Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Rivers/Archive 6

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River maps

@Finetooth and Shannon1: – The project page says every river article should get a map, but I've been pushing back on edits like this that add an uninformative map of a pin on a large state (California in all the cases of the ones I reverted, I think), especially on articles that have illustrations that get displaced down the page by this waste of space. I'd suggest modifying the guideline to ask for good maps, not useless maps. For example, see lots of good maps in the Commons uploads of Shannon1. Dicklyon (talk) 16:30, 16 January 2019 (UTC)

I don't see anything wrong with that map myself, especially since the river is only 14 miles long, and it shows exactly where it is in context to the rest of the state. Not sure why you're reverting it. If it were a longer river a pushpin map would make less sense. SportingFlyer T·C 17:20, 16 January 2019 (UTC)
What's wrong is that the map takes up a lot of space near the top of the article, pushing pictures down, and only provides a vague idea of where it is (indistinguishable from the many other creeks in the area). And if you click on it, you get less info, not more. A county or region push-pin map, hopefully showing the course and nearby other creeks, would be informative, but this is not. Dicklyon (talk) 17:38, 16 January 2019 (UTC)
Are there any examples of US county push-pin maps? It seems like it'd be nice to have them but I can't think of any articles with them. I'd be happy to help make some, though I am not familiar with how they work. Shannon [ Talk ] 21:41, 16 January 2019 (UTC)
I also don't have a problem with the pushpin maps, they aren't ideal, but I think they are still better than no map at all - giving a vague idea of location is better than no idea of location. Good maps take a long time to make and it can be useful to at least have something in the meantime. I don't see pushing other images further down the page a particularly compelling negative. Kmusser (talk) 22:03, 16 January 2019 (UTC)
I agree - a better map is possible, but the page is better off with the pushpin map than no map. SportingFlyer T·C 22:47, 16 January 2019 (UTC)
Lots of infobox templates now automatically add a OSM map if the coordinates exist. These are in addition to the pushpin maps if they are present. Dunes_(hotel_and_casino) is an example. MB 22:59, 16 January 2019 (UTC)
Nice, does Infobox River support this, or can it be added? I think in the example beginning this conversation a OSM pushpin map would be a definitely improvement over the California pushpin map. Kmusser (talk) 14:53, 17 January 2019 (UTC)
I believe it could be added if there was consensus here. Making the change would add an OSM map to every River infobox that had coordinates (either in the infobox or Wikidata - same was with the pushpin maps). MB 15:08, 17 January 2019 (UTC)
Hmmm, it would be nice as an option, but I don't think I'd necessarily want it to be "on" as the default as we'd only want it where we didn't have a better map. Kmusser (talk) 15:42, 17 January 2019 (UTC)
What's an OSM map? Show us an example? Dicklyon (talk) 15:46, 17 January 2019 (UTC)
I gave you a link above to a casino article. Aerial lighthouse is a lighthouse. Or see any article in Category:Lighthouses. MB 16:07, 17 January 2019 (UTC)
Ah, I see it probably means OpenStreetMap. But in those examples I don't see how to put one in an article; must be the template magic doing it. Is there an info page about how to use OSM maps? I see WP:OSM, but it's pretty cryptic. Maybe you can show us how to do one on a river article. Dicklyon (talk) 02:55, 18 January 2019 (UTC)
Well, there is a Template:OSM Location map that I have used to make some manually. You can see samples here. But that is a fairly tedious process (you have to specify the coord of the center of the displayed map in addition to the location you are mapping, and get the scaling right). The ones in the infoboxes are an improved automated version. I don't know exactly how they work, but a Template Editor familiar with them could add the functionality to the river infobox template just like has been done to the others already. MB 03:43, 18 January 2019 (UTC)
My thought in adding a pushpin map to a river article with no map is to make the location more instantly apparent to a reader living thousands of miles from the river in question. Most readers will know where the United States is. Some will know exactly where each state is within the United States, and almost none will know where each county lies. The pushpin maps with the state and national options, as in Dunes_(hotel_and_casino), partially solve the location problem until something better comes along. If the pushpin maps cause layout problems, I think these can be solved by rearranging the images or by adding a gallery section if there's no way to accommodate the images without creating text sandwiches or displacing the article heads and subheads. Finetooth (talk) 22:10, 19 January 2019 (UTC)
I'm not an actual participant in the WikiProject, but I was trying to add an infobox to the newly-made Uchee Creek (Georgia) page. However, the map didn't show up correctly. Can someone assist in correcting it? Thank you. Morriswa (Charlotte Allison) (talk) 16:07, 21 March 2019 (UTC)
Done. MB 16:36, 21 March 2019 (UTC)
@Finetooth: I agree with you, I think a state level pushpin-map is useful for people who live thousands of miles away (or even hundreds of miles away) and have no idea where a given river might be. -Furicorn (talk) 17:57, 21 March 2019 (UTC)

Nomination of Portal:Androscoggin River for deletion

A discussion is taking place as to whether Portal:Androscoggin River is suitable for inclusion in Wikipedia according to Wikipedia's policies and guidelines or whether it should be deleted.

The page will be discussed at Wikipedia:Miscellany for deletion/Portal:Androscoggin River until a consensus is reached, and anyone is welcome to contribute to the discussion. The nomination will explain the policies and guidelines which are of concern. The discussion focuses on high-quality evidence and our policies and guidelines.

Users may edit the page during the discussion, including to improve the page to address concerns raised in the discussion. However, do not remove the deletion notice from the top of the page. North America1000 00:32, 26 March 2019 (UTC)

Article Request: Lane's Balance

Lane's Balance was instrumental to me for understanding fluvial geomorphology. I would consider it to be a mid-importance page. I'd be happy to contribute to it if it existed. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Prometheus720 (talk • contribs) 05:39, 10 April 2019 (UTC)

A new newsletter directory is out!

A new Newsletter directory has been created to replace the old, out-of-date one. If your WikiProject and its taskforces have newsletters (even inactive ones), or if you know of a missing newsletter (including from sister projects like WikiSpecies), please include it in the directory! The template can be a bit tricky, so if you need help, just post the newsletter on the template's talk page and someone will add it for you.

– Sent on behalf of Headbomb. 03:11, 11 April 2019 (UTC)

Rivers of Romania

Rivers of Romania, List of rivers of Romania and four other related redirects have been nominated at Wikipedia:Redirects for discussion/Log/2019 June 17#Rivers of Romania where your comments are invited. Thryduulf (talk) 14:48, 17 June 2019 (UTC)

Merging WP:Waterfalls into this project

Hi all, WikiProject Waterfalls seems to have fallen silent. There was a very brief discussion on its talk page about what to do, and some had suggested merging with this project as a task force. Basically, the 1,100 articles marked with the WP:Waterfalls template would instead get marked with a WP:RIVERS template with a new parameter "|waterfall=yes" or something like that. The sole purpose of the parameter would be to maintain article tracking for waterfall articles, in case folks in the present or future would still like to sort through waterfall articles. So my question: are folks alright with this change? It would result in up to 1,100 waterfall articles being added to this project (though I suspect some are already tagged with WP:RIVERS). Thoughts? Ajpolino (talk) 03:59, 20 June 2019 (UTC)

Sounds a reasonable idea--Ymblanter (talk) 15:35, 20 June 2019 (UTC)
Hah, as I read this I was thinking, "Oh I should show this person how we did the merges over at WP:MOLBIO" and then I saw your name. I guess you already know most of it! For anyone else, check out Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Biology#Possible_Merger:_WP:GEN_+_WP:MCB_+_WP:COMBIO_+_WP:BIOP and some of the neighboring discussions, as well as the "end" result at MOLBIO. We aren't actually done yet. But essentially, we made the smaller projects into taskforces and combined the talk page archives so that they can be searched as one. We did some redesign as well and added some new functionality to the main page. Anyway, that is a model for how a merge process could look. I should note that there is also precedent in WP:VG and WP:USA for merging inactive projects, though I was not involved there. This one would be a lot simpler with only two total projects. If this reaches consensus but there are still technical difficulties or major questions, please feel free to ping me! And to clarify, I am in support of this merger. However, as I am not an active editor in either project (yet, it's on my docket which is why I watch here), my thoughts should count for less than those of the active members here.Prometheus720 (talk) 15:53, 20 June 2019 (UTC)
I am not a very active member either, though the merge seems to be a logical step. The joy of all things (talk) 16:27, 20 June 2019 (UTC)
I agree this is a reasonable idea which should help integrate the hydropower and inland navigation aspects of waterfalls within river ecosystems. Thewellman (talk) 17:50, 20 June 2019 (UTC)
Just an update, I haven't forgotten about this. The {{WikiProject Rivers}} template is template protected, so I'm waiting on an admin or template editor to respond to my template edit request which theoretically should allow the WP:Rivers template to accept a Taskforce Waterfalls parameter. I'll post here when that process is complete. Thanks all for your input! Ajpolino (talk) 19:59, 28 June 2019 (UTC)
I updated the template--Ymblanter (talk) 20:38, 28 June 2019 (UTC)
Fantastic! Then we're off to the races. I've filed a bot request to update the talk page tags. I'll post here before and after any bot run so folks can be on the lookout for any mistakes. Also feel free to let me know and/or comment at the bot request if you see any errors in it. Thanks all! Ajpolino (talk) 22:34, 28 June 2019 (UTC)
 Done by JJMC89. Thanks all for your input and JJMC89 for your assistance!`Ajpolino (talk) 03:28, 12 July 2019 (UTC)

Disambiguating by county

We have lots of same-named rivers and creeks in California and other places, and lots of disambiguating by county. When we do so, we most often include the state name with the county name. I recently moved Adobe Creek (Santa Clara County, California) to Adobe Creek (Santa Clara County) before I noticed that including the state is most common. Should it be? The combination of creek name and county name is most often unique without the state, so it's not ambiguous to omit the state; and the ambiguity is most often within a state when the county is needed. So, should we have some preference for how to do this? More concise vs more fully disambiguated? Or should we try to disambiguate these some other way? I find about 325 cases of creeks disambiguated by county, with near 75% of those including the state. Dicklyon (talk) 04:20, 7 September 2019 (UTC)

I think I'll remove some more states if nobody objects. Dicklyon (talk) 01:35, 12 September 2019 (UTC)

I'd just double check that the creek county combination is indeed unique, for example GNIS has 4 creeks that would match Little Creek (Jefferson County). Kmusser (talk) 14:11, 12 September 2019 (UTC)
Sorry, I meant to reply to this thread earlier and forgot. Thanks for raising the issue. My personal feeling is that invoking the county name without naming the state makes the title feel incomplete, and it kind of feels like it's asserting an assumption (however unintended) that "of course everybody knows which state ___ County is in." In the text of articles, county names are usually not invoked without somehow establishing the context of the county's larger jurisdiction, and to me it seems friendlier to readers (maybe not to editors) to do that in the title, too. Thanks-- TimK MSI (talk) 15:40, 12 September 2019 (UTC)
Apparently about 3/4 of editors feel that way. Perhaps we should make that the convention then? Also, in many rivers that are disambiguated by county, it might just be better to do something completely different. Dicklyon (talk) 05:25, 18 September 2019 (UTC)

Different name same river

Beaver River (Oklahoma) and the North Canadian River are the same river with interchangeable names. I thought Beaver River might be about that part in Oklahoma but it does not appear to be the case. Otr500 (talk) 09:02, 23 September 2019 (UTC)

I've replied at Talk:Beaver River (Oklahoma) and I propose consolidating the discussion there. Thanks--TimK MSI (talk) 11:18, 23 September 2019 (UTC)

Request for information on WP1.0 web tool

Hello and greetings from the maintainers of the WP 1.0 Bot! As you may or may not know, we are currently involved in an overhaul of the bot, in order to make it more modern and maintainable. As part of this process, we will be rewriting the web tool that is part of the project. You might have noticed this tool if you click through the links on the project assessment summary tables.

We'd like to collect information on how the current tool is used by....you! How do you yourself and the other maintainers of your project use the web tool? Which of its features do you need? How frequently do you use these features? And what features is the tool missing that would be useful to you? We have collected all of these questions at this Google form where you can leave your response. Walkerma (talk) 04:24, 27 October 2019 (UTC)

New bot to remove completed infobox requests

Hello! I have recently created a bot to remove completed infobox requests and am sending this message to WikiProject Rivers since the project currently has a backlogged infobox request category. Details about the task can be found at Wikipedia:Bots/Requests for approval/PearBOT 2, but in short it removes all infobox requests from articles with an infobox, once a week. To sign up, reply with {{ping|Trialpears}} and tell me if any special considerations are required for the Wikiproject. For example: if only a specific infobox should be detected, such as {{infobox journal}} for WikiProject Academic Journals; or if an irregularly named infobox such as {{starbox begin}} should be detected. Feel free to ask if you have any questions!

Sent on behalf of Trialpears (talk) via MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 02:34, 12 December 2019 (UTC)

Discussion about tributary and basin categories

Currently rivers are categorized hydrographically in two systems: Category:Tributaries by river and its subcategories, and Category:Drainage basins and its subcategories. Not all rivers are categorized by tributary, and not all rivers are categorized by basin, there is limited overlap (Category:Tributaries of the Prut River vs. Category:Prut basin, Category:Tributaries of the Po (river) vs. Category:Po basin). In this CfD discussion, it was proposed by Marcocapelle to categorize all rivers in "tributaries" categories, which are parented by the related "basin" category. This "basin" category would contain the related "tributaries" categories and the other waterbodies (lakes, reservoirs, canals etc.) of that basin. If a "basin" category only contains "tributaries" categories and no articles, it could be upmerged. Since this would be a major change, I would like to discuss it here. First whether it is considered an improvement to implement this idea, afterwards we can discuss details like how to sort the tributaries in the category, direct and indirect tributaries, how to nest the tributary and basin categories into their parent categories, etc. etc. Markussep Talk 08:22, 6 December 2019 (UTC)

Making the basin categories parents of the tributary categories makes sense to me, as you mention the basin categories may contain things other then tributaries, but all tributaries are going to be in the basin by definition. Kmusser (talk) 17:16, 8 December 2019 (UTC)
That structure also sounds good to me. I do think the widely-used "Tributaries of..." naming convention is really bad. In common usage, to say "River A is a tributary of River B" is to say that River A flows directly into River B. The "Tributaries of..." categories are at odds with that common usage. I think something like "Rivers of the ___ basin" would better express the categories' purpose. Thanks--TimK MSI (talk) 19:33, 8 December 2019 (UTC)
Both "indirect tributary" and "second-order tributary", "third-order tributary" etc. are commonly used, see these Google Scholar searches [1] and [2]. Maybe it's not beautiful English, but it exists outside Wikipedia. An alternative option (which involves less work, on European rivers at least) would be to abandon the "tributaries" categories completely and to rename or merge them to "basin" categories. Pinging users that were involved in a previous discussion: @Ymblanter:, @Bermicourt:, @Thewellman:, @Mhockey:, @Jokulhlaup:, @Redrose64:, @Hmains:. Markussep Talk 08:38, 9 December 2019 (UTC)
I favour the system on German Wikipedia which is highly developed and even allows rivers to be grouped by stream order within a category using an initial number in the category syntax. Essentially they categorise all rivers and other waterbodies by basin down to 4th-order streams e.g. de:Kategorie:Flusssystem Rhein. There is no need for a tributaries category as all the tributaries are grouped by stream order within the basin category alongside the different types of waterbodies, each in their own group. This is achieved using the category syntax. Alongside that, especially for the bigger rivers, they have a river category e.g. de:Kategorie:Rhein which includes the basin but also covers the cultural, economic, historical, geographical and regional articles associated with the river.
The problem with having both basin and tributary categories is that, often, the latter is often just a large subset of the former; not quite a duplication, but almost so. Bermicourt (talk) 20:37, 9 December 2019 (UTC)
Rivers are also categorized Category:Rivers of political subdivision. I see no reason why the drainage basin categories (which might also contain cities or historic sites within the basin) would be any more objectionably duplicative than the present political subdivision categories. Thewellman (talk) 22:38, 9 December 2019 (UTC)
Trying to sort a category of rivers by "stream order" is prone to opinion. Consider the River Goyt and River Tame; their confluence is at Stockport. Which river is the tributary of the other? --Redrose64 🌹 (talk) 23:35, 9 December 2019 (UTC)
@Thewellman: I don't propose to delete the "basin" categories, I'd like to discuss whether we need "tributaries" categories (as subcategories of "basin" categories). @Bermicourt: the method we used for grouping by stream order doesn't work anymore because of a change in how numbers are sorted in categories, which German wikipedia apparently escaped from. I don't think we'll succeed in reverting that, so probably we should give up this grouping system, unless we can think of a good alternative. @Redrose64: I guess they would both be tributaries of the Mersey, just like Brigach and Breg are tributaries of the Danube, and Mayenne and Sarthe are tributaries of the Maine. Markussep Talk 08:39, 10 December 2019 (UTC)
As an inclusionist, I perceive value in tributary subcategories (particularly for rivers within lake basins) and didn't intend to imply basin categories should be cause for their deletion. Thewellman (talk) 14:16, 10 December 2019 (UTC)
There seems to be a consensus, or at least a majority towards having both "basin" and "tributaries" categories, where "tributaries" categories are subcategories of "basin" categories. Meanwhile, Marcocapelle has started implementing this for the Category:Prut basin. Before we continue, I think it's good to find agreement on some issues regarding the structure:
  • By default the content of Wikipedia categories is sorted alphabetically. Sorting by number requires a lot of explanation and is merely confusing. Marcocapelle (talk) 21:49, 14 December 2019 (UTC)
I agree, I think that's in line with the WP:CAT guideline. The way it is done in German wikipedia is nice, but not really what a category is meant for IMO. And it doesn't work here anymore due to the changed number sorting in categories. About categorizing the categories: the complete category tree of for instance Category:Danube basin is also available by expanding the subcategories (for instance Category:Tisza basin), so do we really need all grandchildren and greatgrandchildren in the parent category? Markussep Talk 11:14, 15 December 2019 (UTC)

Can we agree on the following proposal?

Markussep Talk 09:01, 6 January 2020 (UTC)

Are these suggested specifications intended to inclusive, or exclusive? Thewellman (talk) 17:05, 7 January 2020 (UTC)
Do you mean with "exclusive" that a "tributaries" category should be a subcategory of only one "basin" category, and only one higher "tributaries" category? And a "basin" category a subcategory of only one "basin" category? That's what I intended. Markussep Talk 19:44, 7 January 2020 (UTC)
My question was whether the specifications would be one of several possible categorization options, or if they would be the only acceptable categorization scheme. Do I understand correctly you propose to exclude other categorization options? Thewellman (talk) 21:20, 7 January 2020 (UTC)
The categorization of rivers by country, region, state, province etc. can remain as is IMO, I propose a standard for hydrographic categorization (by basin/tributaries). Markussep Talk 08:01, 8 January 2020 (UTC)
Might these tributary and basin categories contain things other than rivers? Your suggested list of possible water features failed to include marshes, caves, aquifers, (and possibly others which don't come to mind at the moment.) Basin categories are potentially as useful as (and more durable than) political subdivisions, and might contain other non-hydrographic features like mountains, deserts, cities, or historic sites. Thewellman (talk) 18:09, 8 January 2020 (UTC)
Sure, why not? The basin categories are perfectly suited for that. I didn't mention marshes, but bogs and swamps are in the {{Category doc drainage basin}} documentation template. I thought I'd seen a "cities in the X basin" category, but I can't find them now. Markussep Talk 19:32, 8 January 2020 (UTC)

The Limnology and Oceanography Barnstar

I've made the Template:The Limnology and Oceanography Barnstar. Awarded to users who've shown great editing skills in improving Limnology and Oceanography related-articles. Jerm (talk) 20:34, 8 January 2020 (UTC)

Consistency of Lists of Rivers

I noticed inconsistency between List of rivers by discharge and List of U.S. rivers by discharge which sparked a thought. For information displayed as rows in a table, it seems that defaults such as ordering columns, ordering direction and display units should be consistent. To achieve this, it seems that the table on river list pages should be generated by a query to a single underlying Wikidata store rather than written manually. This could work even in the cases when sources disagree on underlying measurements as long as we specify a consistent default for which source takes precedence.Lextrounce (talk) 18:28, 22 January 2020 (UTC)

The Great Britain/Ireland Destubathon

Hi. The Wikipedia:The Great Britain/Ireland Destubathon is planned for March 2020, a contest/editathon to eliminate as many stubs as possible from all 134 counties. Amazon vouchers/book prizes are planned for most articles destubbed from England, Wales, Scotland and Ireland and Northern Ireland and whoever destubs articles from the most counties out of the 134. Sign up on page if interested in participating, hope this will prove to be good fun and productive, we have over 44,000 stubs!♦ Dr. Blofeld 18:31, 4 February 2020 (UTC)

AFD on List of Latin names of rivers

See ongoing Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/List of Latin names of rivers, where there is suggestion that List of Latin names of rivers might be deleted or might be merged to List of European rivers with alternative names. --Doncram (talk) 23:37, 10 March 2020 (UTC)

Article titles for rivers in Russia, Ukraine and Belarus

CONSENSUS
Clarification to WP:NCRIVER for rivers in Russia, Ukraine and Belarus: Articles should be titled "X" if they're the only or primary topic

The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

Several years ago we established a naming convention for rivers, see WP:NCRIVER. I quote:

River articles may be named "X", "X River", or "River X", depending on location and most common usage. "River X" is used for many (but not all) rivers in the UK and Ireland. "X River" is the norm in the Americas. "X river" (i.e. non-capitalized "river") is not recommended. When common usage does not include the word "River", but disambiguation is required (e.g. the river Inn in central Europe), parenthetical, non-capitalized "river" should be used: Inn (river). In other words neither "river" (without parentheses) nor "River" should be used to disambiguate articles. Country-specific exceptions to this rule should be discussed within WikiProject Rivers and/or that country's WikiProject.

Currently, the plain "X" (or "X (river)" in case of ambiguity) is now used for rivers in most European countries, except Russia, Ukraine and Belarus, where most article titles are "X River". I don't think "River" is part of the name of these rivers, nor is the Russian, Ukrainian or Belarusian equivalent Река, Річка or Рака part of the local names of the rivers (see for instance the Great Soviet Encyclopedia or the Encyclopedia of Modern Ukraine). Therefore I propose to move these river articles to titles that are consistent with WP:NCRIVER and with articles about rivers in other European countries: "X", or "X (river)" if disambiguation is needed. In total there's about 1,100 river articles that would need to be moved. So yes that's quite some work, but I don't mind doing it. I will announce this discussion at the three country Wikiprojects as well. Markussep Talk 14:39, 1 May 2020 (UTC)

  • That sounds good to me. Thank you! --TimK MSI (talk) 16:11, 1 May 2020 (UTC)
  • Oppose. I do not see why it should be consistent. This is not a Wikipedia policy.--Ymblanter (talk) 19:19, 1 May 2020 (UTC)
  • Surprised anyone would oppose this, so voicing my support as long as they're not referred to as "X reka" locally. Just be careful if you do it in bulk. SportingFlyer T·C 19:36, 1 May 2020 (UTC)
    They are not referred as X reka locally in Russian (well, nost of them - for example the Moskva is always Moskva reka). And, indeed, in the Russian Wikipedia most titles do not have river in the title, for example, the Volga River is just Волга. However, we are in the English Wikipedia. and the relevant question is how these rivers are referred to in English. And if I take Britannica for example, I find there - surprise - Volga River.--Ymblanter (talk) 19:57, 1 May 2020 (UTC)
    But the word "River" in "Volga River" may or may not be used as a proper noun in English. I don't see any reason why this can't be moved to Volga (river). A better example would be the Tereshka River - this isn't referenced much in English and is typically referred to as a river or as Tereshka River or River Tereshka. And in any circumstance, the same occurs with other rivers in eastern Europe which have had their naming conventions changed. It's also not that big of a change and works within existing consensus. SportingFlyer T·C 20:14, 1 May 2020 (UTC)
    There is no existing consensus, otherwise we would not have separate naming conventions for the UK or the US. And current naming is we covered by River articles may be named "X", "X River", or "River X".--Ymblanter (talk) 20:29, 1 May 2020 (UTC)
    WP:NCRIVER is part of WP:NCGN, which is a guideline. You're right that we should follow English usage, and that Britannica uses "Volga River". Britannica also uses "Rhine River", "Nile River" and "Danube River", where Wikipedia uses "Rhine", "Nile" and "Danube". Many other English language encylopedias and dictionaries do not use the "River" form, see Columbia Encyclopedia, Encyclopedia.com, Lexico, Merriam-Webster, American Heritage, Collins. Markussep Talk 08:31, 2 May 2020 (UTC)
    Right, which means we are in a "I do not like it" area.--Ymblanter (talk) 19:02, 2 May 2020 (UTC)
    The separate naming convention for the UK and US is nothing to do with a lack of consensus. Both those countries have official names for their rivers which can be looked up. Indeed in Britain there are even rivers called Sydling Water, Bere Stream and Carnon River. However, for other countries authors tend to use the convention of their homeland e.g. it's unsurprising that Encyclopedia Britannica uses "Foo River" because it's an American publication. But calling a river "Foo" is also very common and has the advantage that a) it often reflects national naming and b) it is region-neutral i.e. neither American nor British nor Australian etc. in flavour. But insisting on e.g. Russian rivers always being called "Foo River" is forcing an American convention on them that even their native nomenclature doesn't use. Bermicourt (talk) 16:10, 8 May 2020 (UTC)
  • Support. I feel the names of these rivers will be sufficiently unusual in the context of English Wikipedia to avoid difficulty in locating the appropriate articles. Is there some more important reason to adhere to an inflexible convention? Thewellman (talk) 21:23, 1 May 2020 (UTC)
  • Partial support. I support moving river articles from "X River" to "X" in cases that are not ambiguous or where the river is clearly a primary topic. For example, I support moving "Volga River" to "Volga" (Volga already redirects to Volga River) for simplicity and in accordance to predominant usage. I do not support moving "X River" to "X (river)" because I don't see any benefit of doing so. Vanjagenije (talk) 09:26, 8 May 2020 (UTC)
    There is a fundamental difference between "X River" and "X (river)": the former implies that "River" is part of the name. Note that WP:NCRIVER now says neither "river" (without parentheses) nor "River" should be used to disambiguate articles. You said you don't see a benefit of moving "X River" to "X (river)", but do you see objections (apart from the work moving the articles and updating links)? Markussep Talk 07:49, 9 May 2020 (UTC)
  • Support for consistency, for compliance with the guideline, but most of all because it reflects general usage in English as well as Russian sources.Bermicourt (talk) 15:01, 8 May 2020 (UTC)
  • Support less for consistency and more per User:Bermicourt's comments above: "[I]nsisting on e.g. Russian rivers always being called "Foo River" is forcing an American convention on them that even their native nomenclature doesn't use." Volga River in particular grates the eyes (but not any worse than Yenisei River or Irtysh River). I you want to get more input, do a move request with a couple of them and see what happens. —  AjaxSmack  21:16, 8 May 2020 (UTC)
  • Support to no surprise I fully support the idea, since I already tried it before but failed. My argumentation follows exactly the line of Bermicourt's and AjaxSmack's. -- ZH8000 (talk) 16:49, 10 May 2020 (UTC)

Thank you all for participating in the discussion. I think the conclusion is that articles about rivers in Russia, Ukraine and Belarus should be titled "X" if they're the only or primary topic (for example Volga, Yenisei, Irtysh, Berezina) and "X (river)" if disambiguation is needed and they are not obviously the primary topic (for example Kostroma (river), Don (river), Pripyat (river)). If there are more rivers with the same name, parentheses will be used for disambiguation, see WP:NCRIVER. I will notify the three country Wikiprojects, and then I will start moving articles. Markussep Talk 08:58, 16 May 2020 (UTC)

I am sorry but this needs to be formally closed by someone who has not participated in the discussion.--Ymblanter (talk) 18:48, 16 May 2020 (UTC)
That's just gaming the system - this is definitely a case of WP:SNOW. Bermicourt (talk) 21:53, 16 May 2020 (UTC)
Ymblanter, i have reviewed this conversation. A preponderance of respondents support the proposal. —¿philoserf? (talk) 22:24, 16 May 2020 (UTC)
Then please close it, with {{atop}}, {{abot}}, some (possibly brief) summary of arguments, and your signature.--Ymblanter (talk) 22:28, 16 May 2020 (UTC)
Ideally, the arguments must be supported by a policy, but it is probably too much to expect this.--Ymblanter (talk) 22:30, 16 May 2020 (UTC)
@Philoserf: could you close the discussion formally? The discussion was about how to apply the existing WP:NCRIVER to rivers in Russia, Ukraine and Belarus, and specifically whether common usage for these rivers includes the word "River". If an argument is needed, probably WP:CONCISE. Markussep Talk 17:33, 17 May 2020 (UTC)
Markussep, can do...standby —¿philoserf? (talk) 17:34, 17 May 2020 (UTC)
The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

course of the river

Hello,

this just to say that the Woluwe does not cross the municipality of Evere

Regards — Preceding unsigned comment added by Luc Lebrun 2 (talk • contribs) 09:04, 27 May 2020 (UTC)

Splitting proposal at Charding Nullah

Hi, there is a proposal here to split part of the article on the river Charding Nullah into a new article called Demchok dispute. Any input is appreciated! — MarkH21talk 16:56, 29 May 2020 (UTC)

More tributary disambiguators to update

I've done about 1200 river moves to update to the 2017 consensus convention (Wikipedia:Village pump (policy)/Archive 139#RfC about river disambiguation conventions), but there are still about 500 to go according to my latest search. I've compiled a list at User:Dicklyon/tributaries, and if there are no objections here I can ask for a bot to do these moves. OK? Dicklyon (talk) 21:09, 4 June 2020 (UTC)

I've never been a fan of adding the seemingly superfluous word "tributary" to an already perfectly good disambiguator, but if there is a consensus among American editors to do that for American rivers, who am I to object. Bermicourt (talk) 21:33, 4 June 2020 (UTC)
Indeed, it's not that often that you see a unanimous consent like this. Dicklyon (talk) 21:49, 4 June 2020 (UTC)
I noticed a few outliers on the list like Chu River (Tributary of Wei River) that should be held back from the bot (a ctrl-f search for "tributary of" will identify the ones in that format) but otherwise it looks good to me. Thanks! --TimK MSI (talk) 23:37, 4 June 2020 (UTC)
Good catch; I had caught "tributary to" but not "tributary of". I went ahead and removed the Russian Ob and Ik related ones, as there's a separate discussion about Russian river name conventions, and at least one of those was a redirect anyway. Dicklyon (talk) 23:53, 4 June 2020 (UTC)
I went ahead and manually moved 3 Chinese ones, to see if that gets any pushback, and took them out of the list so that we don't have to worry about that. Dicklyon (talk) 00:01, 5 June 2020 (UTC)

By the way, I made the list using queries like this one. I'm sure I missed some things. Dicklyon (talk) 00:06, 5 June 2020 (UTC)

I have requested a bot to do this, at Wikipedia:Bot requests#Move 500 River articles per consensus on tributary disambiguator. Please comment if you care one way or the other. Dicklyon (talk) 04:06, 6 June 2020 (UTC)

User:BD2412 has been doing a bunch of these by hand in the meantime. Dicklyon (talk) 04:36, 6 June 2020 (UTC)

One of your project's articles has been selected for improvement!

Hello,
Please note that Ship canal, which is within this project's scope, has been selected as one of Today's articles for improvement. The article was scheduled to appear on Wikipedia's Community portal in the "Today's articles for improvement" section for one week, beginning today. Everyone is encouraged to collaborate to improve the article. Thanks, and happy editing!
Delivered by — MusikBot talk 00:05, 15 June 2020 (UTC) on behalf of the TAFI team

Longest undammed rivers in the continental US

I have noticed some conflicting information on wikipedia regarding the longest undammed rivers in the US. On the John Day page (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Day_River), the John Day, 284 miles, is said to be the third longest river in the continental US- anyone have a reference on this?

On the wiki page https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_longest_undammed_rivers the John Day is not listed but is shorter than the Yellowstone, Salmon, and White that are listed. The Salmon River page (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Salmon_River_(Idaho)) states the Salmon is one of the longest undammed rivers with out stating if is second or third. Under the wikipedia page (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/White_River_(Missouri_River_tributary)) on the White, there is no discussion that it is the 2nd longest or one of the longest undammed rivers. Anyone want to try to resolve this? — Preceding unsigned comment added by Nbouwea (talk • contribs) 21:23, 2 September 2020 (UTC)

German rivers

A lot of the German rivers are poorly sourced, even by German wiki standards and don't have many sources available in a search. We have stubs on small tributaries and even the parent rivers which are tributaries of more notable rivers are still short stubs. In looking I think we'd be better off having stubs on the larger ones and redirecting the smaller tributaries and simply listing them as tributaries and at least trying to write a few sourced paragraphs. Dill (river) for example we ought to have a detailed article on that and for tributaries such as Aar (Dill). The German wikipedia article for Aar for instance is detailed but poorly sourced so it's difficult to transwiki it and chase up the sourcing. I don't think we should have seperate articles on tributaries of the Aar too like Monzenbach (which I redirected). The granddad river needs writing properly first! I really think a great number of the German rivers should be redirected into a tributary list/summary in the larger rivers until they can be researched properly. It's difficult to find detailed sources on a lot of them. Ideally we'd have decent articles on every one, but it's frustrating browsing categories by German state and not being able to find the more notable rivers and a decent well-researched article.† Encyclopædius 12:23, 10 July 2020 (UTC)

I agree that many of the about 3000 German river articles are very short, and do not give much more information than their location and the river they flow into. But IMO the question is whether all these rivers are notable or not. WP:GEOLAND states that "Named natural features are often notable, provided information beyond statistics and coordinates is known to exist.". And also: "If a Wikipedia article cannot be developed using known sources, information on the feature can instead be included in a more general article on local geography.". I think it's not too difficult to find German sources for most of these rivers, it's just much work. So it's a good idea to set priorities about which articles to improve first. About Encyclopædius' last remark, the main rivers of a state should be mentioned in the geography section of the articles about the state. Maybe this could be improved as well. Markussep Talk 20:01, 13 July 2020 (UTC)
Redirecting rivers of less import to their parents works for me; should the need or desire manifest itself, they can always be reverted and then constructed as actual articles rather than mere thumbnails. –Vami♜_IV♠ 16:01, 14 July 2020 (UTC)
That's true, but I would only do that if the article is not referenced, and there's no hope that it will ever be expanded beyond coordinates and length. For instance because it is a very small stream, like the Dittenbach (2.4 km according to German Wikipedia). Markussep Talk 12:07, 17 July 2020 (UTC)
I'd caution against turning lots of river stubs into redirects. It only takes seconds to trash something, but much longer to rebuild it once it's been trashed. I've expanded dozens of German river stubs into bigger articles because there's been a basis on which to build (infobox, categories, interwiki links, lede and basic structure and data), but I wouldn't waste the effort of starting the article up from scratch if it's a redirect.
So, being positive, I'd focus our efforts on expanding the stubs, not scrapping them unless they really are very small, in which case we should be careful to import the info into the parent river. Bermicourt (talk) 12:59, 17 July 2020 (UTC)
I concur with focusing efforts on expanding stubs, and suggest early emphasis might be ensuring all tributary streams include an internal link to their discharge point, and that discharge point article includes an internal link to that tributary. It is very difficult to predict when some presently little-known stream may become a focus of attention through future events and circumstances. In the meantime, Wikipedia's internal link structure will enable readers to readily find an article focused on that point of interest. Thewellman (talk) 19:44, 17 July 2020 (UTC)
BTW the Dittenbach must be a lot longer than 2.4 km as it flows into the USA! :) Bermicourt (talk) 21:36, 2 September 2020 (UTC)

Cem

Hello, everybody. I've nominated Cem (river) for GA status. Right now, it's one of the oldest unreviewed nominations. A large factor that has kept it in that state is the fact that many sources are in Albanian or Serbo-Croatian. I can help the review by providing exact quotes to make the verification easier. It'd be much appreciated if an editor active in this project, did the review. Thank you.--Maleschreiber (talk) 21:49, 27 September 2020 (UTC)

River Weaver list of tributaries

The River Weaver article is a good article, but now has a long list of tributaries with absolutely no context, no references, and no explanation of what the L, R, Rs and Ls mean. It appears to me to be the worst kind of list. Is there any consensus for including such information, and if so, is this an acceptable format? Bob1960evens (talk) 16:54, 7 December 2020 (UTC)

The same editor appears to have done the River Dane article in the same way but has added a diagram showing the relative positions of each of the tributaries which makes a little more sense. As a lot of them appear to be minor streams, perhaps the list could be pruned back to just the main one(s). Certainly some explanation of the abbreviations used would be useful for the general reader. Murgatroyd49 (talk) 17:20, 7 December 2020 (UTC)
I've added some introductory text to the list to explain. I think the editor has perhaps lifted the list (and that for the Dane, both back in 2016) directly from List of rivers of England where it is fully explained and performs a useful role. It may of course be preferable to simply direct those viewing the River Weaver article to the relevant section of that page. cheers Geopersona (talk) 09:22, 13 December 2020 (UTC)
Correcting myself: No, not lifted - as that level of detail is not within the Weaver or Dane list at List of rivers of England, it's just the same approach has been extended down to a more local level. Geopersona (talk) 19:21, 13 December 2020 (UTC)
I still think a diagram would be of use in making the situation clearer. When I get time I might have a go. Murgatroyd49 (talk) 20:42, 13 December 2020 (UTC)
Agreed - good luck with it! Geopersona (talk) 20:59, 13 December 2020 (UTC)
Might be a week or so, nudge me if I forget! Murgatroyd49 (talk) 21:23, 13 December 2020 (UTC)

Notability of an obscure stream?

Koatse is devoid of information. I've only found some passing mentions in botany journals, and there's so many wiki-mirror hits on Google that it's hard to determine if any are decent refs. I'd guess it's an off-shoot of the Upper Mazaruni, but I don't have anything to go on for a merge. Any tips for improving this article? Cheers, Estheim (talk) 19:46, 17 December 2020 (UTC)

  • We have very, very low standards for geographical features and I'd say that's on the line - I'd probably be a very weak keep at AfD if there was no good merge target since it clearly passes WP:V, but a merge would be better here. An additional source would get it over the line, but I can't find any easily. SportingFlyer T·C 20:01, 17 December 2020 (UTC)
Yeah, SportingFlyer, I agree AfD isn't quite appropriate here. I suppose I shall leave this article be and hope the next batch of jungle-trekking botanists give future editors something to work with. Cheers! Estheim (talk) 19:50, 18 December 2020 (UTC)

Seasonal stream

What I was looking for and got disappointed is "Seasonal stream/river/watercourse", with wadis in mind, but there are several other regional types as well (arroyo, winterbourne, etc.). There are two attempts at dealing with the topic, "Stream#Intermittent or seasonal stream" and "Intermittent river". I've created redirects to the latter for all possible terms, and cross-reference ("see also") between the two. The problem is,

  • there is no one useful article on the topic. Between 30% and 50% of the world's watercourses are not perennial, and we still deal with the topic in a "by the way" manner.
  • The "Stream" page is undersourced and needs a lot of work altogether. Also, the "Stream#Intermittent or seasonal stream" paragraph has more info in several regards than the dedicated article.
  • There is confusion between US definitions, which are specific for that one country, but readily available online and therefore too heavily represented, and terms & reality elsewhere in the world.
  • Maybe connected to the above, the strict distinction between "ephemeral" and "intermittent" streams. Additional to that difficult distinction, I dare say that "intermittence" can also have a spatial meaning (in carst areas, where streams disappear in dolines and reemerge at karst springs), so not just temporal.

Anyone interested? Thanks, Arminden (talk) 18:56, 28 February 2021 (UTC)

Discussion at Template talk:Infobox river § Automatic short description

 You are invited to join the discussion at Template talk:Infobox river § Automatic short description. --Trialpears (talk) 21:12, 19 April 2021 (UTC)

Requested move at Talk:Shortest river#Requested move 18 May 2021

There is a requested move discussion at Talk:Shortest river#Requested move 18 May 2021 that may be of interest to members of this WikiProject. Elli (talk | contribs) 19:06, 3 June 2021 (UTC)

Bottomlands

I started Draft:Bottomlands but wondering if this is already covered by either floodplains or upland and lowland?VR talk 23:10, 13 June 2021 (UTC)

Bottomland is not found in either the Cambridge Dictionary or in Penguin's Dictionary of Physical Geography, but is listed in Merriam-Webster, so it looks like a specifically American term. It appears to equate to floodplain as you suggest. I'd add the definition to floodplain stating who uses it and how/where it is used. Bermicourt (talk) 07:02, 14 June 2021 (UTC)
Thanks and done.VR talk 19:03, 14 June 2021 (UTC)

Updates for project pages

I looked through the project pages and updated some of the content and links to make it easier to find out what to do to improve existing river articles and update old links that didn't work. I hope this helps others working on this project. -- Talk to G Moore 14:01, 19 June 2021 (UTC)

Checking for bad coordinates

I have added {{GeoGroupTemplate}} to the Category:United States river stubs and subcategories. This allows viewing of the locations of the coordinates in River articles in a given region. When I see a coordinates that is another continent or another state on the map generated, I check the coordinate in the article to see if it is correct. I have found about a half dozen cases of missing minus signs or E instead of W in the coordinates and have fixed the coordinate of these articles. I also checked the GNIS database to make sure the coordinate is correct. I started with the Stub articles but this could be expanded to other categories, as well. Many stub articles also needed Pushpin Maps and Infobox river, as well, so I added them. -- Talk to G Moore 14:37, 2 July 2021 (UTC)

G. Moore, Amazing! Thank you for doing this. --ARoseWolf 14:41, 2 July 2021 (UTC)

Arabic river name convention

Hello all - I'm looking at WP:NCRIVER, and at the List of rivers of Lebanon. There is a case that is not covered in the convention. Some river names are listed as "X River", while others are listed as "Nahr X" (Nahr نهر = River in Arabic). Does it matter which naming is used? Should the convention also clarify what to do about such cases? -- Majdal.cc (talk) 18:55, 16 July 2021 (UTC)

The most common way of naming rivers outside of the US and Britain, is just "Foo" (usually preceded by the definite article eg. "the Foo") although "Foo River" is also common, especially in American sources. Ngram viewer is a good way to determine the most common name e.g. this search tells us that "the Asi" is about twice as common as "the Asi River", but that River Asi is also used. Bermicourt (talk) 21:06, 17 July 2021 (UTC)
Except we already have articles for 32 different ASI, including the Orontes River which uses the Greek name of that river. American usage is strongly X River to the extant of the not uncommon, but silly, formation, Rio Grande River. Consistent and English-language naming is a good thing. Rmhermen (talk) 02:23, 18 July 2021 (UTC)

Looking for information on the Dunt stream in Gloucestershire, England

Does anyone know sources for the length, source, mouth, etc. of this (minor) stream? (I know it probably doesn't qualify as notable enough anyway, seeing as Google results are sparse and mostly referring to a poem about the stream. Just asking because I couldn't find any Google results specifically about the river.) Quanstizium (talk) 16:30, 27 July 2021 (UTC)

There are articles on three of the villages/hamlets on the stream, Duntisbourne Leer, Duntisbourne Abbots and Duntisbourne Rouse. The other, Middle Duntisbourne doesn't appear to have an article yet. That might help you. The Duntisbournes have their own website at Villages website HTH Murgatroyd49 (talk) 16:46, 27 July 2021 (UTC)
As a follow up The Shell Guide to English Villages, in the section on Daglingworth decribes the Dunt Valley as running parallel to Ermine Street. The only remotely helpful geographic reference to the stream I have come across so far. Murgatroyd49 (talk) 16:56, 27 July 2021 (UTC)
The lower end appears on the maps as the Daglingworth Stream which joins the Churn at the end of Barton Lane in Cirencester. Daglingworth stream information is here. Murgatroyd49 (talk) 08:51, 28 July 2021 (UTC)
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