rcatfish_updates: Access catalog changes and additions

In rcatfish: An R Interface to the California Academy of Sciences Eschmeyer's Catalog of Fishes

Access catalog changes and additions

Description

This function is used to access the Eschmeyer's Catalog of Fishes Summary of Changes and Additions.

Usage

rcatfish_updates(
  changes = TRUE,
  author.changes = TRUE,
  spell.changes = TRUE,
  added.genera = TRUE,
  added.species = TRUE
)

Arguments

changes	Logical. Should the function return the table of changes to the catalog? Default is TRUE.
author.changes	Logical. Should the function return the table of author and year changes to the catalog? Default is TRUE.
spell.changes	Logical. Should the function return the table of spelling changes to the catalog? Default is TRUE.
added.genera	Logical. Should the function return genera added to the catalog? Default is TRUE.
added.species	Logical. Should the function return species added to the catalog? Default is TRUE.

Details

This function displays the information on the "Changes and Additions" tab of Eschmeyer's Catalog of Fishes. The catalog updates this information monthly with changes to the catalog, new genus information, and new species information. Each updates removes the last month's information, so data obtained through this function is only representative of the changes and additions made since the previous update.

Value

A named list. Names include UpdateDate, Changes, AuthorshipChanges, AddedGenera, and AddedSpecies. UpdateDate will always be returned and is a character string of the date the catalog was updated. Changes, AddedGenera, and AddedSpecies summarize changes to the catalog, changes to authorship information, genera added to the catalog, and species added to the catalog respectively. The elements returned are based on which parameters are set to TRUE. An itemized list describing the contents in the columns of the data returned is described below.

• Original.Taxon - Character. The original taxonomic name in the database.

• Was - Character. Previous status of the taxon in the database.

• Previous.Taxon - Character. Previous taxonomic name in the database.

• Now - Character. Current status of the taxon in the database following the update.

• Current.Taxon - Character. Current taxonomic name in the database for the taxon following the update.

• Taxon - Character. Taxon (of any rank) whose citation was updated.

• Previous.Author - Character. Authorship information of the citation before the update.

• Current.Author - Character. Authorship information of the citation following the update.

• Species.Name - Character. Current taxonomic name in the database for the taxon following the update.

• Genus.Name - Character. Name of the new genus added to the database following the update.

• Authors - Character. Authorship for new taxonomic names added to the database following the update.

• Year - Character. Year for new taxonomic names added to the database following the update.

• Region - Character. Region new taxa added to the database are known to occur in.

• Was.Spelled - Character. Previous spelling of the taxon in the database.

• Now.Spelled - Character. Revised spelling of the taxon in the database.

Author(s)

Brandon E. Dominy, Samuel R. Borstein

References

Fricke, R., van der Laan, R. & Fong, J.D. (Year Accessed). Eschmeyer’s Catalog of Fishes: Changes and Additions. https://researcharchive.calacademy.org/research/ichthyology/catalog/ChangeSummary.asp.

Examples

# return all available data
myList <- rcatfish_updates(changes = TRUE, added.genera = TRUE, added.species = TRUE)

rcatfish documentation built on Feb. 3, 2026, 5:07 p.m.