Critical review of Hoser’s publications on agamid lizards

We analyzed four papers on agamid lizards by self-proclaimed Australian herpetologist Raymond Hoser with respect to the presentation of diagnostic characters as well as their taxonomic and nomenclatural merits. In most cases the taxonomic concepts were lifted from earlier phylogenetic publications and the diagnoses were copied from other authors. Copied text in Hoser’s diagnostic section within the analyzed papers amounts to a staggering 83% for Draconinae, 82% for Amphibolurinae, 77% for Laudakia and 78% for Uromastycinae, respectively. We found a number of plagiarized paragraphs, sometimes half a page long. Hoser hardly ever makes any effort to attribute statements to the original author and in some cases he even omitted to cite the relevant source. With respect to nomenclature, we found that Hoser proposed names that were preoccupied or unavailable, that a nomen oblitum was resurrected incorrectly, nomina nuda were produced, a type locality was restricted incorrectly and a questionable holotype was designated for a new species. With respect to taxonomy, we found examples of wrong diagnoses, falsely attributed species, omission of taxa and a lack of understanding or misinterpretation of previously published taxonomic studies on agamid lizards. Furthermore relevant literature on taxonomy and nomenclature has been overlooked or disregarded.