Merging taxa is a powerful, and hence, dangerous operation to perform. For this reason, it is only available to users with supervisor status.
Every taxon in Lizard Island Field Guide has a unique identifier, known as a group ID. Sometimes, the same taxon can inadvertently be given two or more identifiers. In these cases it is helpful to merge the duplicate group identifiers into a single identifier. The group ID editor facilitates such merge operations. The group with the identifer that is being edited gets merged into another group. A merger operation involves, moving all of the contents of the description of the group being edited into the description of the chosen group. It also involves changing all references to the identifier of the group being merged to be references to the identifier of the chosen group. This affects specimen identifications, for example. It also affects group references in group classification hierarchies. When a hierarchy includes a reference to both the group being edited and the group it is being merged into, then the reference to the group being edited is deleted, with all of its children (in the same hierarchy) becoming children of group being merged into. Care should be taken in performing such operations, because of the extensive nature of the changes that can result.