Entomologists with any interest in the New Zealand fauna will no doubt have come across the two-letter codes affectionately known as "Crosby codes". These codes denote geographical regions in New Zealand and are used for the purposes of grouping and retrieving specimens. They are named after Trevor Crosby, the lead author of two papers in 1976 and 1998 where these codes were defined. The 1998 paper expanded the codes to include New Zealand's offshore islands, and includes written descriptions of the boundaries between each region.
The codes have proved to be very useful in the entomological context, and have also been used in many other fields where the distribution within New Zealand is important.
Reference:
Crosby TK, Dugdale JS, Watt JC. 1976. Recording specimen localities in New Zeland: an arbitrary system of areas and codes defined. New Zealand Journal of Zoology 3:69 + map.
Crosby TK, Dugdale JS, Watt JC. 1998. Area codes for recording specimen localities in the New Zealand subregion. New Zealand Journal of Zoology.25:175-183
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Landcare Research have made a shapefile of these regions freely available for use in GIS. It can be obtained here, at Landcare's LRIS portal for supplying environmental data.
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