Flag for Taxon: Western Blacktail Shiner (Cyprinella venusta)
| Flagger | Content Author | Content | Reason | Flag Created | Resolved by | Resolution |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| wildlander | Western Blacktail Shiner (Cyprinella venusta) |
somewhat misidentified |
Dec. 4, 2023 16:38:26 +0000 | riverrat09 |
Taxon split |
Comments
@wildlander I noticed that Eschmeyer's Catalog of Fishes used Gilbert (1998) as their source for eurystoma and stigmatura being valid species. Gilbert treated venusta a little different then the recent Johnson (2022) paper that is not included as a reference for any of Eschmeyer's dececions. That can largely be noticed in Johnson 2022 by the addition of cooglei and also presence of cercostigma and absence of stigmatura.
I'm assuming range based on Gilbert would be considered Mississippi River and west - venusta
Mobile Basin - stigmatura
east of the Mobile River - eurystoma
East of the Mississippi R. to the Mobile River - ??? Not sure exactly how to treat this area following ECoF. ECoF lists Cyprinella cercostigma as a synonym of Cyprinella venusta. Type locality of cercostigma is in the Pearl River, Mississippi.
Johnson 2022 makes it very clear where he would split them, but Eschmeyer's is not yet following what Johnson proposed. I'm not sure which species should be between the Mississippi River and Mobile River. It'd either be venusta or eurystoma.
Looking at Eschmeyer's Catalog of Fishes it doesn't really give much for a range of these species, mostly the generic "southeast USA". It does mention for venusta the subspecies cercostima being all of the gulf drainages east of the Mississippi River. Though we know that the gulf drainages east of the Mobile River are now eurystoma. Which still leaves the question as to how to treat the gulf drainages that are between the Mississippi River and the Mobile River.
Below is what ECoF shows for all of the venusta group.
Cyprinella stigmatura - type locality tributary of Etowah River
** C. calliura as a synonym - type locality Black Warrior River, Alabama
Cyprinella eurystoma - type locality Nancys Creek, tributary of Chattahoochee River
** leucopus as a synonym - type locality Chattahoochee River at Shallow Ford
Cyprinella venusta - type locality Rio Sabinal at Sabinal, Uvalde County, Texas
** cercostigma as a synonym - type locality Pearl River at Monticello, Mississippi,
** chickasavensis as a synonym - Chickasawha River at Enterprise, Mississippi
** cooglei as a synonym - Pelucia Creek, south of Greenwood, Leflore County, Mississippi
** notata as a synonym - Rio Seco , Medina County, Texas
** urostigma as a synonym - San Saba River (tributary to Colorado River), Texas
Based on this ECoF considers specimens from the Pearl River in Mississippi and also the Chickasawha River in Mississippi to be venusta. This would imply that everything west of the Mobile basin is considered Cyprinella venusta by ECoF
After reviewing everything above it appears that ECoF would consider the ranges of venusta, eurystoma, and stigmatura to be the following.
Mobile River Basin - Cyprinella stigmatura
East of the Mobile River - Cyprinella eurystoma
West of the Mobile River - Cyprinella venusta
This my interpretation of how ECoF deals with the "venusta" group. I am curious what others think and if they interpret it any differently than I.
*** As a side note I agree more with the way "venusta" group is treated by Johnson 2022 which is clearly different than what ECoF is following. Johnson places the Mobile river and gulf drainages west until you get to the Mississippi River as Cyprinella cercostigma (in this case Cyprinella stigmatura would be synonym of Cyprinella cercostigma) But Johnson 2022 is not a peer reviewed source and is not a listed reference in ECoF. Since ECoF is in general the standard naming source for iNat that's what we should follow.
@riverrat09 Do you have a link to Johnson 2022? I got asked by @catostomus in a DM for publications on this group and all I had was the fishbase stuff and a little more that I'd read up on last night.
@wildlander the only location that I could find the Johnson 2022 thesis was on ProQuest. I was able to download the full text there, but unless you have some form of access to the article it will only give you a preview and not the full text. The preview is 17 of the 81 pages
If you want some more reading on the topic here is the text for Kristmundsdόttir & Gold, 1996.
I'm fine saying everything west of the Mobile Basin is venusta for now. I can go back and correct the IDs I made between the Mobile and Mississippi drainages.
If we are able to determine a good way to handle the split I will get the three species atlases'd and perform a split that will allow iNat to make all of the ID changes (this is same as @wildlander created the flag for) . Way easier and better way of doing then everyone having to go back and change ID's to the new taxon.
I'm just trying to figure out how the best way to handle the range of the three species. My only question mark is how to treat the area between the Mississippi River and Mobile River. Rather to keep it as venusta or to call it stigmatura or eurystoma. It seems from what I have found it would not be eurystoma and it would be either venusta or stigmatura.
Under classification of cercostigma that is what the question area would be but since we're not recognizing that as a species it sounds like it should be venusta. The argument for stigmatura seems to based off an argument that stigmatura doesn't exist. Of course these designations are also likely to change sometime in the future
I atlased the three species and drafted a taxon split that can be found here https://www.inaturalist.org/taxon_changes/135660
I will leave it like that for a few days in case there needs to be any changes or anybody has input or more to discussion to add.
This is how I atlased the species
venusta - west of the Mobile River
stigmatura - mobile river basin
eurystoma - east of the mobile river
I was able to adjust the overlap areas of the atlases so that it should assign correctly and not bump any IDs to genus level
I did realize that those atlases miss a couple observations along the Georgia and South Carolina border and also a little bit into South Carolina. Those areas are non-native introduced populations and I am can't find anything to indicate which species they might be. What will end up happening to those couple observations is identifcations of venusta will get bumped to cyprinella and be genus level IDs
Yay, I do have institutional access to Proquest
Does anyone have any further comments on this taxon split https://www.inaturalist.org/taxon_changes/135660
If not, I will go ahead and commit the split soon.
I am resolving this flag for now because the taxon split has been committed.
It was not real clear how some areas needed to be atlased but the taxon split was atlased with an attempt to follow ECoF and how that source treats the venusta group.
Cyprinella stigmatura - type locality tributary of Etowah River
** C. calliura as a synonym - type locality Black Warrior River, Alabama
Cyprinella eurystoma - type locality Nancys Creek, tributary of Chattahoochee River
** leucopus as a synonym - type locality Chattahoochee River at Shallow Ford
Cyprinella venusta - type locality Rio Sabinal at Sabinal, Uvalde County, Texas
** cercostigma as a synonym - type locality Pearl River at Monticello, Mississippi,
** chickasavensis as a synonym - Chickasawha River at Enterprise, Mississippi
** cooglei as a synonym - Pelucia Creek, south of Greenwood, Leflore County, Mississippi
** notata as a synonym - Rio Seco , Medina County, Texas
** urostigma as a synonym - San Saba River (tributary to Colorado River), Texas
Cyprinella stigmatura and Cyprinella eurystoma are often misidentified as Cyprinella venusta since no taxon split has formally occured on here. It would be good if we could atlas one and do so.