## Species Customisation

This form can be used to add, modify or delete species from the system, as this form is directly linked to the species lookup table. Each entry consists of five parts, each of which must contain data or be selected:

Species
The species abbreviation consists of up to 20 characters, and is used for rapid data entry. Any additions cannot duplicate an existing abbreviation.

Species Output
This field is used to record the formal, Linnaean nomenclature of the species, up to 50 characters in length.

Common Name
This field is used to record the common name of the species, again up to 50 characters in length.

Catchall 2
This field is used to group the species in the system by various categories. Included in the system are:

- large mammal
- medium mammal
- small mammal
- main domesticates
- minor domesticates
- wild mammal
- human
- bird
- domestic bird
- wild bird
- fresh water fish
- marine fish
- migratory fish
- other fish
- amphibian
- crustacae
- echinodermata
- reptile
- unidentifiable

Users are welcome to add their own catchall categories.

Class
The class of the species being added must be selected.

### Taxonomic Information

Order and Family
These fields are used to order the list of species, and can be used in queries and reports. Although not required, it is highly recommended to use them. All mammals, birds and fish in the system by default have order and family data entered, and future versions of the system will include full taxonomic data for amphibians and reptiles too.

Fish taxa nomenclature follows Wheeler 1992.

Numeric Order and Family
This number is used to order each class of animal. It is based on the following books, which are considered to be comprehensive guides to each class:

- Corbet, G.B. and Hill, J.E. 1991. A World List of Mammalian Species, Natural History Museum (London)
- Snow, D.W. and Perrins, C.M. 1997. The Birds of the Western Palearctic, Oxford University Press (Oxford)
- Nelson, J.S. 1976. Fishes of the World, John Wiley & Sons (New York)

This number is based on the page numbers of the order and family for each species, from the relevant book. The four digits that are recorded using the units, tens, hundreds and thousands represent the family page number, while those digits in the ten thousands place and greater represent the order page number. For example, the butterfish has the number 2750331.2. Its order is Perciformes, which are found on page 275, and its family is Pholididae, located on page 331. Finally, the decimal place is used if two or more families are found on one page. In this case, the Pholididae family is preceeded by another on the same page, so it is recorded using ".2".

The full list of all orders, families, and their page numbers can be found in 'order family data.xls', located in the help file folder. This can be referenced when adding in new species.

Additional information regarding amphibians and reptiles taxonomy has been taken from the following books:

- Beebee, T.J.C. and Griffiths, R.A. 2000 Amphibians and Reptiles: A Natural History of the British Herpetofauna. HarperCollins (London)
- Romer, A.S. 1956 Osteology of the Reptiles. University of Chicago Press (Chicago)

The Add button can be pressed when values have been entered into the four fields and a class has been selected. If the user wishes to delete a species, it must be selected from the list before pushing the Delete button.