wareagle69
09-03-2009, 06:33 PM
when you look at your books and see for example thistle cirsium spp do you understand what this means?
let me quote a couple of references first samuel thayer
the scientific name consisits of two parts. The first name s generic(indicating the geus,a closely related group of plants); it is always capitalized.the second name is specific(indicating the specis with in the genus);it is never capitalized. The scientific name is written in italics. the genus name is often abbreviated when the context makes it clear which genus we are discussing. The abbreviation "spp" means "species plural" and indicates the discussion of multiple species within one genus.
so my take on this is the thistle when the book says
THISTLE cirsiumspp. it means it is referring to the true genus of thisltles of the genuscirsiumas well as the nodding thistle carduus nutans; it does not refer to sonchus(sow thistle) or tosilybum(milk thistle. the US and canda has dozens of speies of true thistles, which is why spp is used the book is refering to the specific species of true thistle and cannot possibly cover evey single species under the genus thislte
does this help
let me also quote wikipedia-species
the authors use "spp" as a short way of saying something applies to many species within a genus, but do not wish to say that it applies to all species within that genus.
my interpretation of this. the word deer brings a particular species to mind. but deer is genus not species of which 34 species belong to deer could actually mean moose or elk so if you are reading about what a "deer spp" eats then it is refering to all 34 species and not just to bambi.
hope this helps
let me quote a couple of references first samuel thayer
the scientific name consisits of two parts. The first name s generic(indicating the geus,a closely related group of plants); it is always capitalized.the second name is specific(indicating the specis with in the genus);it is never capitalized. The scientific name is written in italics. the genus name is often abbreviated when the context makes it clear which genus we are discussing. The abbreviation "spp" means "species plural" and indicates the discussion of multiple species within one genus.
so my take on this is the thistle when the book says
THISTLE cirsiumspp. it means it is referring to the true genus of thisltles of the genuscirsiumas well as the nodding thistle carduus nutans; it does not refer to sonchus(sow thistle) or tosilybum(milk thistle. the US and canda has dozens of speies of true thistles, which is why spp is used the book is refering to the specific species of true thistle and cannot possibly cover evey single species under the genus thislte
does this help
let me also quote wikipedia-species
the authors use "spp" as a short way of saying something applies to many species within a genus, but do not wish to say that it applies to all species within that genus.
my interpretation of this. the word deer brings a particular species to mind. but deer is genus not species of which 34 species belong to deer could actually mean moose or elk so if you are reading about what a "deer spp" eats then it is refering to all 34 species and not just to bambi.
hope this helps