Anyone in Hedge End fancy Naming a Species of Animal or Plant?

Natural England, the Guardian, and Oxford University Museum of Natural History are asking members of the public to come up with common names for ten of England’s endangered species of animals and plants and which are known currently only by their Latin names.

The competition is being run by the Guardian and has been launched to mark the United Nations’ International Year of Biodiversity 2010. The list of species to be named includes beetles, bees, flies, jellyfish, algae, shrimp and lichen.

You have until 12 noon on 8 July to come up with some inspiration and you can either submit your suggestion/s online or through the post.

The Guardian website has pictures of all ten and for each a written description plus details of habitat and where they can be found in England.

Advice is to come up with as an imaginative and creative name as possible, while perhaps incorporating an aspect of appearance or colour, or something about habitat or where in the country the species is found. Ideally it will have two names plus the taxonomic name (beetle, shrimp, etc).

To make sure your name doesn’t already belong to another animal or plant you can check with Arkive or the Encyclopedia of Life.

For each species the panel of judges (from the Guardian, Natural England and Oxford University Museum of Natural History) will choose two runners-up and a winning name.

 

Of the species the closest residents to Hedge End seem to be the ‘nippy, jet-skiing beetle’ Stenus longitarsis, which modern records put in the Test Valley in 1974 and the New Forest in 2000 and the larvae-eating beetle Megapenthes lugens which is found only in Windsor now, but made a 19th century appearance in ‘Hampshire’.

There’s a startlingly beautiful ‘coral-like jellyfish’ and I feel sure I ought to be able to come up with something imaginative and creative for a beetle found in Sherwood Forest.

The competition has been devised following a report from Natural England called Lost Life which revealed that 430 species have become extinct in England in the last 200 years. George Monbiot, the report’s author said: “Species are disappearing, unknown and unmourned – but it is hard to persuade people to care about something they can’t pronounce. We need to connect people with nature, and common and accessible names are the first step in raising people’s awareness of the wildlife around them and the importance it plays in all our lives”.

Established in 2006 Natural England advises the government on the natural environment in England, focusing on wildlife and landscape issues. 

The Oxford University Museum of Natural History houses the University's scientific collections of zoological, entomological and geological specimens.