Holarctic Listing

With few exceptions, English names follow a descending order of precedence:

• Birding World (1995) for taxa recorded in the WP
• Beaman (1994) for other taxa recorded in the Eastern Palearctic
• AOU for other taxa recorded in the Nearctic

Birding World's names for WP species still best reflect those in everyday use by native-English-speaking recreational birders in Europe (cf alternatives prescribed by IOC, AERC, BB or BOU).

Similarly, Beaman's names for Eastern Palearctic species still seem to have greater currency than those prescribed by King (1997) or Inskipp et al / OBC (2001).  I particularly regret the trend recently followed by some authors whereby well-known and evocative Russian and Central European names have been replaced by bland alternatives, whilst the (more easily pronounced) names of Western pioneers have generally been retained.

Hyphenated compound names are generally avoided.  The American spellings 'gray' and 'colored' are retained where used within the English names of taxa mainly occurring in the New World.

Where the English name includes a non-English word or proper name, any diacritic marks are generally retained to aid correct pronunciation.

Where the English name has a qualifying prefix which is frequently omitted by birders in a local British or Western European (or even Holarctic) context, the prefix is enclosed within square brackets.

Any conflicts with the international English names recommended by Gill, Wright & Donsker / IOC are identified in an additional column.  Where a split is not implemented by IOC, the international English name of the parent species is given, preceded by the symbol '>'.