It is common in species catalogues to cite the first page of the work where a particular species was originally described. Although in many articles we see the first reference to the new name in the abstract or in different parts of the main text, we usually cite as the "first page" that where the "Description" is set, citing the holotype, type locality, etc. But what about a new species whose description is placed in an unpaginated supplementary material? This question arose when reading the recently published article describing a new lizard species, Ameivula apipensis: http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/zsc.12277/full
This is an extremely bad practice of Zoologica Scripta to put species description into online supplementary material. Unfortunately (if the description meets all the criteria of ICZN online publication) there is no other way just referring to the online supplement. I think authors describing new species should avoid publication in such journals even-thought it has "high impact factor"
This is an extremely bad practice of Zoologica Scripta to put species description into online supplementary material. Unfortunately (if the description meets all the criteria of ICZN online publication) there is no other way just referring to the online supplement. I think authors describing new species should avoid publication in such journals even-thought it has "high impact factor"
I think it is bad practice to put a species description into supplementary material. However, in your case the description seems to be in the abstract: "Ameivula apipensis sp nov. is characterised by a whitish brown vertebral stripe in adults and juveniles, a lateral field without ocelli and with overlapping spot, presence of an interfrontoparietal scale in 46.2% of the specimens, 12–17 femoral pores, an hemipenis without lateral sac, five xiphisternal ribs, and by a combination of meristic features as confirmed by discriminant analysis." So it is fine to reference the paper.
I'm not sure, that mentioning in the abstract "Ameivula apipensis sp nov. is characterised ....." is enough to made the name available because important criteria of availability are missing. Eg. 16.4.1 (explicit fixation of Holotype, 16.4.2 deposition). I have no access to the online appendix but I presume that only the Appendix publication meets all the criteria of availability.
Hi Henrique, I find the questioning very pertinent, since the recent changes in ICZN allow the availability of the name under some criteria pointed out in the amendment.
As it stands, in the format of "supplementary material 9" in "appendix 2" in "word" format is not possible. Thus, I agree that the only safe way to cite the species at its first mention, preserving the nomenclatural act is precisely in the summary as noted by @Andreas Altenburger, since the very amendment of the code "8.1.3.2" suggests that among the forms that may be used shall include "widely accessible electronic copies with fixed content and layout". Example: The Portable Document Format (PDF / A), described by ISO Standard 19005-1: 2005, is a file format that allows content and layout to be preserved unchanged.
I did not agree with the editorial policy of this journal when I submitted a species description there and they suggested that it should appear as supplementary material, making it clear that they only encourage the phylogenies in the body of the article, but this was not clear in the authors' instructions and I only realized when I received a correspondence from the publisher.
Portuguese below:
Oi Henrique, acho muito pertinente o questionamento, visto que as recentes mudanças no ICZN permitem a disponibilidade do nome sob alguns critérios apontados na emenda.
Tal como está, no formato de "material suplementar 9" no "apêndice 2" no formato "word" não é possível. Sendo assim, concordo que a única maneira segura de citar a espécie na sua primeira menção, preservando o ato nomenclatural está justamente no resumo como constatado pelo Andreas Altenburger, visto que a própria emenda do código "8.1.3.2" sugere que entre as formas que podem ser utilizadas devem constar "cópias eletrônicas amplamente acessíveis com conteúdo fixo e layout". Exemplo: O formato de documento portátil (PDF / A), descrito pelo ISO Standard 19005-1: 2005, é um formato de arquivo que permite que o conteúdo e o layout sejam preservados inalterados.
Eu não concordei com a política editorial dessa revista quando submeti uma descrição de espécie para lá e eles sugeriram que deveria aparecer como material suplementar, deixando bem claro que eles só encorajam as filogenias no corpo do artigo, mas isso não estava claro nas instruções aos autores e só fiquei sabendo ao receber uma correspondência do editor.
Abraços,
Paulo.
@Csaba Csuzdi, I think in this specific case the name is made sufficiently available as it says in 16.4. : "... for which the name-bearing type of the nominal taxon it denotes is fixed automatically [Art. 72.7], must be accompanied in the original publication ..." The type material is detailed in the supplementary information S2 which I think is enough to fullfill the "accompany" criterion.
Yes, @ Andreas Altenburger, you might be right. My problem is if somebody goes to the library and take off the shelf this volume (s)he cannot do anything with the name mentioned in the abstract. It is a very bad practice and somehow journal editors should learn that there are no inferior and superior science (taxonomy vs. molecular phylogeny or whatever) just good science or bad science.....
It's in the supporting information file "zsc12277-sup-0009-AppendixS2.docx":
Appendix S2. Taxonomic account
Genus: Ameivula Harvey, Ugueto & Gutberlet, 2013
Ameivula apipensis sp. n. (Fig. S2)
Holotype: UNNEC 11200, adult male, from Apipé island, (19°17´24´´S, 43°32´55.1´´W), Corrientes province, ARGENTINA, elevation 70 m, collected by Federico Arias, Eduardo Etchepare, Maria del Rosario Ingaramo and Belén Arrieta, on May 9 of 2011.
I myself used to cite the description data with range of pages on which the valid description has been printed (like: "Callopistus nigripes Théry 1923: 200-201"), but indeed there is a common custom of quoting only the initial page ("Théry 1923: 200"); such citation means in fact "page 200 and (if any) following ones"). In the case described by Andreas, citing the page of abstract as that of the description is - in my opinion - not correct, because neither on that page nor on the following (nor anywhere in the printed version of the paper!) the data required for the nomenclatural availability are complete! By the way, it is not quite clear to me whether such description is indeed available according to the Code: electronic publications are allowed, but here we have printed publication with electronic "appendix" ["supplementary" means "additional", "inessential", "not being a part of"!]? Or, for nomenclatural purposes, such "supplement" should be considered a separate publication?
Anyway, I fully agree with Csaba: "authors describing new species should avoid publication in such journals even-thought it has "high impact factor""!
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