Roger, it’s a pertinent question, “what is going on with the Birdlife Australia Working list versus the BARC IOC Checklist?”. I’m sure there are plenty of confused people who wish to know more. Since Tony Palliser is away, I’ll provide some information from my position as a member of BARC. However, I emphasize that this is only one side of the story, and I do not represent BARC’s position. BirdLife Australia Rarities Committee (BARC) needs a checklist that deals with bird species occurring outside Australia. BARC used to use the Birds Australia Australian checklists, namely Christidis & Boles 1994 and Christidis & Boles 2008. However, these never covered birds not yet recorded in Australia. For those birds, BARC once followed Sibley & Monroe (1993), but in 2006, during the preparation of C&B 2008, Walter Boles recommended to Tony Palliser that BARC follow IOC checklist, which is international and online. For several years BARC followed C&B for most birds but IOC for anything new to the Australian list. By 2010 this was becoming impossible as the 2 lists were not close. C&B 2008 was ageing rapidly. Furthermore, the BA’s Taxonomic Advisory Committee had disbanded and there was no prospect that the Australian checklist would be revised again in a suitable time frame. After committee discussions and an internal voting process in late 2011 BARC decided to prepare a checklist of Australian birds using the IOC taxonomy, nomenclature and sequence. Before adopting or releasing the BARC checklist we informed the then CEO of Birds Australia (Graham Hamilton) of our intent, via a detail memorandum that outlined our reasons and why we had chosen the IOC system over other options. At that time BARC was aware that the recently published “The Action Plan for Australian Birds 2010” by BA adopted a species list that was based on C&B 2008 with updates from BLI checklist and exceptions where required. This was addressed in the memo with the suggestion that “Such a synthetic approach shows that an updated checklist has been required for some time. It is likely that this sort of approach cannot provide for consistency in the future”. No immediate response was received, so BARC released the first version of its checklist in November 2011, announced primarily via Birding-Aus and the BARC website. Some months later the memo reached staff members at the BLA office in Melbourne, who contacted Tony Palliser, but were not encouraging, effectively saying “we have our own checklist” based on the Action plan list. It suddenly transpired that before long, different sections of BLA could be using different checklists. Obviously this was not intended or desirable. After some debate, it was decided that the issue would be put to the BA Research and Conservation Committee (RACC). BARC reiterated its case in a revised memo, although we never saw the arguments or a case for the BLA checklist. Last I heard, perhaps a year ago or more, it had been raised at the RACC once or twice but there was no outcome. Subsequently BLA released its draft checklist announced via the BLA e-newsletter on 1 July 2013. BARC had not been advised that the checklist was being released, and were taken by surprise since we were expecting some resolution from the RACC first. Incidentally, the long-standing Recommended English Names Committee (RENC) was taken completely unawares, and the large number of REN changes in the BLA checklist prompted a number of resignations from that committee. Apparently the RACC will decide whether the BLA draft list will be adopted by BLA, or perhaps they already have. Meanwhile, BARC has not heard anything from the RACC. This has become a frustrating situation. In my view it has arisen through a lack of communication. I am as eager as anyone to see it resolved. It is desirable to have only one Australian checklist. It is also desirable that the one checklist be as good as it can be. Having investigated things in detail, BARC is of the opinion that the IOC system is superior to the BLI system and the synthetic BLA system, and we have argued that case strongly. However, BLA has not responded in substance, except by ignoring BARC’s communications. Should BARC abandon the IOC checklist system if the RACC endorses the BLA checklist, or continue to argue for adoption of the IOC system? Can we have 2 checklists in Australia and BLA? Can BARC maintain a list of birds confirmed in Australia in IOC taxonomy even if BLA officially uses its own taxonomy? Should staff members at BLA take over the traditional roles of committees such as the Recommended English Names Committee, the Taxonomic Advisory Committee and BARC? Cheers, David James Sydney ============================== =============================== To unsubscribe from this mailing list, send the message: unsubscribe (in the body of the message, with no Subject line) to: birding-aus-request@vicnet.net.au http://birding-aus.org ===============================
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