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Hello again, this time I'm asking you a taxonomy/systematics question rather than a nomenclature question! I've come to ask you about your thoughts on the current consensus of the taxonomy of the fly superfamily Tipuloidea, particularly since you edited all the relevant articles to follow Petersen et al. (2010) back in 2014, recognising only two extant families Pediciidae and Tipulidae and treating both Cylindrotomidae and Limoniidae as subfamilies of Tipulidae. I ask this because Wikipedia is not internally consistent here: Tipuloidea once again lists all four of the extant families as valid, Cylindrotomidae's article treats it as a family again, but Limoniinae's article still treats it as a subfamily of Tipulidae and Tipulidae's article itself still lists both Cylindrotomidae and Limoniidae as subfamilies after your changes. On top of this Tipulomorpha's article lists all four of these families as valid as well, but Template:Diptera families lists only Pediciidae and Tipulidae. Obviously this must be fixed, but which classification should be used? Two families or four families?

Trying to answer this question for myself by looking around for articles on the subject, the impression I get is that most people since Petersen et al. (2010) don't follow their proposed classification at all and instead continue to recognise all four of Cylindrotomidae, Limoniidae, Pediciidae and Tipulidae as families, even if they actually cite Petersen et al. (2010) itself. For example, Pape et al. (2011) and the more recent Diptera of Canada and Catalogue of Diptera (Insecta) of Morocco articles seem to recognise all four of these families (the Morocco one doesn't list Cylindrotomidae, but I assume it probably would if that family was recorded in that country). In addition there is the Catalogue of the Craneflies of the World website, which also recognises all four of them (and is cited by the Diptera of Canada article). Meanwhile, the only article I've found so far that states it follow Petersen's classifcation is Gelhaus and Ruggeri (2012).

My thoughts are that, even if Petersen et al. (2010)'s proposed Tipuloidea classification could become more generally accepted in the near future, the current consensus to me appears to be to recognise all four of Cylindrotomidae, Limoniidae, Pediciidae and Tipulidae as valid for the time being, and Wikipedia should probably reflect this (even if Limoniidae is also generally recognised as paraphyletic). Does this sound right to you? Did I overlook something?

(Apart from anything else, I've learned that the two fossil families originally listed at Tipuloidea, Architipulidae and Eolimnobiidae, are no longer recognised as far as I've been able to tell; the former has been considered a subfamily or synonym of Limoniidae since Blagoderov et al. (2007), and the latter has been implied to be a synonym of Ptychopteridae since Lukashevich (2008) (I say this because it treats Eolimnobia as a synonym of Eoptychoptera, though it doesn't state what happens to the included species of Eolimobia.). I've already dealt with the latter on Wikipedia, but I've done nothing about the former yet thanks to the issue of Limoniidae/Limoniinae. On Wikispecies I've already put these two families in synonymy.)

(Sorry for the wall of text, by the way)

Monster Iestyn ( talk) 15:25, 17 June 2022 (UTC)

I guess that as of 2014, resistance to the conservative classification had not yet become obvious. I don't have time to look more closely at this particular case, but my general approach when dealing with establishing a "consensus" classification for WP/WS pages is to see if there's evidence of an active rejection of a new classification. I don't generally place much weight on catalogues; what I mean by an active rejection is a paper with a cladogram, or any sort of analysis of characters, that presents actual evidence that refutes a proposed classification. I also take into consideration who the authors are. Among the references post-2010 that do not use the conservative classification is only a single tipulid researcher, Pjotr Oosterbroek, and I can find nothing he has published that states why he insists on using the 1992 classification scheme rather than the newer scheme. Gelhaus & Ruggeri are tipulid experts. In that respect, this appears to be an actual ongoing controversy, rather than a consensus that runs against the new scheme. Unfortunately, that makes things much harder, and short of consulting a tipulid expert, can't offer good advice. It may boil down to a very stereotypical cladist/non-cladist debate, given that the old scheme is adopted by non-cladists, and the new scheme by cladists. I'm very strongly biased in the latter camp (I don't like any classification not supported by a phylogeny), so not an entirely neutral source of opinion. Dyanega ( talk) 21:25, 17 June 2022 (UTC)

I see... unfortunately I haven't found anything that actively rejects the new classification either. Best I've been able to find are the Finnish lists Salmela (2011) and Salmela and Petrašiūnas (2014), which both seem to justify using the old classification but only because the new one has some problems yet to resolve (?). But those don't seem to actively reject the classification, only avoid it. Cylindrotomidae's article apparently cites Zhang et al. (2016) as a reason to reject Petersen et el., but oddly enough I don't any outright rejection in here either (if anything they seem to confirm Petersen et el.'s findings, while quietly avoiding use of their new classification even though they mention it??). I have no idea if any of the authors of these particular articles are specialists in tipulids anyway. Thanks for explaining your position on this though. Monster Iestyn ( talk) 22:39, 17 June 2022 (UTC)

Hi again! I should have got back to you about this before, but I learned a few months ago of a rejection of Petersen et al. (2010)'s phylogeny by Jaroslav Starý in 2021: [1]. In it he basically restates the four families from his 1992 phylogeny and that Limoniidae is monophyletic. Monster Iestyn ( talk) 15:38, 1 January 2023 (UTC)

I have some changes I want to make about the Monarch's conservation status, but I want to be sure I won't conflict with your edits. Thanks, Dan Bloch ( talk) 15:52, 22 July 2022 (UTC)

Hi. I'm done - it was imperative to distinguish that the IUCN has two separate status designations for two separate subdivisions within the species - so long as that's clear, we should be good. Thanks. Dyanega ( talk) 16:06, 22 July 2022 (UTC)

My take is that that's mostly but not completely right. The IUCN deals in species and subspecies, not populations. You can see my changes and comment soon. Thanks, Dan Bloch ( talk) 16:13, 22 July 2022 (UTC)

		The Starfish Barnstar
		For User:Dyanega and their proofreading & citation-checking efforts on pages related to the Lycorma genus. User has consistently made quality edits to biology related articles with an eye for detail that we can all aspire to. Etriusus ( Talk) 17:39, 9 August 2022 (UTC)

I see you reverted my good-faith edit. Why remove it and not offer a clarification of your own? The word is likely not known to most readers of Wikipedia, and the article would benefit from it. DeeJaye6 ( talk) 17:44, 17 August 2022 (UTC)

Dear Editor,

I am contacting you to ask Nothorhina punctata page you made. /info/en/?search=Nothorhina_punctata

On the thread, you put "This species is native to Europe, but has been introduced to Japan." I am wondering the backup reference for the below phrase. Any remark of INVASIVENESS of this species to Japan was found in GBIF. Look forward to getting your reply!

Seunghyun Chiyark ( talk) 13:08, 4 September 2022 (UTC)

Hi. The host plant of this beetle does not naturally occur in Japan, so the records in Japan are on an introduced host, and I've clarified that and given a cite. It's not possible to find a cite specifically stating that Pinus sylvestris is introduced in Japan, but there are references to the tree's natural distribution in the article about that species, and Japan is clearly outside of that range. Dyanega ( talk) 17:59, 4 September 2022 (UTC)

So you wrote that statement only based on the host plant? Japanese friends collect the beetles mostly on Pinus densiflora, which is native tree, and that's the same in Korea. We were confusing about this statement because most of the Japanese entomologists consider the beetle native to Japan. Chiyark ( talk) 01:02, 5 September 2022 (UTC)

Thanks for editing the thread Dr. Doug Yanega! It looks way better and more neutral. Sorry recognizing your ID too late! I am Seunghyun Lee, we talked via email a few years ago when my Cerambycinae paper published in MPE! I am preparing the new report of Nothorhinini in Korea and found out this thread is a bit confusing. Thanks again Doug. Seunghyun. Chiyark ( talk) 03:57, 6 September 2022 (UTC)

I was unaware that this species was found on a different host in that region; I could not find any reports to that effect. To be honest, that suggests that it might be a different species; this will possibly require DNA sequencing to determine. Be that as it may, I will change the wording of the article slightly to reflect this new information, and would be grateful if you are aware of a published record of P. densiflora as the host. Dyanega ( talk) 15:13, 6 September 2022 (UTC)

Hi Dyanega. Do you know what wasp species the video I posted is? A local expert referred to it as "avispa cartonera", which is Spanish for paper wasp. And I now notice that I wrongly edited the specific European Paper Wasp, because in Spanish wikipedia we don't have an entry for the general "paper wasp", but only for the european one. Jackbravo ( talk) 18:26, 7 September 2022 (UTC)

Hope you don't mind me responding here rather than on that other editor's talkpage. Seemed a more appropriate location, though.

Anyway, as far as monotypic taxa goes, I agree when it comes to articles that just happen to be the wrong way around--genus redirecting to species--though every once in a blue moon I'll take my time to fix a few of those when I'm doing wider updates on that particular taxonomic area (e.g. if I'm updating the entirety of a tribe or subfamily, I may as well swap the pages around so they're in compliance with WP:MONOTYPICFAUNA). Used to do it more systematically, but yeah, there's more important stuff to focus on. However, when we end up with two separate pages on essentially the same thing--like someone creating a species page when the monotypic genus already has an article, like was the case here--I may as well redirect it immediately. One fewer article to keep up-to-date, and articles that are pretty much duplicates help no one, anyway. (Even worse when it's one of those genera/species where just about the entirety of available knowledge is "it exists, according to someone". We certainly don't need two articles to say "this is a taxon in higher taxon" with basically no further information and quite possibly outdated taxonomy to boot.)

As far as prioritization goes, I agree in principle. However, I often use my bursts of constructive-but-low-prio work to find what areas need desperate (well, pretty much all of it, but some of it is in even worse shape than other areas) attention. For example, diffusing stubs and categories is a great way to get a view of what areas have an above-average amount of stubs that boil down to "this exists, probably (but without any refs, who knows, it might be a junior synonym or a typo or a misunderstanding or who knows what else)" or with taxoboxes that conflict with the actual prose or categories (yay for partially-implemented taxo-revisions...), or so on. Tagging redirects is a good way to get a feel for what areas haven't seen much if any attention for years (because most of the areas that do see some attention have up-to-date redirect categorization) and thus are quite probably massively outdated (or have been flat-out wrong from the beginning). And so on.

Plus I just don't always have the kind of focus/mindset to work on the "most useful" edits, and I figure that when I'm choosing between "lower priority but someone should eventually do it" or "nothing", the former's still a more constructive use of my time. For many of those tasks, particularly the burst-of-repetitive-uncontroversial-edit tasks, it's not like anyone else actually wants to do them, anyway, even if no one disagrees it should eventually be done. (And halfway implemented categories are a mess that often leads to worse messes down the line to sort out, in my experience. Better spend an hour here and there to keep the categorization tree in more-or-less good shape than weeks repairing it afterwards. Good categorization structures make things easier to sort out when there's been major taxo-revisions, too.)

But yeah, "not a lot of us" and "staggering amount of articles" is absolutely right, unfortunately. There's days where it all feels like "this. never. ends." and things like coming back from two-year-breaks and finding that about 99% of what was on my lists of "needs to be done" still is on my list of "needs to be done" certainly doesn't help any there. Or finding old lists of stuff to be done in my userspace from like 2014 and realizing that yup, eight years down the line, still no one has gotten around to it. AddWitty NameHere 16:54, 9 September 2022 (UTC)

1. thank you (from a non-specialist) for very quick reaction!
2. I feel that the comparisons between these three species represent an American point of view, as do some of the texts (for example referring to common pests et al.) what say you?
3. on a different tack: what do you think of the naming of Planuncus (Ectobius) tingitanus and Planuncus vinzi cf. articles in [en] [de] and [fr]

jw ( talk) 20:54, 6 October 2022 (UTC)

(1) You're welcome. (2) Articles tend to reflect the selected sources. For these articles, most of the sources seem to have American authors. (3) "vinzi" is not a valid name; it is a junior synonym of Planuncus (Planuncus) tingitanus. See species Planuncus (Planuncus) tingitanus (Bolívar, 1914) Dyanega ( talk) 21:02, 6 October 2022 (UTC)

3. I hear you; but in [fr] there is no page at all for tingitanus, nor redirect :) I shall eventually find time to do something about this, un jour, dans un avenir pas trop lointain jw ( talk) 21:42, 6 October 2022 (UTC)

An automated process has detected that when you recently edited Autohaemorrhaging, you added a link pointing to the disambiguation page Tiger moth.

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I saw your comment on the Anophthalmus hitleri page wrt the lack of any evidence of an ICZN ruling. I was the person who added the better source needed tag and I was really glad to see that a domain expert had weighed in! Thanks! After reading your comment, I took a better look at that source and, after trawling through the footnote trail, it seems to me that what happened was this:

1. In 1934, a completely different species of insects is named Rochlingia hitleri.
2. In 1949, an entomologist named Hermann Haupt attempts to synonymize the genus with an older one, effectively renaming it Scepasma europea and declaring Rochlingia hitleri a nomen nudum.
3. This doesn't catch on, possibly because Hermann Haupt's argument was incorrect.
4. rosegeorge.com recounts this story (possibly sourced from Buzzwords: A Scientist Muses on Sex, Bugs, and Rock 'n' Roll?) in an article about the Anophthalmus hitleri in a way that suggests Hermann Haupt attempted to change the name on the basis that it was offensive and failed, and then mentions that ICZN rules probably don't allow changing a name for that reason.
5. strangeanimals.info misses that the story isn't about the Anophthalmus hitleri and also assumes that Hermann Haupt's name change attempt was taken up with the ICZN and was denied, despite the fact that the article quotes someone as saying "if people really object, they could bring it to the Commission."

Given this lineage, I think it's safe to say that the source claiming that this has been brought before the ICZN is unreliable and that that section can safely be rewritten to remove the claim. I'll probably do so soon, unless you have any objections. Cuniiform ( talk) 06:20, 8 October 2022 (UTC)

Just did so. Feel free to check it out to make sure I didn't get anything wrong. Cuniiform ( talk) 22:38, 8 October 2022 (UTC)

Seeing the recent Trigonalidae/Trigonalyidae discussion at Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Tree of Life, I'm wondering now: does Article 29.4 not even allow for authors of family-group names published after 1999 to later correct their spellings to be correctly formed in accordance with Article 29.3? The example I'm thinking of right now is the extinct beetle family Coleopsidae Kirejtshuk & Nel, 2016 (based on the genus-group name Coleopsis Kirejtshuk, Poschmann & Nel, 2014), which was later emended to "Coleopseidae" by Kirejtshuk, 2020 (which declared the original name to be a "lapsus calami"). I get the feeling the answer in this case is a hard no and it should be the original spelling, which is Coleopsidae, but I just want to make sure. Monster Iestyn ( talk) 13:47, 16 October 2022 (UTC)

If it had been published before 1999, Art. 29.5 would apply, and this would depend on the Code glossary definition: "usage, prevailing, n. Of a name: that usage of the name which is adopted by at least a substantial majority of the most recent authors concerned with the relevant taxon, irrespective of how long ago their work was published." However, as you correctly note, this name was published after 1999, so Article 29.4 explicitly prohibits anyone from changing the spelling. Coleopseidae is not a valid name, Coleopsidae stays. Dyanega ( talk) 15:24, 17 October 2022 (UTC)

Okay thanks, that means I will have to update Wikispecies accordingly (I see you already updated English Wikipedia, thanks). Monster Iestyn ( talk) 16:57, 17 October 2022 (UTC)

It appears that you have been canvassing—leaving messages on a biased choice of users' talk pages to notify them of an ongoing community decision, debate, or vote—in order to influence Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Tree of Life#Ongoing disaster: a heads-up. While friendly notices are allowed, they should be limited and nonpartisan in distribution and should reflect a neutral point of view. Please do not post notices which are indiscriminately cross-posted, which espouse a certain point of view or side of a debate, or which are selectively sent only to those who are believed to hold the same opinion as you. Remember to respect Wikipedia's principle of consensus-building by allowing decisions to reflect the prevailing opinion among the community at large. Thank you. BilledMammal ( talk) 00:02, 29 October 2022 (UTC)

Then you should respect that there is an existing community whose input you have deliberately avoided. Dyanega ( talk) 00:03, 29 October 2022 (UTC)

Please edit your notices to comply with WP:CANVASS, particularly the aspects based on "Message" and "Audience". BilledMammal ( talk) 00:07, 29 October 2022 (UTC)

I'll look into this when I'm back online, I have to leave now. In the meantime, if you're going to accuse me of bias, then maybe you can explain why you have not attempted to carry out mass merges of stub articles involving birds, or fish, or mammals, or reptiles. Insect taxonomy is an easier target? You'll also note that I did not selectively target the "TOL: Insects" groups, or "TOL: Beetles" groups, but the primary group, as the principle you are promoting, of mass merging of taxonomy stubs, affects the entirety of the taxonomic hierarchy. Or are you saying that I should include all the sub-groups of TOL in my posting? Dyanega ( talk) 00:11, 29 October 2022 (UTC)

@ BilledMammal:, Dyanega could very well have have started this by initiating a thread at ANI. That wouldn't be canvassing (ANI isn't going to have a partisan POV about the having stubs for species versus having redirects). Dyanega is a long-time editor (longer than you or I); Wikipedia:Don't template the regulars. I've never initiated a thread at ANI, and I'm fairly certain Dyanega hasn't done so either. Many productive Wikipedia editors aren't interested in stirring up formal (ANI) drama. BilledMammal, you didn't consult anybody before deciding to convert a large number of species articles into redirects. WP:TOL would be an obvious place to have consulted about that. Dyanega notified TOL about your edits, and another editor brought that to ANI. BilledMammal, would you specify which other pages Dyanega should have notified about your actions in order to avoid your templated accusation of canvassing? Plantdrew ( talk) 02:46, 29 October 2022 (UTC)

All but two of the linked species in Batillipes are redirects back to that page (one has an article, one is a red-link). These were created as redirects (not as articles) by User:Galactikapedia who created several thousand redirects for species across various obscure corners of the tree of life (they've expressed regret for these creations, there's no need to bring it up again). I've made a little bit of an effort to tag their redirects with {{ R animal with possibilities}} (or {{ R taxon with possibilities}}), but the majority are untagged (if I worked on it further, I'd also add {{ R from species to genus}} which didn't exist when I worked on it before).

Stemonitis had several bouts over a period of years of converting species/genus sub-stub articles to redirects. Many of these have been spun back up to articles. Affected areas I'm aware of are freshwater crustacean species (Stemonitis has some expertise in this area), Diptera genera, and Carex species. Here's a link to their contributions at a time they were redirecting species. I see there are talk pages for species, and redirects for vernacular names and synonyms that still point to genus articles even though the species articles have been reinstated. Eiconaxius still has many of it's species redirecting there (but the redirects aren't linked). List of Carex species has more than 100 species redirecting there, and is a terrible target for those redirects (people searching for the species might find the Carex article somewhat useful), but Wikipedia practice says redirects should target a place where they are mentioned, and the genus article for Carex doesn't mention the species.

Of course, standard practice here is to have the species in a fossil genus redirect to the genus article. Sometimes articles have been created for species and subsequently redirect. I've seen a few cases (gastropods if I recall correctly) where a genus has both fossil and extant species, and redirects have been created for the fossil species, with many of the extant species appearing as red-links.

There are a handful of small genera where each species is discussed in some detail in prose (not a table), and the binomials redirect to the genus article. Apororhynchus is one of these. Two Apororhynchus species once had stand-alone articles that were redirected, the other four species were created as redirects.

I find taxonbars immensely useful. The primary reason I visit Wikipedia articles in my professional life is for the taxonbar, which has links to all but one of the online resources for plants that I regularly consult. I don't really find any fault with the way ''Apororhynchus species are being covered; there a so few of them, that taxonbars for each could just be added to the genus article. But Apororhynchus approach is definitely not something that would work for a genus with dozen or hundreds of species.

There are a couple different ways to make redirects stand out visually, see Wikipedia:Visualizing redirects. I find this very useful for taxonomy related editing. Plantdrew ( talk) 21:23, 2 November 2022 (UTC)

These aren't tables; I used the word table very explicitly in this sentence, for that very reason. There are lots of lists, but BilledMammal is not proposing using lists, he is proposing putting most of the existing species article content into tables (as in [2]), and then deleting/redirecting the sources. This wipes out the taxonbars and all connections to Wikidata, among other things. The Apororhynchus example is interesting, and the species list could made targetable if "===" subheaders were used. However, again, those species don't have their individual taxonbars. Dyanega ( talk) 21:47, 2 November 2022 (UTC)

I’m happy to consider alternative ways to present the content, and if you can propose a suitable way I’m also happy to include taxonbars. My goal is to increase the utility of these articles for average readers, and I don’t mind what format this takes. BilledMammal ( talk) 21:54, 2 November 2022 (UTC)

If you're sincere about engaging in a dialogue as to alternative approaches, I am happy to do the same, and I do have ideas. However, (1) I would request that the discussion be with other WP:TOL regular editors, which was the primary source of distress right from day one, that we were left out of the loop. Open up a new thread at Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Tree of Life and I will gladly take part in the discussion. (2) until the discussion at WP:TOL comes to a consensus, would you be willing to refrain from deleting or merging taxonomy articles in the meantime? We have examples of some of your attempts that we can link to for discussion purposes, but the AfDs and such are a distraction at the moment. It seems to me that those two steps would be genuine gestures of good faith, and I would reciprocate, and other TOL editors would also appreciate it. Dyanega ( talk) 22:06, 2 November 2022 (UTC)

Dyanega, Stemonitis produced tables for freshwater crustacean genera they worked on. I'd have to dig through their edits quite a bit to find out if there are any current cases where species are still redirects and there is a table in the genus article. Orconectes has a table, and at one point the species were redirects, but the species articles have now been restored.

BilledMammal, thank you for being willing to discuss. One suggestion I'd make regarding your version of Bothriospilini is to include the taxonomic authority in the same column as the species name (the authority isn't necessarily the first person to describe a species, although it often is). That would save some space which could then be used for an additional column for other data. Plantdrew ( talk) 03:07, 3 November 2022 (UTC)

The Orconectes table is problematic; it does not indicate recombinations, which are essential even on forked content. It lacks synonymies, as well, but if the species have their own articles, then synonymies can be listed there. It's very similar to BM's early attempts, and needs rethinking. Dyanega ( talk) 22:18, 2 November 2022 (UTC)

By "does not indicate recombination" you're referring to authorities that should have parentheses but lack them? That's a problem on Wikipedia in general, not just the Orconectes table (we've discussed this on my talk page before). But it does highlight why TOL should be consulted (not to get TOL's "permission", but to get advice about what is important to preserve).

As designed, taxonbars don't work well in tables. They are intended to be very wide, which is fine when they're placed at the bottom of an article. If taxonbars are going to be included in tables, a variant would be needed, something like {{ taxonbar_table}}. I'm not sure what is possible, but if a table contains images that increase the height of a row, it would be pretty awesome if the taxonbar could dynamically decrease width and take advantage of the increased height. There are some links displayed by regular taxonbars that could be excluded to keep a table variant smaller (we probably need to have some ongoing discussion and review about which links regular taxonbars should display anyway, and which new Wikidata properties need to be supported by taxonbars). Regular taxonbars are highly customisable in which links are displayed. A variant taxonbar for tables might include switches (e.g. |beetle, |plant) that could be set to exclude Wikidata links with low value for a particular group of organisms. Plantdrew ( talk) 03:07, 3 November 2022 (UTC)

One suggestion I'd make regarding your version of Bothriospilini is to include the taxonomic authority in the same column as the species name (the authority isn't necessarily the first person to describe a species, although it often is) That makes sense; I will do that.

Your comment about taxonbars also make sense; removing barriers to their inclusion in tables will help. I'll see if I can come up with anything, but I'm not experienced at editing templates. BilledMammal ( talk) 08:20, 3 November 2022 (UTC)

My original plan was to open a discussion in my user space, once I have produced several examples of species articles merged to their genus parents within the Asteraceae family (initial example of a first draft can be found here), and invite editors from TOL whose comments suggest that would be open to considering the idea to workshop the proposal before taking it to the village pump to determine if a consensus exists for it.

However, I'm willing to try holding that discussion at TOL instead if you believe that to be a better idea. I also have no plan to boldly merge or delete any taxonomy articles without consensus. BilledMammal ( talk) 08:20, 3 November 2022 (UTC)

That is, in large part, what most of us really were looking for in the first place - a dialogue - and I'm happy to offer guidance; I've been editing taxonomy articles for 16 years. One last note, about taxonbars. I have seen, but don't have time today to look in detail, that articles for monotypic taxa do have multiple taxonbars at the bottom (one for genus, one for species). In cases where a genus has only a few species, having an alphabetic list of taxonbars at the bottom could be workable, rather than trying to cram them in a table. The more I look at it, the more I think I personally prefer the general approach used at Apororhynchus. Not a table, but individual text summaries, including references. I see one VERY important advantage to this over a table; it avoids the "blank box" problem. That is, an article subsection would have an image only if one is available; it would list synonyms only if they exist; it would give distribution notes only if they are available; etc. - this would avoid having a huge table where fewer than half the boxes contain anything, which is one the most dramatic drawbacks of a big table. The main stumbling block at that point, perhaps, would be whether people could agree on a reasonable and objective cutoff for how many species can be accommodated in one article in this format. Finding consensus for a definition of "manageable" is the kind of thing that collective decision-making can get hung up on. Regardless, I look forward to a broader discussion over at TOL. Dyanega ( talk) 18:18, 3 November 2022 (UTC)

As brief brainstorming before taking it there, I believe their needs to be a discussion on several topics:

1. What information about child species should always be included in genera articles, regardless of whether the child article has a standalone article?

   My initial thoughts are that the species name, its authority, its subspecies, its synonyms, its conservation status, its range, and a depiction of it should always be included.

2. Should child species articles exist if there is no content currently provided beyond that information?
3. At how many species should we switch from a list format (similar to Apororhynchus) to a table format?

   I agree that a list format is preferable, but it may become too long for for the larger genera.

4. If species should not always have standalone articles, at what level of content in a list-style genera article should they be split out?
5. If species should not always have standalone articles, what additional content can be included in the a table-style genera style article before splitting the species out?

   A brief description section?

6. Should we only include the species-specific information contained within taxonbars in genera-level articles where there is no species article?
7. When taxonbars are included, where should they be included?
   • At the bottom of the article like Amborella?
   • For articles that use a list format, at the end of each section covering a single species?
   • For articles that use a table format, as a column in the table?

BilledMammal ( talk) 02:19, 4 November 2022 (UTC)

1. That's basically the maximum amount of information I'd expect on species in a genus article (outside of cases like Aporororhynchus). But that may result in a "huge table where fewer than half the boxes contain anything" (synonyms, subspecies and conservation status will often be absent). And keep in mind, there are some enormous genera where the species are only mentioned in a separate list, e.g. Bulbophyllum/ List of Bulbophyllum species (Bulbophyllum sub-stubs were prime examples in the discussion that led to MASSCREATE)
2. I don't mind sub-stubs that only have that information (plus a taxonbar, which is what makes these potentially useful to me), but I understand you disagree. Before taxonbars were introduced, I had more of a feeling that Wikipedia sub-stubs were potentialy harmful as they displaced sites with more useful information in search engine results (but these sites are now generally found in taxonbars). If there's consensus to merge sub-stubs, articles created by Polbot including a little more information (habitat and threats) might be candidates for merging (Polbot sometimes produced nonsense e.g. "Its natural habitat is plantations . It is threatened by habitat loss." Plantations are a "habitat" that is expanding, not being lost)
3. I'd say around 10 species (maybe up to 20)
4. Definitely split when there are 10 sentences of prose, maybe sooner (the accounts for Aporororhynchus species run from 4 to 9 sentences)
5. This seems like mostly the inverse of question 4. In articles with tables, any additional information might lead to a split. In Apororhynchus style articles, it should have all of the information suggested in question 1 in prose format, plus a description and possibly habitat (for parasites like Apororhynchus, the habitat is the host)
6. I'm not very sure what you're asking. We shouldn't have taxonbars for species in genus articles when the species has it's own article.
7. Taxonbars should be at the bottom of the article; the bar format means they take up the full width of the article so they don't fit well anywhere else. I think they could be at the bottom of a list formatted article, or if there's a narrower version, it could be at the end of sections (if there is a narrower version, I'd consider a higher number for question 3). In a table formatted article, something like a taxonbar should be in a column in a table(but the existing format for taxonbar won't fit in a table). Lists of astronomical objects (e.g. List of minor planets: 23001–24000) include (two) external links as column in a table. Plantdrew ( talk) 16:54, 4 November 2022 (UTC)

For 1, larger genera will need a different solution; maybe splitting into multiple tables, similar to the lists of minor planets? I also think that the issue of empty cells is one we will have to accept if we want information about the child species within articles about the larger genera.

For 5 and 6, I missed a few words in my questions, but it appear you understood them. Your responses all make sense; I'll draft a discussion starter to post in ToL over the next few days and invite you and Dyanega to look over it before posting. BilledMammal ( talk) 05:47, 6 November 2022 (UTC)

Briefly, as I'm fairly busy today: it's important to bear in mind that any standards or guidelines adopted need to apply to all taxa, from fungi to plants to vertebrates to insects. The clause "regardless of whether the child article has a standalone article?" is likely to be one of the most important decisions, up front. At the very least small existing articles should become redirects, but redlinked taxa don't need a redirect or a taxonbar, though these could be added. Species articles that are substantial standalones should obviously be left as is, with a link pointing to them in the genus article. My own feeling is that there is far less constraint if a subsection format (I think a "list" is what the present format of most articles is), and the set of parameters you suggest already show why a table would be a poor choice: out of the overall total of existing articles, very few species have subspecies, or conservation status, or public-domain images, and only a minority have included synonyms or distributions. Importantly, the first three parameters either exist or they don't, but those latter two frequently exist but are not presently incorporated directly into the article text. Done as a table, there would be lots and lots of empty boxes, and when you have one species with 50 synonyms, or an image, the remaining column of BIG empty boxes would be super-wasteful. That said, I'll point out that even though existing article text often fails to include synonyms or distributions, if there is a taxonbar then that information can be found using those links, with very few exceptions, as well as many images (ones that would not be possible to use in WP) - one of the main reasons I objected so strongly to eliminating taxonbars. Under these circumstances, I think a fair starting point would be to assume that a subsection format would be preferred, and that subsections would include whatever text is present in the existing article being merged (maybe even less), plus a minimal taxobox. The latter is essential, as it covers several of the parameters you mention: since the genus article already HAS a taxobox showing higher level classification, the species taxoboxes would only need to give parameters that are unique to that species; namely, the authorship, the synonymies, an available image, the geological time period (for fossils), and the conservation status (rarely, a map - unlikely in stub articles). Those parameters are all normally included in the taxoboxes, so the format is already familiar to readers, and for most species, they would only be a few lines long. I'm going to link an example that is not taxonomic at all, but I think it shows how editors dealing with the same basic problem in other areas have found a viable approach: Los Angeles Dodgers minor league players. Each subsection has what amounts to its own taxobox, and each subsection has a different amount of descriptive text, with references. That particular article has 26 subsections, and it seems just a little larger than desirable, so maybe we're looking at something like 20 species being close to an upper limit for a merged genus article. It would be fantastic if the species-specific taxonbar can be made to appear within the section for each species, otherwise scrolling to the bottom to look for it is not reader-friendly. One other thing before I go: be aware that if you're browsing around existing insect genus/tribe/subfamily articles, there are a very large number of them that were created by a single editor (EdiBobb, via "QbugBot") who used almost exclusively US-centric online sources that are incomplete, outdated, and often contradictory, and the taxa discussed often also occur outside the US. These articles are written as if they are definitive, and I and other editors have our hands full trying to improve them whenever we come across them. They may say something like "There are about N genera and at least # described species in X" and these numbers are rarely accurate. The section headers will say "Species" instead of "Selected species" or "Genera" instead of "Selected genera". They may list the same species under two or even three different spellings, and very often they include names that are synonyms, or have been moved into other genera. These articles exemplify a problem with simply adopting existing articles, and it's one of the reasons that bulk merges are problematic; if a genus or tribe article is incomplete, then it should be improved to make it ready to be merged into. Just something to think about. Dyanega ( talk) 16:20, 4 November 2022 (UTC)

I've written a draft here and opened a discussion on it here. I'll move it to TOL when we have had a chance to fix the largest issues. BilledMammal ( talk) 05:34, 13 November 2022 (UTC)

Is it dead? Where can I find the archives? Shyamal ( talk) 05:39, 18 November 2022 (UTC)

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Hey Dyanega,

Saw the lead info before I added [3]. As I understand the lead is an overview and should be a synopsis of the article itself. Adding the recent definitive and non-assumptive declaration in the body seemed appropriate, even more so as the statement in the lead, "no confirmed sightings" from the primary WSDA source makes no mention of such facts (it may have when first added) and the Newsweek article is presumptive before the official close of the season.

Thoughts on how we can improve this?

Thanks! TheGREYHORSE ( talk) 01:24, 7 December 2022 (UTC)

I replaced the WSDA link with the news item you had linked. The season ended in October, the traps were reclaimed in November, a trivial nuance regarding the "official" end of the season. As for putting it in the body of the article, it isn't necessary, and would be entirely redundant since it would be essentially a verbatim copy of the single sentence in the lead; moreover, the section in the text is essentially a list of reported sightings, none of which occurred in 2022. If there are any sightings next year, that sentence would need to be deleted from the text (meaning two changes would need to be made), whereas if it only appears in the lead, only one change would need to be made, since statements about eradication would no longer be appropriate. Dyanega ( talk) 15:56, 7 December 2022 (UTC)

Makes sense and fair enough. I defer to your professional experience and your 32,000(!) edit career here at Wikipedia. I appreciate the update that you made as it fits much better.

Thanks for taking the time to respond and most especially thankful that your response will help me become a better editor.

Have a good one.

TheGREYHORSE ( talk) 23:47, 7 December 2022 (UTC)

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