Talk:Reindeer

America-Centric, Inconsistent

The very first sentence on this page says that the article is only about the Eurasian reindeer, NOT American caribou. But the rest of the article is mostly about North America, with little mention of Eurasia, and 100% America in some sections. If the article is meant to be global then it needs to be balanced, not America-centric, and should be merged with Caribou. If it's meant to be about only the Eurasian reindeer, then all the caribou stuff needs to be moved to the Caribou article. -- 209.162.56.112 (talk) 16:17, 2 May 2014 (UTC)

I agree that the current situation is not good and have proposed re-merging back to one article. See Talk:Caribou#re-merge reindeer. Beeblebrox (talk) 18:33, 27 July 2014 (UTC)

They are the same animal and there should only be one article. Why the much newer (Jan. 21, 2014 vs. this one from 2004) caribou article was even created, with large copying from this one (and still survived), is a mystery to me. It's basically a one-man project, and not a collaborative project. The consensus has always been (and admins always strictly enforced it), that a redirect exist pointing to Reindeer. Regardless of final title, there should only be one article. -- Brangifer (talk) 14:57, 3 September 2014 (UTC)

A merge discussion is occurring at Talk:Caribou, so this conversation should continue there. Please comment. -- Brangifer (talk) 16:07, 3 September 2014 (UTC)

Restoration of deleted content

Due to many edits (many deletions) which weakened this article, in favor of the competing Caribou article, I have restored the deletions. Some good edits got deleted in the process, and I will restore them later. -- Brangifer (talk) 23:23, 4 September 2014 (UTC)

Which of the edits favoured the article Caribou? I removed the section entitled Bibliography because there was only one item in it which was already in the references. I believe I created that section at one time and put that item in myself. You had commented that the references were a mess and I was trying to tidy them up, particularly any items that I had edited in originally. I removed the section entitled Caribou-specific links (North America) and copied and pasted the three items in that section to the general External Links section to declutter. Just as you spent a lot of time creating and contributing to the article Reindeer hunting in Greenland, I have spent a lot of time creating and contributing to the article Caribou (North America). Problems arose when it was renamed simply Caribou by another editor. This article on reindeer was criticized for being too North American centric and I have been editing it ever since to add new content and references that are not North America centric and removing those that are to the article Caribou (North America). Suggestions have been made on the Caribou talk page that elements from the Reindeer article have been copied from it. In most cased I wrote the original copied material and have been re-editing it in both articles so the content reflects the North American context or the Eurasian context. I don't think this is a COI issue since I am quite open about the intentions. Is there a problem with the caption on the image you use in your Reindeer hunting in Greenland? The photo of a porcupine caribou or Grant's caribou (Rangifer tarandus granti) taken by Dean Biggins of the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service in Alaska is by far one of the best photos of caribou I have seen. But you use this image in an article about barren-ground caribou (Rangifer tarandus groenlandicus) in Reindeer hunting in Greenland with no reference to Alaska. I think this is the issue. Caribou refer to only a small number of subspecies and a number of ecotypes in North America. Reindeer refer to other subspecies and ecotypes in Eurasia. If we don't caption images carefully the content becomes confused. When someone has just read an article about caribou they should not be diverted to an article about reindeer. In the Inuit Circumpolar Conference they use both terms reindeer and caribou, depending on the country discussed. There is room in Wikipedia for two articles. Oceanflynn (talk) 00:23, 5 September 2014 (UTC)

Removal of any content from the Reindeer article which tended to split the subject into a false dichotomy of caribou vs reindeer was detrimental to the Reindeer article and created an argument for creating a second article about Caribou. Your last sentence above is the key: I don't think there is room for two articles, since the subject would largely be duplication. We're talking about the same animal (Rangifer tarandus), with several subspecies, and terminology variations which are not exclusive or consistently distinguish between species.

One article was covering the whole subject. If it wasn't doing it well enough, the answer is not to split off content, but to build that content into the main article. Your creation of a new article and removal of that content from the main article was not proper.

The terminology aspect is covered pretty well by the IUCN:

1. "Rangifer tarandus (Caribou, Peary Caribou, Reindeer)".
2. "The reindeer has a circumpolar distribution in the tundra and taiga zones of northern Europe, Siberia, and North America (Corbet 1978, Hall 1981, Koubek and Zima 1999, Wilson and Ruff 1999)."
3. "There are large numbers of reindeer (locally known as caribou) in North America."

There is a good name etymology section in the reindeer article which discusses the variations of terminology. They are a matter of history, language and geography, and not exclusively a matter of species. Trying to force a clear separation which does not exist in reality is wrong. -- Brangifer (talk) 04:03, 5 September 2014 (UTC)

BTW, when I commented that the references were a mess, I was referring to the Caribou article. There should not be multiple references sections. Right now you have Notes, Citations, and References. That could all be combined. -- Brangifer (talk) 04:09, 5 September 2014 (UTC)

References and Citations are part of the Sfn citation template, a highly respected and accurate form of referencing in Wikipedia. It involves creating a list of references in alphabetical order and the reflist generated citations. See Sfn and here Why I prefer Sfn citation template from an article posted by User:Diannaa Oceanflynn (talk) 5 September 2014

It's really not that big of a deal. It just looks very messy and it's not typical to have differing reference section styles. I've seen two at times, but never three. -- Brangifer (talk) 02:55, 6 September 2014 (UTC)

IUCN

The IUCN Red list regarding Rangifer tarandus is highly problematic regarding the status of caribou in North America. The full paragraph from which User:Rangifer takes his quotation includes a blanket statement that "This species is listed as Least Concern due to a wide circumpolar distribution and presumed large populations." In North America, there are subspecies and ecotypes of Rangifer tarandus that are endangered. While the large numbers globally cannot be dismissed, the situation for caribou in North America is cause for concern.

While IUCN is a respected institution it is not without controversy. In this article entitled Seeing Red: Inside the Science and Politics of the IUCN Red List by Lisa M Campbell published in the journal Conservation and Society in 2012, the author discusses a broader debate regarding the a crisis of legitimacy of the IUCN list and its role in the "science-policy interface as it relates to wildlife and biodiversity conservation." By maintaining two separate articles, one for Caribou (North America) and one for Reindeer this type of over-generalization cannot happen. In North America, subspecies like the Boreal woodland caribou have been declared endangered by Committee on the Status of Endangered Wildlife in Canada (COSEWIC). Inuit and First Nations are working closely with industry, NGOs and different levels of government on caribou counts in every province because of dwindling herds from coast to coast. This discussion is not part of the article on reindeer. A casual reader would assume that since all reindeer look alike and there are a lot of them, there is no need for concern. This should not be a popularity contest. Of course there will be more searches for reindeer partly because of its mythical cultural weight among other things. Oceanflynn (talk) 5 September 2014

I certainly agree that the various subspecies have widely differing degrees of endangered status. Some have only small herds left. Some are extinct. Some have enormous herds without any danger, at least at present. This can be covered in one article. -- Brangifer (talk) 03:01, 6 September 2014 (UTC)

Former range

Is there any concrete proof (fossil finds with dates, historical accounts, paintings) that they have existed naturally in Britain and/or Ireland since the Pleistocene? I've seen claims they existed in Scotland as late as 1000BP, but unlike wolf, bear, lynx there doesn't seem to be much if any evidence. Also what about the north European plain (Denmark or north Germany in particular)? If they got to Britain via the old land bridge they must have survived quite late there too.

Walshie79 (talk) 16:37, 22 September 2014 (UTC)

Santa Claus' reindeer

Just a minor annotation, the German word for lightning is "Blitz", not "Blitzen" (Believe me, I'm German. Blitzen is just a special case, plural.) For the sake of correctness, I advice a change of the text to something like "...Blixem was later changed to Bliksem, then Blitzen ("Blitz" being German for "lightning")". — Preceding unsigned comment added by 2003:6E:4F57:3E94:B4F4:E5E1:72CD:41BF (talk) 17:30, 25 December 2014 (UTC)

Thanks. Done. Dger (talk) 19:02, 25 December 2014 (UTC)

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Falkland

Although this is not depicted on the map nor directly mentioned in Reindeer in South Georgia, the latter refers to a source that talks about successful introduction of SG reindeer to Falkland in 2001. It's been 15 years since, so the data should be renewed, of course, but I'd say it is worth mentioning along with the other southern introduction attempts. --85.253.66.252 (talk) 21:51, 17 September 2016 (UTC)