Re: Original description & identity of Hypselodoris peasei

Dear Ron,
Thanks for noticing my lapse, and thanks even more for letting me know. I try and proof read all the text and check that all the hypertext links work, but for perfection I rely on feedback from all of you who regularly read the Forum.

For any of you who don't understand, or realise, that there is a a convention concerning brackets [parentheses] around the author's name and date in scientific names, this is a good time to mention it. If a species is no longer in the genus it was first placed in, then the first author's name and date should be in brackets. For example. In Terry Gosliner & Rebecca Johnson's excellent recent review of Hypselodoris they have proposed that a species which I described in 1995 as Hypselodoris punicea should be better placed in the genus Thorunna. They therefore refer to it as Thorunna punicea (Rudman, 1995). Another species, like Hypselodoris maridadilus Rudman, 1977, doesn't have brackets in their paper, because they agree with my placement of it in the genus Hypselodoris.

This is a very useful convention, especially today when we rely quite heavily on computerised searches. If you see an author's name in brackets then it's likely you won't find a reference to the original description if you use the present generic name in your search.

Best wishes,
Bill Rudman.