Skip to main content Skip to main navigation menu Skip to site footer

Abstract

Recently a new species of bombyliid fly, Marleyimyia xylocopae, was described by Marshall & Evenhuis (2015) based on two photographs taken during fieldwork in the Republic of South Africa. This species has no preserved holotype. The paper generated some buzz, especially among dipterists, because in most cases photographs taken in the field provide insufficient information for properly diagnosing and documenting species of Diptera.

References

  1. Arillo, A.,Peñalver, E., Pérez-De La Fuente, R., Delclòs, X., Criscione, J., Barden, P.M., Riccio, M.L.& Grimaldi, D.A. (2015) Long-proboscid brachyceran flies in Cretaceous amber (Diptera: Stratiomyomorpha: Zhangsolvidae). Systematic Entomology, 40, 242–267.
    http://dx.doi.org/10.1111/syen.12106

    Connif, R. (2016) Our natural history, Endangered. The New York Times, pp. SR4. Avaliable from: http://www.nytimes.com/2016/04/03/opinion/ournatural-history-endangered.html?smid=fb-share&_r=0 (accessed 11 May 2016)

    De Barro, P.J., Liu, S.S., Boykin, L.M. & Dinsdale, A.B. (2011) Bemisia tabaci: a statement of species status. Annual Review of Entomology, 56, 1–19.
    http://dx.doi.org/10.1146/annurev-ento-112408-085504

    Diniz–Filho, J.A.F., Loyola, R.D., Raia, P., Mooers, A.O. & Bini, L.M. (2013) Darwinian shortfalls in biodiversity conservation. Trends in Ecology & Evolution, 28, 689–695.
    http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.tree.2013.09.003

    Dubois, A. (2003) The relationships between taxonomy and conservation biology in the century of extinction. Comptes Rendus Biologies, 326 (Supplement 1), S9–21.
    http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/S1631-0691(03)00022-2

    Dubois, A. (2009) Endangered species and endangered knowledge. Zootaxa, 2201, 26–29.

    Dubois, A. (2010) Nomenclatural rules in zoology as a potential threat against natural history museums. Organisms Diversity and Evolution, 10, 81–90.
    http://dx.doi.org/10.1007/s13127-010-0015-1

    Dubois, A. & Nemésio, A. (2007) Does nomenclatural availability of nomina of new species or subspecies require the deposition of vouchers in collections? Zootaxa, 1409, 1–22.

    Edmunds, S.C., Hunter, C.I., Smith, V., Stoev, P. & Penev, L. (2013) Biodiversity research in the “big data” era: GigaScience and Pensoft work together to publish the most data-rich species description. GigaScience, 2, 14.
    http://dx.doi.org/10.1186/2047-217X-2-14

    Fitzpatrick, J.W., Lammertink, M., Luneau Jr., M.D., Gallagher, T.W., Harrison, B.R., Sparling, G.M., Rosenberg, K.V., Rohrbaugh, R.W., Swarthout, E.C., Wrege, P.H., Swarthout, S.B., Dantzker, M.S., Charif, R.A., Barksdale, T.R., Remsen Jr., J.V., Simon, S.D. & Zollner, D. (2005) Ivory-billed woodpecker (Campephilus principalis) persists in continental North America. Science, 308 (5727), 1460–1462.
    http://dx.doi.org/10.1126/science.1114103

    Gentile, G. & Snell, H. (2009) Conolophus marthae sp. nov. (Squamata, Iguanidae), a new species of land iguana from the Galápagos archipelago. Zootaxa, 2201, 1–10.

    Grimaldi, D., Shedrinsky, A., Ross, A. & Baer, N.S. (1994) Forgeries of fossils in “amber”: history, identification, and case studies. Curator, 37 (4), 251–274.
    http://dx.doi.org/10.1111/j.2151-6952.1994.tb01023.x

    Hrycaj, S., Chesebro, J. & Popadić, A. (2010) Functional analysis of Scr during embryonic development in the cockroach, Periplaneta americana. Developmental Biology, 341, 324–334.
    http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.ydbio.2010.02.018

    International Commission on Zoological Nomenclature [ICZN] (1999) International Code of Zoological Nomenclature. 4th Edition. International Trust for Zoological Nomenclature, London, 335 pp.

    Kelling, S., Hochachka, W.M., Fink, D., Riedewald, M., Caruana, R., Ballard, G. & Hooker, G. (2009) Data-intensive science: a new paradigm for biodiversity studies. BioScience, 59, 613–620.

    Khoury, B.M., Bigelow, E.M.R., Smith, L.M., Schlecht, S.H., Scheller, E.L., Andarawis-Puri, N. & Jepsen, K.J. (2015) The use of nano-computed tomography to enhance musculoskeletal research. Connective Tissue Research, 56, 106–119.
    http://dx.doi.org/10.3109/03008207.2015.1005211

    Krell, F.T. & Wheeler, Q.D. (2014) Specimen collection: plan for the future. Science, 344, 815–816.
    http://dx.doi.org/10.1126/science.344.6186.815

    Löbl, I., Cibois, A. & Landry, B. (2016) Describing new species in the absence of sampled specimens: a taxonomist’s own-goal. Bulletin of Zoological Nomenclature, 73, 83–86.

    Lonsdale, O. & Marshall, S.A. (2016) Revision of the family Nothybidae (Diptera: Schizophora). Zootaxa, 4098 (1), 1–42.
    http://dx.doi.org/10.11646/zootaxa.4098.1.1

    Lynch, C. (2008) Big data: How do your data grow? Nature, 455, 28–29.
    http://dx.doi.org/10.1038/455028a

    Marshall, S.A & Evenhuis, N.L. (2015) New species without dead bodies: a case for photo-based descriptions, illustrated by a striking new species of Marleyimyia Hesse (Diptera, Bombyliidae) from South Africa. Zookeys, 525, 117–127.
    http://dx.doi.org/10.3897/zookeys.525.6143

    Marshall, S.A. & Evenhuis, N.L. (2016) Proxy types, taxonomic discretion, and taxonomic progress: a response to Löbl et al. Bulletin of Zoological Nomenclature, 73, 87–92.

    Matsumoto, G.I. (1988) A new species of lobate ctenophore, Leucothea pulchra sp. nov., from the California Bight. Journal of Plankton Research, 10 (2), 301–311.
    http://dx.doi.org/10.1093/plankt/10.2.301

    Minelli, A. (2015) Biological systematics in the Evo-Devo era. European Journal of Taxonomy 125, 1–23.
    http://dx.doi.org/10.5852/ejt.2015.125

    Minteer, B.A., Collins, J.P. & Puschendorf, R. (2014) Avoiding (re)extinction. Science, 344, 260–261.
    http://dx.doi.org/10.1126/science.1250953

    Nemésio, A. (2009) On the live holotype of the Galápagos pink land Iguana, Conolophus marthae Gentile & Snell, 2009 (Squamata: Iguanidae): is it an acceptable exception? Zootaxa, 2201, 21–25.

    Peters, R.S., Meusemann, K., Petersen, M., Mayer, C., Wilbrandt, J., Ziesmann, T., Donath, A. Kjer, K.M., Aspöck, U., Aspöck, H., Aberer, A., Stamatakis, A., Friedrich, F., Hünefeld, F., Niehuis, O., Beutel, R.G. & Misof, B. (2014) The evolutionary history of holometabolous insects inferred from transcriptome-based phylogeny and comprehensive morphological data. BMC Evolutionary Biology, 14, 52–69.
    http://dx.doi.org/10.1186/1471-2148-14-52

    Robb, M.S., van den Berg, A.B. & Constantine, M. (2013) A new species of Strix owl from Oman. Dutch Birding, 35, 275–310.

    Santos, C.M.D., Amorim, D.S., Klassa, B., Fachin, D.A., Nihei, S.S., Carvalho, C.J.B., Falaschi, R.L., Mello-Patiu, C.A., Couri, M.S., Oliveira, S.S., Silva, V.C., Ribeiro, G.C., Capellari, R.S. & Lamas, C.J.E. (2016) On typeless species and the perils of fast taxonomy. Systematic Entomology, 41 (3), 511–515.
    http://dx.doi.org/10.1111/syen.12180

    Santry, K., Joomun, S. & Phibbs, S. [without year] Jones’ Icones Online. Museum of Natural History, University of Oxford, Oxford, UK. Available from: http://www.jonesicones.com/index.html (accessed 17 Jun. 2016)

    Schlick-Steiner, B.C., Steiner, F.M., Seifert, B., Stauffer, C., Christian, E. & Crozier, R.H. (2010) Integrative taxonomy: a multisource approach to exploring biodiversity. Annual Review of Entomology, 55, 421–438.
    http://dx.doi.org/10.1146/annurev-ento-112408-085432

    Sibley, D.A., Bevier, L.R., Patten, M.A. & Elphick, C.S. (2006) Comment on “Ivory-billed woodpecker (Campephilus principalis) persists in continental North America”. Science, 311, 1555a–1555a. [sic]
    http://dx.doi.org/10.1126/science.1122778

    Skejo, J. & Caballero, J.H.S. (2016) A hidden pygmy devil from the Philippines: Arulenus miae sp. nov.—a new species serendipitously discovered in an amateur Facebook post (Tetrigidae: Discotettiginae). Zootaxa, 4067 (3), 383–393.
    http://dx.doi.org/10.11646/zootaxa.4067.3.7

    Toscano, N.C, Castle, S.J., Henneberry, T.J. & Prabhaker, N. (1998) Persistent silverleaf whitefly exploits desert crop systems. California Agriculture, 52, 29–33.
    http://dx.doi.org/10.3733/ca.v052n02p29

    Van der Heyden, T. (2015) “Wild shot” photographs of an apparently undescribed bug species of the tribe Anisocelini from Costa Rica (Hemiptera, Heteroptera, Coreidae). Boletín de la Asociación Española de Entomología, 39, 407–410.

    Zhang, Z.-Q. (2014) Sustaining the development of world’s foremost journal in biodiversity discovery and inventory: Zootaxa editors and their contributions. Zootaxa, 3753 (6), 597–600.
    http://dx.doi.org/10.11646/zootaxa.3753.6.6