Re: species flock -Reply

[William Vannerson <William_Vannerson@ama-assn.org>]

>> I don't remember having seen, read or heard anything about
structured flocks/schools, beyond a community temporarily feeding
together. <<

The term "Flock" has a different definition when discussing African Lake
cichlids.  Here's a quote from _The Cichlid Fishes of Lake Malawi,
Africa_  web site (http://connix.com/~mko/mw01002.htm).

"A species flock is a group of closely related species all living in the
same ecosystem. As Greenwood (1974: 19) emphasized, "The term
'species flock' . . . should, strictly speaking, be applied to a species
assemblage of monophyletic origin." The clear implication, then, is that a
species flock evolved within the ecosystem from a single ancestral
species by repeated speciation events. Thus, for an assemblage to merit
the term "species flock," theoretically it should be possible to point to one
or more synapomorphies (shared specialized characters) in all members
of the assemblage, characters lacking in relatives outside the flock. "

So in this sense, there may be flocks of apistos.  This kind of ties into the
thread earlier regarding whether or not population codes should be
adopted or not as well as the discussion on possible research
opportunities to identify the genetic relatedness between Apisto species.
 According to this quote, and I can't vouch for it's accuracy in the
science community, a DNA analysis is required to determine flocks, not
just physical attributes.

Several months ago I made reference to a presentation Tomas Hrbek
made at my killie club meeting were he re-categorized the Rivulus genus
based on his mitochondrial DNA analysis.  The six or seven "groups" he
identified resulting from his study could then be defined as "flocks."

Bill Vannerson
http://ourworld.compuserve.com/homepages/william_vannerson


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