Talk:American Coot

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The first paragraph describes the coot as a large waterbird. Is this accurate? If it's the same creature that's often called a mud hen, the ones we have in California are rather small – smaller than gulls and mallards, for instance. Cognita 03:49, 9 November 2006 (UTC)

Can / should this page be merged with the other Coot article? Paulburnett (talk) 17:20, 12 June 2009 (UTC)


 * No, the Coot article is about all the coots, several species worldwide, this page is just for the American species jimfbleak (talk) 06:22, 13 June 2009 (UTC)

I have a problem with the sentence: "The way in which their heads bob when they walk or swim has earned them the name 'marsh hen' or 'mud hen'." It makes no sense. How would the bobbing manner lead to a name like marsh or mud? The way in which their heads bob, to me, should give a name like "bobbing hen" or something like that. Marsh or mud just seems to refer to the place they're commonly found. What do others think? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 141.211.123.37 (talk) 18:54, 17 June 2010 (UTC)

Problems with map for coot
Map American_Coot-map-localisation-fr.svg is inaccurate and lacks detail. In Boston, MA coots do not breed, but are winter migrants as is correctly shown by the Cornell Lab of Ornithology map at http://www.allaboutbirds.org/guide/american_coot/lifehistory/ac.

This is my first attempt to edit Wikipedia. The Cornell Lab site is copyrighted and so the map is off limits. I do not know how better data could be incorporated into a new map. Peggy hopper (talk) 00:57, 8 January 2012 (UTC)

Edits made for Behavioral Ecology class
Hi, I have just made a few organizational and content edits under the "Ecology" section of this article. I will be working with and adding to this article the rest of the semester as I learn more about animal behavior and coots! This is my first time with Wikipedia. Please let me know if there are any errors or organizational issues that need to be addressed.

Some notes about the article: The Wikipedia entry on the American Coot focuses mainly on the physical characteristics of the adult coot, their range in habitat, and their behavior. In the behavior section, they talk about how coots fly, their hunting technique, and their aggression. At the very end of the article, there is discussion on the American Coot fossil record. I think that the “Ecology” section, which focuses on behavior is extremely disorganized—all the different behaviors are mixed together under a single heading. My suggestion would be to create subsections under “Ecology” with labels like breeding, aggression, predator-prey interactions, etc. The article could also discuss more about the bearing and caring of young. Our textbook cites a study that determined that American Coot chicks have “ornaments” that charm parents to feed them more. I would include that study and insert more pictures on the subject. Katheefwah (talk) 19:40, 25 September 2012 (UTC)

Behavioral Ecology Assignment
Hello, I am reviewing Wikipedia articles for my behavioral ecology class. This used to be a very short article, with most of the Coots’ behavioral traits condensed under one heading of “Ecology,” but now it has been nicely expanded by Katheefwah. The article gave very brief accounts of breeding, nesting, and eating habits. However, I was interested to learn from the Wikipedia article that these birds practiced conspecific brood parasitism, meaning females sometimes laid eggs in their neighbors’ nests, even if they had nests of their own! In my textbook, (and as Katheefwah mentioned) it said that the American Coot was the only species of the Rail family that has been studied for parental feeding preferences. Experiments were done where the brightly ornamented Coot chicks had their bright orange feathers trimmed so that they were darker in color. When all the chicks were trimmed, their parents showed no preference, but when only half the chicks in a brood were trimmed, the parents showed a clear preference for feeding chicks that were more ornamented. This is an interesting result that could be added to the Wikipedia article. Also, the article, while doing a great job of posting pictures of adult American Coots, failed to put up any pictures of coot chicks. This is interesting since the coot chicks are notable for their flaming orange and red plumes. Ihyuan (talk) 22:33, 25 September 2012 (UTC)

Reformatting headers
I moved a bunch of headers around today, merging "Range" with the "Ecology" section. I tried my best to clean up the "Behavior" section, but it still looks massive and intimidating. Does anyone have any ideas on how to divide/tighten it up while still maintaining the general organization? WolfyFTW (talk) 21:46, 14 October 2012 (UTC)
 * Thanks, Robert! The article looks much more organized now. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Katheefwah (talk • contribs) 23:31, 15 October 2012 (UTC)
 * Hi there. In regards to organization, I've broken up the "Behavior" section into smaller sections of Nest, Egg-laying and clutch size, etc. I also combined some shorter paragraphs into nicer blocks of text. It's overall very well done with a lot of interesting information. I noticed lots of inconsistencies in the capitalization of "coot" so I changed them all to "Coot." I also made some minor grammatical edits. Feel free to continue reorganizing or reformatting the sections. The newly-created headers/sections were just my own personal opinions so you're welcome to edit them as you see fit. Njoymusic2 (talk) 03:52, 17 October 2012 (UTC)

Edits on 10-14-12
Hi, all. This article definitely appears to have a lot of content! I am impressed by the details and variety of behaviors listed. To summarize my contributions, I cleaned up the reference section that had multiple references which referred to the same articles. That shrunk the reference section down a bit. I also added some hyperlinks here and there and changed some confusing wording(though there weren't many cases of this. I also reactivated the table of contents section in response to WolfyFTW's comments about dividing up the article. Now, it should be easier for users to navigate to the preferred section of the article. Good work! GenesBrainsBehaviorNeuroscienceKL (talk) 02:23, 15 October 2012 (UTC)
 * Thanks, Kevin! The article looks much more organized now. I was trying to figure out how to bring the ToC up...thanks for doing that!

New GA Nomination
I believe I have fixed all of the problems discussed in the first GA review process with the exception of changing the species distribution map. I an unfamiliar with inserting these maps into wikipedia and am currently trying to figure it out. Any help would be appreciated. Gabeh12345 (talk) 03:58, 11 July 2013 (UTC)

Wikipedia Ambassador Program course assignment
This article was the subject of an educational assignment at Washington University supported by the Wikipedia Ambassador Program&#32;during the 2012 Fall term. Further details are available on the course page.

The above message was substituted from by PrimeBOT (talk) on 16:05, 2 January 2023 (UTC)