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Published:
Sep 29, 2022Keywords:
Taxonomy; systematics; jellyfish; cryptic species; species delimitation
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Commentary
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Morphology is not always useful for diagnosis, and that’s ok: Species hypotheses should not be bound to a class of data. Reply to Brown and Gibbons (S Afr J Sci. 2022;118(9/10), Art. #12590)
Jonathan W. Lawley
Edgar Gamero-Mora
Maximiliano M. Maronna
Luciano M. Chiaverano
Sérgio N. Stampar
Russell R. Hopcroft
Allen G. Collins
André C. Morandini
Abstract
This paper serves as a reply to the Commentary by Brown and Gibbons (S Afr J Sci. 2022;118(9/10), Art. #12590) on our recently published paper on systematics of the moon jellyfish genus Aurelia (Lawley et al. PeerJ 2021;9, e11954)). We emphasise that we are not advocating for the routine use of molecular data alone in taxonomic diagnoses, rather that it is a valid approach in cases where, after detailed analyses, morphological features are shown to be unreliable.
