Talk:Galerina marginata

GA Review

This review is transcluded from Talk:Galerina marginata/GA1. The edit link for this section can be used to add comments to the review.

Reviewer: Ucucha 02:53, 24 February 2010 (UTC)

Most recent comments: (not sure where else to put this, sorry)

• Some redundancy makes the article longer than necessary: amatoxins are explained in detail in a long paragraph, despite also linked to their own Wikipedia article. Would be better to merge that section into the Amatoxin page, then removing the extra fat from here, making the already great G. m. article even better. Luna Kid (talk) 11:53, 14 October 2011 (UTC)
• Also, to taxonomy: what about Strophariaceae (seen in indexfungorum.org), and Cortinariaceae (taught to me in a course)? Could it be clarified in the article please? Thanks! Luna Kid (talk) 11:53, 14 October 2011 (UTC)

First comments:

• "species complex" - this term refers to a single supposed species that is found to contain a number of species, not to a group of species that is found to be a single species (which is what seems to be the case here)
• Why is the "phylogenetic analysis" mentioned in the lead not mentioned in the body?

More to come as I read through... Ucucha 02:53, 24 February 2010 (UTC)

Thanks for picking up this review so incredibly fast! I feel bad for the good people waiting in the queue in front of me, so I'll have to assuage my guilt later by reviewing someone else's GAN :) Regarding species complex, that was me not reading critically enough... the term is used freely in Gulden 2004 (eg. "Several species complexes of Galerina are in need of critical revision (e.g. the G. marginata [cf. Gulden et al. 2001]") and more cryptically in Gulden 2001, where the lot is referred to as " a complex of species", so shame on them for using the term incorrectly, and shame on me for trying to perpetuate it. I've described the 2001 study in more detail. Feel free to suggest any improvements that might help this article at FAC, as it will probably end up there someday. Sasata (talk) 04:45, 24 February 2010 (UTC)

Thanks for the quick improvement. Alt text, for one, but I probably won't have to tell you that. I'll continue reviewing in depth tomorrow. I might have been too definite in my earlier comment--I meant to include that this is my understanding of what the term means, but of course that understanding is mostly based on the mammalogical, not the mycological literature. However, the current text is probably clearer anyway, especially since you had "species complex" linking to a page about cryptic species. Ucucha 04:58, 24 February 2010 (UTC)

• I subdivided the hook into three paragraphs (Taxonomy/distribution, description, toxicity); it should be more than one paragraph but feel free to use a different subdivision.
• You might also want to mention Galerina pseudomycenopsis, which is also genetically identical but was kept separate by Gulden en et al. because it is ecologically distinctive. (Good idea, done.)
• "cap profiles that are not conical to campanulate (bell-shaped) in maturity" - difficult to understand. Can you get rid of the "not" in some way? (clarified)
• "As the caps grow, they expand to become broadly convex, flattened, sometimes developing a central elevation known as an umbo, which may project prominently from the cap surface." - weren't they already convex to begin with? Also, "expand" is already implied in "grow". (in mycological jargon, convex has a different implication than broadly convex; I've tried to make it clearer that it's a progression of cap shapes from convex to flat.)
• "Viewed with a light microscope," - I would guess they have the same characteristics when no one is looking at them with a microscope (though maybe not). Perhaps just remove this phrase? (ok)
• Why is Kuehneromyces vernalis not linked? (it is now)
• Cite needed for similarity to Conocybe filaris. (ok)
• "typically in groups or clusters" - you said that one of the characters that distinguish Pholiota mutabilis from G. marginata is that the former occurs in clusters. Are P. mutabilis clusters larger? (yes they are, have clarified)
  • Still not quite convinced the two passages work well together, perhaps add "small" to "typically in groups or clusters" piece to make the point more clearly? Ucucha 12:42, 25 February 2010 (UTC) (added small)
• "this species is thought to be the only amatoxin-producing genus" (fixed)
• "Over two decades" - which decades? Also, the list is rather complex; perhaps you'd best recast it into a table or leave the details out. (recast as hopefully less confusing prose)
• "78.17 to 243.61 µg/mg of fresh weight" - that's up to 24%. Also, you already mentioned amanitin content two paragraphs before this, with more realistic-sounding numbers. (I got the data from a table in the article, which had the incorrect units; the text specified the correct ug/g - now corrected)
  • Shame on whoever peer reviewed that then. What about moving the two pieces about amanitin content together into one paragraph? Ucucha 12:42, 25 February 2010 (UTC) (sure, done)
• "the scarcity of these fungi," - why is this not mentioned earlier? (reworded to make it sound more like what I was trying to say)

Ucucha 23:58, 24 February 2010 (UTC)

Thanks for the last fixes. I am now passing it as a good article. It shouldn't be far from FA, assuming it is comprehensive. Ucucha 15:20, 25 February 2010 (UTC)

And thanks again for the review, you've help give it a good shove towards FA. Sasata (talk) 15:36, 25 February 2010 (UTC)