Talk:John Day Fossil Beds National Monument/Archive 1

Coordinates
The coordinates given are for the Painted Hills Unit, but there are three units to the JDFBNM. I added the other two but it messes up the page. I'm not sure what to do about it. Cacophony (talk) 04:15, 9 March 2008 (UTC)


 * Looks fine now. You might want to add the unit names to the coords. Cheers, Pete Tillman (talk) 20:04, 23 March 2008 (UTC)

Geology question
How can a single area be a good fossil gathering place for thirty million years? --BlueNight (talk) 04:26, 12 September 2009 (UTC)

Video clip
I reverted the inclusion of the video clip mainly because it violates the Wikipedia layout guidelines at WP:MOS. For example, one of the guidelines says, "Avoid sandwiching text between two images that face each other, or between an image and an infobox." Readers who want to see more images of the fossil beds can click through to the Commons via the link provided at the bottom of the article in the "External links" section. Finetooth (talk) 22:09, 7 November 2011 (UTC)

Painted Hills panorama
Since images are important for an FA candidate, does anybody have a strong opinion on whether the panorama of the Painted Hills at the bottom of this article should be the original image (right) or the brighter version (bottom right)? Jsayre64  (talk)  05:55, 7 January 2012 (UTC)
 * 's original looks fine to me. The "enhanced" version looks washed out. In addition, six reviewers supported promotion of the article in its present form (with the exception of a few things you've added since). No one faulted the images. One reviewer opposed on grounds that the article was not comprehensive, with which opinion I strongly disagreed. Finetooth (talk) 17:41, 7 January 2012 (UTC)

No mosasaurs, etc.
This claim, recently added to the "Geology and palentology" section is not supported by the source: "Other discoveries in the Painted Hills include fish scales and parts of reptiles such as the shark-like ichthyosaur, the marine lizard and snake ancestor mosasaur, and the avian pterosaur." Bishop and Allen, when describing these discoveries, refer to sediments laid down west of Mitchell (but not in the park) prior to the eruption of the Clarno volcanoes. To the best of my knowledge, those sediments are not exposed in the park. The creatures, ichythosaur and so on, have not been found in the Painted Hills, as far as I know. Finetooth (talk) 18:19, 7 January 2012 (UTC)
 * I guess I misinterpreted the book. On page 192 of Hiking Oregon's Geology, the text mentions the geology of an area west of Mitchell, and then says: "Wood chips and fish scales appear in the sandstones and shales along the highway. Fragments of an ichthyosaur, mosasaur (marine reptile), and pterosaur (avian reptile) have been reported from these rocks." So you're right, those fossils have not been found in the Painted Hills. Jsayre64   (talk)  05:56, 8 January 2012 (UTC)
 * Bishop covers the same west-of-Mitchell stuff in more detail in Chapter 5, "Cretaceous", in In Search of Ancient Oregon. If you're interested in Oregon's geology, I think you'd like this book. Finetooth (talk) 20:49, 8 January 2012 (UTC)

Recent changes by Iceagecaver
After trying to figure out what to do about the many recent changes by User:Iceagecaver, I reverted them all. That doesn't mean they are all wrong, just that taken as a whole, they made the article worse rather than better. For example, the lead is to be a summary of the main text; therefore, new information should not be added to the lead unless it summarizes something new in the main text.

Every significant claim in an article needs to be supported by a reliable source. Inserting a new unsupported claim in the middle of a paragraph otherwise supported by a reliable source or sources is particularly damaging because the reader is thereby led to believe that the new material comes from those source(s). Here's an example: "This stretch can experience extremely low water levels in summer due to alfalfa irrigation in the John Day River valley but it is County controlled so the river does not dry up in this area entirely." This set of claims was inserted into the existing text and appears to be supported but is not. I don't see anything in the cited sources about alfalfa irrigation, county control, or water levels within the park.

A new or unregistered user will not be familiar with Wikipedia's internal guidelines and may add things with the best of intentions. The best way for a new editor to proceed with a GA or FA article, heavily vetted by many editors already, is to discuss significant additions or corrections here on the talk page one by one before making them. I'd be happy to discuss these, and I think others might chime in too. Finetooth (talk) 20:40, 26 November 2013 (UTC)


 * Not hearing from Iceagecaver, I went ahead with modifications to the article based on his or her original changes, several of which were quite helpful. Finetooth (talk) 20:09, 3 December 2013 (UTC)

Caps or lowercase?
Shouldn't "Federal" be lowercase where it occurs in the sixth paragraph of History and in the first paragraph of Activities? Also in that Activities paragraph, perhaps "Presidents Day" should be "Presidents' Day" with an apostrophe. Or maybe it should be changed to "Washington's Birthday" because that's the title of the article. Jsayre64  (talk)  00:35, 3 December 2013 (UTC)


 * Thanks. Yes and yes to the first two questions. I think not "Washington's Birthday", though. The birthday article should probably be updated by changing its name, IMHO. I'm still planning to add something about Goose Rock, the Cretaceous, and the Age of Dinosaur thingies found near Mitchell but not in the park. Probably won't get to that until tomorrow. Finetooth (talk) 02:37, 3 December 2013 (UTC)


 * OK, and unfortunately I won't get to review my edits from Jan. 2012 until after tomorrow. I've got a lot of things going on. Jsayre64   (talk)  05:38, 3 December 2013 (UTC)


 * No problem and no hurry. I just wanted to incorporate as much as I could of Iceagecaver's work before too much time had passed. Iceagecaver is unregistered and may or may not see these notes; he or she might well be miffed at my initial blanket revert. Going through the changes one by one, then giving explanations in the edit notes seemed like the best course. Goose Rock, etc., is the last of the batch. Finetooth (talk) 17:25, 3 December 2013 (UTC)


 * I included mention of the Cretaceous rocks and fossils as Note 4. Finetooth (talk) 20:09, 3 December 2013 (UTC)

West-of-Mitchell discoveries
So I just had the chance to review my additions from 2012, and I was about to add this:

 

immediately following the text, ''' Fossils found in the John Day Strata include a wide variety of plants and more than 100 species of mammals, including dogs, cats, oreodonts, saber-toothed tigers, horses, camels, and rodents. ''' in the 3rd para. of the paleonotology section, but I noticed, Finetooth, that you had already added a similar note about the same area. Do you think it would be better to combine the notes or something, or should I go ahead with the edit that I almost made? Jsayre64  (talk)  03:54, 4 December 2013 (UTC)
 * Combined, I think. I'd like to keep most of mine because it includes the time frame and rock types and mentions Goose Rock, and it expands on the geology. Additionally, the fossils you mention are not in the John Day Strata but are so old they are not even on the chart along the right-hand edge of the page. What would you say to expanding my note with your fish scales and bits of mosasaur and your descriptions like "avian", keeping my note positioning, and adding your RS as well as mine? Finetooth (talk) 22:03, 4 December 2013 (UTC)


 * Done. And in case there is ever more paleontology information that needs to be added, here's a webpage that I'd like to hold on to because it would probably be useful: . Jsayre64   (talk)  03:44, 5 December 2013 (UTC)
 * Looks good. Did you notice that the OPLI website you've saved was designed by Ellen Bishop (whose books we cite), who also took the photos? Multi-talented, she is. Finetooth (talk) 04:16, 5 December 2013 (UTC)
 * I did not notice that. I enjoyed reading her and Allen's hiking guide, especially the parts about Eastern Oregon places like Leslie Gulch. Jsayre64   (talk)  04:38, 5 December 2013 (UTC)

Abbreviation
I removed the JDFBNM abbreviation use from the article — unlike FBI, NASA or NAACP, it's not a frequently-used or well-known abbreviation, and has very little usage in the real world. Even NPS sources tend to prefer their own in-house abbreviation, "JODA" rather than a full initialism. Given that we're a digital encyclopedia, we don't really need to save space so badly that we would consider such an abbreviation desirable. NorthBySouthBaranof (talk) 04:18, 3 August 2014 (UTC)
 * Thank you. I agree. The Manual of Style section on abbreviations, MOS:ABBR, advises against uncommon abbreviations because readers may find them puzzling rather than helpful. Finetooth (talk) 17:37, 3 August 2014 (UTC)