At 08:16 AM 10/26/98 -0800, Diann MacRae wrote:
>Hi, Tweets
>
>Regarding bird names and capitalization, for those of us who are
>professional writers (at times), we must go with the editor of whatever
>journal or periodical we are writing for at the moment. There is no real
>standardization here, some capitalize, some don't. My preference,
>personally, is no caps, except of course for words always capitalized, but
>I strongly feel it's correct either way.

Certainly the world of print supports your contention. I usually submit is
no caps except for proper nouns (i.e. spotted towhee, Townsend's warbler) but
the reality is the editor of whatever rag I deal with does whatever they want,
and as you note, their's no standardization.

The capitalization of names is really kinda archaic, and it seems to be only
the bird world that has hung onto the convention. I suspect that over the
next
century or so that the bird world will end the practice, just as we no longer
write of Cats and Dogs or Roses and Pansies...



- Don Baccus, Portland OR <dhogaza at pacifier.com>
Nature photos, on-line guides, and other goodies at
http://donb.photo.net