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Topic: Taxon Designations on R6 - JNCC combined list

I've just run off a list of species for a local planning authority, using all the spp on the dictionary named "JNCC collation of taxon designations" and various attributes including the long, short and abbreviated designation names. Looking at it, the designations don't all match the current list downloadable from here: Conservation designations for UK taxa. What is more, they don't match the outputs from last year's list either! For example, the list includes:

Starling Sturnus vulgaris - output doesn't mention the Birds of Conservation Concern Red listing, only the Birds Directive Annex 2.2 (not helpful in this context) and FEP007. The same applies to Song Thrush and House Sparrow (should be Red) and Bullfinch (should be Amber). I haven't checked all the others. If you look up Starling in the Taxon Dictionary Browser, however, Bird-Red is listed in the Statuses column.

For Starling there is also no mention of England Priority Species or NERC Act status in the outputs OR the Taxon Dictionary browser.

Other birds, e.g. Cuckoo (Red) show up correctly in the designation outputs column as "Bird-Red"; House Martin and Dunnock (Bird-Amber).

Dandelion Taraxacum officinale agg. appears on the list, but with no designation listed in the outputs at all, or the taxon dictionary browser. Surely a list of species restricted to everything on the JNCC list shouldn't have this?

Poa pratensis comes up in the Taxon Dictionary browser for the JNCC list, but has no status listed. It also appears in the output with no status listed.

I haven't time to go through them all, but this affects quite a few species.
Incidentally, using the List tab in the taxon dictionary to check the species status seems to be taking a long time.

I have reindexed the taxon dictionary but it hasn't changed anything. Long story short, we cannot rely on R6 for outputting accurate designation statuses,  and must go through every output to change the relevant designations and tweak the list, so as not to mislead the recipient of the data.

Does anyone know if this is a problem of Recorder 6 and the taxon dictionaries, or something wrong with either the querying system in R6, or our own database?

Linda

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Re: Taxon Designations on R6 - JNCC combined list

Hello Linda

The issue with missing birds from the Birds of Conservation Concern list in the UK Species Inventory has been raised in this Forum Post. The UKSI has recently been updated to include these missing bird designations. These changes should be incorporated in Recorder 6 when the Recorder 6 species dictionary is next updated.

Best wishes

Graham

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Re: Taxon Designations on R6 - JNCC combined list

Thanks Graham. That would bring back the right BOCC list. It wouldn't necessarily sort out the other glitches with the JNCC collation. It that dictionary likely to have any other amendments soon?

Linda

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Re: Taxon Designations on R6 - JNCC combined list

Hello Linda

Following these amendments, in addition to the including the missing bird designations, the UKSI's Taxon Designation table is  now closely aligned with the designations found within the JNCC's Conservation Designations Spreadsheet and so hopefully should help with other reported issues with the JNCC collation.

Best wishes

Graham

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Re: Taxon Designations on R6 - JNCC combined list

Thanks for commenting Graham - I think we will be doing an update on the NBN Atlas fairly soon which would precipitate an update to R6. I just need to do a few adjustments to a couple of checklists and then get sign-off on them and I can issue the updates. :)

Chris Raper, Manager of the UK Species Inventory, Angela Marmont Centre for UK Biodiversity,
Natural History Museum, Cromwell Road, London, SW7 5BD.  (tel: 020 7942 5894)
also Tachinid Recording Scheme (http://tachinidae.org.uk/)

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Re: Taxon Designations on R6 - JNCC combined list

This never happened then. Although the dictionary update claims to have the BOCC update it's still wrong - Curlew for instance is still amber.

Graham Hawker
Thames Valley Environmental Records Centre

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Re: Taxon Designations on R6 - JNCC combined list

Hello Graham

The dictionary update 0000003Y includes the BoCC update for Curlew, listing it as having a red status and not amber and so the dictionary update should have updated the status for this species. The current red/amber statuses for all the bird species listed in the Birds of Conservation Concern 4 list (https://www.bto.org/science/monitoring/psob) are the same in the JNCC collation of taxon designations list on the UK Species Inventory, as given in the JNCC designation spreadsheet, and so applying this dictionary update should aligned the BoCC statuses in UKSI with the JNCC designation spreadsheet.

On checking these statuses against the ones in the BTO list there is a mismatch with one species, Hen Harrier, resulting from an incorrect TaxonVersionKey. This currently means Hen Harrier's red status is listed under Marsh Harrier. I have corrected this in the JNCC designation database and will send the correction on to Chris Raper so that it can be corrected in the UKSI.

In addition to these BoCC statuses listed in JNCC collation of taxon designations list on the UKSI, there are also additional BoCC statuses listed under the RSPB checklist of UK Birds list (Taxon_List_Key = NBNSYS0100000003) in the UKSI. These statuses, referring to an older 1996 BoCC list, differ from the current BoCC statuses for 38 species, including Curlew listed as Amber and not with the current Red status. Is it these statuses you are seeing rather than the JNCC designation statuses? If so, presumably this older RSPB BoCC list should be archived in the UKSI?

Best wishes

Graham

8 (edited by Lindsay_FifeNature 23-11-2018 16:12:54)

Re: Taxon Designations on R6 - JNCC combined list

Hi,

Looking at the 'JNCC collation of taxon designations' dictionary in Recorder 6, there are a whole load of butterflies included that aren't on the JNCC spreadsheet (unless I've lost the plot!).  E.g. Comma (Polygonia c-album), Common Blue (Polyommatus icarus), Green-veined White (Pieris napi), Orange-tip (Anthocharis cardamines), Small White (Pieris rapae), but also several more.

Anyone know what's going on there?

Thanks,
Lindsay

Lindsay Bamforth
Fife Nature Records Centre,
Information Officer

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Re: Taxon Designations on R6 - JNCC combined list

Hi Lindsay

I have a feeling that those have been removed and were added in error. I'd check the next taxonomy update (coming very soon) and you should see they have gone. They're not on my local master copy here :)

Best wishes,
Chris R.

Chris Raper, Manager of the UK Species Inventory, Angela Marmont Centre for UK Biodiversity,
Natural History Museum, Cromwell Road, London, SW7 5BD.  (tel: 020 7942 5894)
also Tachinid Recording Scheme (http://tachinidae.org.uk/)

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Re: Taxon Designations on R6 - JNCC combined list

Will do - thanks Chris :)

Lindsay

Lindsay Bamforth
Fife Nature Records Centre,
Information Officer

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Re: Taxon Designations on R6 - JNCC combined list

Hi Chris,

We managed to get IT to update the Recorder 6 dictionary today with the upgrade released a couple of days ago (00000049-0000004B) but all the butterflies are still in the 'JNCC collation of taxon designations' dictionary as noted previously.  As you've noted they aren't on your master list, is their continued presence something I should chase up with Mike Weideli?

(If anyone has run the upgrade and does not see these species in the JNCC list, please let me know in case something's gone wrong at this end!)

Thanks for your help,
Lindsay

Lindsay Bamforth
Fife Nature Records Centre,
Information Officer

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Re: Taxon Designations on R6 - JNCC combined list

Hi Lindsay

I've double-checked again and Orange-Tip and Comma have all been marked as deleted at my end so they shouldn't be coming up there at all. It might be an import problem there so have a chat with Mike Weideli about it and see if he can spot a roblem.

Best wishes,
Chris R.

Chris Raper, Manager of the UK Species Inventory, Angela Marmont Centre for UK Biodiversity,
Natural History Museum, Cromwell Road, London, SW7 5BD.  (tel: 020 7942 5894)
also Tachinid Recording Scheme (http://tachinidae.org.uk/)

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Re: Taxon Designations on R6 - JNCC combined list

There is a slight issue with a few taxa being on the JNCC designation list which shouldn't be there but this  list should contain all taxa which are currently designated or ever have been. What drives current designations is the  table Taxon_Designations which relates the taxa in the JNCC list to the Taxon_Designation_Type  and R6 is in line with the NHM  as far as this goes. Removing the Taxa from the JNCC list will have little  effect on designations unless the Taxon Designation  table  is updated.

Mike Weideli

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Re: Taxon Designations on R6 - JNCC combined list

Hi Mike,

I have what might well be a daft question then:  If I wanted to get a report of records of species currently on the spreadsheet from within Recorder, how would I do that?  I'd thought that if I went through the Report Wizard, selected the 'JNCC collation of taxon designations' list, then checked 'All taxa from list' that would do it, but if the list contains anything that's ever been on it, that's not right...

Thanks,
Linds

Lindsay Bamforth
Fife Nature Records Centre,
Information Officer

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Re: Taxon Designations on R6 - JNCC combined list

Hi

To be honest I just leave the designations to JNCC  and just provide R6 users with what is there. However, as a result of your query I am working with Chris to look at some of the anomalies. We have found something which isn't right which we can fix, but it is fairly minor and there are potentially other issues which will take a bit of time to get to the bottom of. I will keep you informed. Hopefully we will get somewhere in the next day or two.

Mike Weideli

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Re: Taxon Designations on R6 - JNCC combined list

Hi

I have now done a lot of checking on the designations. A few things have come out of this, but nothing serious. As I said viewing the JNCC Collation List will show all the taxa for which there are designations and will include taxa where the designation is no longer applicable. The taxa you mention should not be shown in the list and they will be removed with a NHM update shortly. However, this doesn't have any impact on designation reporting as this is driven by the table Taxon_Deisgnation. I have done checks between the JNCC Master list and the entries currently in R6  based on number of records in each designatioin type and the two seem to be much in step. 

I attach an XML report which I hope you can implement see https://forums.nbn.org.uk/viewtopic.php?id=6672, which will report on the JNCC Collation list in a form similar to the JNCC Master Spreadsheet. It is a system supplied report and will be found under the menu heading 'Designations'. I can modify it if needed.

Post's attachments

R6Team_Des05_JNCC.xml 1.58 kb, 9 downloads since 2019-01-09 

You don't have the permssions to download the attachments of this post.
Mike Weideli

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Re: Taxon Designations on R6 - JNCC combined list

Hi,

I just spotted a few bird species that aren't being output by the new Recorder report but that are on the JNCC combined list:
- Sylvia atricapilla (Blackcap)
- Fringilla coelebs (Chaffinch)
- Aegithalos caudatus (Long-tailed Tit)
- Acrocephalus schoenobaenus (Sedge Warbler)
- Linaria flavirostris (Twite) - subspecies pipilans and bensonorum are included
- Sylvia communis (Whitethroat)

Am I missing something obvious in terms of why they wouldn't be included?  I haven't done any kind of comprehensive comparison of the 2 lists, these were just spotted by chance.

Thanks :)
Linds

Lindsay Bamforth
Fife Nature Records Centre,
Information Officer

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Re: Taxon Designations on R6 - JNCC combined list

Hi

This is what I have established so far. Three of the species have a date_to which suggest they are no longer designated. I don't know how correct this is.  There seems to be a bit of a muddle with the Linaria but designations should report OK in R6.  Fringilla coeleb I am not sure about. 

Sylvia atricapilla  date to of 01/07/1998
Fringilla coelebs in the list but not in the Taxon_Designation table. Does the designation only apply to NI ?
Acrocephalus schoenobaenus has a date to of 01/07/1998
Sylvia communis  has an end date of 01/12/2015
Linaria flavirostris seems to have designations under Carduelis flavirostris, but the Recommended names seem Ok so both names should work in R6. However, the sub species are all under Linaria flavirostris ssp

Mike Weideli

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Re: Taxon Designations on R6 - JNCC combined list

Hi folks,

I've spent a bit of time checking the outputs of Mikes xml (R6 dictionary version 4k) against the JNCC spreadsheet (Taxon_designations_20180725_repack_20190305).

The JNCC spreadsheet seems to be using different TVKs and preferred names (be warned anyone attempting to join status directly from the spreadsheet!) to the current version of R6, UKSI and NBN so I ran the R6 names through a copy of Chris Rapers working copy of the uksi (UKSI 20190812093504 Simplified Copy) which seemed for the most part to bring both names and TVKs in line.

The following are in R6 but not JNCC:
R6 Carinoma armandi Scottish Biodiversity List
R6 Emplectonema neesii Scottish Biodiversity List
R6 Tetrastemma vermiculus Scottish Biodiversity List
R6 Cerebratulus fuscus Scottish Biodiversity List
R6 Ramphogordius sanguineus Scottish Biodiversity List
R6 actual name=Psammamphiporus elongatus preferred name=Amphiporus elongatus Scottish Biodiversity List
R6 Amphiporus hastatus Scottish Biodiversity List
R6 Nemertopsis flavida Scottish Biodiversity List
R6 Tetrastemma robertianae Scottish Biodiversity List
R6 actual name=Procephalothrix filiformis preferred name=Cephalothrix filiformis Scottish Biodiversity List
R6 Tubulanus linearis Scottish Biodiversity List

The species above all appear on the SBL here:
https://www.webarchive.org.uk/wayback/a … tylist/SBL
can anyone shed any light on why they are not on the JNCC list?

R6 Solorina bispora s. lat. Scottish Biodiversity List appears on the above as list but not s. lat. Solorina bispora not

R6 Palliduphantes antroniensis has NR-includes and RedList_GB_post2001-CR(PE) http://srs.britishspiders.org.uk/portal … troniensis still listed as rare here so not sure why not on JNCC list?

R6 Prostoma jenningsi, BAP-2007, NERC, RedList_GB_Pre94-Insu
listed nerc:
https://webarchive.nationalarchives.gov … tance.aspx
and bap:
http://archive.jncc.gov.uk/default.aspx?page=5169. Again does anyone have any ideas why this species isn't listed in the JNCC spreadsheet?


The following pairs seem to be referring to the same species but have different TVKs
R6 preferred name=Pardosa saltans actual name=Pardosa lugubris NS-includes (TVK=NBNSYS0100004475)
JNCC Pardosa lugubris NS-includes (TVK=NHMSYS0020001412)

R6 Micarea prasina s. str. NS-includes (TVK=NHMSYS0020103730)
JNCC Micarea prasina s. str. has NS-includes (TVK=BMSSYS0000289997)

R6 Cetrelia olivetorum s. str. NR-includes (NHMSYS0020105991)
JNCC Cetrelia olivetorum has NR-includes (BMSSYS0000533644)

R6 actual name=Leptidea reali, preferred name=Leptidea juvernica NI_Priority (TVK=NHMSYS0020978559)
JNCC Leptidea reali Real's wood white NI priority species (TVK=NHMSYS0000516430)

Based on the above it looks as though the status information in R6 pretty accurately reflects what is in the JNCC spreadsheet and depending on what answers we get to some of the questions posed above one might conclude that the R6 dictionary is currently more accurate than the JNCC spreadsheet!

Thanks Mike!

Ian

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Re: Taxon Designations on R6 - JNCC combined list

Hi Ian,

I've been retrieving designations from the JNCC spreadsheet using the UKSI so it is very useful to see the differences in R6 in case there are major problems I need to be aware of. I would like to be using the most accurate source of designations but unfortunately because of our database structure at the moment we have no choice but to use the JNCC spreadsheet.

I have checked a couple of the species in my full copy of the UKSI by searching the TVKs:

Pardosa lugubris/saltans - JNCC is referring to the species aggregate which has a designation but neither of the S.S. entries have designations. R6 entry for Pardosa saltans might be incorrect as this species is common and widespread (unless it is referring to the aggregate)

Cetrelia olivetorum - JNCC referring to Cetrelia olivetorum sensu lato entry


Leptidea - NHMSYS0000516430 (JNCC) comes out as Leptidea sinapis (Wood White) in UKSI (Are JNCC using old name?)
NHMSYS0020978559 (R6) comes out as Leptidea juvernica (Cryptic Wood White) in UKSI. These two TVKs in JNCC and R6 look like they are referring to the two separate species.


Hope this helps a bit

Josh

Josh Baum
ERCCIS
Environmental Record Centre for Cornwall & Isles of Scilly

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Re: Taxon Designations on R6 - JNCC combined list

Thanks Josh!

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Re: Taxon Designations on R6 - JNCC combined list

Thanks Ian, most reassuring.

Data Manger
Somerset Environmental Records Centre

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Re: Taxon Designations on R6 - JNCC combined list

MikeWeideli wrote:

I attach an XML report which I hope you can implement see https://forums.nbn.org.uk/viewtopic.php?id=6672, which will report on the JNCC Collation list in a form similar to the JNCC Master Spreadsheet. It is a system supplied report and will be found under the menu heading 'Designations'. I can modify it if needed.

Hi Mike,

Would it be a big job to also include a column with preferred taxon name?  The 'Actual_Name' column is name as designated isn't it?

Thanks,
Linds

Lindsay Bamforth
Fife Nature Records Centre,
Information Officer

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Re: Taxon Designations on R6 - JNCC combined list

Hi

Attached now includes the recommended name.

Post's attachments

R6Team_Des05_JNCC.xml 1.75 kb, 4 downloads since 2019-11-30 

You don't have the permssions to download the attachments of this post.
Mike Weideli

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Re: Taxon Designations on R6 - JNCC combined list

Thanks Mike :)

Linds

Lindsay Bamforth
Fife Nature Records Centre,
Information Officer