Subsequent taxonomic splits have retricted the name to the populations in the Southland and Otago Regions in New Zealand's South Island.
For this reason, many language families have had lumper–splitter controversies, including Altaic, Pama–Nyungan, Nilo-Saharan, and most of the larger families of the Americas.
1877 also saw the publication of his first paper, in which he split the sea-lily genus Poteriocrinus into four; in his lifetime, Sladen would gain a reputation as a "splitter" because of his proclivity for declaring specimens to belong to new genera or species.
The vernacular name "Yariguies Brush-finch" was selected because the Yellow-breasted Brush Finch, as a subspecies of which it is currently classified, is to be split into several species, and it is not clear at the moment to which of these the newly-described bird would belong (Donegan & Huertas, 2006).
The “Wanderer” group of albatrosses has been split into several taxa including, as well as the Wandering Albatross, the Antipodean, Gibson's, Tristan and Amsterdam Albatrosses, not all all of which are recognised by all authorities.