yellow Warbler, the first two letters
> of each word provide the abbreviation, YEWA.

OOPS, Stop right here!
Yellow Warble is, in fact, YWAR so as not to be confused with Yellow
Wagtail YWAG and here is where the "simple logic" starts to go a little
wonky.

> If either word is hyphenated however, then the first letter of
> each part of the hyphenation is used rather than the first two
> letters. The abbreviation for Great-crested Flycatcher is thus GCFL.
> (Note FL is used for flycatcher, not FC)
>(3) For three-word names such as Great Blue Heron, use the first letter
> of each of the species part (Great Blue), and the first two letters
> of the family part (Heron), which gives us GBHE.

Great blue Heron is GTBH so as not to be confused with Green-backed Heron
(GNBH) which of course id no longer Green-backed Heron, but changing
the code would be too confusing...


> Unless, of course a word is hyphenated, as in Greater Black-backed
> Gull, which should be GBBG.
>(4) For four-word names, it is the first letter of each name.
> Black and White Warbler should be BAWW (please correct me if I'm wrong).
> The abbreviation BWWA for example, stands for Blue-winged Warbler.
>(5) Any ambiguities are taken care of as special cases. For example
> Black-throated Green Warbler and Black-throated Gray Warbler
> would both be BTGW. In such a case, I believe that the most
> common one is abbreviated according to the above rules, then the
> other is abbreviated arbitrarily. Comments ?
>
>Now, how does one abbreviate Black-backed Three-toed Woodpecker ?
>
>Hope I am not iterating a previous posting here.
>
>Neil J. Fergusson ******************
>1405 1/2 NE 56th St. * Baffled *
>Seattle, WA 98105 * or *
>(206) 517-5466 * bust *
>cccc at u.washington.edu ******************
>
>
>

The moral of this story and the convention we have been trying to
form is always mention the birds your talking about at least once in
full followed parenthetically with the four-letter code if you plan
on mentioning it repeatedly.

I would also add that putting the bird in all caps, particularly in
field notes makes for easier perusing as well. I will attempt to access
the NBS/BBL for the complete USFW 4-letter code and post it for all to
see.



--
********************************
* Mike Patterson, Astoria, OR *
* mpatters at ednet1.osl.or.gov *
********************************