def remove_species_and_rename_other(df, drop_species, rename_category):
    """
    Remove the species in drop_species, and rename the "other" category to 
    "rarely_requested_species".
    """
    reduced_df = df.loc[~df.species_group.isin(drop_species),:].copy()
    reduced_df.species_group.cat.remove_categories(drop_species, inplace = True)
    reduced_df.species_group.cat.rename_categories(rename_category, inplace = True)
    
    return reduced_df