What's in a (wrong) name? Thoughts on the true utility of electronic museum catalogues

Abstract

Electronic collections catalogues need to be accurate even if they are not correct. A specimen in the collections of the Sedgwick Museum, Cambridge, from the Llandovery (Telychian) of the May Hill Inlier of the Welsh Borders, is identified therein as Periechocrinus moniliformis (Miller). This species was based on inadequate material and is unidentifiable; it would provide nothing but confusion if used uncritically in the compilation of a database. But this indication of a Llandovery crinoid promises much to the informed observer. British Llandovery crinoids remain rare. This specimen is just a fragment of column, derived from a cladid or camerate, but it was infested by an epizoozoan, a bryozoan, only the second such association recognised in the Telychian of the British Isles. The specimen also asks a taphonomic question: why is the bryozoan preserved as a mould, yet the crinoid is still calcitic?