Review of the GenusThoracophorus(Coleoptera: Staphylinidae: Osoriinae) in North America North of Mexico, with a Key to Species

“Collection Bias” and the Importance of Natural History Collections in Species Habitat Modeling: A Case Study UsingThoracophorus costalisErichson (Coleoptera: Staphylinidae: Osoriinae), with a Critique of GBIF.org

“…Rather, it is a widespread generalist that is commonly collected using a dozen techniques, is available throughout the year, is easily recognized by researchers, and is distributed throughout eastern North America (Ferro 2015), a well-surveyed region. Despite or because of this, specimens from at least 15 collections had to be surveyed before a reasonable distribution model (90% total reference) could be created.…”

“…During compilation of an updated distribution of the furrowed rove beetle, Thoracophorus costalis Erichson (Staphylinidae: Osoriinae), the first author reviewed 4,926 specimens from 38 collections and compiled the most comprehensive collection of distributional data for the species to date (Ferro 2015). The resultant data set allowed for a case study evaluating how the model of a species' distribution was affected by the number of collections surveyed, and how it compared to models created solely from literature records and online databases.…”

On natural history collections, digitized and not: a response to Ferro and Flick

“…All natural history museums have misidentified and partially identified specimens, and specimens sorted under junior synonyms (Meier and Dikow 2004, Goodwin et al 2015 but see also Page 2015). Although the greatest digitization efforts have been to fund museums to database their holdings, the highest quality data with the fewest misidentifications comes directly from taxonomic revisionary work such as Ferro (2015). These datasets are the highest quality but sadly, most fail to be shared digitally and thus join the accumulation of what are called ‘dark data’ (Heidorn 2008).…”

“…As remains typical of the majority of taxonomic work currently being published, Ferro (2015) and Ferro and Flick (2015) did not share their specimen data online. The reasons for this are likely varied and include (1) a lack of tradition or expectation to do so, (2) a lack of a user-friendly data-pipeline that taxonomists can use to share and prepare their data in the best format (Darwin Core standard, Wieczorek et al 2009), (3) a lack of motivation by journal peer reviewers and editors to encourage (or insist) that data be shared, and (4) a lack of perceived reward for doing the extra labor involved in sharing of data.…”

“…Working with scientific publishers, GBIF has strongly advocated for the broader use and acceptance of data papers as a means of gaining academic recognition of activities necessary for data collection, curation and publication (see http://www.gbif.org/mendeley/data-paper). We encourage Ferro to publish what is described as the “most comprehensive collection of distributional data for the species to date” (Ferro 2015), as a data paper (Costello et al 2013, Costello and Wieczorek 2014). Datasets published through GBIF are automatically assigned a DOI and URL.…”