Talk:External morphology of Lepidoptera/GA1

GA Review
The edit link for this section can be used to add comments to the review.''

Reviewer: Stemonitis (talk) 09:04, 22 January 2011 (UTC)

Declaration: I am a minor contributor to the article, and have previously been asked to make suggestions about its content. --Stemonitis (talk) 09:04, 22 January 2011 (UTC)

Detailed comments will follow shortly. --Stemonitis (talk) 09:04, 22 January 2011 (UTC)

First pass
Well, it's a sizeable article, and my initial impressions are very positive. I've only managed to read half of it in detail, but I thought I'd leave you comments on that now, so that you had something to be getting on with. In no particular order, then:
 * There are a number of links to disambiguation pages (see link in box above): Caudate, Cocoon, Costa, Cremaster, Dentate, Echolocation, Frenulum, Homology, Retinaculum, Tagma (from tagmata).✅ AshLin (talk) 16:37, 12 February 2011 (UTC)
 * I would recommend using  in images which are portrait, so that they are the same overall size as the landscape images. ✅. Some images given the upright argument. Please indicate if any others need to be given this argument. To me, as of now, the issue seems to be brought under control. AshLin (talk) 03:05, 13 February 2011 (UTC)
 * Yes, that looks fine to me now. --Stemonitis (talk) 20:15, 17 February 2011 (UTC)
 * ✅ AshLin (talk) 00:19, 18 February 2011 (UTC)


 * I would be tempted to replace the image galleries with multiple image, which allows you to add a header explaining the encyclopaedic point of the images (e.g. "Variation in head morphology"). I think the overall number of images could probably be reduced, too. For example, when demonstrating the great variation in wing form, a single row would probably be enough, because the reader will have seen plenty of other images of typical Lepidoptera throughout the article. In that case, I would suggest the images of Pterophoridae, Syntomeida epilais, Palumbina guerinii and Hemaris diffinis; the remaining images are of less unusual leps.
 * Seeing that encyclopedias and books sometimes provide a gallery of images giving many examples or modifications, I'm a little reluctant to reduce the number of images, especially since Wikipedia has the capability of hosting many more images in an article than an article on the same topic in a book or journal. I'd rather provide more than less of course remembering that each and every image should have encyclopedic value. However, I'll reduce some images. The Lycaenid tail would probably be better suited elsewhere where the role of morphological characters help the survival of the insects. Still pending as a point. ✅ Nothing more to reduce on my accord.  AshLin (talk) 03:17, 13 February 2011 (UTC)
 * The etymology in the lead appears to have been slightly mangled. The source actually gives "lepis", not "lepteron", and I would suggest linking to λεπίς / λεπίδος (i.e. ). In fact, use the etymology from the section "Scales", which appears to be correct.✅ AshLin (talk) 16:45, 12 February 2011 (UTC)
 * The lead also includes unfamiliar terms such as "obtect" and "adecticous". These need either to be explained there and then, or left out until they are discussed in detail later. Even in the section on "General body plan", where they re-appear, these terms are not explained at all.✅ AshLin (talk) 16:54, 12 February 2011 (UTC). ✅ AshLin (talk) 17:34, 12 February 2011 (UTC).
 * Lists comprising sentence fragments, such as "Distinguishing taxonomic features", should not have full stops at the end. In each case, check if the list could be converted into prose. It may not be possible, but if it is, the manual of style prefers the prose alternative.
 * The source has these features listed in prose. They were converted to a list while rewriting to avoid plagiarism. Please check source cited as a reference. AshLin (talk) 16:59, 12 February 2011 (UTC)
 * There are some instances where a reference is given in both "Harvard style", and using tags (e.g. "within the lumen of some scales (Poladian et al., 2008).[37]"). I can't see any reason to retain the Harvard-style references. ✅ AshLin (talk) 17:34, 12 February 2011 (UTC).
 * We are told that the "fore-legs in the Papilionoidea exhibit reduction of various forms", but only one form of reduction is mentioned. Either re-word the sentence or provide further examples.✅ AshLin (talk) 02:59, 13 February 2011 (UTC)

I'll be back to read the second half before too long. --Stemonitis (talk) 07:37, 27 January 2011 (UTC)

Second pass
Here goes:
 * The various instances of ref. [23] only cite pages 39–40, so move that information from rp to cite. Likewise, [24] is only cited once, so move pages to cite. For all others, where possible, move rp to cite.
 * Reduced to minimum necessary. ✅ AshLin (talk) 13:22, 17 February 2011 (UTC)


 * Scales: Colour – I assume that "(Argyros etal 2001)" is ref. [38].
 * Since I am quoting Argyrops et al, would it be correct to remove the inline attribution? AshLin (talk) 05:27, 17 February 2011 (UTC)
 * An inline citation will suffice; it doesn't need an additional, "Harvard-style" reference. --Stemonitis (talk) 20:15, 17 February 2011 (UTC)
 * ✅ AshLin (talk) 00:41, 18 February 2011 (UTC)


 * Make sure dashes follow WP:MOSDASH – don't use hyphens in place of n-dashes ("the most complex photonic scale architectures known – regular three-dimensional periodic lattices", "androconia (singular – androconium)"). This also applies to page numbers, whether in rp or elsewhere.
 * Done my best. Willing to learn more. Please recheck. AshLin (talk) 17:28, 17 February 2011 (UTC)
 * Looks OK to me now. --Stemonitis (talk) 20:15, 17 February 2011 (UTC)
 * ✅ AshLin (talk) 00:41, 18 February 2011 (UTC)


 * Scales: Function – I would link "warning" to aposematism, and re-phrase "communicate their aposematism (toxicity or inedibility)" to "communicate their toxicity or inedibility", since aposematism strictly refers to the warning, not the toxicity.
 * It now reads:  ...which are distasteful to predators help communicate their toxicity or inedibility, thus preventing a predator from preying on it. . Will this do? AshLin (talk) 08:28, 17 February 2011 (UTC)
 * Good solution. --Stemonitis (talk) 20:15, 17 February 2011 (UTC)
 * ✅ AshLin (talk) 00:41, 18 February 2011 (UTC)


 * Scales: Androconia – link sexual selection. ✅ AshLin (talk) 08:28, 17 February 2011 (UTC)


 * Abdomen: "The Noctuoidea also have tympana, located on the underside of the metathorax." I think I would re-phrase this "..., but in their case they are located ...", to clarify that these tympana are not on the abdomen. ✅ AshLin (talk) 08:28, 17 February 2011 (UTC)


 * Should "Genitalia" be a subheading of "Abdomen"? ✅ AshLin (talk) 17:52, 16 February 2011 (UTC)


 * Genitalia: gloss "ductus bursae"
 * I did not understand. Please explain more clearly. AshLin (talk) 17:52, 16 February 2011 (UTC)
 * Sorry. Explain what ductus bursae is/are, in general terms. --Stemonitis (talk) 20:15, 17 February 2011 (UTC)
 * ✅. AshLin (talk) 11:44, 22 February 2011 (UTC)


 * link spermatheca. ✅ AshLin (talk) 13:23, 17 February 2011 (UTC)


 * Could "Morphology of early stages of life" be shortened to "Development"? ✅. AshLin (talk) 04:24, 16 February 2011 (UTC)


 * "... a dormant developmental stage called a pupa". Is it really dormant, or just sessile? I always thought of the metamorphosis as rather metabolically active. ✅ AshLin (talk) 13:28, 17 February 2011 (UTC)


 * Perhaps shorten the Caterpillar and Pupa sections: for summary style, they seem quite long.
 * ✅. Moved material on sawfly and pupal mating to Caterpillar and Pupa respectively as they could be considered not directly concerned with topic. Most people would look at caterpillar of they had a problem of identification, so though it is morphological in nature, it won't be missed in this article.AshLin (talk) 01:20, 18 February 2011 (UTC)


 * "Some leaf-mining microlepidoptera lack segmented thoracic legs." doesn't seem to fit in the proleg paragraph and repeats information from the previous paragraph. It could probably be removed. ✅ AshLin (talk) 13:33, 17 February 2011 (UTC)


 * Having discussed the differences between sawfly larvae and lepidopteran larvae, it might be nice to include at least one illustration of a sawfly larva. (I remember it taking me ages to identify the larva of Abia sericea once, because I had assumed it was a lep.) If you need to remove an image from the gallery to make space without running to an extra row, you could remove "Caterpiller of Common Aspen Leafminer Phyllocnistis populiella, Family", which would save you from having to fix that caption.
 * Already present - see fourth image in section "Caterpillar". :-) AshLin (talk) 17:52, 16 February 2011 (UTC)
 * Oh yes. It isn't obvious that that image is connected to that paragraph. Perhaps you could add "(see image on right)" or something, after "... the larvae of sawflies". --Stemonitis (talk) 20:15, 17 February 2011 (UTC)
 * ✅ but wonder if wp:self applies. AshLin (talk) 00:41, 18 February 2011 (UTC)
 * Moved sawfly material to Caterpillar to reduce section length vide point above. AshLin (talk) 01:21, 18 February 2011 (UTC)


 * "... with the family Sphingidae considered to be the most evolved." This phrasing is very old-fashioned. While we might call Sphingidae the "most derived" these days, the source appears to be an old one, and the author probably had something else in mind. It might be best to remove the phrase entirely if no more recent reference is available. ✅ AshLin (talk) 01:27, 18 February 2011 (UTC)


 * Shorten "Morphological characters in defense and predation" to "Defence and predation"? ✅ AshLin (talk) 04:24, 16 February 2011 (UTC)


 * See also – The image of antennal forms seems out of place. I would prefer to see links to portals here:, not least because once this passes GA, it will be listed on both of those as a selected article.
 * ✅. I used to place old, relevant, good-looking images for decorative purposes at the article end. I have since discontinued this practice. AshLin (talk) 17:51, 16 February 2011 (UTC)

Once all these little things have been taken care of, I'll proof-read the whole article and see if anything else crops up, although I'm not expecting to find much.

Third pass
OK, so it's taking me longer than I expected, and I'm finding more little problems than I expected. Sorry about that. I've been going through in more detail, and I've got as far as the end of the "Head" section. I'll deal with the rest soon, but again, I'll give you my comments so far, rather than keep you hanging on. --Stemonitis (talk) 08:44, 27 February 2011 (UTC)
 * The article begins "Lepidoptera morphology...". This should probably read "The external morphology of butterflies and moths..." or something similar, in line with the current title.✅ AshLin (talk) 10:15, 27 February 2011 (UTC)
 * "The head is capsular with appendages." The meaning isn't clear to me here. ✅ AshLin (talk) 11:19, 27 February 2011 (UTC)
 * "In some butterfly genera such as Libythea and Taractrothera the knob is hollowed underneath." This is the first mention of a knob, so it needs to be explained. ✅ by rearranging. AshLin (talk) 11:05, 27 February 2011 (UTC)
 * "Like most insects, Lepidoptera antennae also have Johnston's organ which senses any stretching between the pedicel and the rest of the antenna." To what end? ✅. Removed the sentence. Not relevant to Lepidoptera. AshLin (talk) 12:12, 27 February 2011 (UTC)
 * "de-focussed" vs "fully focussed". What is the significance of this distinction? I also think that "de-focussed" suggests taking a focussed image and then blurring it, whereas "unfocussed" would suggest it was never focussed in the first place. ✅ Edited to "unfocussed". This is a fact picked up which differentiates ocelli in the imagines from those in larvae. AshLin (talk) 12:08, 27 February 2011 (UTC)
 * "The palpi are ... upward pointed, ... curving up in front of the face. Typically [they are] erect (curved upwards). ... [They] may be 'erect' (curved up in front of the face) ..." This section seems quite repetitive. It could probably be reduced to a couple of carefully worded sentences.✅ AshLin (talk) 11:18, 27 February 2011 (UTC)
 * "Palpi consist of [three joints]." This is pedantic, but surely the palpi consist of segments, which are connected by the joints. ✅
 * Maxillary palpi should probably be dealt with under "Mouthparts". ✅ AshLin (talk) 11:46, 27 February 2011 (UTC)
 * "Others, such as the basal family Micropterigidae..." Link basal? ✅. AshLin (talk) 11:23, 27 February 2011 (UTC)
 * "The proboscis contains muscles for operating." Operating what? ✅. Removed sentence. AshLin (talk) 12:05, 27 February 2011 (UTC)
 * "Suction takes place due to..." This awkward wording should be replaced by "Suction is achieved by..." or "Suction is effected through...", or something similar. ✅ AshLin (talk) 11:43, 27 February 2011 (UTC)
 * "There is a scaling relationship between body mass of Lepidoptera and length of proboscis." I take it this means that body size and proboscis length are (positively) correlated. Is this either surprising or relevant? ✅. Expanded with example and reference. AshLin (talk) 12:05, 27 February 2011 (UTC)

No issues about the time taken or number of improvement points detected. It is a large article on a fairly complicated subject and being an engineer rather than a biologist, I'm sure to miss a number of finer nuances. The motivation to persevere is that this will be a fairly unique free resource on lepidopteran morphology when its done. AshLin (talk) 12:16, 27 February 2011 (UTC)

Fourth pass

 * "... popularly but incorrectly referred to as 'veins'" needs a reference for the claim of incorrectness; it is a striking claim given that you later refer to venation.
 * Could not locate context outside the original 1932 reference. So deleted the phrase "popularly but incorrectly". Found the reason, added info. Changed the ref. ✅ AshLin (talk) 10:34, 8 March 2011 (UTC)


 * Venation: needs references; there appear to be some concealed in HTML comments.✅ AshLin (talk) 06:51, 9 March 2011 (UTC)
 * Scales: λεπίδος derives from lepis (gen. lepidos). Is this correct? If λεπίδος is the genitive of λεπίς, then it does not exactly "derive from" λεπίς, and does not need to be repeated.
 * I really don't know how to tackle this as I don't understand what genitive means and what to do if it is a genitive. AshLin (talk) 06:23, 9 March 2011 (UTC)
 * The genitive is a different case form from the nominative, but is part of the same word. English has lost most of its case endings (cf. who / whom / whose), but other languages retain them. You would need to check back with the original source, to see how it describes the etymology; the online ref. doesn't mention λεπίδος deriving from lepis, so that can only have come from Scoble.--Stemonitis (talk) 08:22, 9 March 2011 (UTC)
 * No, could not locate the Scoble ref in the few pages visible so removed that reference. Checked up the Wiktionary linked entries, the Etymology online page and the dictionary.com page from where I had found the etymology link, I have amended the reference. Reworded. Please check. ✅ AshLin (talk) 09:50, 9 March 2011 (UTC)


 * Scales: "Downey & Allyn (1975)" - perhaps add an inline citation to their actual publication. ✅ AshLin (talk) 10:10, 8 March 2011 (UTC)
 * Structure: "macrochaetes" - this is the first time this term appears: should it be "macrotrichia"? No, macrochaetes are correct, Have linked macrochaete. ✅ AshLin (talk) 09:50, 8 March 2011 (UTC)
 * Genitalia: "The females of some moths have a scent-emitting organ located at the tip of the abdomen." This seems disconnected from the previous paragraph or two. I assume there is some connection with the genitalia.
 * The lack of good books to refer hinders me. Imms (9/ed, 1963) makes no mention of abdominal scent glands. Chapman (online) refers to abdominal scent organs in aphids but does not mention them in Lepidoptera but these have no connection to genitalia. Scoble & Capinera now hide the concerned pages which were earlier visible. Genitalia sections make no mention of scent glands. So what do we do? AshLin (talk) 07:29, 9 March 2011 (UTC)
 * Since there is no direct connection with the genitalia, I would probably move the information on scent glands to the general abdomen section, or attach it to the following paragraph, about male secondary sexual characteristics. --Stemonitis (talk) 08:22, 9 March 2011 (UTC)
 * So moved. ✅ AshLin (talk) 09:50, 9 March 2011 (UTC)

I think that's all. --Stemonitis (talk) 07:26, 8 March 2011 (UTC)
 * Pupa: The etymology ("χρυσός") should be in the text, not (just) in a figure caption. ✅ AshLin (talk) 10:21, 8 March 2011 (UTC)
 * Defence: "Other caterpillars emit bad smells to ward off predators." This seems incongruous, and probably only repeats material later in the paragraph. ✅ Deleted the sentence. AshLin (talk) 06:21, 9 March 2011 (UTC)

Response
Sorry, just noticed this page at the moment. Will respond over the next three-four days. Thanks for your patience. AshLin (talk) 12:03, 12 February 2011 (UTC)

Some side notes

 * Their seems to be a lot of redundant citations in the lead. The information in the lead should, for the most part repeat the information of the article, rather than introduce new information.   Bugboy52.4 ¦  =-=  03:48, 22 February 2011 (UTC). ✅ AshLin (talk) 13:50, 27 February 2011 (UTC)
 * Will work on reducing this vide WP:LEADCITE. There is no new information, lead summarises article. Will recheck this aspect. AshLin (talk) 11:42, 22 February 2011 (UTC)


 * Their seems to be a lot of bullet point list, was that an aesthetic choice?   Bugboy52.4 ¦  =-=  03:48, 22 February 2011 (UTC)
 * ✅. Reduced two lists of three points each to prose. Remaining are required to be maintained as lists imho. These lists were mostly bulleted because where I was copying them from they were in prose. Converting points in prose form to a bulletted list is a legitimate form of rewriting to avoid copyvio concerns. Where many points are in bulleted form, converting to prose makes it lessaccessible, understandable and often makes it difficult to make out how many points/facts are present. AshLin (talk) 11:02, 22 February 2011 (UTC)


 * Their are also a lot of galleries, and images that seem redundant, For example their are two diagrams of the butterfly under External Morphology.   Bugboy52.4 ¦  =-=  03:48, 22 February 2011 (UTC)
 * ✅. Reduced one image of morphology. Disagree regarding images too many. The galleries are required to display some of the most prominent of very large varieties of morphological features. All insect encyclopaedias have huge image sections. See pages pg 565, 570, 579, 584 of Reshe & Carde. AshLin (talk) 11:14, 22 February 2011 (UTC)

Thank you for your comments. Having internet problems hence unable to do much more than email and a reply. Will address the issues you outlined once my connectivity returns. AshLin (talk) 04:08, 22 February 2011 (UTC)

Is the review nearing a conclusion? Looks like things have slowed down. Wizardman Operation Big Bear 05:13, 7 March 2011 (UTC)


 * See here. I haven't forgotten. --Stemonitis (talk) 07:37, 7 March 2011 (UTC)

Final review
This article now appears to me to fulfil the GA criteria, and I am happy to pass it. --Stemonitis (talk) 08:54, 15 March 2011 (UTC)


 * Thanks for the detailed review. I'm sure it has helped improve the article greatly. I also would like to thank all contributors to this article for helping it develop into what it is today. Happy days! AshLin (talk) 13:13, 15 March 2011 (UTC)

Great Article
I think it is little overwhelming for a middle to elementary school student who wants information on the anatomy of the butterfly. Can I simplify this already good article without it losing its greatness?
 *  Bfpage &#124;leave a message 20:08, 6 March 2015 (UTC)
 * You might be interested in creating a simplified page for Simple English Wikipedia, which would then appear as a link to the left, just like other language Wiki articles. --Animalparty-- (talk) 20:42, 4 April 2015 (UTC)