[Coral-List] Tubastraea vs. Tubastrea?

Judith Lang jlang at riposi.net
Mon Dec 24 11:17:03 EST 2012


Hi Charles,
In the early 1970's, when Cornell University's John Wells, at the time senior scientist scleractinian taxonomist in the English-speaking world, sent me his re-working of my re-working the Jamaican coral list that he and Tom Goreau Sr. had earlier published, I noticed that  an "a" had been added between the "r" and the "e" in both Montastraea and Tubastraea. 

So naturally I wrote him to ask why. 

He responded with the following one sentence on a postcard that had been printed decades earlier in Jamaica but never previously used:   "Montastraea and Tubastraea are their original and correct spellings."

The original and correct  spellings were "reintroduced" in the Wells and Lang (1973) Appendix to his "Scleractinian Corals from Jamaica"  in the Bulletin of Marine Science.

Happy holidays everyone!
Judy







On Dec 23, 2012, at 8:08 PM, Delbeek, Charles wrote:

> Curious as to what the correct spelling for this genus is. I have seen it spelled both ways in the grey literature and scientific papers and books. WORMS says it is Tubastraea. http://www.marinespecies.org/aphia.php?p=taxdetails&id=267930 and I have always written this way, except for my first book where we spelled it Tubastrea and it was pointed out as wrong.
> 
> Best regards,
> Charles
> 
> 
> J. Charles Delbeek, M.Sc.
> Assistant Curator, Steinhart Aquarium
> California Academy of Sciences
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