Subject: [Tweeters] Codes : STSA
Date: Aug 11 21:57:23 2015
From: birdmarymoor at gmail.com - birdmarymoor at gmail.com


Clarice - there is some disagreement with this disambiguation; not all of us
agree that the rule-generated code should EVER be used if there is a
conflict with another species. Since both species would, by default, result
in STSA, neither species should use it, at least according to some of us who
use 4-letter codes for data entry. It's FAR too easy to mis-enter a
sighting that way. Far better to get an error, and have to explicitly
specify the correct species. The original banding codes used this rule; I
don't know if they still do, but it still makes sense.

This is one of the big reasons that 4-letter codes aren't very good for
communication; there's no single, comprehensive, agreed-upon definition of
the codes. It's easy to find lots of lists of codes, but they DON'T agree.
The original banding codes were problematic for a whole host of reasons; not
all species were banded, and they treated recognizable subspecies and forms
as if they were full species, just to name a couple. The ABA and the AOU
have not defined official 4-letter codes. Instead, everybody creates their
own list, such as the one you linked to, from the Institute for Bird
Populations (who???).

There was a famous letter to the editor of BIRDING magazine, many years
back, where someone proposed that the "common" bird should get the default
code, and the "rare" bird should get the non-standard code. He was from the
East Coast, so his definitions of common and rare were skewed. According to
him, Tree Swallow should be TRSW, while Trumpeter Swan should be TRUS.
Here in Washington, in early March, it's quite common to have both birds on
the SAME checklist, with Trumpeter Swans outnumbering Tree Swallows by two
orders of magnitude. That kind of kills his argument for me.

So I use TRES and TRUS, NSHR and NSHO, and so on (hopefully, you can figure
out that second example). And I DON'T use STSA. I'm not even sure I'd know
which was more common here - Stilt or Sharp-tailed. I've seen both only a
few times in the state.

Even though I constantly use 4-letter codes, I try very hard NOT to use them
on Tweeters.

== Michael Hobbs
== www.marymoor.org/birding.htm
== BirdMarymoor at frontier.com

-----Original Message-----
From: Clarice
Sent: Tuesday, August 11, 2015 9:30 PM
To: Tweeters
Subject: [Tweeters] Codes

STSA = stilt sandpiper
SPTS= sharp tailed sandpiper

See
http://www.birdpop.org/docs/misc/Alpha_codes_eng.pdf

Clarice Clark
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