Why bother with Scientific Names?

In any field guide you use to identify and learn about creatures in the estuary, you will learn the common names of various organisms. The osprey. The green crab. The sea lavender. So, why are there Latin names too? What do they mean?

Species sometimes have quite a variety of common names, and these can vary from region to region. A quick Internet search brought up plenty of common names for a particular fish that returns each year to spawn in the rivers of Great Bay Estuary. Here’s the list, but I have left out the name most often used in New Hampshire. Can you figure out which one it is? Summer herring, glut herring, river herring, kyack, blackbelly, big-eye, and river herring. Read on for the answer.

To help everybody, everywhere know for sure which living thing is being discussed, biologists assign each known organism a unique, two-part name. These names are derived from Latin or Greek.

Scientific names help everyone around the world speak the same language. If you ask Japanese marine biologists to describe the Alosa aestivalis, they would give you the characteristics of a herring that swims up the Oyster, Exeter, and Winnicut rivers each spring to spawn—better known locally as the blueback herring.

Alosa aestivalis

The first part of the name is the genus it belongs to (e.g. Alosa), and it is always capitalized. The second name is the species name (aestivalis), and it is always lowercase. Alosa is the genus of the river herring, which also includes the alewife (Alosa pseudoharengus), American shad (Alosa sapidissima), Hickory shad (Alosa mediocris), Alabama shad (Alosa alabamae), and skipjack herring (Alosa chrysochloris). A species is a group of individuals sharing the same anatomy and physiology that interbreed to produce fertile offspring.

Scientific names often describe characteristics of the organism, or perhaps the name of the biologist who discovered it. This is the Latin translation for blueback’s scientific name: Alosa means “herring,” and aestivalis means “relating to summer.”

The System for the Names
All known living things (many are yet to be discovered) have been organized into a classification system, based on various shared characteristics like body form, genetic similarity, and body chemistry. It is a hierarchal system called taxonomy (taxa being the Greek word for order). The broadest category is the kingdom. Each of the five kingdoms is subdivided into various phyla. Then each phylum is further divided into subphyla, and so on.

To get a better idea how this classification system works, let’s look at the criteria that position the blueback herring in the taxonomic scheme of things.

Kingdom Animalia
Multi-celled; no rigid cell walls; cells organized into specific tissues, etc.
Phylum Chordata
With hollow notochord at some point in lifecycle
Subphylum Vertebrata
Has vertebral column surrounding notochord
Class Osteichthyes
The fishes with skeleton of bone rather than cartilage
Subclass Actinopterygians (“ray-finned”)
Fins are webs of skin supported by spines
Order Clupeiformes
Anchovies and herrings (With soft-rays, at least five rays on abdominal pelvic fin, etc.)
Family Clupeidae
Herring (Silvery, dark bluish/green backs; forked caudal fins; long/closely set gill rakers; shallow water species; schooling, etc.)
Genus Alosa
River Herring
Species Alosa aestivalis (Blueback Herring)
Usually one shoulder spot; lower jaw does not project with mouth closed; large eyes; 44-50 gill rakers on lower limb of first gill arch; etc.

To learn about the many resident and visitor species of Great Bay Estuary, explore the kingdom links. Here are some highlights of how the kingdoms are classified.

THE FIVE KINGDOMS

Procharyotes - Organisms with no nucleus
(hereditary material not enclosed in membrane)

Kingdom - Monera
Single-celled organisms

Eucharyotes: Organisms with defined nucleus
(hereditary material is enclosed in membrane)

Kingdom - Protoctista
Single-celled organisms; specialized internal structures

Kingdom - Fungi
Develop from spores; plant-like, no photosynthesis; get food from environment

Kingdom - Plantae
Multicellular; rigid cell walls; develop from embryos; most have chlorophyll to produce through photosynthesis

Kingdom - Animalia
Multicellular; membranes around cells; develop from blastula; cells organized into tissues with specific function; must capture food

Copyright © 2006 Barbara Driscoll.