User talk:Dysmorodrepanis~enwiki

• Talk page archive 2005-2006
• Talk page archive 07-JAN-01 - 07-NOV-19

Important note:
This editor sometimes leaves annotations for sources, most often in articles on biological taxa. If you do not know what these mean, ask. Many refer to source material that is freely available online. See also here on what the abbreviated journal titles stand for.

Whats wrong with this willow?

Hi, I was recently in North-West Greenland, in the town Upernavik. There I found this infected willow (probably Salix arctica, maybe Salix glauca) (see also here). I noticed you are a main contributor to an article about bugs feeding on willow. Have you got any idea what hit this willow? I plan to upload the photos to Commons once I understand what is going on and can give the photos a meaningful name. -- Slaunger (talk) 20:46, 22 November 2007 (UTC)

2 possibilities:

• Plant galls. In which case I'd go with gall mites as the ones responsible. See also here; the lowest 2 pictures. How the galls look like depends on both the willow and the parasite, but Eriophyidae generally make smallish galls that stick out of the upperside, are hollowed out from below, and are usually tough, horny, yellow or red and sometimes hairy.
• Fungal disease. In which case they're fruiting bodies, and would probably be outgrowths of the upperside of the leaf only and the underside would be normal, or bear a black dead spot or a dimple where the growth is but not a hollow.

I think the former is more likely. But see also Tenthredinidae (the red "sausage galls" to the left some 2/3 down in the page linked above). These gall midges make what looks like a coarser version of Eriophyidae (gall mite) galls, only they are hollow inside (I think) and almost always MUCH larger: the gall midges might be just 1-2 mm long, but the mites are microscopic See Image:Gehölz.mit.Gallwespe.4067.jpg for what seems to be Tenthredinidae galls on what might be another species of Salix. Eriophyes padi produces very similar (more hairy) galls on Rosaceae: see photo here. But I don't think that one can narrow it down to more than family if at all; see Image:Eriophyes tiliae 2005.08.19 16.44.07-p8190001.jpg for the very different galls caused by another member of Eriophyes on linden (Tilia).

Overall, I'd say if the things were hollowed out from below, I'm 95% in favor of Eriophyidae gen. et sp. indet (at present ;-) ). If it is a fungus, I can only promise to take note when I come across something similar; I know next to nothing about these guys. Dysmorodrepanis (talk) 21:37, 22 November 2007 (UTC)

Wow, that was a fast and very thorough reply with very good references. Thank you very much. I agree with your intepretation. da:Bruger:Sten also indicates to me that it is Eriophyidae on my talk page on the Danish wiki (aways nice with a second opinion). -- Slaunger (talk) 21:46, 22 November 2007 (UTC)

Always a pleasure! Dysmorodrepanis (talk) 21:50, 22 November 2007 (UTC)

Tall Dropseed

Hi there! I saw your recent page move regarding this page. It showed up in the WP:PLANTS assessment log. Anyway, I just wanted to mention a couple conventions you may not have been aware of for future moves. 1) Regarding common names and article titles, it's been something discussed without consensus, so much like non-national topics and their British English vs. American English spellings, WP:PLANTS has never come to a conclusion and therefore considers the style of the first major contributor to be the one to follow. The larger convention, however, appears to prefer lowercase when it's not a proper noun. 2) That's all rather moot, though, since this species also falls under WP:NC (flora) which prefers article titles at scientific names unless it meets one of the given exceptions, which it doesn't look like this page does. Anyway, I just wanted to let you know about those conventions so you can use them as you wish. Oh, and I've left a note at WP:RM for an admin with those capabilities to move the page to the species name title. Cheers, Rkitko ^(talk) 02:02, 24 November 2007 (UTC)

So I'll mv pages to the scientific name title in the future, OK? As regards genus pages, I tend to link to the common name that seems most common and/or makes most sense. That way, it is easy to check for redirects. Dysmorodrepanis (talk) 02:26, 24 November 2007 (UTC)

Sure, but it's no big deal. We're not actively going around moving pages, but when you find one and the spirit moves you, so be it. I do whenever I encounter a page that doesn't seem to fit either exception listed in the naming convention. And regarding linking to genus pages, whatever you do is fine. No convention on that, really. Mullein and Verbascum both get you to the same place. Cheers, Rkitko ^(talk) 02:35, 24 November 2007 (UTC)

Vague references

Hi Dysmorodrepanis! I'm sure you mean well, but what is the purpose of the vague references to "PacificScience61:36" that you recently added to Vipera ammodytes, Trimeresurus and Bothrops atrox? It looks like a reference to a scientific journal; have you found some interesting articles in it? (PS -- Please answer here, as I've temporarily added your talk page to my watchlist). --Jwinius (talk) 11:33, 28 November 2007 (UTC)

Ha! I totally forgot: we had a similar conversation regarding Crotalus atrox back in August. I think you're going to have to be a little more helpful with this one, though. I did manage to find this overview page that shows the contents of previous issues of the Pacific Science journal, but it shows nothing yet for volume 61. Will we have to wait for that until next year?

On a side note, I find it very irritating that these scientific journals charge people for access. For even if I managed found your article, it looks like I would not be able to read more than the abstract unless I were to buy a subscription. Now that we have the Internet, it seems to me like these commercial publishing houses are little more than bloodsucking parasites that form a barrier to scientific progress. Why do academics continue to put up with this nonsense? --Jwinius (talk) 14:05, 28 November 2007 (UTC)

This is a paper about introduced Small Indian Mongoose (Herpestes javanicus auropunctatus). These snakes are mentioned more briefly. It says:

In 1910, the small Indian mongoose was introduced to three Croatian islands to control the horned viper (Vipera ammodytes). In the same year, it was also introduced to Okinawa to control the habu pit viper (Trimeresurus flavoviridis). The effects of these two introductions on the local snake populations have not been studied.

The small Indian mongoose was introduced to Martinique and St. Lucia (dates of introduction unknown) to control the fer-de-lance (Bothrops atrox), a venomous species of pit viper (de Vos et al. 1956). Some authors blame (or credit) the mongoose with the extirpation of this snake on those islands (Barbour 1930, Nellis 1989), but it is uncertain whether mongooses actually attack these snakes in the wild. Hinton and Dunn (1967) stated that mongooses are commonly killed by the fer-delance in ‘‘fighting pit’’ shows, but Nellis and Everard (1983) believed that the mongoose usually wins.

References are:

• Barbour, T. 1930. Some faunistic changes in the Lesser Antilles. Proc. N. Engl. Zool. Club 9:73–85.
• de Vos, A., R. H. Manville, and R. G. van Gelder. 1956. Introduced animals and their influence on native biota. Zoologica 41:163–194.
• Hinton, H. E., and A. M. S. Dunn. 1967. Mongooses: Their natural history and behavior. Oliver and Boyd, Ltd., London.
• Nellis, D. W. 1989. Herpestes auropunctatus. Mamm. Species 342:1–6.
• Nellis, D. W., and C. O. R. Everard. 1983. The biology of the mongoose in the Caribbean. Stud. Fauna Curacao Other Caribb. Isl. 195:1–162

Pacific Science is available on BioOne 2. Some universities already have it and together with asking the authors there is a fair chance to get hold of one of these. They had a similar review on the Brown Tree Snake recently. Dysmorodrepanis (talk) 20:12, 28 November 2007 (UTC)

The article in the journal Pacific Science that Dysmorodrepanis refers to is:

Hays WST, Conant Sheila. 2007. Biology and Impacts of Pacific Island Invasive Species. 1. A Worldwide Review of Effects of the Small Indian Mongoose, Herpestes javanicus (Carnivora: Herpestidae) Pacific Science - Volume 61, Number 1, pp. 3-16

--Jwinius (talk) 20:46, 28 November 2007 (UTC)

In birds, we had this one guy adding massive reflists to articles, none of which were actually used. These days, they are generally outcommented as annotations under the ref section, and used at leisure. Everybody wanting to do some significant editing can check these out and pick refs as needed. In other pages I have seen them dropped on the Talk page. Dysmorodrepanis (talk) 20:55, 28 November 2007 (UTC)

Barremian Changes

Hey, I noticed you redid the fauna section of the Barremian page, and I like it quite a bit. However, I have some proposed suggestions...

1. Separate headings for vertebrates and invertebrates would be cool.
2. Brief descriptions of the major animal groups would be helpful for readers not acquainted with paleontology, not to mention aesthetically putting some space between the many blue links.
3. The fourth column under the ammonite heading makes the section's contents go much farther to the right than all the other sections. I propose having the ammonite section have three columns and an image to the right (Annuloceras probably).
4. Adding daggers(†) to extinct taxa's names.

...And I think that's it. Also, any suggestions for the Flora and fauna of the Maastrichtian stage article would be cool. Although please warn me if you're going to make major changes, I put alot of effort and time into that page. Abyssal leviathin 03:05, 3 December 2007 (UTC)

Annuloceras is indeed Barremian but maybe it is found in Aptian strata as well? Anyway, looking forward to see the fruit of your "playing around" with the formatting. :) Abyssal leviathin 13:34, 3 December 2007 (UTC)

Barnstar

see here. Actually, see Elopteryx nopcsai. Dysmorodrepanis (talk) 20:22, 19 December 2007 (UTC)

Speedy deletion of Chinook (language)

Thank you for experimenting with Wikipedia. Your test worked, and the page that you created has been or soon will be deleted. Please use the sandbox for any other tests you want to do. Take a look at the welcome page if you would like to learn more about contributing to our encyclopedia

If you think that this notice was placed here in error, you may contest the deletion by adding {{hangon}} to the top of the article (just below the existing speedy deletion or "db" tag), coupled with adding a note on the article's talk page explaining your position, but be aware that once tagged for speedy deletion, if the article meets the criterion it may be deleted without delay. Please do not remove the speedy deletion tag yourself, but don't hesitate to add information to the article that would would render it more in conformance with Wikipedia's policies and guidelines. PookeyMaster (talk) 04:22, 14 December 2007 (UTC)

Fixed that. Dysmorodrepanis (talk) 04:24, 14 December 2007 (UTC)

Revised APG II?

Can you be more specific about what you mean by "updated APG II" or "revised APG II" on Brassicales? The pages at Angiosperm Phylogeny Group and APG II system just mention the one APG II from 2003. Kingdon (talk) 05:09, 18 December 2007 (UTC)

Haston, E.; Richardson, J. E.; Stevens, P. F.; Chase, M. W.; Harris, D. J. (2007). A linear sequence of Angiosperm Phylogeny Group II families. Taxon 56(1):7-12. Dysmorodrepanis (talk) 05:10, 18 December 2007 (UTC)

Thanks; your edit to Brassicales clears things up. Kingdon (talk) 13:08, 18 December 2007 (UTC)

Special Herbs Vol. 3, Special Herbs Vol. 4

• Cheers for your herbal knowledge in the track listings of these. Best, tomasz. 10:45, 19 December 2007 (UTC)

Thanks! Dysmorodrepanis (talk) 12:23, 19 December 2007 (UTC)

Elopteryx

Well thanks! And though I couldn't find a pic of the remains (might have seen them in Lambrecht tho), I dug up one of a failed reconstruction and tied it in (section 2 para 2). Better to have how it not looks like than to have no visuals at all ;-) Dysmorodrepanis (talk) 20:39, 19 December 2007 (UTC)

I had a good laugh about "how it not looks". I also had some questions about the synonymy in the taxobox; I left it on the talk page. Firsfron of Ronchester 22:50, 20 December 2007 (UTC)

Hirundinidae

Do you know the source for the split between Hirundo and Cecropis? There is some material here Patterns of Molecular Evolution in Avian Microsatellites by Craig R. Primmer and Hans Ellegren but is based on a limited set of species. Cheers Shyamal (talk) 08:22, 23 December 2007 (UTC)

Sure - they maintained their split over a row of papers, starting with 1990s-era DNA-DNA hybridization and ending (for the time being) with:

Frederick H. Sheldon et al.: Phylogeny of swallows (Aves: Hirundinidae) estimated from nuclear and mitochondrial DNA sequences

Molecular Phylogenetics and Evolution 35 (2005) 254–270 doi:10.1016/j.ympev.2004.11.008

While that's not online, a review of the accumulated evidence is: Sangster et al. (2005): Taxonomic recommendations for British birds: third report

Or you can simply default to HBW vol. 9 which adopts these changes too. Dysmorodrepanis (talk) 10:15, 23 December 2007 (UTC)

TNC T-ranks now valid

Hiya. Thought you might like to know I've updated the taxobox to allow T-ranks now, so you don't have to use the G ones. e.g. for Mission blue butterfly. —Pengo 03:06, 30 December 2007 (UTC)

Strophocincla

Hi ! Do you have a full list of species in this genus ? Shyamal (talk) 09:56, 4 January 2008 (UTC)

Paper on Passerine supertrees

Is it possible to share that 2006 paper Zoologica Scripta 35(2) via email, let me know if you have lost my mail id ? You may be interested in this dissertation here Shyamal (talk) 11:22, 4 January 2008 (UTC)

Received. Many thanks ! Shyamal (talk) 15:06, 5 January 2008 (UTC)

Passerines query

Well done on the reworking of the passerines article - a heroic effort. I've posted a couple of queries on the talk page. Cheers. SP-KP (talk) 00:33, 5 January 2008 (UTC)

Elopteryx

Hi, of course it was wrong there. It cannot be placed in the synonymy section of any page at present but if it could, it's likely to be in either Iberomesornithidae, Protopterygidae and Troodontidae. Fat chance though as it's entirely resistant to cladistic analysis. Not that Mickey Mortimer hasn't tried... Dysmorodrepanis (talk) 01:19, 5 January 2008 (UTC)

Oh no, that was about -idae. Dysmorodrepanis (talk) 01:24, 5 January 2008 (UTC)

Hey! Yes, I was worried about a family being synonymized with a genus. Other than that, your work on this article has been truly wonderful. It sounds like this taxonomic triangle (Elopteryx, Heptasteornis, and Bradycneme) was a real mess! Thanks for clearing this all up... until the next paper comes out, at least... ;) Firsfron of Ronchester 01:46, 5 January 2008 (UTC)

splitting the Dicruridae

I'm planning on splitting the Dicruridae to follow the HBW unless you can give me a compelling reason not to. Any thoughts? Sabine's Sunbird talk 23:31, 5 January 2008 (UTC)

"belong into"

Before I work on the wording of passerine (which won't be tomorrow), I'd like to ask you about this phrase. It's pretty rare (38,000 Google hits compared to over 6 million for "belong in" and 50 million for "belong to") and most of the hits on the first two pages are computer jargon. Why do you prefer it to "belong in"? It seems to me that, for example, "May belong in Tadorninae, currently placed elsewhere" says exactly the same thing is your version with "into". —JerryFriedman (Talk) 03:32, 6 January 2008 (UTC)

I asked simultaneously at alt.usage.english, and people pointed out that many users of this construction seem to be German or Eastern European. Also (I'm completely taking their word for this) that the German phrase gehört in takes the accusative, and in followed by the accusative is usually translated into English as "to" or "into", but this is one situation where "in" is a better translation. I looked at your user page and said, "Aha!" Until just now, I hadn't realized German was your native language. Of course, that doesn't mean you went through this thought process. But if, as you said, you saw it in a paper, it might well have been written by a speaker of German. —JerryFriedman (Talk) 05:14, 7 January 2008 (UTC)

Eastern European, more likely. Dysmorodrepanis (talk) 12:34, 7 January 2008 (UTC)

Commenting out

You fooled me with your commented-out words in bird articles. They looked exactly like an odd form of invisible vandalism so I removed them and mistakenly called you vandal. Sorry!! Then I realised it was some kind of Reference. It's not a good idea to put an apparently meaningless <!-- Condor109:192 --> into an article so that editors on vandal patrol think it's vandalism and then waste their time removing it. Could you please explain inside your comment what it means then no-one will remove it. Thanks - Adrian Pingstone (talk) 09:41, 13 January 2008 (UTC)

Python edits

Hi Dysmorodrepanis! I'm sure you meant well with your recent edits to Pythonidae and Python reticulatus, but the intro style is a known alternative that's been applied to some 400 snake articles. For more information see Alternative lead section. I've done my best to apply the same formatting across all of the snake articles that I've worked on (some 400+) and try to keep it all consistent. As for the synonymy for P. reticulatus, this is all from the same source (checklist) that the taxonomy is based on. Regarding Broghammerus, that's first of all not part of the current synonymy, and second it's from an extremely controversial source, so beyond mentioning RH's papers in the various Taxonomy sections, my position is that we should not mention his work any more than is absolutely necessary. (PS -- Please answer here, as I've temporarily added your talk page to my watchlist). --Jwinius (talk) 23:16, 24 January 2008 (UTC)

As regards intro style - this is a quite non-SOP, but well, if you wanna go through with it... it's not that I can't see the advantage. Probably not very useful for many taxa - like birds which have by and large standardized "default" common names - but I'll remember it in future snake edits.

In pages I have edited, I have usually added a section or subsection on common names, if these were too numerous and/or significant. This lends itself readily to taka which have many clokal names, perhaps even with intersting folklore, etymology etc attached. But though this might apply for the Reticulated Python in particular, it is probably pointless for most reptiles, for which it's more a question of common English pet/trade names. (There is precisley one "herptile" genus where I have done really significant work to date IIRC)

Broghammerus... the genus name should be technically valid. I have checked the source, and if there's no ICZN caveat applying it should be acceptable. The genus is delimited properly due to monotypy. However the subspecies names are undiagnostic.

As regards the source, yeah, I noted... it's rare to see so many people quite obviously going OMG WTF!!!!1!11 over a taxonomic pub. Do we have a scholarly or otherwise expert review and condemnation of these taxa? Because if so, we could point out more strongly that ppl should not follow the proposed taxonomy. I had seen the taxon used on the Web, and became curious... my actual intent by putting the thing in was to point out that the darned thing exists but has no merit.

That it doesn't hit on Scholar is not surprising, as much of the relevant literature is not indexed (aquaria/terraria community has many non-indexed journals). I am not a herper, so I didn't really know where to dig for good refs slamming Broghammerus. But if such sourcing is available, I suggest it's better to leave the original paper in. I have done the same with some ornithological articles, and IMHO it's batter to resolve a taxonomic dispute in no uncertain terms than to be shy about it. "Folk taxonomy" can only benefit... in the long run, we'll hopefully see less Broghammerus then ;-) Dysmorodrepanis (talk) 23:41, 24 January 2008 (UTC)

Although it doesn't mention Broghammerus, this paper explains the situation: Wüster W, Bush B, Keogh JS, O'Shea M, Shine R. 2001. Taxonomic contributions in the "amateur" literature: comments on recent descriptions of new genera and species by Raymond Hoser. Litteratura Serpentium 21:67-91. PDF at Wolfgang Wüster. I found it an excellent read. --Jwinius (talk) 03:45, 25 January 2008 (UTC)

Ah! I remember Wüster's name, came across it in passing. Thank You very much! Dysmorodrepanis (talk) 04:09, 25 January 2008 (UTC)

And there's more; check the taxonomic section and associated references in the Acanthophis article, which applies to the Python situation too. 212.10.89.177 (talk) 20:55, 26 January 2008 (UTC)

Stifftia

About your edit to Asteraceae; the names of plants and algae are both ruled by the International Code of Botanical Nomenclature, thus it is simply not possible for a plant and alga to share the same valid name. Could you please provide a source where an alga is (invalidly) named Stifftia? I really couldn't find any. Vielen Dank! Aelwyn (talk) 09:42, 25 January 2008 (UTC)

Fixed that. The alga is now Zanardinia. Dysmorodrepanis (talk) 17:19, 25 January 2008 (UTC)

Crescenti trout

Hey, there just saw your move of this article, and I'm curious, 'cause I wrote the original article, and in all my research I never saw it referred to as "Lake Crescent cutthroat trout", so I'm curious about your reason for moving it, since I'm not super familiar with MOS for species. Murderbike (talk) 00:22, 1 February 2008 (UTC)

Hmm, Ok. The only thing that seems odd, is that we would have to have something that trumps citeability. But I'm not gonna worry about it. Out of curiosity, why is the Beardslee more interesting to you? Cheers! Murderbike (talk) 00:53, 1 February 2008 (UTC)

boldness

On List of brachiopod genera, if you are going to get rid of the bold, you might want to remove the text "Extant genera are bolded" at the top of the page. Oh, and shouldn't you have cited WP:UNBOLD instead of WP:BOLD ;-)? Kingdon (talk) 03:38, 2 February 2008 (UTC)

Tropidolaemus

Hi Dysmorodrepanis! I know you meant well when you added the new species, T. laticinctus, to the Tropidolaemus species table, but I had put that one in the Taxonomy section there for a reason: it's not (yet) recognized by ITIS. The WP:AAR group made the decision to follow the ITIS taxonomy for snakes in 2006 and it's important that we stick to that one taxonomy in order to prevent a mess. Any taxonomic remarks or new species not included in the ITIS database belong in the Taxonomy section. I know that ITIS is rather more conservative than the bleeding edge New Reptile Database (NRDB), but that's actually a good thing, because it allows us to spend more time expanding our collection of articles as opposed to pushing through taxonomic updates. ITIS also contains fewer mistakes and is widely recognized among herpetologists as being the more authoritative.

Having said all this, I should also mention that the ITIS taxonomy for snakes is not yet complete, as Dr. McDiarmid's work, on which it is based, is still in progress. He's currently working on the colubrid family, which is huge, and still has many genera to go, as was pointed out to me last year. In these cases I suppose our best choice is to follow the NRDB, although I never bothered to mention this in AAR. No doubt it would be better if I did. --Jwinius (talk) 13:36, 4 February 2008 (UTC)

Just curious

I was just wondering what the invisible text i.e. <!-- WilsonBull18:47 --> after the references section on the Passenger Pigeon article is supposed to mean? Sting au Buzz Me... 07:51, 12 February 2008 (UTC)

Read intro text on this page

Award

		The Bio-star
		In recognition of the exceptional contributions of Dysmorodrepanis to articles on birds, and an occasional insect or mammal, as well.Walter Siegmund (talk) 05:07, 16 February 2008 (UTC)

Corvus(genus)

Hi! There's been a lot of recent conversation on Crow and Raven about a possible merger. We both know that crows and ravens aren't the same thing, however, there does seem to be a lot of redundancy on both pages. Since both names refer to unique species, but are not inclusive of all animals in that genus, I've proposed that the current crow/raven pages be merged into the Corvus (genus) page, with smaller sub pages dedicated to information unique to crows and ravens( as well as the current pages Jackdaw and Rook. Mstuczynski suggested you as a possible interested party as a bird enthusiast and knowledgeable wikipedia-er. Any thoughts or suggestions? Plcoffey (talk) 15:39, 16 February 2008 (UTC)

I've created User:Plcoffey/SandboxCorvus (genus) which is currently a copied version of Crow, I'm hoping we can transition it into something resembling a representation of the entire genus, and would love to have any help you felt like offering! Plcoffey (talk) 20:26, 17 February 2008 (UTC)

tagging of bird

You've tagged bird with an updates needed tag in Modern bird orders, what in particular needs to happens here? Since the article is now featured I'd like to get any issues, such as fact tags or update tags, dealt with as quickly as possible. Leaving problem tags on the mainspace of the article invites people to want to come and revoke its featured status. Sabine's Sunbird talk 00:50, 20 February 2008 (UTC)

I can make those changes. BTW, do you know what the hell these edits are about? The user in question seems determined to add them, no matter how many times people remove them. Sabine's Sunbird talk 02:10, 20 February 2008 (UTC)

Made the changes, but is the evidence strong enough to split out the turacos too? Sabine's Sunbird talk 03:06, 20 February 2008 (UTC)

Argh, don't ask me, maybe check the source of the relevant articles, I might have dumped refs there.

You would want a study including the Hoatzin (of course), the cuckoos (of course), the turacos, a lot of other stuff from just below the near passerines proper (parrots and doves and sandgrouse... owls... falcons maybe, though then you would perhaps also include the Plains Wanderer just for kicks.)

I don't know if such a study exists, and if, if it has anything worthwhile to say.

I am getting the impression that there is a certain period quite early in neoavian evolution where a polytomy of lineages diverge. Several well-apparent clades (one would call them superorders probably) are apparent by the Paleo-Eocene, like the cypselomorphs and the near passerines and the ciconiiform-pelecaniform(-?) clade. And there numerous orders that seem to have drifted apart throughout a short and turbulent period of evolution, rapidly and randomly without clear indication of supraordinal structure. Where do pigeons come from? Nobody knows.

The fossil record would seem to fix this tangled period to 55-66 mya, with the mol data strongly arguing for a late date in that span (I think it would say 60-70 MA roughly).

I do not have anything on Foro panarium which may or may not the proverbial missing link. Dysmorodrepanis (talk) 04:14, 20 February 2008 (UTC)

interesting article

• ALBRECHT MANEGOLD (2008) "Passerine diversity in the late Oligocene of Germany: earliest evidence for the sympatric coexistence of Suboscines and Oscines" Ibis doi:10.1111/j.1474-919X.2008.00802.x (early edition) Sabine's Sunbird talk 02:29, 25 February 2008 (UTC)

Euodice and Lonchura

Hi. Do you know of any evidence of the first being a good genus ? Shyamal (talk) 06:39, 25 February 2008 (UTC)

Haut de la Garenne

Please remember to mark your edits as minor if (and only if) they genuinely are minor edits (see Help:Minor edit). Marking a major change as a minor one is considered poor etiquette. The rule of thumb is that only an edit that consists solely of spelling corrections, formatting changes, or rearranging of text without modifying content should be flagged as a 'minor edit.' Thank you. -- John (Daytona2 · Talk · Contribs) 11:36, 1 March 2008 (UTC)

Correction of a perseverating lapsus clavis is not a major edit. (Namely, adding the info what the first chamber is, so that the "second chamber" the text mentions entirely without context makes sense).

And gormlessness and being a dick is poorer etiquette still. (An automated comment template is usually proof an editor is acting based not on knowledge and insight but on an automated alert. Before you cry wolf, DNA-type a scat ample and verify it's not a stray dog.) Dysmorodrepanis (talk) 12:43, 1 March 2008 (UTC)

WikiProject Birds March 2008 Newsletter

The March 2008 issue of the Bird WikiProject newsletter has been published. You may read the newsletter, change the format in which future issues will be delivered to you, or unsubscribe from this notification by following the link. Thank you.
This has been an automated delivery by BrownBot (talk) 18:38, 1 March 2008 (UTC)

WikiProject Germany Invitation

Hello, Dysmorodrepanis! I'd like to call your attention to the WikiProject Germany and the German-speaking Wikipedians' notice board. I hope their links, sub-projects and discussions are interesting and even helpful to you. If not, I hope that new ones will be. Wikipedia:WikiProject Germany | watch Wikipedia:German-speaking Wikipedians' notice board | watch

--Zeitgespenst (talk) 06:11, 10 March 2008 (UTC)

Speedy deletion of Corvus (genus)

A tag has been placed on Corvus (genus) requesting that it be speedily deleted from Wikipedia. This has been done under section A1 of the criteria for speedy deletion, because it is a very short article providing little or no context to the reader. Please see Wikipedia:Stub for our minimum information standards for short articles. Also please note that articles must be on notable subjects and should provide references to reliable sources that verify their content.

If you think that this notice was placed here in error, you may contest the deletion by adding {{hangon}} to the top of the page (just below the existing speedy deletion or "db" tag), coupled with adding a note on the talk page explaining your position, but be aware that once tagged for speedy deletion, if the article meets the criterion it may be deleted without delay. Please do not remove the speedy deletion tag yourself, but don't hesitate to add information to the article that would would render it more in conformance with Wikipedia's policies and guidelines. From-cary (talk) 21:37, 14 March 2008 (UTC)

Your merger proposal

Your proposal to merge effect of sun angle on climate into solar variation makes me wonder if you have any idea what either of those two articles is about. Solar variation is about variations in energy that the sun emits. It has nothing to do with seasons on EARTH, or anything about the earth at all. If the earth disappeared, the topic of solar variation would still exist. Effect of sun angle on climate is about the way in which variations of the EARTH's position affect its absorption of energy from the sun. If there were no variations at all in energy emitted by the sun, the topic of effect of sun angle on climate would still be there. Michael Hardy (talk) 03:03, 19 March 2008 (UTC)

Ah, so Solar_variation#Solar_interactions_with_Earth and Solar_variation#Solar_irradiance_of_Earth_and_its_surface refer to "Earth", the hypothetical frozen-helium Oort cloud object then?

Is this a joke or what? Dysmorodrepanis (talk) 03:14, 19 March 2008 (UTC)

You make no sense. Yes, solar variation affects the earth. I know that. I do not need to be convinced. But (1) solar variation would still exist if the earth did not, and (2) the topic of effect of sun angle on climate would still make just as much sense if there were not solar variation. There would still be seasons without solar variation, because of the earth's motions relative to the sun, and there would still be geographic variations in climate without solar variation. That is simply a separate topic from the topic of solar variation. Michael Hardy (talk) 03:21, 19 March 2008 (UTC)

OK, so the solar variation article needs much work. Because it does discuss the effect of the sun's angle on Earth climate. It even has an illustration of Milankovitch cycles in mid-text, as if these were subject of the article. Dysmorodrepanis (talk) 03:52, 19 March 2008 (UTC)

Banana

Thanks for the work on answering the question at Talk:Banana, and for the intro to Europanto :) --Chriswaterguy talk 13:13, 20 March 2008 (UTC)

A pleasure! I really needed such a no-holds-barred research job yesterday! Dysmorodrepanis (talk) 21:45, 20 March 2008 (UTC)

BrEng and AmEng printed Wikipedias?

I don't know the answer to this. That's probably something they'll discuss at WP:1 as we get closer to the time for that version. - Dan Dank55 (talk) 03:53, 29 March 2008 (UTC)

{{Missing taxobox}}

Hi, I see most of the tags for {{Missing taxobox}} were put by you. In the future could you put those on the talk page of articles and not in the article itself? (Per Wikipedia:WikiProject_Tree_of_Life#Cleanup). You may also be interested in a (partly outdated) rant about the issue: User:Shanes/Why_tags_are_evil. Pro bug catcher (talk • contribs). 18:35, 29 March 2008 (UTC)

Yo. These are/were articles that had the new code not implemented yet. Dysmorodrepanis (talk) 04:47, 30 March 2008 (UTC)

Answered on my talk page. Pro bug catcher (talk • contribs). 15:05, 30 March 2008 (UTC)

WikiProject Birds April 2008 Newsletter

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This has been an automated delivery by BrownBot (talk) 00:51, 2 April 2008 (UTC)

Merging articles

Hi! I recently saw one of your page merges, Guanacaste (tree). You correctly moved it to the scientific name. In order to comply with the GFDL license all contributions are released under here at Wikipedia, we must maintain the edit history of each article. When merging, it's important to maintain the edit history. If you'd like, after you're done with a merge, alert me on my talk page and I can merge the histories for you. Thanks! Cheers, Rkitko ^(talk) 12:33, 2 April 2008 (UTC)

Can you give me a brief summary how to merge Talk, so I can do it on my own in the future? (Or do you need Admin rights?) Dysmorodrepanis (talk) 12:47, 2 April 2008 (UTC)

Yes, admin privileges are required. When it's a simple merge with only a few edits, I wouldn't bother. But if there are significant edits on both pages, just alert me and I'll do the history merge for you :-) Cheers, Rkitko ^(talk) 12:51, 2 April 2008 (UTC)

P. eques

The current listing on the genus page is:

1. Réunion Parakeet, Psittacula (eques) eques - extinct (mid-18th century)
2. Mauritius Parakeet, Psittacula (eques) echo

I am not sure if they should be separate species or subspecies. Do you have any suggestions? Snowman (talk) 15:15, 2 April 2008 (UTC)

Thanks for help with the classification of the Echo Parakeet. I hope you like the photo of the Echo in the infobox. Snowman (talk) 22:00, 2 April 2008 (UTC)

Oh yes I do! Dysmorodrepanis (talk) 10:34, 3 April 2008 (UTC)

"This may be the only material proof of these birds' existence, or be from Mauritius." On the echo page, does this refer to the reunion parakeet? Should it be from Reunion? Snowman (talk) 11:28, 7 April 2008 (UTC)

Agapornis

I have heard about some alternative classification systems of Lovebirds. Are they of the Psittaculini? Is there such a parrot as Lillian's Lovebird? Snowman (talk) 21:48, 2 April 2008 (UTC)

List of Euphorbia species

Hi Dysmorodrepanis. I removed the taxobox because there is one at the genus article, my understanding is there should only be one box per taxon. I can think this is sensible, the species article would link to this genus article, duplicated boxes are disorientating. Lists should not replicate articles, at over 2 000 species there is no room for extras; the purpose of the page is to merely list the species. I thought twice about even editing the page, it is enormous, trimming improved its accessibility. I regretted doing it, but intend to make a nice page at commons instead. Do you agree with my reasoning? Will you restore my trimmed version if I make the appropriate page at Commons? Regards, cygnis insignis 15:18, 6 April 2008 (UTC)

Uggh, Commons taxonomy is currently going through serious pains; there are heaps of competing standards... I mean, go ahead if you can pick one that seems good (be caeful with ITIS; somebody has been adding it all over the place, and for birds specifically ITIS just stinks; for many plants it is not good either). But there is another problem - it seems Commons is generally getting rid of genus pages, so you'd have to make it a Category or risk that it'll be gone tomorrow. But then again, the Category would one way or another link the genus articles there...

The Commons Euphorbia stuff is in need of overhaul anyway, and bigtime. I pondered whether I should do it last year and didn't, because it would have been one very messy week of editing...

My reasoning is basically: user-friendliness beats SOP each and every time ;-) The taxobox certainly adds significant information here. Basically, the problem with "bare" lists is that they are arguably not Wikipedia-worthy at all. We have enough problems with the non-notability crew as it is, so a bit of eyecandy can help ;-)

Usually I am rather swift in deleting redindant information - especially taxonomic data, because it's so hard to maintain all those taxon authorities, synonyms etc when they are on several pages (taxon authors as placeholders for taxa where no page exists or - especially in Senneae its' important - when there is excessive homonymy are good). But I guess that the genus page and the species list only work together as a team, though one can reach them from either end. So I'm not firm on this issue, but I would rather keep the taxobox... it helps, especially on a page like this. Makes it more accessible to non-specialist users. (And I basically just like taxoboxes. Sleek piece of code, very pleasurable to use.)

Well if you really want to see it gone - why not just outcomment it for the time being and leave a note to that effect on the Talk page? That way, if it eventually gets restored the code is already in place (it's a bit different from the genus taxobox). Dysmorodrepanis (talk) 15:31, 6 April 2008 (UTC)

Yep, commons is going through growing pains. There are also people deleting categories on the basis that there is an 'article' (gallery) on the taxon. The discussion on this was not adequate, it is worth noting that several user accounts are adding to their edit counts by systematically removing useful information from the images. The simple answer to any perceived problem with an internationally accepted system of taxonomy is to do both, have galleries and categories. The specious reasoning provided for the deletion of these could be applied to any form of categorisation, something otherwise encouraged by the Commons community. It is a case of editors simplfying their own self appointed tasks, something that often degrades our contributions. It is very much a case of a view formed and implemented without proper consideration or consultation, the justifications are retrofitted to suit their actions. Anyone who is willing to squabble over there own uploads, and the quite reasonable application of a second or third category (overcat, apparently), is eventually given leeway to improve commons. This supports my contention that the edit count is the prize, they need to find unmonitored images or those they can bluff. That is my rant, so much for assuming good faith.

They are sleek indeed, the taxobox at the genus has a diversity link to the list of Euphorbia. They should not be different otherwise, that would be a worse problem. Duplication is disorientating to users, especially browsers, thinking of them is my standard SOP. I can't see a reason for IAR in this case. Other taxonomic systems exist, articles and lists are useful for these as well. All taxa are theories, if they are notable we should include them all. I think there is enough to do with the widely accepted systems, but explaining alternatives is potentially a valuable contribution.

Lists are accepted by the community here, and I think they are useful, however they are not regarded as articles. We are not explaining anything with them, they are a convenient arrangement of data that often support the 'proper' articles. An addendum.

I often use comment out, I didn't think it necessary as the duplicate is linked by the article title of the genus.

If you attend to this genus, you might use IPNI for the reference. We are, of course, not deciding who is most correct, the Kew Index is a great start for finding citations and by far the most established index of plant names. Also check the redirects to Euphorbia and article Taxonomy of the Euphorbiaceae, and note that it is unreferenced and the editor has not responded to requests for a citation AFAIK. The template at the top of the list (This article is 100 KB or more in size.) is founded on a good rationale, the images should be chopped out. cygnis insignis 18:02, 6 April 2008 (UTC)

Merge: Argusia argentea -> Tournefortia argentea

Can you merge the histories? Thanks in advance! Dysmorodrepanis (talk) 15:03, 6 April 2008 (UTC)

Done. Thanks for letting me know! And I also wanted to mention, thanks for all of your valuable contributions in checking taxonomy like that. It's hard to keep up with! Cheers, --Rkitko ^(talk) 17:04, 6 April 2008 (UTC)

There's a bit more on this topic in a new thread on Rkitkos' talk page. Hesperian 12:37, 9 April 2008 (UTC)

Polytelini

There are a few red links on the "Parrot" page. The one that seems to be the biggest gap is the redlink to the current tribe of "Polytelini". What is this? Snowman (talk) 11:31, 7 April 2008 (UTC)

Nice!

Good job on this It's good to see the article getting some attention! :) Der Wohltemperierte Fuchs ^(talk) 13:00, 21 April 2008 (UTC)

Cormorant article

No problem with removing the picture, that wasn't that good a home for it anyways . That red footed shag thing , wow . That's one eye-catching bird :D Cheers --Mad Tinman _{T C} 13:04, 22 April 2008 (UTC)