Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Birds

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Another FAC candidate

I've put Flight feather up for consideration. Please comment here! MeegsC | Talk 22:56, 30 October 2007 (UTC

Yet another ID request

Anyone want to put a name to this one? Here's a back view. Apparently it's a tame bird used to keep the gulls away in a resort in California. Also apparently, the naturalist told the photographer it was an African Hawk Eagle, but I don't believe it. —JerryFriedman

California Condor on Main Page

Today (Dec. 4)'s Main page article is the California Condor. If its not already, could everyone please put it on their watchlist to revert the vandalism a main page article typically attracts? Thanks. Rufous-crowned Sparrow 02:09, 4 December 2007 (UTC)

And congratulations on getting it on there (and keeping wrestlers and cartoons OFF!) Totnesmartin 17:24, 4 December 2007 (UTC)

Charles Foster Batchelder

Just wrote this, and will now proceed to submit it over at T:TDYK, but I'd appreciate if people could give it a review,maybe add stuff about his scientific significance in the field, given that I have relatively little on that. Circeus 03:15, 4 December 2007 (UTC)

why ignore an important link?

All the classification boxes ignore the fact that bird are in fact dinosaurs. T.Neo (talk) 14:33, 5 December 2007 (UTC)

• Considering that the class Aves was coined by Linnaeus in Systema Naturae, while Goodrich's Sauropsida was introduced some 150 years later, its actually the other way around (in terms of the taxonomical names).Rabo3 (talk) 17:06, 5 December 2007 (UTC)

So dinosaursare In fact birds? They are one and the same. T.Neo (talk) 11:55, 8 December 2007 (UTC)

• Well, yes and no (considering that the popular use of the term "dinosaurs" is a bit imprecise), but that's another discussion. My answer related directly to your question, where you asked why the taxo-boxes ignored the dinosaur link. They do not, as it, strictly speaking, is the oldest name that should be used (cf. ICZN). The name Aves is older than Sauropsida. So, if the rules were set in stone, Sauropsida would be a junior synonym of Aves - not the other way around (careful; Sauropsida as defined by Benton, 2004, is a rather different group). However, the Linnaeus based names are not strictly limited to monophyletic groups (even if there has been a general move in that direction in the last few decades), meaning that there are a few cases where major groups (class and upwards) are used even if they cover paraphyletic groups. Fishes is another paraphyletic group that frequently is used simply because it - arguably - is a logical group for everybody but hardcore fans of cladistics. Rabo3 (talk) 17:21, 8 December 2007 (UTC)

amen to that and further on the last analogy - the fish article folks refuse a taxobox! Shyamal (talk) 04:49, 9 December 2007 (UTC)

Er... Sauropsida could never be a junior synonym of Aves. And also, Aves isn't paraphyletic. Sheep81 (talk) 03:17, 13 December 2007 (UTC)

When I use the term "dinosaur" I am talking about a creature belonging to the clade dinosauria T.Neo (talk) 19:47, 12 December 2007 (UTC)

Sheep81, no, and I never said Aves was paraphyletic (which it, as you clearly know, isn't). I just said that the Linnaeus system isn't limited to monophyletic groups. The Aves versus Sauropsida comment was said tongue in cheek, and I thought that was clear, but if it was not - my mistake (obviously, no one would ever serious suggest moving the whole deal to Aves!). Part of the problem is the dual use of Sauropsida - sometimes used for the polyphyletic group which popularly could be called reptiles, amphibians and dinosaurs (roughly Reptilia), and sometimes (better, the way it originally was intended and is correct as per cladistics) for the monophyletic group, which also includes the birds (+ a few smaller groups of arguably more problematic status). So, there's the problem, we've got one class, which, from the cladistic point of viuew, includes another class (and the Linnaeus system is pretty clear about the probs in that). Could it be argued that Aves should be changed - well, yes, but there's part of the point I was trying to make earlier: If nothing is gained (which I, at best, would question in this case), then the Linnaeus system does not require that the change, as it does not necessarily require that names are restricted to monophyletic groups. Of course, if was speaking to colleagues or writing a scientific paper on the phylogenetic affinities of these clades that would be a different matter, but wiki is not a "biologists & paleontologists only" club, and when most people think about birds, they think about the extant species. Rabo3 (talk) 05:56, 13 December 2007 (UTC)

I apologize, I was reading your comment backwards. Personally, if taxoboxes are going to use Linnaean ranks then I am just fine with Class Aves for birds and Class Sauropsida for all other reptiles. Linnaean ranks are inherently subjective so I don't really see the point in trying to tie them to phylogeny, making them all monophyletic. The taxobox is kind of a shortcut for people so it's best to use terminology that is more widely understood. That's my opinion. Sheep81 (talk) 06:20, 13 December 2007 (UTC)

Conure/Parakeet

A recently suggested move of the Sun Conure article to Sun Parakeet has resulted in a rather lengthy discussions on its talk page. Any additional input would be appreciated; esp. in regards of the general naming rules - if any - typically applied to pages for birds. Thanks Rabo3 (talk) 16:50, 5 December 2007 (UTC)

Collaboration deadlock and Barn Swallow at FAC

OK folks, there is a deadlock on the choice for collaboration 'tween teh Kea and the Barn Owl at 4 votes each...consider breaking said deadlock or voting for the dark horse if you so desire.....cheers, Casliber (talk · contribs) 01:50, 6 December 2007 (UTC)

Barn Swallow

Barn Swallow has passed FA, great input from the project. The bad news is that I've started ever so slowly tweaking Blackbird.Jimfbleak (talk) 06:45, 7 December 2007 (UTC)

Congratulations Jim! One question though: why is Blackbird tweaking bad news? : ) MeegsC | Talk 09:55, 7 December 2007 (UTC)

Makes lots of work for everyone who edits, reviews, etc ( : Jimfbleak (talk) 12:27, 7 December 2007 (UTC)

Again, congratulations on passing it! Now, if I could only find time to actually do the oft-promised Andean Condor... Rufous-crowned Sparrow (talk) 14:11, 7 December 2007 (UTC)

What featured pictures should be acceptable for birds?

There is a discussion here. Permalink is here. Samsara (talk • contribs) 14:38, 7 December 2007 (UTC)

Bird at FAC....

It has pretty much been ready for months. So I threw it to FAC. If there are any other problems they are minor so go and comment! Hopefully now I can go back to simpler more fun things. Sabine's Sunbird talk 00:47, 8 December 2007 (UTC)

Blackbird

I think the input from various editors now makes this a fairly comprehensive article, so I'm putting it up for peer review. Please make any changes required or comment here Jimfbleak (talk) 08:12, 13 December 2007 (UTC)

ID of Hawaiian bird

File:Bird on Hawaii.jpg Is it a Saffron Finch? Bamse (talk) 09:37, 13 December 2007 (UTC)

Sure is. Rabo3 (talk) 15:45, 13 December 2007 (UTC)

Thanks. Bamse (talk) 07:26, 14 December 2007 (UTC)

Greenspun illustration project: requests now open

Dear Wikimedians,

This is a (belated) announcement that requests are now being taken for illustrations to be created for the Philip Greenspun illustration project (PGIP).

The aim of the project is to create and improve illustrations on Wikimedia projects. You can help by identifying which important articles or concepts are missing illustrations (diagrams) that could make them a lot easier to understand. Requests should be made on this page: Philip_Greenspun_illustration_project/Requests

If there's a topic area you know a lot about or are involved with as a Wikiproject, why not conduct a review to see which illustrations are missing and needed for that topic? Existing content can be checked by using Mayflower to search Wikimedia Commons, or use the Free Image Search Tool to quickly check for images of a given topic in other-language projects.

The community suggestions will be used to shape the final list, which will be finalised to 50 specific requests for Round 1, due to start in January. People will be able to make suggestions for the duration of the project, not just in the lead-up to Round 1.

• General information about the project: m:Philip_Greenspun_illustration_project
• Potential illustrators and others interested in the project should join the mailing list: mail:greenspun-illustrations

thanks, pfctdayelise (talk) 13:04, 13 December 2007 (UTC) (Project coordinator)

Yet another capitalization debate

There is another debate about capitalization at the MoS talk page. This one started as a comment specific to birds, but it appears to be getting bigger than that. Anyone wishing to join the debate please do so. Justin ^chat 18:40, 14 December 2007 (UTC)

Regional bird list template

Darn it! Basar, who'd started work on our "Bird list header" template, has gone and retired! So I've been messing a bit with the template (in my sandbox, of course) for the past few days, seeing how it works. I think the idea has some real potential; it would greatly reduce the amount of time and energy needed to create and maintain regional lists of virtually any sort. However, I think there are some problems with the template as it currently exists.

Chief among them, in my books, is the fact that the edit button is effectively deactivated; you can edit the whole page, but not individual sections. (See List of California birds, as an example.) I think this might be confusing for the average editor, who won't understand why the normal "edit" buttons aren't beside the obvious headers. (Of course, maybe this is a good thing; maybe it'll keep the vandals from doing too much damage!) The deactivation has to do with fact that headers can't be parsed, apparently. I've managed to get around this in the version I'm playing with by putting the headers in the list rather than the template (which might be what we want to do anyway, since several people have already made the suggestion that the header shouldn't say, for instance, "Trogons and quetzals" in countries where there are no quetzals.)

• So, do we want to include "standard" headers in the template, or should these be done individually on each regional list?

Another issue is that adding references to the individual sections isn't possible in the current version. Because the same template is called many times (as many times as there are orders, to be precise), the same citation gets added to the reference list over and over and over. In fact, it gets added as many times as the template is called! I'll keep playing, but I'm wondering if it might be easier and more straightforward (unless someone out there is a template wizard and can suggest a workaround) to create one header template for each order—called, for example "Anatidae list header" or "Phasianidae list header" or whatever. Each of these would only be called once, which would mean the citations wouldn't appear multiple times unless they should. However, it would also mean many more templates to keep track of.

OK, I found a workaround. If we use in-line citations (e.g. (Ogilvie & Rose, 2003)) rather than footnotes, this can work in a single template. It looks a bit different than most of our articles (which use footnotes), and personally, I don't think it's as clean-looking, but it'll work! —Preceding unsigned comment added by MeegsC (talk • contribs) 09:51, 15 December 2007 (UTC)

• Any thoughts on which might be the better solution?

Some additional questions:

• Do we want to include (as standard information on all lists which use the template), a sentence which indicates how many species each order has?

For example: There are 20 species of grebe in the world, though one—the Alaotra Grebe—may be extinct. The advantage of putting this in the template, of course, would be that we wouldn't have to update all the lists if a new species is discovered/described, or if something goes extinct; it would only need to be updated in the template.

• Do we want to include (as standard information on all lists which use the template) a line that indicates the number of a particular order found in the region in question?

For example: There are 20 species of grebe in the world. Of these, one has occurred in The Gambia. (The bold is only for purposes of illustrating what I mean; it wouldn't be bolded in the real text.) It's easy to pass parameters to the template for the number and the country, and this would ensure that all lists have the same sort of information included. The template can also automatically convert numbers to words where necessary (ie under 10), which means we don't have to remember to do it! : )

• Do we want to include the number of species in a particular order found on each continent?

For example: There are 20 species of grebe in the world. Of these, eight have occurred in Africa, and one in the Gambia. Again, this continent-level information could be maintained at the template level; we'd only need to pass it the parameter as to which continent's number we wanted.

Any other comments and/or thoughts are most welcome! MeegsC | Talk 22:45, 14 December 2007 (UTC)

The edit of sections is disabled by __NOEDITSECTION__ and removing that from template:Bird list header should put back normal section editing functionality. Shyamal (talk) 12:14, 15 December 2007 (UTC)

I understood, from comments on the template page, that removing __NOEDITSECTION__ isn't advised unless we remove the headers from the template; otherwise, the parser functions won't work properly. (If you remove it and try to edit the resulting page, you'll see why.) MeegsC | Talk 12:32, 15 December 2007 (UTC)

capitalization of word following hyphen in bird names

While there, at least for birds, is nothing to discuss in regards of the standard capitalization of e.g. Rufous Twistwing (as evidently is being discussed elsewhere), I would point out that, contrary to the information given on the front-page of this group, it is not a generally accepted standard that "the word immediately following a hyphen in a species name is not capitalised". This is true per BOU, but not per AOU, which generally follow the rules recommended by Parkes, 1978 (PDF). An example: Black-crowned Night-heron (correct per BOU) contra Black-crowned Night-Heron (correct per AOU). In short, the "AOU rules" depend on the "truth" of the name, i.e. if it really belongs to the group, it should be in capital. Hence, the Black-crowned Night-Heron, which really is a heron (Ardeidae), should have "heron" in capital per AOU. An example of the contrary is the Superb Fairy-wren, where "wren" shouldn't be written in capital per "AOU rules", as it isn't a wren (Troglodytidae). Not surprisingly, there is a general tendency for African, European, Asian and Australian authorities & bird guides to follow the BOU, while authorities & bird guides in the Americas (North, Central & South + Caribbean) generally follow AOU. Anyhow, I'm not sure how the front-page of this group came to be, but it might be worth mentioning the disagreement among the various authorities on this specific issue. Rabo3 (talk) 00:11, 15 December 2007 (UTC)

Proposed change to Wikipedia:Naming conventions (fauna)

There is a current proposal to change an animal-related naming convention, which directly effects the the Manual of Style guideline, and the naming conventions policy. If you are interested, your input would be appreciated. Justin ^chat 06:32, 15 December 2007 (UTC)

Capitalization of birds

Apparently, some specialist (esoteric) books on birds have an odd convention of capitlizing words, such as Common Pheasants. However, I am still puzzled about why this esoteric convention should be enforced on wikipedia. This is an general encyclopedia, not a web site on birds.

See britannica (Entry at the concise Encyclopedia Britannica).

Any of about 50 species of mostly long-tailed birds in the family Phasianidae (order Galliformes), chiefly Asian but naturalized elsewhere.

Most species inhabit open woodlands and brushy fields. All have a hoarse call. The feet and lower legs are unfeathered. Females are inconspicuous. Most males are strikingly coloured and have one or more leg spurs, and some have a fleshy facial ornament. Males sometimes fight to the death for a harem of hens. Male ring-necked or common pheasants (Phasianus colchicus), 35 in. (90 cm) long, have a streaming tail, coppery breast, purplish green neck, and ear tufts; they are widespread in the northern U.S. Japanese green pheasants (P. versicolor) call in concert when an earthquake is imminent.

What do you think? TableManners (talk) 17:34, 16 December 2007 (UTC)

Hmm. "Esoteric specialist books". Guess that includes any bird field guide (including all of those found in North America), most any reference book about birds (as opposed to an encyclopedia which apparently says "ring-necked or common pheasants" are only found in the northern US! MeegsC | Talk 17:48, 16 December 2007 (UTC)

And I'd love to see the earthquake ref. Jimfbleak (talk) 20:59, 16 December 2007 (UTC)

Yes, wiki articles about birds based on the vast majority of that written in books/articles specifically about birds is clearly problematic. That's comparable to writing wiki articles about physics based on books/articles specifically about... erhm, physics. Rabo3 (talk) 22:06, 16 December 2007 (UTC)

I have a book called Pheasants by Peter Robertson. It does not follow this convention. And it is a whole book on pheasants, not a single book about hundreds of birds. I think this books is probably worth more than my "The Sibley Guide to Birds." Regarding earthquakes, it was in the britannica reference--true or not, I am not sure. TableManners (talk) 01:29, 17 December 2007 (UTC)

Dangerous to extrapolate a pattern from a sample size of one, no? Of my library of bird books there is a split, in favour of capitalisation (particularly the more recent books), although not without numerous exceptions. Likewise in journals. Overall, however the pattern is the important works and journals capitalise. Sabine's Sunbird talk 02:33, 17 December 2007 (UTC)

Yes, it is dangerous to extrapolate. I have another point, however. This is an encyclopedia, and not a bird encyclopedia but a general topic encyclopedia. As such, it seems that an article on birds here would look more like an article on birds in the National Geographic or New York Times, neither of which, I think, would capitalize. TableManners (talk) 02:36, 17 December 2007 (UTC)

The rule is not, as it happens, enforced in non-avian articles for exactly that reason. For example in the article Ode to a Nightingale nightingale is not capitalised (except as the title) because the article is on poetry, even though it is capitalised in Nightingale. Where articles are written about ornithology, ornithological conventions are followed (as are any conventions on specialised articles). Moreover I would be loath to follow the example of the media, given their sloppy work in so many instances of scientific reporting (I have lost count of the number of times that I have seen binomial names like Luscinia megarhynchos rendered without italics or with misplaced capitals on the specific name or whatever, even in distinguished sources like teh Times of London or the BBC). Finally, I'd point out that this has been discussed ad naseum at WP:MOS and WP:TOL and elsewhere. Sabine's Sunbird talk 03:11, 17 December 2007 (UTC)

<undent>Okay, but here is a problem. What if someone starts a WikiProject North American Game, and they have a different set of rules. (I am actually thinking about doing this, not to change the capitalization rules but because hunting information is not very good.). The problem is, for example, we have "Gray fox" and "Common Pheasant". You can group some birds into other logical groupings, and it would be niced to have consistency in that grouping as well. I'll go take a look at WP:MOS and WP:TOL, but I think taking a ornithology POV (not everybody in the world is a birder) may be bad in some bird articles. (E.g., pheasant hunters in the United States would have found the article on Common Pheasant basically worthless, if they had found it at all, since a North American hunter would have just typed in Pheasant, which, until recently, had no easy way to get to Common pheasant. I.e., a North American Hunter would have spent very little time at Wikipedia, and would have instead found the information they were looking for on various Natural Resources departments' websites. TableManners (talk) 03:17, 17 December 2007 (UTC)

I'm not 100% sure what the problem is, could you try explaining it a little more clearly? To try and address some of your concerns,

• It should not be an issue finding an article using American spelling or a lack of capitals, suitable redirects and dab messages should exist to help anyone find the article they want; if they aren't there then they should be.
• a ornithology POV (not everybody in the world is a birder) may be bad in some bird articles - just to be clear, an ornithological POV would be different from a birder POV - one refers to the science of birds and the other to the hobby of watching them. But appropriate information on other important aspects of a species should also be included. For some species, Common Pheasants (in Europe and America), or Paradise Shellducks (in New Zealand), or other game species, information about hunting should of course be including, as it is a vital aspect of their relationship with people. If that information is not yet there that is because no one has yet gotten around to adding it, not because there is an attempt not to include it. This is still a work in progress, rememeber. That said, remember that Wikipedia is not a how-too. But if you want to improve the amount of information about important game species that is no bad thing. Sabine's Sunbird talk 03:31, 17 December 2007 (UTC)

Trying to restate the issue. Some projects (e.g., North American Game) will have inconsistent capitilization. E.g., "red fox" and "Common Snipe". This project would be a grouping (like the birds grouping). It may have different requirements. Who wins? Why does WikiProject Birds get to dictate the capilization rules (and they are extraordinary)? TableManners (talk) 04:01, 17 December 2007 (UTC)

That's not inconsistent capitalization. You will consistently capitalize bird names and consistently not capitalize other names. Sounds pretty consistent to me. Sheep81 (talk) 06:03, 17 December 2007 (UTC)

How about the US Fish & Wildlife Service? See here for a listing of birds protected by the Migratory Bird Treaty Act—with capitalization consistent with how Wikipedia is currently doing it. MeegsC | Talk 11:06, 17 December 2007 (UTC)

Regarding the US Fish & Wildlife Service, it did not take me long to find the following at their cite:

"The mourning dove (Zenaida macroura) is a migratory bird, thus, authority and responsibility for its management is vested in the Secretary of the Interior. This responsibility is conferred by the Migratory Bird Treaty Act of 1918 which, as amended, implements migratory bird treaties between the United States and other countries...."[1]

There are several articles like this that I found. Notice that mourning dove is lower case, and that macroura is also lower case (though Zenaida is upper case). Here are some other examples.

"The American woodcock is a popular game birdthroughout eastern North America."[2]

Here it is American woodcock (and American may be uppercase for other reasons.)

"...trumpeter swans..."[3]

All of these documents were found at www.fws.gov. Is any of this this persuasive? TableManners (talk) 02:05, 18 December 2007 (UTC)

Tablemanners,

All right, here we go through some sources that support capitalizing. First, I own a copy of the Handbook of Bird Biology, a textbook put out by the Cornell Lab of Ornithology through Princeton, that capitalizes all of its species. This is used as the basic textbook for Cornell's ornithology class. BirdLife International, a leader in bird conservation, uses all caps in its articles [4][5] [6]. The IUCN, which judges the status of all bird and other animal species, uses all caps for all animals [7] (scroll down a bit on this one). The Cornell Lab of Ornithology, believed in several circles to be the premier institute in ornithology, uses all caps. [8] [9] [10]. The Handbook of Birds of the World, whose taxonomy every Wikipedia bird article is based on, uses all caps. (website was having server problems when I tried, but if you squint [11]. These listed above are some of the biggest names is the field of ornithology, and they use all caps.

You argued earlier that Wikipedia is a general, not a birding, encyclopedia, and used that as an argument against capitalizing. I ask then what we should base our capitalization rules on other than the basic sources in the field? These are all big names in the ornithology field and if they said that the Hooded Pitohui was poisonous, no one would question the source. Why should we question their rules on capitalization? Is not most of Wikipedia’s articles based upon the leading references in their specific field?

You also asked who should win in a battle over capitalization between WP:Birds and, say, WP North American Game. I would have to say that I would go with the established rule per MOS and go with the WP that covers the topic, such as WP Mammals or Birds, for the capitalization of a species, simply because they cover every member in that class rather than a more specific project that covers creatures in both classes. I'm considering starting a critically endangered task force for WP Tree of Life, and that was how I was planning on approaching capitalization.

Oh, and most ornithological magazines and descriptions of new bird species use all caps too. [12] [13] And I’ve seen several news sources use all caps [14] [15]. Anyways, I know there are references out there that use lower case, but I do not think that there are enough of them to overturn the current decision, based in part on highly influential ornithological and basic references like those above, and change the titles and information in oveer 10,000 articles. Thanks. Rufous-crowned Sparrow (talk) 03:10, 18 December 2007 (UTC)

<unindent<--->Impressive. I'll have to work very hard to overcome that. Meanwhile, a bit of humor. "Why should we question their rules on capitalization?" Because E. B. White knows more about langauge than ornithologists? What if ornithologists had decided to capitalize the first two letters of each word, or the odd letters? CoMmOn PhEaSaNt? At what point would we refuse to follow ornithologist's eccentricities on capitalization? This is all insane...but like I said, you have a good case (and these comments are mostly meant to be humorous). TableManners ^U·T·C 03:21, 18 December 2007 (UTC)

Or what if ornithologists decided to ban common names forevermore and only use scientific? Or decided that all bird articles must be written in Latin? Seriously, though, the point that I was making with the why question comment was that if we accept their information as almost definitive, why ignore their capitalization rules? This merely shows that most of the biggest names in ornithology use all caps. Sorry if it came off as a gruff and oppressive comment. Oh, and I like your new signature, Tablemanners. Rufous-crowned Sparrow (talk) 03:33, 18 December 2007 (UTC)