Talk:Ecosystem/Archive 3

Close to nature forestry

Close to nature forestry considers the forest as an ecosystem, and hence is a subject really related to this article. In fact, the concept of ecosystem is central to close to nature forestry. I kindly ask Guettarda to explain why he has deleted the link to this page.--Auró (talk) 22:07, 9 March 2012 (UTC)

Per WP:SEEALSO: The links in the "See also" section should be relevant, should reflect the links that would be present in a comprehensive article on the topic, and should be limited to a reasonable number. There were over 40 links in the 'See also', which is clearly an unreasonable number. It's down to 30, which is still much too much. Look at the FAs in biology - of the ones that have "See also" sections, most have 3-5 links, with a few up around 12-14. By that comparison, this article has 2-10x as many as it should. As for the specific link, if we included every topic that "treated x as an ecosystem", we'd have hundred of links. I think we need much stronger justification than that. Guettarda (talk) 22:51, 9 March 2012 (UTC)

I will try to explain that we have strong justification. At present forests represent one of the main environments for ecosystems, mainly in temperate and tropical climatic zones. Traditionally, forests have been exploited and treated as simple source for lumber and fire wood. Now we have a forestry theory and practice that promotes to consider forests as ecosystems, and manage them as such. I would say that this is a very relevant subject for the preservation of ecosystems. Probably we could find other links not suppressed that are less relevant.--Auró (talk) 10:02, 11 March 2012 (UTC)

So what's unique about this particular school of thought? Principles of ecosystem management have been incorporated into forestry decades ago - the practice may not always be there, but the principles certainly are. So why this particular framework? Granted, my expertise is in forest ecology, not forest management, and my training as a strong US-UK bias...I don't know as much about continental forestry as I should...but judging from the article, I just don't get what's so special. Guettarda (talk) 15:42, 11 March 2012 (UTC)

I am glad to be discussing the subject with an editor having experience in forest ecology. The name of the article, "Close to nature forestry", comes from a continental school, but the content incorporates the US theory and practice I found reading the work of professor Tom Mc Evoy, "Positive Impact Forestry", and I also made reference to the "Ecoforestry Institute". I thought that the title "Close to nature forestry" reflected better the concept than "positive impact forestry". Also I may be biased, because of being a continental, but looking closer, as I am Spanish, and the current is of German origin, I may have certain neutrality. The article does not claim novelty, since the German movement was initiated in 1950. I think that the main value is to consider that the human action in forest should only be to help nature do more quickly the process it would make slowly by itself; and as a result the idea that to manage a forest as an ecosystem has sense also from the economical point of view, as it reduces operating costs. Needless to say that the article is open to incorporate any additional information, particularly concerning US practice and experience, and help balance it.--Auró (talk) 07:31, 12 March 2012 (UTC)

I have made an exercise of looking around. The ecosystem article is so prominent that every editor wants "his" article to be linked from it. It probably has been my position. I accept its deletion, but propose to add a link to Forest ecology. It is a wider concept that Close to nature forestry. On the other hand, I agree with Guettarda that some links may be suppressed. I propose the following: Global warming, Human ecology, Invasive species, Landscape ecology, Natural landscape, Natural resource, Nature, Spaceship Earth, Sustainability, Sustainable development. They are all important or very important subjects, but are not relevant to the concept of ecosystem.--Auró (talk) 22:28, 13 March 2012 (UTC)

GA Review

This review is transcluded from Talk:Ecosystem/GA1. The edit link for this section can be used to add comments to the review.

Reviewer: Stigmatella aurantiaca (talk · contribs) 23:29, 18 June 2012 (UTC)

Beginning review

Hi! Just wanted you to know that I'll be taking on this review. Stigmatella aurantiaca (talk) 23:29, 18 June 2012 (UTC)

First read comments

Quickfail Criteria

Description	Rating
The article completely lacks reliable sources.	OK
The topic is treated in an obviously non-neutral way.	OK
There are cleanup banners that are obviously still valid	OK
The article is or has been the subject of ongoing or recent, unresolved edit wars.	OK
The article specifically concerns a rapidly unfolding current event with a definite endpoint.	OK
The article contains significant close paraphrasing or copyright violations.	OK

I located several of your sources in the university library. Detailed review will begin after I've had a chance to check them out and to skim them over. Stigmatella aurantiaca (talk) 04:46, 19 June 2012 (UTC)

Detailed review

GA review (see here for what the criteria are, and here for what they are not)

1. It is reasonably well written.

   a (prose): b (MoS for lead, layout, word choice, fiction, and lists):

2. It is factually accurate and verifiable.

   a (references): b (citations to reliable sources): c (OR):

3. It is broad in its coverage.

   a (major aspects): b (focused):

4. It follows the neutral point of view policy.

   Fair representation without bias:

5. It is stable.

   No edit wars, etc.:

6. It is illustrated by images, where possible and appropriate.

   a (images are tagged and non-free images have fair use rationales): b (appropriate use with suitable captions):

7. Overall:

   Pass/Fail:

I've spent the past few days skimming the materials that I got from the university library. Mostly I focused on Chapin et al. 2011, since I saw that the 2002 edition of their textbook was a major resource for you. But I also read through the Christensen et al. report and skimmed through other textbooks not on your list.

Being an old fogey, I'm rather amazed at the paradigm shifts that have occurred even in such things as the old succession concept that I learned 40+ years ago. The Odum brothers' use of radiotracers was state-of-the-art when I was learning this stuff in school. How far we've gone! I'm struck by the advances in experimental methods. How do we know what we know? How about paleoecological studies? Computer modeling? Satellite remote sensing? When I learned this stuff 40+ years ago, all we learned about were patterns. Now the emphasis is on processes.

Ecosystems is a huge topic, far too big a subject to cover adequately in a 52,000 character essay, or one even double the current size. There are two basic approaches to attempting to cover such a huge subject in an article that can be read in 15–25 minutes. (1) Provide idiosyncratic coverage in significant detail of just the most important topics, knowing that you're going to miss a lot that people would want to learn. (2) Write the article mostly as a directed set of links. This is the "If It's Tuesday, This Must Be Belgium" approach to writing a Wikipedia article.

Your article clearly adopts the second approach.

Comparing the subjects covered in your article with Chapin et al. (2011), Smith and Smith (2012), and a couple of other texts that I got from the university library, I see that you unavoidably missed a lot of important stuff. I say "unavoidably" because that's just how big this subject is, even taking the approach that you've adopted.

It would be unfair of me to ask you to fix everything, since that would entail writing at least a 200,000 character article. But I can ask you to fix a couple of topics for the GA.

History and development Treatment in this section is very inadequate. You have no dates, and describe nothing after the mid to late 60's. Modern understanding and methods of research have changed ENORMOUSLY in the last several decades since I studied this stuff in school.

Ecosystem processes Late in his life, Jenny recognized human activity as a sixth state factor, but you only mention human activity in the last two sentences? Human-induced ecosystem change is a huge factor in ecosystem processes.

Right now the article stands as about 52,000 characters. To fix these two issues, the article should grow to be maybe, say, around 60,000 characters?

Stigmatella aurantiaca (talk) 23:42, 24 June 2012 (UTC)

Need help?

Is there any assistance that I provide to help you bring this article to GA? For instance, I live near a medium-sized university, so if there are any journal articles that you need, I can check if they are available and if so, can see about sending electronic copies to you. Stigmatella aurantiaca (talk) 01:24, 28 June 2012 (UTC)

Reluctant failure

No effort whatsoever has been made to address any of the issues that I have raised. Indeed, another editor besides myself felt the History section to be so poor, that on July 9, he/she actually blanked it – not exactly a good way of dealing with the issue (the blank was reverted). Regardless, I have no choice but to fail the article. Stigmatella aurantiaca (talk) 12:05, 9 July 2012 (UTC)

An ecosytem is a community of living organisms ( plants,animals,and micorbs) in conjuction with the nonliving componets of their environment and they live in the ocean and their is a lot of fishes and shark down there and i like the story about ecosystem that is my story — Preceding unsigned comment added by 208.71.77.12 (talk) 16:06, 24 January 2013 (UTC)

A human being, as well as all living things, are mo more than ecosystems. One must admit that before understandng life.Greetings from F-land: Vesa Pulkkinen — Preceding unsigned comment added by 178.251.148.247 (talk) 21:11, 8 January 2014 (UTC)

Change "ecology" to "ecologist" in the following sentence: The term "ecosystem" was first used in a publication by British ecology Arthur Tansley.

Semi-protected edit request on 12 March 2014

Bold text'hhhudjdndjdsdjfdsvfvjsdhfvwfvehw 205.213.216.33 (talk) 18:57, 12 March 2014 (UTC)

Not done: it's not clear what changes you want made. Please mention the specific changes in a "change X to Y" format. — {{U|Technical 13}} ^{(t • e • c)} 19:04, 12 March 2014 (UTC)