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piscivorus or piscivorous?
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by ALA_snake33 on February 13, 2007
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I have seen both of these Spellings used for the Cottonmouth and still wonder which one is the Proper Spelling, do any of you know? I know that Gloyd & Conant used the Spelling “piscivorus” instead of “piscivorous” in their Book “Snakes of The Agkistrodon Complex: A Monographic Review” and I have seen the same Spelling used in lots of other Books.
If anyone has any idea of which one of these is Proper, please way in.
Be Safe Ya’ll, Happy Herping : Wally
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RE: piscivorus or piscivorous?
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by thedude on February 13, 2007
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piscivorus is specific epithet used in all of the literature I have accumulated. Not sure if I have ever seen the alternative spelling. I would be interested in where you saw piscivorous though!
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RE: piscivorus or piscivorous?
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by LarryDFishel on February 13, 2007
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I've seen piscivorous once...when I spelled it wrong on the labels on my cages. :) Piscivorus is the correct species name. Piscivorous is the correct English spelling, but that's not what's used in taxonomy.
Agkistrodon piscivorus is partially piscivorous.
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RE: piscivorus or piscivorous?
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by LarryDFishel on February 13, 2007
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P.S. A quick yahoo search tells me it's a fairly common misspelling.
"Agkistrodon piscivorus": 25,000 hits
"Agkistrodon piscivorous": 800 hits
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RE: piscivorus or piscivorous?
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by ALA_snake33 on February 13, 2007
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( http://www.venomousreptiles.org/pages/taxon ) Use this Link and look at the Glossary on this Site, and you will see “piscivorus” Spelled “piscivorous”.
I guess the True Spellings of Scientific Names, can get lost in the Swing sometimes huu? Thanks for the Replies ya’ll, been pondering this for some time now.
Be Safe Ya’ll, Happy Herping : Wally
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RE: piscivorus or piscivorous?
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by agkistrodude on February 13, 2007
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In the book "Living Snakes of the World" by John M. Mehrtens, he used the spelling "piscivorous" throughout the book. Marty
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RE: piscivorus or piscivorous?
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by Cro on February 13, 2007
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Wally, you have discovered an interesting question.
The name piscivorus was first used by Lacepede in his Histoire Naturelle des Serpens in 1788. He came up with Crotalus piscivorus. Because of Taxonomic Rules, the spelling / translation that he used, it is the correct one to continue using, even if the Genus Name was changed over time, and even if other variations have become more popular in common usage.
However, it is somewhat more complicated than that. It goes back to the problem of translating Greek and Latin words into English words. Some words remain the same in English, such as the prefix "pisci," which means "fish." But we have some English words that come from the Greek Root, but do not have a Latin Root. So, when this happens, and you have a word that came from a Greek Root, but does not have a Latin Root, then the word is built off of the original Greek Word.
The word "piscivorous comes from the Latin and the word "piscivorus" has its origins in Greek. Both of course translate to mean "fish-eating."
It gets even more interesting when you translate the Latin to English, as you find the following Latin words that all mean to eat, consume, ingest, devour, etc....
vor-, vora-, -vore, -vorous, -vores, -vora, -vory.
Apparently, the Latin folks were fond of eating, and had a lot of words for it.
So what happened is that when the Cottonmouth Snake was given its name "piscivorus" we were stuck with that translation that was first used due to Taxonomic Rules.
However, other folks used different variations of the word when they created words like "carnivorous" to describe birds, mammals, fish, and bats. Because of this difference, the use of "vorous" spelling has fallen into common usage, and thus results in a "logical" misspelling that often happens when folks describe the Scientific Name of the Cottonmouth.
Therefore, the spelling used by Dr. Conant is the correct one to use, even if it is not the most logical.
Hope this helps.
Best Regards JohnZ
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RE: piscivorus or piscivorous?
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by ALA_snake33 on February 13, 2007
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Thanks John, I have been researching this for some time now and you have cleared it up.
By the way, the word “pisci” is very reminiscent of the word “pescado”, which means Fish in Spanish “Odd Huu”? I lived 9 Years of my Childhood in Mexico and noticed that a lot of Spanish Words, seem to have roots in the Latin and Greek Languages. As we all know, the Spanish Language is thought to have come from Old Latin.
Thanks again ya’ll, been trying to solve this one for some time now.
Be Safe Ya’ll, Happy Herping : Wally
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RE: piscivorus or piscivorous?
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by LarryDFishel on February 13, 2007
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Wally, why do you thinks they call is "Latin America"? :)
John, maybe I'm reading your post wrong, but scientific names are not supposed to be translated into English (or any other language). They are supposed to be spelled according to the more or less agreed upon, pseudo-latin spelling (even though many of them are Greek with no corresponding Latin). I certainly don't know all the rules off the top of my head, but I'm pretty sure "-ous" would never occur. I'm also pretty sure the way it's currently spelled is acceptable, and probably the way it would be if it were named today.
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RE: piscivorus or piscivorous?
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by GREGLONGHURST on February 14, 2007
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Mehrtens was incorrect in his spelling. Not the sort of thing editors are likely to catch. Most snake names have meaning. Ophiophagus translates to snake eater. Both Crotalus & Sistrurus refer to noisemakers. Agkistrodon translates (I may not be exact on this one) to long tooth.
~~Greg~~
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