Scientific Names Quiz

Species Name	Animal Name
Ovis aries
Rangifer tarandus
Ailuropoda melanoleuca
Canis lupus familiaris
Ursus maritimus
Orcinus orca
Capra hircus
Panthera leo
Haliaeetus leucocephalus
Odocoileus virginianus
Rattus rattus

Javascript is not currently enabled on your browser.
If you do have Javascript enabled:
This site uses javascript to make the magic happen.
Please turn on javascript and reload this page, or use a more current browser (like Firefox)

Scientific Names Quiz

by Ben

Created Mar 2, 2009 in Science
Featured Mar 2, 2009
Game Plays 114,336

Report a Mistake

Friend Scores and Standings

Loading friend results....

Top Games Today in Science

Top Games with Similar Tags

Top User Games in Science

Comment below threshold: show it

	Fixial:	Mar 2nd, 2009 at 19:39 GMT	1 point
	Just out of curiosity, which isn't a mammal Chicken or Eagle?

	jesus:	Mar 2nd, 2009 at 19:40 GMT	16 points
	Some of these i got fromm pokemon.

	Gravey:	Mar 2nd, 2009 at 19:42 GMT	38 points
	As a systematic biologist, this is truly horrifying. What is "Macropus macropodidae" supposed to be? There are FOUR species of kangaroo in the genus Macropus, none of which have that as their scientific name. Scientific names are real things that apply to ONE species, you can't just make them up! "Artiodactyl cervidae"... what the @(#*$ is that? It certainly isn't the scientific name of any of the dozens of different deer species. Cervidae is the family, Artiodactyla is the order. It's like saying the scientific name of humans is "Primate hominidae" instead of "Homo sapiens". I appreciate the attempt at getting some biology into Sporcle... but this is just wrong.

	mjenks:	Mar 2nd, 2009 at 19:49 GMT	18 points
	The white-tailed deer's scientific name (Genus species) is Odocoileus virginianus. A grizzly bear is Ursus arctos. Why the sudden desire to switch between generic "bear" (for which the genus name is wrong, anyway) and suddenly get specific with the polar bear? As someone who studies both biology and Latin, this quiz leaves me with a sour taste in my mouth.

	zigra:	Mar 2nd, 2009 at 20:00 GMT	9 points
	Maybe Ben and/or Sporcle admin could just alter or delete a few offenders (from my count and those mentioned "bear", "kangaroo", "dolphin", and "deer" are off). I like the idea for this quiz and I doubt Sporcle has fact-checkers. It might also be improved by making people match the common and scientific names so they don't just randomly type in names of zoo animals.

	Evan:	Mar 2nd, 2009 at 20:03 GMT	0 points
	why is puppy accepted for dog, but kitten isnt accepted for cat?

	Ben:	Mar 2nd, 2009 at 20:08 GMT	26 points
	Well... looks like i screwed this one up big time.. I thought the source I used was decent.. turns out it wasnt even close... I apologize for this and will see if I can't get it corrected

	Hungover:	Mar 2nd, 2009 at 20:14 GMT	6 points
	hey donkey, i produce entourage

	Evan:	Mar 2nd, 2009 at 20:14 GMT	2 points
	LOL thanks for changing the kitten thing so fast. It's funny that anyone would guess those words anyway. I did it as a joke.

Comment below threshold: show it

	SporcleAdmin:	Mar 2nd, 2009 at 20:15 GMT	30 points
	Thanks for all the corrections and (ahem) shall I say candor. We removed a couple of the more offending entries and got a little more specific on others. Our resident Sporcle biologist is also being taken out and beaten. Cheers!"

	ZacharyTaylor:	Mar 2nd, 2009 at 20:17 GMT	-1 points
	bonus kangaroo

	Booger:	Mar 2nd, 2009 at 20:20 GMT	23 points
	Don't give Ben such a hard time. It is an excellent quiz idea that unfortunately turned South on a bad source. To err is human, to forgive is human too.

	blue_elephant:	Mar 2nd, 2009 at 20:21 GMT	1 point
	can i ask why it has to be grizzly bear not just brown bear, as i think they're the same thing?

	Rackie:	Mar 2nd, 2009 at 20:22 GMT	11 points
	I think this has the potential to be a good quiz... I think it would be better if, like some of the other quizzes, you had to type the answer for a specific (e.g. highlighted) name, not just type in random animals in the hope that they'll fit in somewhere?? Just a thought on how it could be improved :) Latin wasn't much help here - leucocephalus - I was desperately trying to think of a white headed animal, The blindingly obvious didn't cross my mind!

	Tim_Allen:	Mar 2nd, 2009 at 20:23 GMT	1 point
	Thanks for adding your redundant opinion as always Davidr. We all appreciate it. :)

	nearlyextinct:	Mar 2nd, 2009 at 20:26 GMT	0 points
	I agree with the whole brown bear because brown bear is ursus arctos and grizzly bear is ursus arctos horribilis.

	davidr:	Mar 2nd, 2009 at 20:28 GMT	3 points
	Ursus arctos is the brown bear in general. The grizzly is Ursus arctos horribilis.

	speedbird007:	Mar 2nd, 2009 at 20:39 GMT	8 points
	so Macropus macropodidae isn't anything then?

	davidr:	Mar 2nd, 2009 at 20:41 GMT	0 points
	There is no such thing as "Delphinidae delphis": Delphinus delphis is the short-beaked common dolphin.

	Booger:	Mar 2nd, 2009 at 20:44 GMT	6 points
	Few know that the scientific name for Alf's species is Alfus Boogerus

	davidr:	Mar 2nd, 2009 at 20:45 GMT	0 points
	@Speedbird: correct. It's not the Linnean name of any species on the planet.

Comment below threshold: show it

	Tim_Allen:	Mar 2nd, 2009 at 20:56 GMT	7 points
	I don't hate anybody. I just think he makes 9 irrelevant comments for every comment that is witty or productive.

	JoeGrzzly:	Mar 2nd, 2009 at 21:00 GMT	8 points
	Odd that Ursus ARCTOS is the Grizzly and not the Polar Bear. You'd think Arctos would mean Arctic. I would also like to mention that everything Booger says sounds like how Alf talks when I read it in my head

	OhhYeah1:	Mar 2nd, 2009 at 21:01 GMT	8 points
	I saw vulpes vulpes and immediately thought of vulpix from pokemon which is a fox pokemon, so thats how I got it

	Nuclear_Knuckles:	Mar 2nd, 2009 at 21:03 GMT	13 points
	I don't even see the Davidr comment which was being commented on. I think his comments are mostly intelligent.

	Tim_Allen:	Mar 2nd, 2009 at 21:04 GMT	3 points
	@Nuclear: That's because he deleted it.

	Jesse:	Mar 2nd, 2009 at 21:05 GMT	2 points
	how come deer gets you white-tailed deer, and rat gets you black rat, but bear doesn't get you grizzly bear? is it just cuz another kind of bear (polar) is included?

	davidr:	Mar 2nd, 2009 at 21:05 GMT	1 point
	@Nuclear: I deleted it because it was pointing out errors that were fixed after I made the comment.

	davidr:	Mar 2nd, 2009 at 21:12 GMT	-3 points
	@JoeGrzzly: `arctos' is Greek for bear.

	soluie:	Mar 2nd, 2009 at 21:12 GMT	11 points
	Earth Science + Spanish = Surprisingly helpful. I had no idea caring about science and Spanish combined'd come in handy some day.

	Kicking222:	Mar 2nd, 2009 at 21:25 GMT	2 points
	Ten minutes for twenty-two answers? Really? Otherwise... I like it. Good one.

	Djibouti:	Mar 2nd, 2009 at 21:27 GMT	7 points
	For some reason I know that Ailurophobia is the fear of cats, so for Ailuropoda melanoleuca I kept guessing every kind of cat I could think of. Who would've guessed the Panda's name means "cat-foot black-and-white"?

	greekmike:	Mar 2nd, 2009 at 21:29 GMT	3 points
	@davidr: 'Arkouda' is Greek for bear. 'Arktos' is Ancient Greek, which has little use outside the Greek Orthodox church and interpreting ancient texts.

	RunnDMC:	Mar 2nd, 2009 at 21:48 GMT	5 points
	Why no primates? Give monkeys some love!

	zalagreensbury:	Mar 2nd, 2009 at 21:58 GMT	5 points
	ursus arctos...that literally means...'bear bear' only in Greek and Latin...what gives?