{"id":30705,"date":"2021-06-10T07:43:35","date_gmt":"2021-06-10T14:43:35","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blog.kootenay-lake.ca\/?p=30705"},"modified":"2021-06-10T08:15:25","modified_gmt":"2021-06-10T15:15:25","slug":"local-tigers","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blog.kootenay-lake.ca\/?p=30705","title":{"rendered":"Local tigers"},"content":{"rendered":"

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Almost simultaneously, the tigers have arrived. They are: a tiger beetle, a tiger butterfly, and a tiger lily.<\/p>\n

I have commented previously, somewhat whimsically, on our rather odd naming conventions for species: butter sipping<\/a> (on butterflies and buttercups); horned birds and insects<\/a>; siskins and catkins<\/a>. But, naming local things after tigers has got be one of the oddest.\u00a0<\/p>\n

The tiger is the apex predator of an Asian cat family (felidae). It has orange fur with black stripes. So, why are local animals named after this distinctly alien species?\u00a0<\/p>\n

Our Canadian tiger swallowtail butterfly won’t have been named for its predator characteristics. Maybe it is those black stripes, but the butterfly’s base colour is yellow, not orange (oops!).
\n\"\"<\/p>\n

The tiger lily is orange, but alas, the black embellishments are spots, not stripes. Now, that is a rather sloppy bit of naming.
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The tiger beetle is certainly named, not for its appearance, but its predation. I have watched them within the week, but this is an earlier shot of two tiger beetles mating. Of course, the question could be posed: Why name this predator after tigers, as opposed to grizzlies or cougars? The province has quite a number of beetle species that are styled as tiger beetles.
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Then there are moths. BC has nearly a dozen species of moths that are styled as tigers. This is one of them, presumably named because of the black stripes (against yellow) on its abdomen.
\n\"\"<\/p>\n

So, we have a few dozen species of various sorts that are named for a large Asian cat. Hmm, there does seem to be a certain linguistic bankruptcy among taxonomists.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

  Almost simultaneously, the tigers have arrived. They are: a tiger beetle, a tiger butterfly, and a tiger lily. I have commented previously, somewhat whimsically, on our rather odd naming conventions for species: butter sipping (on butterflies and buttercups); horned … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[10,13],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-30705","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-bugs","category-wildflowers"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.kootenay-lake.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/30705","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.kootenay-lake.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.kootenay-lake.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.kootenay-lake.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.kootenay-lake.ca\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=30705"}],"version-history":[{"count":12,"href":"https:\/\/blog.kootenay-lake.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/30705\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":30720,"href":"https:\/\/blog.kootenay-lake.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/30705\/revisions\/30720"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.kootenay-lake.ca\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=30705"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.kootenay-lake.ca\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=30705"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.kootenay-lake.ca\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=30705"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}