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The White-Cheeked Geese: Branta Canadensis, B. Maxima, B. "Lawrensis", B. Hutchinsii, B. Leucopareia, and B. Minima.

Article Excerpt
THE WHITE-CHEEKED GEESE: BRANTA CANADENSIS, B. MAXIMA, B. "LAWRENSIS", B. HUTCHINSII, B. LEUCOPAREIA, AND B. MINIMA. TAXONOMY, ECOPHYSIOGRAPHIC RELATIONSHIPS, BIOGEOGRAPHY, AND EVOLUTIONARY CONSIDERATIONS. VOLUME 2. WESTERN TAXA, BIOGEOGRAPHY, AND EVOLUTIONARY CONSIDERATIONS. By Harold C. Hanson. Avvar Books, 203 South Palm Drive, Blythe, California, USA. 2007: xxii + 700 pages, hundreds of maps, tables, morphometric diagrams, black and white photos of geese in the wild, goose skins, and habitat. ISBN: 0-9708504-25. Volumes I and II $50.00 (soft cover), $150.00 (hard cover); Volume II alone $25.00 (soft cover), $ 70.00 (hard cover). Shipping $4.15 domestic, $8.00 Canada, $15.00 overseas.--Volume I, published in 2006, was reviewed in this journal (119: 514-516). Volume II contains chapters 11-37 of Hanson's work; some are authored or coauthored by others. As the title indicates, what we now know as Branta canadensis and B. hutchinsii is divided into five or six species. Branta hutchinsii is called the Arctic Goose. The work is based primarily on the extensive collection of geese at the Illinois Natural History Survey, but the holotypes have been deposited in the Field Museum.

Chapters 11-27 contain "biographies" of 175 newly described taxa--one species, the rest subspecies (in addition to 9 previously named forms). As in Volume I, some new names (41) have been placed in quotation marks and lack the mandated designation that they are new, as publisher/editor B. W. Anderson's effort to avoid formal naming under the Code (ICZN 1999; Article 16.1) of taxa represented by a single individual bird from wintering areas. This effort seems to have been incomplete, as some samples that appear to be of one bird...

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