Talk:Sequoia (genus)

Proposed name change/ primary topic

I propose to change the name of this article to Sequoia, removing the word (genus), in order to bring it in line with Wikipedia naming conventions (flora) and Wikipedia:Disambiguation. Currently all searches for Sequoia are redirected to the disambiguation page instead of here to the Sequoia genus taxon page. This is incorrect because there is one clear primary topic for this term. All other terms at the disambiguation page are either completely different words that could possibly be misspelled (but are not this primary topic), or they are phrases for items that were named after this genus (a school or the Toyata Sequoia for instance). This incorrect redirect to the disambiguation page for the search term Sequoia is causing problems with all the other articles on Wikipedia that believe they are linking to the tree genus by merely using Sequoia, so that this page has shown up on a list of pages that need to be "fixed" because there are about 60 other Wikipedia pages accidentally linking to the disambiguation page. I would appreciate your consensus on this move, thanks! Tom Hulse (talk) 13:03, 25 January 2011 (UTC)

WP:BOLD. The best solution in the case of pages that are not extremely high-profile and whose talk pages are accordingly not extraordinarily heavy in use is rather to put an announcement on the talk page, declare that you are going to wait for some time period (say, a week or two weeks, at most a month) to allow people to voice objections, and if there is no objection after the announced time period, go ahead with your proposed action. My experience is that most talk pages are just not popular enough for waiting for people to voice agreement to be sensible. You'll wait forever if you rely on other people's agreement. --Florian Blaschke (talk) 22:25, 17 February 2011 (UTC)

Agreed. I have meant to do just that; forgot about this page. I think this one needs an admin to do the move because the redirect page it would replace does not have a single-entry history. I'll petition to have it done when I get some time to look up how to do that. --Tom Hulse (talk) 22:48, 17 February 2011 (UTC)

Just a remark: On German Wikipedia, it is claimed that the family was named (by Endlicher) after the person Sequoyah, but with no citation given. The same claim occurs in wikt:Sequoia, again without citation. I think it is exceedingly unlikely that the similarity is a pure accident and that there is no connection at all, so I am quite willing to believe that the family was named after the person, but it would be nice to have a citation. --Florian Blaschke (talk) 00:41, 18 February 2011 (UTC)

Well, the claim is also in the current Enc. Britannica [1]. Also Hyam & Pankhurst, 1995, Plants and their names: a concise dictionary, says "After Sequoiah (1770-1843), son of a British merchant by a Cherokee Indian woman and inventor of a system for transcribing the Cherokee language." It's also in this article according to Google, though I can't access its text. So I think you can take it that Endlicher did name the genus after the person. Personally, I don't think it matters much what the article's title is. Peter coxhead (talk) 16:52, 21 February 2011 (UTC)

That would be great info to add to the article! Since it is being discussed here in the name-change section, I'm not sure if it was meant as relevant to that, so I'll bring up that the different spelling does make it irrelevant to the name change. Sequoia (genus) is still the only primary topic for Sequoia. Most people typing "Sequoia" into the search box really want to go straight to the plant genus, and not have to search for it in a disambiguation page.
Side note: as part of this name change, the name of the disambiguation page should of course be changed to Sequoia (disambiguation)--Tom Hulse (talk) 18:27, 21 February 2011 (UTC)

I think the reason for the disambiguation is that a lot of people are looking for Sequoiadendron not Sequoia (genus). The latter is usually called "coastal redwood" in English. Certainly something like Giant Sequoia National Monument or Legend (film) is referring to Sequoiadendron rather than Sequoia (genus). There has been fairly extensive discussion on this in the past, although I don't know exactly where (either on one of the talk pages, or WT:PLANTS). I can't remember whether redirecting to Sequoioideae was one of the suggestions in the past. Kingdon (talk) 22:00, 21 February 2011 (UTC)

Kingdom, I know that the term "redwood" can be commonly applied to any of the three Sequoioideae, but I think we have to be careful not to apply that same level of commonality to the term "Sequoia". Just because we can point to a few people making mistakes in the common name does mean that Sequoia is a common name for both Sequoia (genus) and Sequoiadendron, which is the Giant Sequoia. I don't know about that old movie making a mistake, but I'm glad you mentioned Giant Sequoia National Monument, since that backs up that Sequoiadendron has a different common name, which includes the word "Giant".
A good Wikipedia example for us is Fir. Even though the Douglas-fir is the most common by far, and it is what you will always get at the lumber yard if you ask for just "fir"; it is not a Fir at all. A search on Wikipedia for "fir" will link smoothly straight to the Fir page, and not first to a disambiguation page.
It is of course Wikipedia policy to usually give extra weight to common names, however there is a very clear exception to that for plant names, per WP:FLORA. Per WP policy, and as we do for the firs, we must link to the correct genus page and then link to the disambiguation from there, instead of letting the disambiguation page be the main page. --Tom Hulse (talk) 08:17, 22 February 2011 (UTC)
Another thing to consider is that if a genus did have a common name that is identical to another genus name in which it was formerly included, then that is not a "common" name at all, just an incorrect or outdated name; and that would be good information for notes within the articles, not a means of changing standard Wikipedia policy of structuring article names. --Tom Hulse (talk) 17:19, 22 February 2011 (UTC)

I disagree - if an old taxonomic name was adopted into general use, it is a "common name" even if it is no longer taxonomically applied to that species. A common name is anything people use to refer to something. I also think there's a risk that people will consider "giant" to be a descriptive term, not part of the name, so just look up "sequoia". I don't know how common that is, but if you do move it, I would make the hatnote say "...for 'giant sequoia', see Sequoiadendron. For other uses, see Sequoia (disambiguation)". Thomas Kluyver (talk) 14:25, 23 February 2011 (UTC)

Thomas, when you say that a common name is anything people use, yes that's true in one very narrow sense, but really there are more nuances there. A common name in the venacular that does not inaccurately describe a plant is much different that a latin name for another plant that is now incorrect. If Wikipedia were to start treating old incorrect genus names as if they were full-blown-equal common names and give them equal disambiguation treatment with correct names, then the whole system would be a virtually incomprehensible confusing mess.
Also, I think it's very important to remember that Wikipedia's preference for common names does not apply to plants, per WP:FLORA. Common names for plants just don't matter here unless there is some major use that makes them more prominent in some other field than in botany. However your hatnote sounds perfect to me, and I would fully endorse it. -- Tom Hulse (talk) 21:23, 23 February 2011 (UTC)

Well, we can agree on the hatnote, if not exactly the reasons. ;-) Plant article titles should in most cases be taxonomic names, but common names should point to them (by redirects or disambigs), and I think that applies equally for common names even if they are incorrectly applied Latin names. The only difference is that we need to take care to ensure that the difference is clear. See also Nasturtium. So do we have a disambig page, or a primary page on Sequoia (the genus)? Searching on Google (sequoia tree -wikipedia) suggests that "giant sequoia" is a lot more common, but the key is whether people think of "giant sequoia" as a name, or as a description (the sequoia, which is giant). Thomas Kluyver (talk) 11:38, 24 February 2011 (UTC)

Thank you Thomas for the link to Nasturtium, and yes I do think they've made a mistake there with disambiguation page coming first. That common name for Tropaeolum is not just common, but plainly incorrect in all senses. In the encyclopedic interest of teaching people correct names, I would have a search for Nasturtium link right to the true Nasturtium genus page, with a hatnote linking to the disambiguation page just as you described here. I think we should take care not view common names as just another equal version in another naming system... usually they are just wrong names. We can record them, we can acknowledge them, but we can't give them equal disambiguation/redirect status per WP:FLORA.
However there is a difference there at Nasturtium from our Sequoia discussion: Sequoiadendron does not share a matching common name with Sequoia, only a similar one . If people are, as you say, confused about the difference between a description and a common name for Sequoiadendron, then it's not our job to make it more confusing by linking "Sequoia" striaght to a disambiguation page as if a mistakenly similar common name has equal equal standing with the actual genus name. -- Tom Hulse (talk) 19:36, 24 February 2011 (UTC)

I'd have to disagree again, then. Far more people looking for "nasturtiums" are likely to be thinking of the flowers than the watercress. Wikipedia is not on a crusade to dictate to people the "correct" names for things, and common names cannot be "incorrect". I don't know of any consensus or guideline on conflicts between common names and taxonomic names (WP:FLORA doesn't mention it), but I certainly don't think a general purpose encyclopaedia should automatically let scientific names trump common ones. Thomas Kluyver (talk) 13:04, 25 February 2011 (UTC)

I'll leave the Nasturtium thing lest we get too far off topic, but with Sequoia, regarding a guideline for common vs. taxonomic names, see the WP:FLORA section Scientific versus common names, where is says "scientific names are to be used as article titles in all cases", except where the plant has special use that makes it more prominent outside botany (rose, coffee, rice). WP:PLANTS gets even more specific under the heading Guidelines, where it also says "Scientific names are to be used as page titles in all cases except...". Then it clarifies the redirects/common-names, as we are discussing: "Common names (vernacular names) are to redirect to scientific names". Unlike articles about animals, common names at Wikipedia just don't get any respect if they're for plants.
We all want less confusion here, but the question is not whether or not to disambiguate; rather it's really 'how intrusive should we make that disambiguation'? The hatnotes & separate disambiguation page are *enough*, and letting Sequoia searches go first to the primary topic will bring the article in line with Wikipedia policy. There is no way we could say that Sequoia (the genus) is not the primary topic, especially since the word Sequoia was created soley within the framework of a universally accepted system (ICBN) that was specifically designed for keeping plant names un-confusing, and that framework says only one plant applies to this name. Consider that the name Sequoia would not even exist if not for this framework. -- Tom Hulse (talk) 07:38, 27 February 2011 (UTC)

I think you're reading something into WP:FLORA that it doesn't say. For a particular taxon, we generally use the scientific name as the title, and make redirects from common names. I'm not disputing that. But it doesn't consider the case where one name is both a common name and a taxonomic name, for different taxa. And it certainly doesn't say that common names don't get any respect. So I maintain that the "primary topic" is then a question of what more people expect that name to mean. I'm just not sure what that is for "Sequoia". Thomas Kluyver (talk) 11:46, 27 February 2011 (UTC)

Thomas, When you say you're not sure what more people expect that name to mean, I contend that it doesn't matter. Think about the difference in policy at WP for article titles between plants and animals. Common names are not allowed here for plants: it doesn't matter what people think it means, an enclopedia is here to teach them what it does mean (what you call dictating is really teaching, without which there is no use for WP to exist). Please give me your thoughts re: the fact that Sequoia as a word would not even exist if it wasn't for that framework (ICBN) that was specifically designed to keep names from becoming confusing.
Perhaps I could turn the burden of proof over to you? Intead of 'I think' as a standard, could you show me Wikipedia policy that uses other than the straight botanical name for a case like this, and could you show me Wikipedia policy that allows for a reverse of the redirects for a plant name (right now we have to look at similar common names before we get to the real Sequoia, and searches for Sequoia are redirected to the page of common names)? I did show you policy saying the article name should be the straight botanical name (nothing there about adding "(genus)"), and I did show you policy saying "common names (vernacular names) are to redirect to scientific names". If you think this case is special, trying breaking Sequoia into two words: 1) Sequoia(common), and 2) Sequoia(scientific); then plug these two names into that bold sentence. It says: "Sequoia(common) is to redirect to Sequoia(scientific)". That's it in a nutshell, it completely answers it. That whole page of common names now at Sequoia must redirect to the real scientific name, not the other way around as we have now. The hatnotes will preserve clarity.
Lastly, I don't think you have directly addressed our early discussion that "Sequoia" is not even a common name for Sequoiadendron, the "Giant Sequoia", it is only a similar name. Thank you, btw, for a very intersting, friendly discussion! -- Tom Hulse (talk) 19:21, 27 February 2011 (UTC)

No, that sentence says "Giant sequoia (common) should redirect to "Sequoiadendron (scientific)", in the same way that, for instance, Goat willow redirects to Salix caprea. That is, a common name A referring to taxon B should redirect to B, not that it should redirect to a taxonomic name which happens to be the same as A. That makes more sense, and is by far the more common case. WP:FLORA does not mention the exceptional case where the common name of one taxon is the scientific name of another. If you would like me to cite some policy, I'll take this snippet from WP:DISAMBIG: "Although an ambiguous term may refer to more than one topic, it is often the case that one of these topics is highly likely—much more likely than any other, and more likely than all the others combined—to be the subject being sought when a reader enters that ambiguous term in the Search box. If there is such a topic, then it is called the primary topic for that term."

I agree that the accepted common name is "giant sequoia"; I'm just not sure whether most people treat the two words together as the name, or think the first word is simply descriptive. But in this case, I wouldn't have a big problem with the primary article being the genus. I maintain that in the general case, scientific names don't automatically make primary topics for a term. Thomas Kluyver (talk) 01:01, 28 February 2011 (UTC)

Thomas thank you very much for steering more towards Wikipedia policy, but there are more considerations to your quote about what makes a "Primary Topic":

• First you haven't demonstrated that Sequoiadendron is specifically being sought at any percentage of searches for "Sequoia". In fact you haven't even claimed it (just "not sure"). If we're talking percentages of real, actual searches, then if someone doesn't know the proper difference between Sequoia & Sequoidendron (so that they need disambiguation), then how could they possibly know when they typed Sequoia that they didn't want the real Sequoia (and how could you demonstrate it)?
• Second, also make sure to include the full context of your quote, such as the next paragraph where it talks about exception based on educational value.
• Third, those first two don't really matter because plants are unique at Wikipedia, having their own specific naming & redirect conventions that supersede more general provisions, like the one you quoted. For instance, again from WP:PLANTS: "Common names (vernacular names) are to redirect to scientific names" (that does not hold for any other area of Wikipedia, even animals).
  

In your A/B example, I'm a little disappointed that you're trying to read confusion into a rule that just isn't there. You are pleading a special case: that the rule doesn't specifically mention when a common name is the same as a genus name. This type of argument is a logical fallacy (see Special Pleading). Since the rule is simple & plain, the burden is not on the rule to specifically account for every possible permutation; rather the burden is on you to show that your special case IS specifically addressed in the rule. So yes, as you say, Goat willow does redirect to Salix caprea; but also in our case here, the rule is clear that Sequoia the common name redirects to Sequoia the scientific name, and no exceptions are mentioned. This quote plainly says that yes, generally, scientific names do automatically make primary topics for a plant article. –– Tom Hulse (talk) 07:12, 1 March 2011 (UTC)

How can I demonstrate that? I don't know what people are thinking when they search. But given that "giant sequoia" is the most widely used name for Sequoiadendron, and that as the largest tree species it's very widely known, it seems inevitable that a substantial proportion of people entering "sequoia" will actually be thinking of Sequoiadendron. I think that needs to be weighed against the preference for scientific names. Whether the "educational value" clause is important here is debatable, and that clause is also under discussion on the talk page there.

Regarding what WP:FLORA says, I reject the suggestion that I am reading confusion into it, or resorting to special pleading. The text "Redirects should be created for all commonly used names" has a simple meaning, but it does not override disambiguation, nor say that a common name should redirect to a taxon that happens to have that name taxonomically. Like any other ambiguous term, an ambiguous common name is disambiguated, not simply redirected. Indeed, WP:FLORA mentions conflicts among common names in the next paragraph, but simply has nothing to say about conflicts between common and scientific names. I am not trying to find an exception to the rules: there is no guideline specifically for this case, so we fall back to the general principles of disambiguation. Thomas Kluyver (talk) 11:53, 1 March 2011 (UTC)

P.S. For information, here's the original discussion which made Sequoia a disambiguation page: [2]. There's some ambivalence about whether it should be a dab page or have the genus as the primary topic, but it seems marginally more people came down in favour of a dab page. Thomas Kluyver (talk) 12:04, 1 March 2011 (UTC)

Thomas thank you for the link to the past discussion, but I'm afraid you are misinterpreting it. First, the votes were primarily on a separate question (common vs. scientific article title), and the dab page issue was ancillary. There were two separate discussions there (two blue boxes), and the first is largely irrelevant because its participants were overturned with consensus due to their lack of understanding WP policy. If you look at the main vote (second blue box), even though disambiguation was not the main voting issue, two voters said Sequoia should be a genus level article, one said it should be a dab page, and one said he would be fine with it either way. That could not in any way be construed as consensus for your position. Remember that I do support disambiguation, and I do support having a full Sequoia disambiguation page, only it should not replace the position of a genus level article. Regarding your special pleading, I was explaining it with WP:PLANTS, not WP:FLORA. It says
"Article naming for flora articles differs from standard TOL policy..." (differs in that standard TOL policy is to give common names priority)
"Scientific names are to be used as page titles in all cases except the following..." (your special case is not even near one of those listed)
"Common names (vernacular names) are to redirect to scientific names." (right now it is the opposite; scientific redirects to the list of common names)
"Ambiguous common names, applied to multiple taxa, are to be listed on a set index article." (your clear answer on how to disambiguate with plants; and no you do not have any special, unlisted case)
"All known common names for a taxon are to be listed in the article about that taxon."
These quotes are not separate, to be taken individually, but are in the context of one paragraph together as the whole policy for article names & disambiguation for plants. Thomas you have to understand that plant name articles are meant to be soley at their scientific name except for the listed special cases.-- Tom Hulse (talk) 21:22, 11 March 2011 (UTC)

I discussed this with US natives in depth, and indeed they even say sloppily 'the Sequoias' when they mean Giant Sequoias. The other species almost always ist just Redwood. To make it more complicated, they may still refer to 'the Redwoods' including Giant Sequoias. On the other hand there are still British people only knowing of Sequoia gigantea. To me this is a horrible and frustrating mess and i suggest not to perpetuate this confusion in wikipedia. Please make a clean cut. --rosetta — Preceding unsigned comment added by 78.48.165.185 (talk) 22:47, 13 January 2014 (UTC)

Found in Canada too

Sequoia are found in the coastal rain forests of British Columbia. 207.216.222.107 (talk) 02:31, 2 July 2011 (UTC) Are you certain about that? Sequoia are generally a dryer conditions tree and have only been reported from the groves in California and Oregon. Are you thinking if the western red cedars?--Kevmin § 05:19, 2 July 2011 (UTC)

I've never heard of a B.C. grove but there may be plantations. --rosetta

See http://www.redwood.forestthreats.org/range.htm — Preceding unsigned comment added by 78.48.165.185 (talk) 22:59, 13 January 2014 (UTC)

Endlicher ... was not familiar with Sequoyah

It is absurd to state as proven fact that Endlicher did not know of Sequoyah. Lowe merely shows that he could not have read a particular article in English published in The Country Gentleman. It is hard to believe that Endlicher would not have read August Friedrich Pott's article on "Indogermanischer Sprachstamm published i 1840 in Allgemeine Encyclopädie der Wissenschaften und Kunst (second section, pages 1-112). Pott mentions "Sequojah" on page 7 of that work and provides a reference to F.C.W. Vogel's 1834 translation of John Pickering's Indian Languages of America which devotes ten pages to Sequoyah's work. Neither etymology can be regarded as proven or disproved. Nomen ambiguum (talk) 17:59, 3 November 2013 (UTC)

I agree. I gave a shot at a rewrite of that section. I'm sure it could stil be polished up some though, please let me know what you think. --Tom Hulse (talk) 21:53, 3 November 2013 (UTC)

FWIW, there is no conjugation form of the latin word "sequor" which is similar in spelling or pronunciation to "sequoia". Depending on what exactly is the last of a sequence of what, indicating "<it is> the last of a sequence" should probably be "sequenti" or "sequitur". Endlicher was a linquist and Latin expert; I would not think he'd be inclined to mangle conjugation of Latin. Latinizing the spelling of the name "Sequojah", however, does produce Sequoya or Sequoyah. 31.211.215.201 (talk) 07:20, 18 October 2020 (UTC)

The etymology section has problems. The addition of both of the Lowe references and the Muleady-Mecham references by IP editors should raise OR concerns for those edits. I am purposely posting this as an IP editor because it seems nobody really cares. The language of this phrase,

...however there are debilitating limitations to the arguments presented in the 2017 article,

does not convey a neutral voice and seems to be the conclusion of the reference it precedes. Lowe presents particular problems in that the Fremontia reference is conveniently not peer-reviewed and the magazine specifically disclaims the views and conclusions of the authors, the argument could be made that this is essentially assisted self-publishing. As for Lowe's self-published book (really, Lowe Bros Publishing didn't raise a flag?), regardless of which university library press partnered to publish, it doesn't meet the reliable sources guideline. Muleady-Mecham's article, while problematic in how it was added to the article meets the guideline for reliable sources. Since neither of these two authors have a definitive case, I recommend that a subcategory be created where this controversy can be discounted appropriately. Why we would allow an adjunct professor of biology and a water geologist to continue an argument in a wiki article about a subject that is the specialty of neither is beyond my comprehension. Born2flie (talk) 01:55, 6 December 2020 (UTC)

Properties of the timber

I watched an old black and white film about felling redwood trees, and making them into lumber. The film claimed that the timber was resistant to microbes and wet conditions (presumably they were used as props in wet mines). This article would benefit from a section about the use and properties of redwood timber. Would someone in the know care to add such a section? FreeFlow99 (talk) 13:34, 8 August 2016 (UTC)

Userbox Sequoia

This user enjoys giant sequoia.

If you like these trees, you may put this Userbox on your userpage like this: {{User:UBX/Sequoia}}
--Tangopaso (talk) 17:25, 25 March 2020 (UTC)