American Scientist

Taxonomy is a very important branch of science—after all, we can’t protect species that we don’t know exist. However, the field has a reputation of being somewhat stuffy and dry. In short, taxonomy often faces a marketing problem. One new species announcement, however, is taking social media by storm: University of California Los Angeles ecology and evolutionary biology graduate student Kelsi Rutledge arranged for a professional photoshoot with Psuedobatos buthi, a new species of guitarfish she discovered. It’s named after Don Buth, her mentor, and she stresses that the individual in the photographs is a museum specimen (she didn’t kill a live animal for this photoshoot) and not the type specimen the species is described from (she didn’t damage a specimen important for future scientific research).

Rutledge got the idea for this photoshoot from her friends. “Many of my friends are starting to get married and have children, and I frequently see announcement photos like this,” she said. “I thought it would be funny to announce my new species in the same way. The purpose of my photoshoot was an attempt to spice things up and show a new side of taxonomy. This has reached a large audience, and I think that is especially important for this understudied and threatened group of fishes.”

Rutledge’s unusual approach seems to be working: As of this writing, Altmetric reports that her paper describing P. buthi has been shared on Twitter over 700 times, nearly unheard-of engagement for fish taxonomy papers.

Others who have been working hard to make taxonomy accessible to the public are big fans of Rutledge’s efforts. “I’ve been seeing this make the rounds on social media, and I think it’s absolutely fantastic,” says Yi-Kai Tea, a PhD candidate at the University of Sydney who recently named a species of fish after elements from the Marvel comic books. “I think Kelsi is doing a great job with science communication and outreach, making taxonomy fun and whimsical.”

While Rutledge’s photoshoot has helped make P. buthi go viral, the fish and the story of its discovery is fascinating in its own right. Guitarfish are an understudied group of fishes of great conservation concern—the giant guitarfishes are considered some of the most threatened fish in the world, and based on the habitat where it was found, the new species of guitarfish Rutledge discovered is probably facing major threats of its own, especially from being caught as bycatch (unintended catch resulting from fishermen targeting another species in the same area) in the Gulf of California.

“I discovered this new species in a museum,” Rutledge said. “It has been hiding at UCLA’s fish collection for over 60 years! My advisor inherited the fish collection, and informed me of a note [that this guitarfish looked different from other guitarfish], and asked me if I wanted to look into it further. It has gone unnoticed for so long, and it is likely housed in other museums now, but misidentified!”

Rutledge hopes that her science outreach will help open up the world of taxonomy to a new, larger audience. “Taxonomy and systematics are sometimes viewed as boring or low impact, and have also been historically dominated by old, white males,” she says. “But this is changing, and I think it’s important to show that taxonomy can be fun and important. It’s easier to get people to care or listen if they can be excited about it. My love for these fish is apparent, and the silly nature of the photoshoot will only bring more attention to them.”