What’s in a Name?

This is Betsy, a loggerhead sea turtle, Caretta caretta, who was being cared for by the Conservancy of Southwest Florida. She was not a permanent resident, but was released back into the wild this past March after two years in their care. Betsy was part of an ongoing study on sea turtle gender ratios by Florida Atlantic University, which is how we knew she was female.

At the end of my last story, I mentioned the death of the last individual of a particular species of tree frog from Panama. The article about the frog reminded me about naming conventions in science and wildlife care. The individual in question was named ‘Toughie’ by the young son of one of its keepers.

In the sciences, there are differing perspectives when it comes to giving names to individual animals. As with many things, there is a trade off depending on which approach we choose to take. It is important to differentiate between wild animals and pets, so that people do not treat the former like the latter. However, studies have shown that the general public finds it easier to relate to animals with names. The name tends to stick in the mind more. This is true in my own experience as well. I imagine that Myrtle was so memorable partially because of her name.

My personal philosophy on this is a bit of a middle ground. I do not mind giving names to animals that will remain in captivity, but I dislike naming animals that will subsequently be released. I have dealt with a large number of named animals in my time and I occasionally even give them personal nicknames of my own. I’ve already introduced you to the peacocks, Picasso and Priscilla. The Conservancy had a number of other named animals, including a chicken turtle, Deirochelys reticularia, named Stretch.

A coney grouper, Cephalopholis fulva, named Carl.

And a pair of diamondback terrapins, Malaclemys terrapin, named Stud and Muffin.

None of these animals will go back to the wild, but Betsy did. Thus, I did not like the idea of naming her even though I had no problem with these others (along with many more) having names.

I feel this way because I feel the names have a tendency to lead to the anthropomorphism of animals (the attribution of human traits to them). Some animals, especially the great apes, do possess human-like characteristics, but it is far too easy to generalize these onto other, less intelligent, fauna. Let’s look at sea turtles, for example.

This is the rear of a loggerhead sea turtle skull. As you can see, there isn’t a lot of space for brains there. Generally speaking, turtles are not known for their smarts. Sea turtles especially are highly instinctual, since they have almost no parental care to speak of, and none after the eggs are laid. One of the reasons why we could release Betsy was because sea turtles are much less likely to ‘imprint’ on their caretakers and treat them as a parent.

At this point, you might be wondering ‘does this really matter’? For a scientist, it is important to be objective, but what about everyone else? Let me be clear, I am not suggesting that you refrain from naming your pets. Just try and avoid doing it with actual wild animals. Domesticated animals are different from wildlife and should be treated differently.

It can be hard to do that because each individual animal, wild or otherwise, will develop its own quirks. For example, Betsy had a tendency to swim using only her rear flippers, which is bizarre for a sea turtle since those are mainly used for steering. However, this should not be treated as a ‘personality trait’. She was too small for the reef tank (the one in the picture with Carl) when she arrived, only 14cm long, one-third of the size required before she could be released. She initially stayed in a smaller tank that could be crossed using rear flipper power alone. So it became a developed habit even as she continued to grow and moved to a larger tank.

Giving an animal a name can potentially make you treat it more like a person. Next time, I’ll talk about a specific way that this can cause problems, both for you and for the wildlife.