Talk:Lion/Archive 4

Range Map
The range map shows the historic (rather than the prehistoric Pleistocene) range of the lion as including Spain, Portugal, southern France, Italy and much of western Asia as far north as the Caucasus region. I am aware of the presence of lions in ancient Greece, and in some parts of the Middle East during antiquity. However, the presence of lions in the other northern regions (as shown in this map) during historic times is inaccurate.

Does anyone have any source that shows otherwise? This web page makes the claim that the lion inhabited those areas (in a later section), but does not give any source. The "European Lion" wiki article gives only one source claiming lions inhabiting those regions during historic times. However, it is a website on ancient Greek coins rather than an informed source (.http://rg.ancients.info/lion/lions.html). It only addresses the lion's range in passing in a single sentence and has no references or sources.

—Preceding unsigned comment added by 96.246.125.24 (talk) 01:09, 17 December 2009 (UTC)


 * Changed the range in Southern Europe to question marks in response to controversy on reliability of sources.

--188.221.198.220 (talk) 20:03, 11 January 2010 (UTC)

Here are some sources on the presence of lions in the regions of Greece, Bulgaria and Roumania. According to these sources, lions were still present in these regions until the 1st c. B.C.


 * Bulgaria - Ninov, L. (1989) Des vestiges de lion sur les terres bulgares. Archeologia (Sofia), 1989, 2, p. 55-61 (more sources on the Balkans and Russia are cited in the text; text in Bulgarian with an abstract in French)


 * Roumania - Voros. J. (1983) Lion remains from the late neolithic and copper age of the Carpathian basin. Folia Archaeologica, 34, 1983, 33—50.


 * Greece - Yannouli, E. (2003) Non-domestic carnivores in Greek prehistory : a review. In Kotjabopoulou, E. Zooarchaeology in Greece: Recent advances. British School at Athens studies, 9. London, 2003 (p. 175-192).

Ivan Marinov (talk) 21:59, 10 October 2010 (UTC)

Lions hunting a Buffalo
Shouldn't we use the following picture from commons to illustrate lions hunting buffalos in Botswana? TSBr (talk) 14:33, 13 October 2009 (UTC)


 * Oh that's a nice image. I'll try to incorporate it. Alphard08 (talk) 09:48, 14 October 2009 (UTC)

heads
The "heads" section had this text:


 * Cave paintings of extinct European Cave Lions exclusively show animals with no head, or just the hint of a head, suggesting to some that they were more or less headless;[28] however, females hunting for a pride are the likely subjects of the drawings—since they are shown in a group related to hunting—so these images do not enable a reliable judgment about whether the males had heads. The drawings do suggest that the extinct species used the same social organization and hunting strategies as contemporary lions.

This uses a circular reasoning: a) the cave lion paintings show animals without heads, however these were probably paintings of hunting lions, so they must be female, as with contemporary lions only females hunt; b) since the pictures depict only females, it is proof for the same social organization as contemporary lions. -- As can be seen, if a) fails, b) fails as well. It may be headless males hunting, for all we know. Also, the whole "however" is without citing sources, and chunky, the cave paintings do not show groups of lions hunting, but just individuals. Also, that last sentence has no place in a section called "heads". For these reasons, I removed the whole "however (...)" part. Jalwikip (talk) 20:29, 4 November 2009 (UTC)


 * 'Agreed, I would hardly consider a cave painting to be an accurate depiction/reference to an animals physical characteristics or hunting behavior. I am rather annoyed at myself for not catching it.  Zoo  Pro  21:51, 4 November 2009 (UTC)

Proposal: Remove all "National symbols of XX" Categories
And instead attach them to Lion (heraldry) or Cultural depictions of lions, depending on the circumstances. --Kevlar (talk • contribs) 03:30, 16 December 2009 (UTC)

Semiprotection
Seriously, this article will always cop alot of vandalism. The real problem with articles this size is when it gets hit by a couple of IPs in a row and someone reverts the second vandal. It's a huge article and trying to clean up a year or so down the track can be frustrating. Okay, it's getting reverted now pretty promptly but this will continue every day (not sure about school holidays though) and sooner or later there'll be a hiccup. We had to clean up Humpback whale a couple of years ago with huge chunks of text gone bye-byes. Yes it's only one click to revert, but aren't there a truckload of things to revert? I have this idea that if there were less reverting needed, recent change patrollers would slow down a bit and maybe we'd get more done. Unfortunately editor time is a precious resource. cheers, Casliber (talk · contribs) 23:20, 18 February 2010 (UTC)
 * Thanks yes more time seems to be spent on reverting then actual editing, i welcome the protection. Zoo  Pro  00:03, 19 February 2010 (UTC)
 * Heartily agree. My devandalization work here is approaching 50% of my time, especially as regards pages about "cute and cuddly" animals, like Red Panda, Tiger, and so on.  And we haven't even mentioned the Ape and Elephant articles.  Lion was protected for a year, and as soon as the protect was lifted just days ago, the kids went to work.  It wouldn't break my heart to see dozens of mammal articles protected in perpetuity.  After all, we do have real work to do.  --Seduisant (talk) 00:25, 19 February 2010 (UTC)
 * I agree we should protect the cute and cuddly articles. Zoo  Pro  00:34, 19 February 2010 (UTC)

Panthera Leo Abyssinica
I removed
 * * Panthera Leo Abyssinica, a species of Ethiopian lion, the males of which have distinctive black manes.

from Black Lion (disambiguation) for lack of coverage in the accompanying article. BTW, it sounds like a sub-species. --Jerzy•t 23:16, 22 March 2010 (UTC)

Error in footnotes
There's a typo in the footnote 45. The author of the paper is Craig Packer, not Parker. I'd fix it, but the article is protected. Chrisjthompson (talk) 05:59, 28 March 2010 (UTC)
 * Thanks for that. Casliber (talk · contribs) 06:20, 28 March 2010 (UTC)

Etymology
"it shows a striking resemblance to Sanskrit pundarikam "tiger," which in turn may come from pandarah "whitish-yellow".


 * Sanskrit words for tiger include: "vyāghraḥ, śārdūlaḥ, dvīpin." (Apte's English-Sanskrit Dict). Panther is also 'dvīpin'. There is a word puṇḍarīka meaning 'lotus'. Monier-Williams records that ancient Indian lexicographers link puṇḍarīka to "a tiger" but that it is *not found in practice* - one has to pay attention to the abbreviations in MW the 'L.' in particular! Note that Harper only suggests a comparison with puṇḍarīka not a cognative link. He's not very familiar with Sanskrit and often makes small errors in his suggested connections to Sanskrit - though his dictionary is very useful on the whole. Whatever resemblance there is between the words, it is far from "striking" to anyone familiar with Sanskrit or the principles of historical linguistics.


 * In fact the common word for 'lion' in Sanskrit (and in fact all North Indian languages) is siṃha. You can see this in the surname of Sikhs Anglicised as 'Singh' and in the name 'Singapore' (Skt Siṃha-pura 'the lion city').


 * English 'lion' is most likely a Semitic loan word; the Greek lēon has no Sanskrit or Avestan/Persian cognate, while the Hebrew and Egyptian are similar. QED.


 * Actually there are several words for lions in Hebrew that are not mentioned in the article :(כפר)KoPHeR for a maned lion and ARYeH or ARI (ארי or אריֶה)for a generic lion.Sochwa (talk) 17:24, 2 March 2011 (UTC)
 * So perhaps someone with edit rights could change the article? mahaabaala (talk) 15:31, 29 March 2010 (UTC)
 * I will add some information if you can provide me with sources. Remember this is english wikipedia so I have no intention of putting in the hebrew words for Lion or adding pointless words that have little to no real world use. Zoo  Pro  11:03, 25 March 2011 (UTC)

Tree Climbing Lions :- The true Lion Kings on their Throne Unique to Uganda's Queen Elizabeth National Park - Ishasha Sector
editsemiprotected

Although Lions do not normally climb trees as a habit and may sometime do this when being chased by another lion group or wild buffalo. The unique exception to this is that in Queen Elizabeth National Park - Ishasha Sector of Uganda one finds the Tree Climbing Lions. They climb tree and rest on them during afternoons, when the sun is high. This is truly unique as it doesn't happen else. There have been similar sightings rarely in Lake Manyara National Park of Tanzania. It is truly a wonder to see the King of the Forest - Lions up a tree making it their high throne. Perhaps Uganda's Queen Elizabeth National Park hosts the true Lion Kings which are the Tree clibing lions of its Ishasha Sector.


 * Provide reliable sources, and it can be added. C T J F 8 3  pride 16:31, 20 June 2010 (UTC)

Main photo of male lion
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:African_Lion_Panthera_leo_Male_Pittsburgh_2800px.jpg

That photo is kinda stupid because.. lions do not naturally live in snow!!! remove that shit and replace it with a majestic wild lion...


 * I think the same, maybe this image? Tb hotch Ta lk C.  23:19, 24 June 2010 (UTC)


 * Yeah I thought that was funny as well. It ought to be replaced, Lions wouldn't naturally be in snow at all I don't think. Probably they couldn't survive in such cold conditions if the lion didn't have a warm place to sleep at night (in the zoo). Hvatum (talk) 02:06, 26 June 2010 (UTC)

Male Lion as "Leader" of the Pride
This photo http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/b/b8/Pride_leader.jpg/180px-Pride_leader.jpg with its caption "Mature male pride leader With two lionesses, northern Serengeti" is directly contradicted by the article and almost everything else I've ever read about lions. This is like old encyclopedias that talked about the "king bee". There is no meaningful way in which a male lion is the leader of a pride. He's an auxiliary fighter, a sometime hunter and a mate. Lions are not people or even wolves, they have their own social organization and the article makes it clear that the females do the "lion share" of the hunting, the care of cubs and also "lead" the defense of the pride as much as the male lion could be said to do so. The caption could more honestly read, "Two lionesses and a mature male lion of a pride, northern Serengeti." Halfelven (talk) 01:38, 8 July 2010 (UTC)

Dubious subspecies section: P. l. sinhaleyus
"erected this subspecies" is the wording used in the cited paper, but its meaning is not completely obvious. Does it mean proposed it, documented it, definitively established it, or what else? Please could an expert suggest better wording to make it more clear? --Stfg (talk) 18:15, 18 July 2010 (UTC)

Taxonomy and evolution: 1st paragraph
The 1st paragraph of Lion is really about genus Panthera and would be better in the Panthera article. As this article is way too long, would anyone mind if I delete this paragraph from here?

If it is preferred to keep it here, there's an inconstency that needs dealing with: if the Laetoli fossil is 3.5 million years old and the oldst confirmed Panthera leo records are 2 million years younger, then they are 1.5 million years old. But the following paragraph puts it much later. --Stfg (talk) 18:55, 20 July 2010 (UTC)


 * Now done, keeping the sentence about closest relatives. --Stfg (talk) 09:11, 27 July 2010 (UTC)

Roar!
Lions are distinct in people's minds for several likely reasons, none the least being their roar. The section on communication would benefit from the addition of Pfefferle et al. (2007), who found that lion's roars do not distinguish between the sexes as much as they establish territorial boundaries. From the abstract: "The analysis revealed differences in relation to sex, which were entirely explained by variation in body size. No evidence that acoustic variables were related to male condition was found, indicating that sexual selection might only be a weak force modulating the lion's roar. Instead, lion roars may have mainly been selected to effectively advertise territorial boundaries."

The full citation is:

Pfefferle, D., West, P.M., Grinnell, J., Packer, C, & Fisher, J. (2007). Do acoustic features of lion, Panthera leo, roars reflect sex and male condition? Journal of the Acoustical Society of America, 121(6), 3947-3953.

Sonnyrosenthal (talk) 08:33, 11 September 2010 (UTC)

Citation Needed
The page shouldn't have been tagged "Featured" when there are "citation needed" and "dead link" tags present in the article. I will provide them after a few days, but these ought to be thoroughly checked before being labeled as featured or good articles, otherwise their credibility would be undermined...Cupidvogel (talk) 20:04, 15 November 2010 (UTC)

Edit request on 10 December 2011
85.185.14.120 (talk) 13:26, 10 December 2011 (UTC)
 * ❌. Got a source other than your friend? Seems to be original research-- Jac 16888 Talk 13:42, 10 December 2011 (UTC)

Edit request on 15 December 2011
"was a man-eater," needs a reference. Section "Characteristics," paragraph four. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Maxcherney (talk • contribs) 04:54, 16 December 2011 (UTC)
 * It already has one, the "Guinness Book of Animal Facts and Feats". See the inline citation at the end of the sentence. ~ Kimelea (talk) 05:56, 29 February 2012 (UTC)

Lion Skin (question, not correction)
In the "White Lions" section, it says "They are not albinos, having normal pigmentation in the eyes and skin."

That sentence made me wonder: What IS normal skin pigmentation for a lion? I can see that there is black or pink (or both) skin on their lips, eye rims, and nose, but if someone were to spread the fur on a lion's leg or back or belly, what color would the skin below be?

Gatorgirl7563 (talk) 23:40, 15 March 2012 (UTC)


 * A cat's skin is the same colour, more or less, as the fur on top. Pale fur has pale skin underneath. If memory serves (I have seen a lion with a shaved patch, but it was some time ago), a lion's skin is beigey pink. If you shaved a tiger, it would still have black stripes where the stripes grow in the fur :) ~ Kimelea   (talk)  20:28, 29 March 2012 (UTC)

P. l. melanochaita
The article states:

P. l. melanochaita, known as the Cape lion, became extinct in the wild around 1860. Results of mitochondrial DNA research do not support the status as a distinct subspecies. It seems probable that the Cape lion was only the southernmost population of the extant P. l. krugeri.

But that is a wrong way to put it, since the Cape Lion was named first, which gives it priority over P. l. krugeri. P. l. krugeri are therefore populations of P. l. melanochaita, not the other way around. FunkMonk (talk) 17:14, 13 May 2012 (UTC)
 * Now the article states "although one of these, the Cape lion, formerly described as Panthera leo melanochaita, is probably invalid." Yet again, this is wrong, as P. l. melanochaita has many years priority over P. l. krugeri. FunkMonk (talk) 22:30, 24 November 2012 (UTC)

Talk Page contents
Does anyone know how to make a contents box appear on this page? Is there any reason to not have one? LookingGlass (talk) 07:01, 20 March 2013 (UTC)

Reference requests
I have placed an inline tag to illustrate where I think references would benefit the statements made. I also noticed that a number of sections in the article seem to rely on one source: Schaller. I have added a message on one of these sections, requesting additional sources. The references to Schaller are made in a "non-wiki" style so at first I couldn't find the reference at all. Although the book referred to is detailed: Schaller, George B. (1972)." The Serengeti lion: A study of predator-prey relations", these details, or at least some of them, should be included in the references themselves.http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Citing_sources#Inline_citations LookingGlass (talk) 07:37, 20 March 2013 (UTC)
 * See the "short citations" section. The way in which this is cited is fine for a FA. LittleJerry (talk) 00:30, 22 March 2013 (UTC)

Edit Request
congo lion needs a link to its wiki article. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 80.176.89.230 (talk) 13:57, 24 June 2013 (UTC)

Edit Request
The Hebrew text in the etymology section should be altered/removed ("The Hebrew word לָבִיא (lavi) may also be related.[9]"). The Hebrew word for "lion" is not "lavi," it's arieh, which is rendered in Hebrew text as: אריה
 * It appears as if there are sources that say that it may be related --Jnorton7558 (talk) 08:31, 25 August 2011 (UTC)
 * The source cited is not available online. Heatherly84 (talk) 14:04, 25 August 2011 (UTC)
 * It is worth noting that the Hebrew spoken today is the result of deliberate efforts to revitalise a once-almost-extinct language and has futher changed over time anyway - it is significantly different to the ancient Hebrew used when Jewish people would have encountered asiatic lions in their historical range.

This article does discuss in some depth the variety of scriptural Hebrew words for lion and mentions lavi with reference to the specific scripture. Article: http://www.jewishvirtuallibrary.org/jsource/judaica/ejud_0002_0013_0_12564.html — Preceding unsigned comment added by 80.176.89.230 (talk) 14:05, 24 June 2013 (UTC)

Featured article?
Although this article is assessed as FA, I still find one [date missing] tag, one [clarification needed] tag, one [citation needed] tag and some ISBN errors. Someone pls fill them up, else the supporting claims may be removed. Kailash29792 (talk) 16:03, 30 July 2013 (UTC)


 * Sigh - this article is a high-traffic one and suffers a steady rate of erosion....will take a look later today. Cas Liber (talk · contribs) 21:22, 30 July 2013 (UTC)

Edit Request 12/28/13
The statement that female lions do all the hunting has been proven false because of the fact that male lions hunt with the pack but female lions do a lot of the hunting: https://www.google.com/search?q=male+lions+hunt  — Preceding unsigned comment added by Mattkohnen (talk • contribs) 20:03, 28 December 2013 (UTC)

Mfuwe Man-eater
The only source of this incident comes from a book that may not be credible. Unlike the Tsavo man-eaters, I can find no research done on this lion or the supposed attacks. I suggest the removal of this story. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Greedo8 (talk • contribs) 22:01, 30 January 2014 (UTC)

Pronoun usage in article
Throughout the article, lions are referred to with the inconsiderate pronoun "it", in all cases. While, when the sex is ambiguous, "it" seems agreeable, "they" would be less demeaning and chauvinistic. Especially concerning to me are instances where the sex of the lion is clearly known (e.g. when discussing the ethology of male and female lions), yet they are still regarding as objects. This is concerning to me, and while it seems like a small issue, it is important that style be improved wherever possible. 2620:104:E001:A011:ACD1:C701:77ED:BD37 (talk) 16:54, 7 April 2014 (UTC)
 * Could you give some examples of the issue? Could you then explain what changes you would like to make for each example? Thanks. Greedo  8  17:22, 7 April 2014 (UTC)

Vandalism overlooked?
Why is the Conservation Status listed as "Extinct"? — Preceding unsigned comment added by 173.51.130.99 (talk) 04:20, 5 June 2014 (UTC)
 * Thanks, status restored! AshLin (talk) 04:57, 5 June 2014 (UTC)

Semi-protected edit request on 13 November 2014
Cite 79 uses a source that is already a general source. Please fix this. 155.138.246.147 (talk) 21:14, 13 November 2014 (UTC)

155.138.246.147 (talk) 21:14, 13 November 2014 (UTC)
 * that ref was added by you . Could you make it consistent with the other refs for Schaller (refs 61-66) if you know the page number? Thanks, Stickee (talk) 00:13, 14 November 2014 (UTC)


 * thanks for pointing it out I will fix it.  Big Cats   -   talk   07:37, 15 November 2014 (UTC)


 * Fixed :)  Big Cats   -   talk   12:17, 15 November 2014 (UTC)

Hunting in packs v. hunting alone
I may have missed it, but is there a term for animals that hunt in packs like lions and wolves -- as opposed to animals that hunt alone? I think it would a good idea to incorporate that concept into this article. Rissa, copy editor (talk) 03:34, 5 February 2015 (UTC)
 * The term is "cooperative hunting".__DrChrissy (talk) 10:40, 5 February 2015 (UTC)

Semi-protected edit request on 4 March 2015
The following phrase makes it appear that William of Malmesbury was the one keeping the lions. Also, the Palace was a hunting lodge until Henry II (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Woodstock_Palace):

Population and conservation status -- In captivity:

"stocked with animals from an earlier menagerie started in 1125 by Henry I at his palace in Woodstock, near Oxford; where lions had reportedly been stocked by William of Malmesbury."

The phrase would better read:

"stocked with animals from an earlier menagerie started in 1125 by Henry I at his hunting lodge in Woodstock, near Oxford (the lodge later becoming Woodstock Palace) -- the stocking of lions was reported by William of Malmesbury."

Fewwiggle (talk) 05:08, 4 March 2015 (UTC)
 * , you should be able to edit the page. Cas Liber (talk · contribs) 05:34, 4 March 2015 (UTC)
 * Yes check.svg Done Also,, Fewwiggle only has 9 edits. 10 are required for autoconfirmed status. Stickee (talk) 06:07, 4 March 2015 (UTC)

Add a new section?: Human-lion conflict
I am currently working on a new section about human-lion conflict, specifically livestock depredation. Thoughts on if this should go under this page or be a separate page?JuliaD123 (talk) 18:15, 27 March 2015 (UTC)

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Number of "big cats"
The lead sentence of this article describes the lion as "one of the five big cats in the genus Panthera", with big cats linking to a Wikipedia article stating that only 4 of the 5 cats in this genus (the snow leopard being excluded) are generally considered big cats. This contradiction ought to be resolved in one way or another. Since it involves a subject only peripherally related to lions, my default would be to defer to the page on big cats, but I'll wait to give someone more knowledgeable than me a chance to address this. JudahH (talk) 21:51, 29 March 2016 (UTC)
 * Would deleting the word "five" solve the problem? It strikes me that omitting this detail might be better than misinforming the reader. DrChrissy (talk) 21:55, 29 March 2016 (UTC)
 * I would be in favor of deleting the word "five". The source used in the big cat article is very poor, and the statement appears to be unsourced in this article unless I'm missing something. Do you have any notion on this? -- Laser brain   (talk)  22:24, 29 March 2016 (UTC)
 * Yeah I tend to agree, the number is somewhat tangential to the discussion anyway, so I have removed it. Cas Liber (talk · contribs) 22:43, 29 March 2016 (UTC)

Longevity
Less a question of what to include, but where to include it: So far the lead mentions that wild males can reach an age of 10-14 years. And under 6.1 In captivity, the example of Apollo, who reached an age of 22 in Honolulu Zoo is given. I think more information could be given about the longevity. For example Nowell & Jackson compile information that in the wild, "males generally 12 (Hanby and Bygott 1991), and up to 16 years (Smuts et al. 1978), females generally 15-16 (Hanby and Bygott 1991), and up to 18 years (Bertram 1975a); [Captivity] average 13 years, but up to 25-30 (Guggisberg 1975)". To be precise, Guggisberg states for captivity that "Twenty-five years is sometimes given as the maximum, but there exists a record of one attaining an age of about thirty years in the Cologne Zoo." But as said in the beginning: Where would you put this information in the article? I didn't really find the fitting place. Separate section (although it would be a very short one)? Robuer (talk) 07:47, 30 September 2016 (UTC)

Addis Ababa lion


"A team of international researchers has provided the first comprehensive DNA evidence that the Addis Ababa lion in Ethiopia is genetically unique and is urging immediate conservation action to preserve this vulnerable lion population." http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2012/10/121011085336.htm FunkMonk (talk) 13:44, 6 November 2012 (UTC)
 * Wow, interesting. Will read properly and digest and add later. Casliber (talk · contribs) 20:19, 6 November 2012 (UTC)
 * Seems they're not having a good time: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ek5MU3Lf0LM FunkMonk (talk) 18:36, 8 November 2012 (UTC)

A photograph of an Ethiopian lion (P. l. roosevelti or P. l. abyssinica)
Can this be added for the section on subspecies of lions? Leo1pard (talk) 13:57, 10 April 2017 (UTC)

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Lion cf. African Lion
I have found this article a little confusing in its title. There is only one species of extant lion and several sub-species. This article is about the single species, the lion, also known as the African lion. So why is the name of this article not "African lion", or, why does it not mention this in the very first sentence?__DrChrissy (talk) 23:29, 2 January 2015 (UTC)
 * "African Lion" redirects to this page. I am unsure what else you are asking, could you clarify? Greedo  8  15:43, 4 January 2015 (UTC)
 * I have edited the opening sentence to how I believe it should be. Is this incorrect?__DrChrissy (talk) 16:25, 4 January 2015 (UTC)
 * As far as I know the edit you made is correct. Thanks! Greedo  8  16:31, 4 January 2015 (UTC)
 * Cheers!__DrChrissy (talk) 17:35, 4 January 2015 (UTC)

It's incorrect to state it's also called African lion, as there are wild lions in India. Editor abcdef (talk) 08:52, 21 January 2015 (UTC)
 * That depends on the subject of the article which is the question I have tried to raise above. If the article is only about the lion that lives in Africa than I think it is correct to say it is also called the African Lion.  If it is about lions in general, I agree it may not be appropriate.  However, the taxobox states the article is about P. leo the species.  The Asiatic lion is a sub-species.__DrChrissy (talk) 12:54, 21 January 2015 (UTC)
 * Of course this is about Panthera leo the whole species. Editor abcdef (talk) 21:50, 21 January 2015 (UTC)
 * Well then, why is it incorrect to say this is the African lion?__DrChrissy (talk) 23:50, 21 January 2015 (UTC)
 * Because there is the subspecies of the Asiatic lion Panthera leo persica. In other words: on the one hand, if you talk about the African lion (which anyways does not really exist as such, but consist of various subspecies), the Asiatic subspecies is not included. On the other hand, if you talk about the whole species Panthera leo (as does the article) this includes the Asiatic subspecies and can therefore not be called the African lion. Robuer (talk) 07:24, 22 January 2015 (UTC)
 * Yes, I follow that reasoning. But if the "African lion" does not exist, we should perhaps make this clear in the article?__DrChrissy (talk) 16:02, 22 January 2015 (UTC)
 * I have edited the first couple of sentences to clarify this - comments are welcome.__DrChrissy (talk) 16:11, 22 January 2015 (UTC)
 * Well, i found the following on the Homepage of the IUCN/SSC Cat Specialist Group in the Profile called "African Lion" (there is a separate one for the Asiatic lion): "Previously lions were divided into two subspecies: the African lion (Panthera leo leo) and the Asiatic lion (Panthera leo persica). However, based on several recent genetic studies, the lion (Panthera leo) is due for taxonomic revision. The studies indicate that lions from Asia and West and Central Africa are more closely related than lions from Eastern and Southern Africa. These two main divisions of lions are not homogeneous as there is genetic subdivision within each, with more genetic variation and deeper divergences within the Eastern and Southern branch than within the Asian plus West and Central African one." I guess the statement in the first sentence could also be mentioned in the article for clarification on where the term "African lion" actually comes from? Or what do you think? Unfortunately the Website only gives a list of references but not which statement is from which source.__Robuer (talk) 09:17, 23 January 2015 (UTC)

Redirecting African lion to Lion
What I am thinking of is editing that section on the lion's distribution and habitat into 2 sections, one for Eurasia, the other for Africa, and then redirecting African lion to the sub-section for Africa, that way, we can have a more valid link for African lion IMO, rather than African lion having to redirect to the whole article, since this article also talks about extant Asiatic lions and prehistoric cave lions. What do you think? Leo1pard (talk) 14:54, 30 May 2017 (UTC)
 * This redirect may not be appropriate. Taxonomy of the cats has recently been revised, and 2 lion subspecies are now recognised: P. l. leo in northern Africa and Asia, and P. l. melanochaita in Southern Africa, hence there is anyway no 'Eurasian' lion. -- BhagyaMani (talk) 15:55, 30 May 2017 (UTC)
 * I meant in a geographical way, not a taxonomic way. Leo1pard (talk) 16:11, 30 May 2017 (UTC)
 * Given the what is now known about lions, African lion is probably the appropriate name for all modern lions ( as distinct from cave lions). All modern lions are derived from a relatively recent African population. The "Asiatic lion" is just an African lion that migrated out of Africa. The history of the name, though, would make this too confusing.
 * I think the redirect suggestion makes sense. It is to the Africa subsection of the Distribution and habitat section rather than to a section on African lions. It could be labelled Lions in Africa to be even clearer, although that seems redundant. I changed a reference to the subspecies in the Eurasia section. While not a subspecies, the name Asiatic lion is still appropriate. Jts1882 (talk) 10:45, 31 May 2017 (UTC)

When was the last wild Barbary Lion killed?
In this article we have:
 * as the last wild Barbary lion was killed in Morocco in 1922. (Nowell, Kristin; Jackson, Peter (1996). "Panthera Leo" (PDF). Wild Cats: Status Survey and Conservation Action Plan. Gland, Switzerland: IUCN/SSC Cat Specialist Group. pp. 17–21. ISBN 2-8317-0045-0)

Where as in Barbary Lion we have:
 * The last of its kind was shot in the western Maghreb in 1942 near the Tizi n'Tichka pass. (Black, S. A., Fellous, A., Yamaguchi, N., Roberts, D. L. (2013). Examining the Extinction of the Barbary Lion and Its Implications for Felid Conservation. PLoS ONE 8(4): e60174).

This looks like there might be an inconsistency. (Msrasnw (talk) 11:35, 2 April 2014 (UTC))
 * I think we should use the latest source (the one from 2013). Greedo  8  15:39, 2 April 2014 (UTC)


 * Done. Poor Barbary lions :~ BigCat82 (talk) 19:51, 7 September 2014 (UTC)
 * If you mean the Barbary lion as being the lion that was in North Africa, then yes, the wild Barbary lion is gone, but if you go by genetics, then it appears that it lives on in what we would know as the Senegal lion of Western and Central Africa. Something similar applies to the Cape lion, given its relationship with extant Southern African lions, at least. Leo1pard (talk) 17:10, 2 June 2017 (UTC)

This article not to mention the lenght of skull of the lion
The book  A field guide to the carnivores of the world   ISBN 978-2-603-01856-9  written by Luke Hunter Priscilla Barret, published by New Holland Publishers in 2011 mention that it is  the lion that has the greatest length of skull among the big cats and ahead in this area the siberian tiger( which is the subspecies of tiger with the largest skull with a skull length of 37,9 cm on average) with a skull length of 42 cm on average, and a record length of skull of 91 cm held by a lion killed in Burkina Faso in West Africa in 2008.

--~rourébrébé80.15.124.56 (talk)

Further, I think (but am not certain) that the skull picured in the article is not actually a lion's skull. Maybe a bear skull? --170.145.0.100 (talk) 14:56, 19 July 2013 (UTC) The skull is not a lions but bear skull. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Jwolf2242 (talk • contribs) 21:11, 25 January 2015 (UTC)


 * After comparing it to some other photos, the dentition, shape of the infraorbital foramen, shape of the mandible, and overall elongated shape of the skull make me pretty sure that this is not a lion skull, but rather some species of bear. I don't want to change it myself without some confirmation from an expert, because I'm just a random layperson. To be clear, the image in question is http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Lionskull-tobuzoo-2012.jpg --170.145.0.100 (talk) 16:13, 31 July 2013 (UTC)

This picture is definitely not a lion skull. It is some species of Ursid. Tooth number, molar shape are obviously not felid. This needs to be changed. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 193.60.182.97 (talk) 09:24, 30 September 2013 (UTC)

The cited article says "Le contour de la tète" this is French for "the circumference of the head", since "contour" is also used in English and has a similar meaning it is confusing that it got mistranslated, mistakes happen I guess. To set the record straight remember that among carnivorans (dogs, bears, cats and kin) only the largest individuals of the largest bear taxa surpass 50cm in skull length along with the extinct beardog Amphicyon inges, if you see mentions of felids with skulls bigger than that, be suspicious of its veracity. Mike.BRZ (talk) 03:31, 31 March 2014 (UTC)


 * Check Tiger versus lion, the information on the maximum, known length of the lion's skull is there. Leo1pard (talk) 13:50, 10 April 2017 (UTC)

Lion's weight
I think that in the intro it should be introducing my mentioning that exceptionally large males exceed 7000 lbs. I feel that anyone that wants that there is biased. I thought Wikipedia was supposed to be farts. That's not true at all. A lion over 9000 lbs is record sized not. We don't always need to mention the weight of an animal in the intro, but if everyone insists for this one, it should say "with some males exceeding 1000 lbs". Golfcourseairhorn (talk) 21:33, 7 September 2011 (UTC) joany brown owns a lion he lives in jamaca. which is neither misleading nor biased. The statement is simply intended to illustrate how large the animal is. Further down, in the Characteristics section, it is noted that "Weights for adult lions range between 150–250 kg (330–550 lb) for males and 120–182 kg (264–400 lb) for females." By all means make a constructive suggestion if you think the lead needs to be changed. Thanks. --Seduisant (talk) 23:31, 9 September 2018 (UTC)


 * Would you present the Elephant article with "with some males exceeding 16,000 lbs"? The Polar bear article with "with some males exceeding 1760 lbs"? The American alligator article with "with some males exceeding 15 feet"? The Hippo article with "with some males exceeding 9,000 lbs"? Golfcourseairhorn (talk) 01:12, 11 September 2011 (UTC)

The heaviest lion ever recorded was not simba(826lbs).Lions like simba (826 lbs) are being shown to be not as uncommon as most would think, many other lions rival and even surpasses his size and weight, such as Woody (800 lbs); Rutledge (806 lbs); Rhino (850 lbs); Prince (900 lbs); Peter jacksons lion (930 lbs); lion named ali (1,000 lbs) Ethopian courts lion (1,000 lbs) Sultan (1,000 lbs).And sultan was biggest of them all only 46 kilos lighter than the biggest siberian tiger ever tyka(1100lbs) — Preceding unsigned comment added by Fpsjeffers (talk • contribs) 19:51, 4 October 2011 (UTC) bye!

Typo
In "hybrids" it first correctly references "Tigon", then later misspells it "Tiglon".


 * Hm, you're right about the inconsistency. The link says "tigon", the first sentence says "tiglon", and the last sentence of the section says "tigon" again. However, the link to Tigon actually redirects to our article Tiglon. That article says: "A tiglon, tigon, or tion (not tigron) is a hybrid cross..."
 * On this article we cite the Encyclopedia Brittanica, which calls the animal a tigon but says "or tiglon", and Wild Cats of the World by Guggisberg, which I don't have a copy of. I dug out my big cat books and found another reference in Big Cats: Kingdom of Might by Tom Brakefield, which calls the animal a tiglon. Basically, both terms are used, though I don't know where we're getting tion from. I have edited the section on this article to make the spelling consistent with our article on the animal - thanks for pointing it out.
 * By the way, please sign your posts on talk pages by typing ~ at the end, thanks. :) ~ Kimelea   (talk)  20:11, 29 March 2012 (UTC)

Edit request on 9 May 2012
i find the section on purpose and use of lion mane to be incomplete. its purpose is said to only be that of appearance -for mating and protecting territory. however the mane also has the purpose of protecting the lion from injury (an armor from teeth and claw from its most formidable threat- another male lion). this is further supported by data offered later in the text that lions with thicker mane reproduce more (thicker mane is a favorable trait).

67.190.103.158 (talk) 01:42, 9 May 2012 (UTC)


 * Red information icon with gradient background.svg Not done: please provide reliable sources that support the change you want to be made.  mabdul 11:22, 15 May 2012 (UTC)

The literature seems pretty much in favour that the mane is selective for all three reasons (intimidating males, attracting females and protection in fights). The debate is about which (if any) is the primary cause of the mane being selected for.

"The mane is thought to be visually intimidating in contests between males while serving as body armour during fights, and also to have a function in attracting females" - Evolution of the mane and group-living in the lion (Panthera leo): a review (Nobuyuki Yamaguchi1*, Alan Cooper2, Lars Werdelin3 and David W. Macdonald)

"Mane length signals fighting success" "By assessing mane length and darkness, males avoid healthier, older, more aggressive individuals, thereby lowering the potential costs of fighting. By preferring males with darker manes, females gain mature, better-fed, more aggressive mates, and their preference confers direct fitness benefits. Dark-maned males are more likely to survive 12 months after being wounded"   -Sexual Selection, Temperature, and the Lion’s Mane (Peyton M. West* and Craig Packer)

"the mane might serve as intimidation, advertisement, and (or) physical protection. The manes of residents may deter trespassers and intimidate nomadic males contemplating a takeover attempt on a pride by serving as a visual signal of a territorial male’s control of a particular area. Females may be more likely to subordinate themselves to males with impressive manes and (or) might select males based on their mane condition. Finally, some have proposed that the mane offers physical protection to the vital head and neck areas against the teeth and claws of competing males (Schaller 1972; Ewer 1973; Bertram 1978; Myers 1987). The principal, or overriding, function of the mane remains unclear, because some of these social hypotheses are nonexclusive and there are few data available to test them against each other. - Mane variation in African lions and its social correlates (Roland W. Kays and Bruce D. Patterson)

The most recent and conclusive study on it I have seen is "Wounding, mortality and mane morphology in African lions, Panthera leo" (PEYTON M. WEST* et al) which has the following summary:

"Our results suggest that the current protective benefits of the mane are minimal, but they do not exclude the possibility of past protective benefits. Forehead manes may have initially evolved as protection and later taken on a signalling function that led to the mane’s exaggeration. It is also possible that the entire mane evolved initially as protection, but that lion fighting behaviour subsequently changed. Studies of fighting behaviour in other felids, particularly the lion’s closest relative, the tiger, P. tigris, may provide a better basis for comparison; if tigers target the shoulders, necks and chests along with the forehead, or if injuries to these areas also cause high mortality, the necessity for protection to these areas would be supported. Tigers and other maneless felids might also have protective dermal shields; if so, the location of these shields should provide clues about the areas most in need of protection. Regardless of the lion mane’s original function, protective benefits are not sufficient to explain the maintenance of the trait; rather, the key benefit of the mane appears to derive from its function as a signal of male condition."

So manes do provide protection, but not in fights between lions as they have evolved to attack other parts of the body (probabaly because the mane is effective protection). Because of this and the fact that they also have other benefits, the primary driver of mane evolution is probably no longer it's protective effect. Perhaps the article could mention something along those lines? NickPriceNZ (talk) 11:58, 20 October 2014 (UTC)


 * I am unsure as to how you would like the article to be edited. Are you saying you want to reword the content to say the mane is currently existing for attraction of females? Greedo  8  14:30, 4 January 2015 (UTC)

Yes. It's misleading (and almost certainly false) to say that the lion mane has no protective purpose. Clarification would be much better and is not that complicated. The main points are that

1. It is widely accepted amongst zoologists that the mane evolved for protective purposes. 2. Male lions now avoid attacking the neck when fighting one another, so the only studied advantages they get from the mane are those of intimidation of other males and preferential selection from females. Summary: The mane is protective - Male lions just down't attack the area protected by it.

-Nick 47.72.242.60 (talk) 00:39, 20 March 2016 (UTC)

Lion Speed
'''Maximum speed: 35 mph over 50 yds. ( 56 km/h. over 46 m.) Biggest Jump: 12 ft. (3.7 m.) vertical, 36 ft. (10.8 m.) horizontal'''.

The lions are naturally fast but they have the same speed of running as tigers and leopards between 30 and 40 mph maximum and they are slower than many of their preys. The zebras, reach speeds of 60 km/h and the wildebeest reach 70 km/h. The lions hunt only the individuals disabled animals (females in gestation, youngs, patients, olds, Woundeds) who are not very fast and lively. The night, the lions have the advantage on preys because they sees better in the black, the gnus, wart hogs and the zebras run only to 40 km/h (25 mph) at night, even the individuals in maid physical conditions because they have no good night-vi eg my mummy ew, the night is really the kingdom of the lions who fart i call them fartinayo.

I have already seen several hunting scenes in broadcast animal documentaries, and I was able to notice that the zebras are a little faster than the lions. I saw exactly 3 different scenes, or a small group of zebras to run to a crazy speed and to sow the lioness to experiment without great difficulty, I even saw 3 differents scenes with zebras escaping the lions, which shows the not success of lionesses in the day, in the hunting, when animals are in maid physical conditions. I also saw not successes, on Giraffes, Buffalos, Wildebeests, Grant's gazelles and Thomson, Impalas, Topis, Elands, and even Wart Hogs. I saw certain wart hogs sowing two lionesses, preys are still better adapted has the running that the predators and in more they hold better their top speeds, they are also stronger in stamina.

At night on the other hand the lions have a better of success in the hunting, because preys have no good view contrary in the day while the view and the speed of the lions stays there even in the darkness.--85.170.228.86 (talk) 13:18, 222 June 2012 (UTC)

Speed
I could not find the lion's sprinting speed anywhere within this so-called "featured" article, despite it being a huge part of the animal's visual aspect—at least, that which is seen by the public. Lame! Mac Dreamstate (talk) 23:28, 8 August 2013 (UTC)

Semi-protected edit request on 14 December 2014
Hi.Iam a lion fan.My name is Hasnain.Iam 20 years old.I wanted to talk about the biggest lion ever in captivity.Many people say it was simba weighing 375kg(826lbs).That would be dwarf if you compare with the biggest tiger in history who was tyka weighing 499kg(1100lbs).I have found that simba was just one of the biggest lions ever.I have found that lions can reach 900lbs and even more weight.In fact,the biggest lion ever was Sultan who weighed 1000lbs.That's only 46 kilos lighter than tyka.That's not a big difference.

I want people to know about the beauty of the king of beasts.The following link tells that there are lions who have surpassed simba's weight. http://teamauthority.myfastforum.org/African_Lion_vs_Grizzly_Bear_about729.html Kindly please accept my request to edit this page

Hzai491 (talk) 18:34, 14 December 2014 (UTC)

❌ This is not the right page to request additional user rights. If you want to suggest a change, please request this in the form "Please replace XXX with YYY" or "Please add ZZZ between PPP and QQQ". Please cite reliable sources to back up your request - you have cited "A comic based team forum" i.e. a blog, which is not a reliable source. - Arjayay (talk) 19:13, 14 December 2014 (UTC)

Semi-protected edit request on 12 April 2015
it says "during a mating bout, which could last several days, the couple copulates twenty to forty times a day".

This seems really extreme, and there is no reference.

I tried to check by looking for info anywhere else but it is hard because other sites have copied this 'fact' from Wikiepdia.

I used a tool called 'wikiblame' and found out it was added here in 2006, without a ref.

I think it is an extreme claim so I suggest removing it unless someone has a good reference.

88.104.24.140 (talk) 17:47, 12 April 2015 (UTC)
 * Yellow check.svg Partly done: I added a citation needed tag to give people the chance to look at it, if it stays this way we can remove it.  Kharkiv07 Talk  13:13, 13 April 2015 (UTC)

Please change "Behind only the tiger, the lion is the second largest living felid in length and weight." to "Second to the tiger, the lion is the second largest living felid in length and weight." Thank you. Rissa, Guild of Copy Editors (talk) 02:04, 21 April 2015 (UTC)

Edit
"Behind only the tiger, the lion is the second largest living felid in length and weight." should be changed to: "Second only to the tiger...." Thank you. Rissa, Guild of Copy Editors (talk) 02:08, 21 April 2015 (UTC)

Lions of india competition
Found this one that should be added into the page.



Bernate (talk) 00:56, 10 November 2016 (UTC)


 * I would prefer that something like that should be for "an article or section that deals specifically with competition or coexistence between Asiatic lions and tigers in the Eurasian wilderness." Leo1pard (talk) 08:28, 24 November 2016 (UTC)

Semi-protected edit request on 8 December 2014
Lions are pride of India. They are on national emblem of India, called as Lion Capital of Ashoka and `Ashoka Stambha (Pillar)` in Indian languages. Source: Constitution of India. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lion_Capital_of_Ashoka

Milind.wakale (talk) 05:33, 8 December 2014 (UTC)
 * Red question icon with gradient background.svg Not done: it's not clear what changes you want to be made. Please mention the specific changes in a "change X to Y" format. Anupmehra  - Let's talk!  19:49, 8 December 2014 (UTC)


 * As in, the Asiatic lion is the pride of India apart from the Bengal tiger, considering that the tiger is the national animal of India, not the lion? Leo1pard (talk) 06:11, 22 October 2017 (UTC)

Taxonomy and phylogeny section
From "Taxonomy and phylogeny", subsection "Subspecies", in the table, "Asiatic lion": "It is protected in the Gir Forest National Park, and four protected areas in the region." Does this mean that there are four separate protected areas within the Gir Forest? Or is the whole Gir Forest protected, with four other protected areas near the forest? Two references are given, but I am unable to view them. Axl ¤ [Talk] 11:17, 18 June 2018 (UTC)
 * No, it doesn't mean that "there are four separate protected areas within the Gir Forest". These patches are outside the protected area. -- BhagyaMani (talk) 11:31, 18 June 2018 (UTC)
 * Thanks. Axl ¤ [Talk] 11:36, 18 June 2018 (UTC)
 * The whole subspecies table should be deleted anyway (as it is obsolete) and all the obsolete names put in the appropriate section (and other material into distribution and habitat. Does anyone object to this before I go ahead and remove it? Cas Liber (talk · contribs) 11:51, 18 June 2018 (UTC)

I suggest to leave it for some time, as this revised taxonomy dates only 2017, and still spurs some objections. -- BhagyaMani (talk) 12:38, 18 June 2018 (UTC)
 * Oppose, the classification by the Cat Specialist Group in 2017 does not solve the issue of where lions in Northeast Africa go, they put a question mark over the region in the map on Page 72. They also proclaimed "The contact zone (between the 2 recognised subspecies) is somewhere in Ethiopia ... On the basis of these recent studies, we recognise two subspecies, although morphological diagnoses are currently unknown," which means that their classification of subspecies of lions, as of now, is not perfect or complete, and still needs review. Leo1pard (talk) 14:38, 18 June 2018 (UTC)
 * Well, this is an example of the objections spurred. The referenced article by Bertola et al. 2016 clearly and unmistakably placed lion samples from Ethiopia, Somalia and Kenya into the East African lion group. It does NOT mean that lion taxonomy needs another review, but merely that morphological analysis of the samples has not been done yet. -- BhagyaMani (talk) 15:24, 18 June 2018 (UTC)
 * Bertola et al. (2016) did not exclusively place lion samples from Kenya and the Horn countries of Ethiopia and Somalia exclusively in the South-East African lion group, which the CSG would refer to as Panthera leo melanochaita. Leo1pard (talk) 15:55, 18 June 2018 (UTC)
 * They did indeed: see supplementary table 1. -- BhagyaMani (talk) 16:37, 18 June 2018 (UTC)
 * Not exclusively the South-East African group, but also including the North-East African group, and this diagram was used in the Page 12 of the document to which the supplementary table links. In addition, some samples from Ethiopia grouped with the North-Central African lion group (which is linked to the North African and Asiatic lions), which you should know. Leo1pard (talk) 17:40, 18 June 2018 (UTC)
 * No opinion on the content matter but we need to stop introducing sub-par writing to this article. "It is thought" is not good writing. -- Laser brain  (talk)  19:27, 18 June 2018 (UTC)
 * , regardless of where some populations are put, the table itself is outdated and misleading, and should be replaced by one with two (2) subspecies plus notes on indeterminate populations. Cas Liber (talk · contribs) 03:00, 19 June 2018 (UTC)

Realistically, you would have to be talking about a table like this, because the indeterminate population of lions in Northeast Africa, which the CSG had difficulty in resolving, are in a region where the two recognized subspecies (P. l. leo and P. l. melanochaita) overlap (which would result in P. l. leo × P. l. melanochaita, similar to a liger being Panthera leo × Panthera tigris), or are both determined by genetic tests to be present at least: Leo1pard (talk) 05:10, 19 June 2018 (UTC)
 * Yes - and if that reflects current thinking, then that is what it should be. Discrete populations can be discussed in Distribution or Conservation sections. Or in the table. Cas Liber (talk · contribs) 06:10, 19 June 2018 (UTC)
 * The middle row in the proposed table is superfluous. melanochaita includes the 9 lion samples from Ethiopia with leo haplotypes. This is what the cited authors wrote, it would anyway be insincere to extrapolate from 9 samples to such a generalized statement that the lion population in Northeast Africa is admixed. Seems to be a big misunderstanding and misinterpretation of the 2 cited sources. -- BhagyaMani (talk) 07:26, 19 June 2018 (UTC)
 * That melanochaita includes the 9 lion samples from Ethiopia with leo haplotypes is what I had said was 'problematic' for the CSG's recognition of only 2 subspecies of lions in Africa and the Old World. The classification of lions into 2 subspecies (P. l. leo and P. l. melanochaita) should mean that lions are divided into 2 groups that are genetically and geographically distinct from one another, but due to the fact that they overlap or are both present in northern parts of East Africa, including Ethiopia, that does not always apply, and certainly, I did not mean that all Northeast African lions are of this genetically mixed group, like I would not say that all Central African lions belong to P. l. leo, when in fact those in the southern part of Congo-Kinshasa or Central Africa belong to the South-East African group (P. l. melanochaita). Leo1pard (talk) 09:35, 19 June 2018 (UTC)
 * Another misinterpretation of the revised lion taxonomy!! But at least you seem to understand now that not all of Northeast Africa is the contact zone but merely Ethiopia. That btw is the basic understanding of subspecies: that they were connected once upon a time, many generations ago. I see that you just copy-pasted my recent addition to the Central African lion wiki article into your wiki posts. I feel honoured. -- BhagyaMani (talk) 11:09, 19 June 2018 (UTC)

A table consisting of three images and a little bit of text seems very superfluous. Discuss it in the text and save the space. FunkMonk (talk) 10:52, 19 June 2018 (UTC)
 * Absolutely agree that 2 are sufficient. -- BhagyaMani (talk) 12:15, 19 June 2018 (UTC) Even the bulleted list may be sufficient. What do you think? -- BhagyaMani (talk) 13:01, 19 June 2018 (UTC)


 * I would have at least modified the information that you put in Central African lion regarding lions in Sudan (which is not in Central Africa, but regarded as being in Northeast or North Africa, or even East Africa), once I made that clear to you where Sudan and its lions actually belong, even if in varied ways. There are lions of which the genetic and geographic statuses make the classification into 2 subspecies complicated. It is not like the case of separating tigers into 2 subspecies, because these 2 subspecies (P. t. tigris in mainalnd Asia and P. t. sondaica in the Sunda Islands) are geographically separated, unlike the subspecies of African lions, and I am using subspecies of tigers for a comparison here, because they are comparatively well defined and simple to understand, partly due to geographic separation. If P. l. leo and P. l. melanochaita did not share a region or overlap, then classifying lions into either subspecies would have been easier, like classifying tigers into 2 subspecies. Leo1pard (talk) 13:09, 19 June 2018 (UTC)


 * There is a source cited in Conservation (Bauer & van der Merwe) but not defined. LittleJerry (talk) 22:14, 23 June 2018 (UTC)


 * Reversion. I suppose that these few had exactly a single ruff between them. Axl ¤ [Talk] 15:33, 28 June 2018 (UTC)

Head-to-body length
In "Description", what does "Head-to-body length" mean? Axl ¤ [Talk] 13:02, 7 July 2018 (UTC)
 * It means the length of the head and body together and excluding the tail. LittleJerry (talk) 18:25, 8 July 2018 (UTC)
 * Is that the phrase used in the sources? When I read it, it seems to me to mean the distance between the head and the body; the head is directly joined to the body (without much of a neck) so the "head-to-body length" is zero. I think that "head-and-body length" makes more sense. However we should follow the sources. If the sources confirm "head-to-body", perhaps we could add a note to explain the definition? <b style="color:#808000">Axl</b> ¤ <small style="color:#808000">[Talk] 09:00, 17 July 2018 (UTC)

Dispute over a Namibian lion being a Southern African lion?


Can you explain what's disputable about the Nambian lion in Okonjima being a Southern African lion? Namibia is in Southern Africa. Leo1pard (talk) 05:42, 1 August 2018 (UTC)


 * The subspecies have been revised. See the subspecies subsection. LittleJerry (talk) 03:03, 2 August 2018 (UTC)

I said, then are you going to remove the name of the Bengal tiger from the lead image of Tiger as well? Why is it that you removed the name of the Southern African lion from this lead image, with the arguments on subspecies (which I already know, but the same should apply to that Bengal tiger because subspecies of tigers have been revised as well, if really your argument on subspecies was relevant to the purpose of this discussion on what type of lion this is), and then that "The name of a population is of no relevance to the average reader", when you were happy to keep the name of the Bengal tiger in the lead image of the article 'Tiger'? Like I said, this lion is a Southern African lion, like that tiger is a Bengal tiger. Leo1pard (talk) 05:25, 3 August 2018 (UTC)


 * The Southern African lion is no longer considered a subspecies. Lion subspecies have been revised numerous times and we don't need that in the main image. LittleJerry (talk) 13:39, 3 August 2018 (UTC)


 * Then why did you apply the opposite logic to the lead image of 'Tiger'? You are unhappy to call this lion a "Southern African lion", even though you were happy to call that tiger a "Bengal tiger". The revision of subspecies is also applicable to tigers, but you followed a different policy for this species. However, as discussed before, the revision of subspecies in 2017 won't necessarily stop people from referring to different populations of big cats, such as South African lions and Bengal and Siberian tigers, as "South African lions" and "Bengal and Siberian tigers", for example. These names have been there, and they continue to be used, despite the reclassification of subspecies. Leo1pard (talk) 16:08, 3 August 2018 (UTC)
 * The Southern lion is not a subspecies. Its that simple. LittleJerry (talk) 03:50, 4 August 2018 (UTC)


 * your argument "The Southern lion is not a subspecies. Its that simple." contradicts at least one source, though it should be noted that not all East African lions purely belong to the southern subspecies (Panthera leo melanochaita), particularly considering the genetics of the Ethiopian lion. In addition, if the Southern African lion is not a subspecies, then neither is an Asiatic lion nor a Bengal tiger, because both populations have been included in wider subspecies, Panthera leo leo and Panthera tigris tigris (for tigers in Mainland Asia) respectively, but you are happy to call those as an "Asiatic lion" and "Bengal tiger", respectively. It is not fair that you are using the issue of subspecies being revised to ignore the name of the Southern African lion, but at the same time, uphold the names of the Asiatic lion and Bengal tiger, especially considering that you kept the name of the latter in the lead image of the article 'Tiger'. If you are going to call an Asiatic lion and Bengal tiger as an Asiatic lion and Bengal tiger, despite the revision of subspecies, then do not stop me from using the name "Southern African lion", to be fair. Leo1pard (talk) 07:01, 4 August 2018 (UTC)
 * The current article on the Southern African lion discusses only lions from the very south. No East African lions which are also part of P. l. melanochaita are included. So no, Southern African lions is NOT a valid subspecies. Mentioning the Asiatic lion in some photos is valid in the context that they are the only population that survives in Asia. I haven't been following tiger taxonomy and I could care less if you remove mention of the Bengal tiger from the lead image. That's irrelevant to this article. LittleJerry (talk) 15:24, 4 August 2018 (UTC)
 * Firstly, the current article on the Southern African lion does not just discuss lions from the very south, it also talks about East African lions in a relevant context, that is taxonomy and genetics:
 * Section "Taxonomic history": "In 2016, IUCN Red List assessors subsumed all African lion populations to P. l. leo. ... Results of phylogeographic studies support the notion of lions in Southern Africa being genetically close, but distinct from populations in Western and Northern Africa and Asia. Based on the analysis of samples from 357 lions from 10 countries, it is thought that lions migrated from Southern Africa to East Africa during the Pleistocene and Holocene eras. Results of a DNA analysis using 26 lion samples from Southern and Eastern Africa indicate that genetic variation between them is low and that two major clades exist: one in southwestern Africa and one in the region from Uganda and Kenya to KwaZulu-Natal. "
 * Secondly, Panthera leo melanochaita is valid for lions in Southern Africa, including Namibia, but you opposed my use of that name, so your argument on subspecies here is not matched by what you did then. Here, you talk about the validity of subspecies, but there, you give a different argument.
 * Thirdly, why did you argue here "Mentioning the Asiatic lion in some photos is valid in the context that they are the only population that survives in Asia," when you would remove the name "Asiatic lion" for pictures of lions from Asia, at the same time, as if it is not? Leo1pard (talk) 15:56, 4 August 2018 (UTC)
 * Fourthly, I was using the example of what you did to the article 'Tiger' to complain that the way you treated this article is different to how you treated another article, and you are me "I haven't been following tiger taxonomy ..." 23 hours after I told you "Well, then never mind what subspecies it is. It is a Southern African lion, like the tiger in the lead image of Tiger is a Bengal tiger, otherwise, are you going to take off the name of the Bengal tiger from the tiger in the lead image of the article 'Tiger' as well?" But you did not care about what I said then. Leo1pard (talk) 16:22, 4 August 2018 (UTC)
 * Sign. I meant that the Southern African lion only has the very southern living lions as the SUBJECT! It only discusses East African lions by their relation to Southern African lions. This article discusses other big cats, but only in relation to lions. Please stop with the hair-splitting. LittleJerry (talk) 16:41, 4 August 2018 (UTC)

You should not have argued with me about subspecies in the first place if you were going to change it to being about 'hairsplitting'. I follow the same rule here as I did in other articles like 'Tiger'. The lead image of that article has had the name of the Bengal tiger population since 2006, and I was happy to keep that name there, even though subspecies were revised in 2017, partly as people would still call Bengal tigers as "Bengal tigers", like they would still call Siberian tigers as "Siberian tigers", and likewise, I was applying the same logic here, but you give me statements that do not always match what you say, or conflict with each other, for example, after you tell me "The subspecies have been revised. See the subspecies subsection." I proceed to talk about subspecies, but then you change your argument to say that this isn't necessary, then I make this edit with a saying about applying the same logic to the article 'Tiger', then you revert it, without caring what I said then, then you talk about subspecies again, then Jts1882 and I had to show that your argument about the Southern lion not being a subspecies contradicted at least one source, then you talk about the issue of subspecies again, and make an argument about the Asiatic lion that did not match what you did at the same time, and now, you are not using the issue of subspecies, but 'hair-splitting', so your statements and actions contradict each other. Please do not give me any more contradictory statements about subspecies or details, or actions, like removing the names "Asiatic lion", "East African lion" and "Southern African lion" (or even "[Southern lion" (Panthera leo melanochaita)), even if it is relevant to the context of what they are in, considering that you told me "Mentioning the Asiatic lion in some photos is valid in the context ..." and just let me proceed to do something that I would do in other articles like 'Tiger', out of fairness. [[User:Leo1pard|Leo1pard]] (talk) 17:52, 4 August 2018 (UTC)
 * Look. I argued that mentioning the Asian lion is valid since it is the only surviving lion in Asia. That doesn't mean I think it is completely necessary and their is still one photo that refers to Asian lions ("Distribution and habitat"). "Valid" and "necessary" do not mean the same thing, so there was no contradiction in my actions there. As for this, I'll admit I exampled poorly there, but "Southern African lion" is not the common name for P. l. melanochaita. If you want to remove mention of the Bengal tiger in the lead image of the tiger article, I won't stop you. But that's relevant here. LittleJerry (talk) 15:42, 5 August 2018 (UTC)
 * I agreed that the simple statement that the Southern Lion is not a subspecies is wrong. There are two recognised subspecies, a southern one (with populations in southern and eastern Africa) and a northern one (with populations in western and central Africa and in India). The problem is that there are no clear common names for these subspecies. Some would argue that southern lion applies only to the southern African population of a Southern and Eastern African lion, while others would consider this a mouthful and opt for the more manageabe Southern (African) lion. I note the article on the Southern African lion is about the southern African population. Either way the Southern African lion describes the photo accurately.
 * The iNaturalist article links to a US Fish and Wildlife Service publication, Endangered and Threatened Wildlife and Plants; Listing Two Lion Subspecies, which gives a nice summary of the situation. It's interesting to note that this predated the Cat Specialist Group publication by almost two years. <span style="font-family:Arial;background:#d6ffe6;border:solid 1px;border-radius:5px;box-shadow:darkcyan 0px 1px 1px;">  Jts1882 &#124; talk 10:43, 4 August 2018 (UTC)
 * P. l. melanochaita is not called the "Southern African lion". That's my point. LittleJerry (talk) 16:49, 4 August 2018 (UTC)

"Southern lion" is used as the name here. Leo1pard (talk) 18:07, 5 August 2018 (UTC)
 * And the article Southern African lion does not have all the lions classified under P. l. melanochaita as its subject. LittleJerry (talk) 02:33, 6 August 2018 (UTC)


 * Southern lion now does, but only in the context of genetics and distribution. I prefer to leave other information like taxonomic history and characteristics are to the older, more detailed pages on the different populations. Leo1pard (talk) 09:40, 6 August 2018 (UTC)

Source
The article currently states "In Sudan, lions were reported in Southern Darfur and Southern Kordofan provinces in the 1980s." I can't find were the sources support this. This was added recently. LittleJerry (talk) 23:48, 17 August 2018 (UTC)
 * See Chardonnet (2002). If that ref is missing, please add it, should have ref name=Chardonnet2002. -- BhagyaMani (talk) 07:42, 18 August 2018 (UTC)
 * Its there on my screen. It doesn't mention Sudan or the provinces. LittleJerry (talk) 13:18, 18 August 2018 (UTC)
 * Okay I guess your using the maps in Riggio et. al. for the provinces, but I don't see a map for Chardonnet (2002). LittleJerry (talk) 13:28, 18 August 2018 (UTC)
 * Don't you have a search function in your pdf viewer. See page 57!!! -- BhagyaMani (talk) 14:46, 18 August 2018 (UTC)

Ahh, okay. The wayback link only goes down to page 27 (for me at least) and the original link is dead. I'd take your word for it that the info is there. LittleJerry (talk) 15:19, 18 August 2018 (UTC)
 * Yes, of course the info is there, a pers. comm. of the author in 1985. Do you think I would invent this? -- BhagyaMani (talk) 16:09, 18 August 2018 (UTC)
 * No, sources could have gotten mixed up. LittleJerry (talk) 16:42, 18 August 2018 (UTC)

The newly classified subspecies
Before 2017, plenty of subspecies of lions, especially the Barbary lion (Panthera leo leo) and Cape lion (Panthera leo melanochaita),  were recognised, then in 2017, the Cat Classification Taskforce of the Cat Specialist Group revised subspecies of lions, besides for other felid species, and recognised the subspecies Panthera leo leo (for lions in Northern, Western and (northern) Central Africa and Asia) and Panthera leo melanochaita (for lions in Eastern and Southern Africa), but put a question mark over the Horn of Africa in a map on Page 72, saying that the two subspecies come into contact in Ethiopia, and this is apparently due to the fact that lions in Ethiopia and other northern parts of East Africa are genetically mixed between clades belonging to two subspecies. meaning that subspecies of African lions are not fully resolved by the Cat Specialist Group as of now. Aside from that, when people say Panthera leo leo or Panthera leo melanochaita, they would often mean the Barbary and Cape populations, not always the newly classified subspecies, which I named the "Northern lion" and "Southern lion", using this and this from the iNaturalist. I ask, what is the point of having the trinomina Panthera leo leo and Panthera le melanochaita as articles of their own when:

1) People use them to refer to the Barbary and Cape populations of lions, therefore

2) We need to be able to call the new subspecies with names, as in, what do you call a Panthera leo leo lion if not a "Northern lion", and what do you call a Panthera leo melanochaita lion if not a "Southern lion"? "Panthera leo leo lion" and "Panthera leo melanochaita lion" are unusual for proper names, and I had earlier used "Leonine" and "Melanochaitan" to describe lions belonging to the two newly classified subspecies, due to a lack of names for them, other than "Northern lion" and "Southern lion". Leo1pard (talk) 14:25, 29 August 2018 (UTC)

A common name is a name that is COMMONLY used in scientific and popular publications about an organism. If you or the owner of a website invents a name for an organism, this doesn't make it a common name! 'Northern' lion and 'Southern' lion have NOT been used in ANY scientific publication since the revision of lion taxonomy was published in April 2017. Hence, they are NOT common names. A multitude of species and subspecies were not given common names by respective authorities. For such cases, the Latin, i.e. scientific name is used. -- BhagyaMani (talk) 15:41, 29 August 2018 (UTC)


 * They may not be common names now, but that's not the only point. As it is, the 2017 revision was recent, you still need to be able to name those subspecies, to avoid confusion. The Barbary and Cape lions are not the newly classified subspecies, so what are you supposed to call them? Leo1pard (talk) 16:31, 29 August 2018 (UTC)

They 'may not' only be, but ARE NOT common names now. What exactly confuses you about Barbary lion and Cape lion? -- BhagyaMani (talk) 17:30, 29 August 2018 (UTC)


 * Just as I was not confused about what I was talking about here (the tigers were not the point of what I was saying, but you could not understand what I was talking about), I am not confused about the Barbary and Cape lions, which are populations of lions whose common names were used a lot in scientific literature in the context of Panthera leo leo and Panthera leo melanochaita respectively, before the reclassification, I am asking you a question. What are you supposed to call a Northern lion if not a "Northern lion", and what are you supposed to call a Southern lion if not "Southern lion"? Leo1pard (talk) 04:08, 30 August 2018 (UTC)

I answered your last question already on 29 Aug 15:41, see above bolded for you: if the respective authority did not give a common name, the Latin name is used. Neither you nor the owner of a website are authorities for inventing or giving common names. -- BhagyaMani (talk) 10:52, 30 August 2018 (UTC)


 * Common names have been used, and they are "Barbary lion" (or other names like "Atlas lion") and "Cape lion", but these are specific populations whose trinomina have been used for the 2 subspecies. What are you supposed to call the subspecies to help people distinguish them from the populations, other than the ones used by the iNaturalist? Leo1pard (talk) 07:25, 31 August 2018 (UTC)

See again my reply from 29 Aug. The names Barbary lion + Cape lion have been COMMONLY used in scientific and popular publications for decades, for at least 10-15. And that is why they are COMMON NAMES: they have been coined long time ago. Today, with the changed understanding of the geographical range of the 2 subspecies, the only unambiguous names for them are their Latin names!! -- BhagyaMani (talk) 13:37, 31 August 2018 (UTC)


 * The 2 newly recognised subspecies overlap in Ethiopia or the Horn of Africa, according to the Cat Specialist Group, unlike the Barbary and Cape populations, which were geographically separated by thousands of kilometres, and the CSG could not decide where to put lions in this region, meaning that unless you accept these lions are mixed between Panthera leo leo and Panthera leo melanochaita, there is ambiguity as to whether these lions should be classified as Panthera leo leo or Panthera leo melanochaita (which made the CSG put a question mark over the Horn of Africa), so the understanding of the subspecies of lions is not yet complete in that perspective, and the iNaturalist warned that whereas common names vary by geography (and this can apply to "Serengeti lion" for lions in the Serengeti subregion of East Africa, and "Kalahari lion"  for lions in the Kalahari subregion of Southern Africa), scientific names change from time to time, and that people are not likely to prefer scientific names (which are in Latin) to common names, especially as nobody or few people today would speak Latin, the CSG said that though they did recognise 2 subspecies, morphological diagnoses were currently unknown (and the work of Bertola et al. (2016) is one of the studies that influenced what the CSG presented on the subspecies, another being the work of Barnett et al. in 2016), and the IUCN said in 2016 that its recognition of the same was based on the work of Barnett et al., but that the work of Barnett et al. is based only on mtDNA and that it could reflect female philopatry, not male philopatry, and that reminds me of the issue of lions in the Central African countries of Gabon and the Republic of Congo being maternally (but not necessarily paternally) related to lions in Southern Africa, which is an issue, because the CSG subsumed lions in Central Africa to the Northern subspecies (Panthera leo leo), not the Southern subspecies (Panthera leo melanochaita), meaning that whether lions in Central Africa and northern parts of East Africa are Panthera leo leo or Panthera leo melanochaita has not been fully resolved by the CSG's revision of subspecies of lions in 2017. In addition, we have been missing something here. Bertola et al. actually used the names Northern and Southern for the 2 subspecies, so the iNaturalist is not alone in calling the 2 subspecies 'Northern' and 'Southern'. Leo1pard (talk) 18:10, 31 August 2018 (UTC)

And I see that the use of 'Northern' and 'Southern' for the subspecies is spreading. Leo1pard (talk) 16:20, 1 September 2018 (UTC)
 * The names Northern lion and Southern lion are logical, but they are not established common names. They have only being used by iNaturalist. Bertola et al (2016) variously refered to them as the northern and southern subspecies or lineages or populations, but these were descriptions, not proposed names. Even if they were proposing a name, scientific publications don't determine common names, usage does.
 * On the other hand, using the trinomials for the article titles seems strange for such well known animals as lions. The problem is that Wikipedia requires sources. iNaturalist is not a particularly reliable source and in this case cites the US Fisheries and Wildlife Service. The USFWS recommends dividing the lion into two subspecies based on the preliminary IUCN Cat Classification Task Force proposal (which has since been published), but they refer to the two subspecies by the scientific names throughout. Wikipedia naming guidelines suggest we should do the same for now. <span style="font-family:Arial;background:#d6ffe6;border:solid 1px;border-radius:5px;box-shadow:darkcyan 0px 1px 1px;"> Jts1882 &#124; talk 13:30, 3 September 2018 (UTC)


 * Thanks, Jts1882!! I performed two searches for 'Northern lion' and 'Southern lion': 1) within Bertola et al. (2011 and 2016): they clearly refrained from coining vernacular names for the described clades; 2) in search engines: not a single publication refers to any of the two. -- BhagyaMani (talk) 14:03, 3 September 2018 (UTC)


 * If reliable scientific publications are not enough to name the subspecies, but usage amongst people is, then I found a fourth website, which not only makes use of the phrase "northern lion", but also "northern subspecies", besides 'southern' for other lions. Like I said, I saw the usage of 'Northern' and 'Southern' spreading. Leo1pard (talk) 14:14, 3 September 2018 (UTC)


 * They use 'northern' lions and 'northern' subpecies. The quotes are to make it clear they are using it to distinguish the two subspecies, not using it is as a formal name. <span style="font-family:Arial;background:#d6ffe6;border:solid 1px;border-radius:5px;box-shadow:darkcyan 0px 1px 1px;"> Jts1882 &#124; talk 16:25, 3 September 2018 (UTC)


 * I have however noticed something about the Southern subspecies. Names like "Southeast African lion" or "East and Southern African lion" have been used, and they can apply to the southern subspecies as it is recognised as comprising lions in Eastern and Southern Africa. Leo1pard (talk) 18:13, 3 September 2018 (UTC)


 * Surprise. John George Wood, using capital letters, referred to the Barbary lion as the "Northern Lion", and described the Cape or Southern African lion as its "Southern relative", in 1865! Leo1pard (talk) 04:14, 4 September 2018 (UTC)


 * What you FAILED TO NOTICE is that ALL these publications date to before revision of lion taxonomy (2017), hence are names for Panthera leo melanochaita and P. l. leo populations, respectively, but NOT for the subspecies as understood since 2017!! You created at least 20 pages with invalid and uncommon names for lions that only contain redirects to other pages with invalid names that you created. You seem to be quite fixated on names. What a waste of time and space, imo, to discuss this for daaayys on end! BhagyaMani (talk) 08:37, 4 September 2018 (UTC)


 * No, I did not fail to notice that, and I know that though the CSG did name felid species, they did not name any subspecies of felids, but that does not change the fact that they were named beforehand, how many times do I have to debunk what you say or do? Leo1pard (talk) 09:56, 4 September 2018 (UTC)


 * As it is, the trinomina used by the CSG for the subspecies do not solve everything. For example, there is ambiguity regarding lions in Ethiopia or the Horn of Africa, because two clades of lions that were related to the Northern (P. l. leo) and Southern (P. l. melanochaita) subspecies were found to be there, meaning that you cannot simply classify them under either P. l. leo or P. l. melanochaita, and it is not just this population of lions for which the CSG's taxonomic revision cannot be easily applied. Certain Central African lions were found to be related to the Southern subspecies (P. l. melanochaita), so if the CSG meant that all lions in Central Africa should be subsumed to P. l. leo, or all in East Africa (particularly the Horn of Africa) should be subsumed to P. l. melanochaita, then they were wrong, because genetic assessments, including those they they referenced to come up with the revision, do not support those, and the lion is not the only felid species which they had trouble with, in recognising subspecies. Leo1pard (talk) 10:01, 5 September 2018 (UTC)
 * On the Central African lions the CSG is clear. The population defined in the molecular studies as Central African lions belong to the northern subspecies. However, this population is confined to the northern part of Central Africa. Not all lions in the geographical or geopolitical region called Central Africa are part of this population. The south-western population of the southern subspecies extends into the southern part of the Central Africa region. The tropical rainforest acts as a clear biogeographical barrier for lions, unlike the situation in Ethiopia where the lion populations may overlap. <span style="font-family:Arial;background:#d6ffe6;border:solid 1px;border-radius:5px;box-shadow:darkcyan 0px 1px 1px;">  Jts1882 &#124; talk 10:14, 5 September 2018 (UTC)


 * More specifically, lions in the northern part of Central Africa, but even then, lions in the area of Virunga National Park, which is the northeastern part of the DRC, and is adjacent to Queen Elizabeth National Park in the East African country of Uganda, were found to be related to the Southern subspecies, which comprises the Haplotype 15, and the Central African lions referred to in the study by Barnett et al. as being at least maternally related to Southern African lions were from the northern Central African countries of Gabon and the Republic of the Congo, so even for northern Central African lions, there should be caution as to which lions belong to the Northern and Southern subspecies. Leo1pard (talk) 13:20, 5 September 2018 (UTC)

And the names of the Eastern and Southern African populations continue to be used, like here, though caution should be made regarding those in the northern part of East Africa. Leo1pard (talk) 10:33, 6 September 2018 (UTC)

And I still see it as the case of you wanting them to have only what you want them to have, and things like this, and your comments above about the proper names existing before the CSG's revision or using scientific names, are in contrast to what you've done for members of other species, like here, where you were happy to use a proper name, even if it was used before the CSG's revision, and that was a huge comment using multiple sources about the name of a particular subspecies, and it's not like I couldn't do something similar for the lions, that is, using this reference to merge the names of two populations that had been used often. Leo1pard (talk) 11:58, 6 September 2018 (UTC)

It is an undeniable fact that melanochaita has been used since 1842, i.e. 176 years now. No other name has been established as long for the leopard in this geographical range!! Vernacular names used in newspaper articles are not relevant, they come and go. Scientific names don't change as frequently, but are long-lasting. -- BhagyaMani (talk) 13:12, 6 September 2018 (UTC)


 * Self-contradiction, Melanochaita was used for a population of lions in the 19th century, and likewise orientalis for a population of leopards at around the same time, in the 19th century, and then both melanochaita and orientalis were applied to broader populations of lions and leopards respectively, due to revisions of subspecies, but that did not stop you from using a proper name for the leopard, but you're complaining about using proper names for the lions. Leo1pard (talk) 13:29, 6 September 2018 (UTC)

Though it was different to what I had done, I decided to respect your attempt to name that page on the leopard subspecies P. p. orientalis as "Far Eastern leopard", seeing its use in literature, so now, Panthera leo leo and Panthera leo melanochaita should be redirected to Northern lion and East-Southern African lion, for similar reasons. Leo1pard (talk) 18:11, 6 September 2018 (UTC)

You were keen on calling P. p. orientalis with a proper name, and I follow the same policy, but you don't? Leo1pard (talk) 11:54, 9 September 2018 (UTC)

I don't care how frequently you change page titles and move content from one to the other. And will refrain from editing any of the lion pages that you created and moved back and forth in the past few weeks. Fact is that neither Bertola et al. (2016) nor Kitchener et al. (2017) introduced and proposed vernacular names for the 2 recognised subspecies. None of the various names that you used in the past weeks have been established in scientific literature since 2016, hence are not common names: I strongly advise you read this definition. As Jts1882 already pointed out with reference to Wikipedia naming guidelines that in such a case should scientific names be used throughout. BTW: the name 'Amur leopard' is a long-established vernacular name for this leopard subspecies, hence a common name. I'm tired of this ridiculous discussion with you on names. -- BhagyaMani (talk) 12:24, 9 September 2018 (UTC)

1) Amongst others things, the link that you sent me says "A common name is sometimes frequently used, but that is by no means always the case. "

2) This reference says that common names may be specific to certain places, and that they lack universality.

3) Names, like those of the eastern and southern populations of lions are commonly used,  and indeed, Bauer et al. had used "East and Southern African lion",

4) Like Jts1882 said, it also depends on usage. From what I see, after scientific names like orientalis and melanochaita in the 19th century, came names like "Amur leopard" and "Northern lion", and whereas the earliest use of "Amur leopard" that I see dates back to 1910, the names of the Northern and Southern lions date back to 1865, and since then, a number of publications like that of Bertola et al. have referred to the currently described subspecies using the words 'northern' and 'southern' (though the names of the eastern and southern populations havebeen used to the extent that I prefer to keep the other name), so firstly, the names that I used for the 2 subspecies are names from literature, and secondly, they have increasingly widespread application.

5) The names "Northern lion" and "Southern lion" are more common than you think, that was not the only book that I found on their names, so redirect Panthera leo leo and Panthera leo melanochaita back to Northern lion and East-Southern African lion. Leo1pard (talk) 14:22, 9 September 2018 (UTC)

As stated here, people are interested in specific information like regarding what an East African lion is,   or indeed, an Eastern-Southern African lion, the recent revision of subspecies involving the use of scientific names (which was not fully resolved for lions the Horn of Africa by the Cat Specialist Group as of 2017) does not necessarily affect that, people are quite likely to use proper names rather than scientific names (which are in Latin, a language that is not commonly used today), and these are not mere repetitions of what is already, for example, this article does not say who first used the name "Northern lion" or when, and Panthera leo leo and Panthera leo melanochaita should be shifted to the more detailed articles Northern lion and East-Southern African lion, respectively. Leo1pard (talk) 04:40, 14 September 2018 (UTC)

Before I can show you books or publications on names, an idea that I had was to redirect these subspecies to African lion, with adjustments for the Asiatic lion, like its taxonomic history. Leo1pard (talk) 12:47, 16 September 2018 (UTC)

Looks like I need to show you them, like this. Leo1pard (talk) 12:50, 16 September 2018 (UTC)

As mentioned elsewhere, we should not have 2 articles for each of the two newly described subspecies. Whereas my creation of the pages Northern lion and Southern lion (now named East-Southern African lion for a reason mentioned here) was due to an earlier discussion regarding the 2 newly classified subspecies, the turning of Panthera leo leo and Panthera leo melanochaita from being redirects to Barbary lion and Cape lion, to articles of their own, which are to an extent based on Northern lion and East-Southern African lion, was not based on any discussion in any relevant talk-page, before Panthera leo leo got turned into an article and I could see what would eventually happen to Panthera leo melanochaita, after which I discussed it here. As for African lion, I turned it into an article, and mentioned it here, so as to have a second option regarding the merger, because I had difficulty in getting Panthera leo leo merged with Northern lion, and Panthera leo melanochaita merged with East-Southern African lion, despite talking about it for some time. Leo1pard (talk) 12:49, 24 September 2018 (UTC)

Now, East African lion and Southern African lion have been reconverted into articles, with Panthera leo melanochaita a stub that links to both. Leo1pard (talk) 06:32, 28 September 2018 (UTC)

A whole series of edits regarding populations and subspecies
Despite talking to him since last year, has once again made a lot of misleading edits regarding populations of lions. For example, 1) A number of Central African lions (particularly the Congo lion (formerly Panthera leo azandica) are of southern subspecies (Panthera leo melanochaita), whereas others, such as the Cameroon lion (formerly Panthera leo kamptzi) are of the northern subspecies (Panthera leo leo), but BhagyaMani has insisted again and again that Central African lions are P. l. leo and not P. l. melanochaita. 2) The northern and southern subspecies are both present in northern parts of East Africa, particularly Ethiopia or the Horn of Africa, and likely overlap there, but BhagyaMani would make it look as if for example Ethiopian and Somali lions are of the southern subspecies. 3) That all Congo lions are Southern African lions, even though the Democratic Republic of the Congo is in Central Africa. 4) That the Nubian lion (formerly P. l. nubica), from a region that is shared between Egypt and Sudan in Northeast Africa, is the same as the Barbary lion (P. l. leo) of the Maghreb. That is like saying that Sudanese lions are Barbary lions.

This is a list of formerly described subspecies, and note that Dubach et al. said that nine subspecies were recognised in East Africa alone!

Leo1pard (talk) 16:42, 30 September 2018 (UTC)
 * this is way way over the top - this level of detail about subspecies no longer recognised as distinct is totally unnecessary. Cas Liber (talk · contribs) 03:55, 1 October 2018 (UTC)

Even if it is unnecessary for the main page, it is for this talk-page, because, despite making several attempts to talk to BhagyaMani about the error of his ways (for example,, , and ), BhagyaMani has a habit of ignoring what I try to talk to him about, and making several edits that reflect a WP:biased understanding of lions, for instance, insisting that all lions in the Central African country of the Democratic Republic of the Congo are Southern African lions, and after my first edit, at first trying to hide the relationship between Asiatic lions and West African lions, and saying that the name of the Central African lion did not exist in any of the sources that I provided, when in fact I already gave him one sources that did, which is this. Leo1pard (talk) 05:49, 1 October 2018 (UTC)
 * I will have a look at the articles you're mentioning. We need to get 3rd and 4th opinions to stop the edit warring. Cas Liber (talk · contribs) 06:11, 1 October 2018 (UTC)

Comment: I would prefer that discussion on article talk pages be restricted to improvement of the article, there is guidance at the top of this page on avoiding the confusion and disruption that is often generated in personalising them.

My opinion [think what you will of me] is that reliable sources only associate vernacular with the systematic names they have preferred since Linnaeus, it follows they are the most common name and the often fascinating history of what the organism has been called in English sources—the 'common names'—can be discussed in the article. The notion that one of the latter can replace the systematic name either slightly or greatly falls foul of core policies on sourcing and pov. If this article were moved to Panthera leo, the verifiable name in English (and other languages [which is good, no?]), the other names can be directly attributable to sources [not talk page discussions] and the reader directed to appropriate content via the current understanding of its subpopulations. That is what we are doing here, as I understand editing, and would prefer that we avoid any involvement and investment in assigning another name to replace and suppress the systematic one. Read any good book on animals and they will propound a similar sentiment in their introduction to their own use of nomenclature and taxonomy. — cygnis insignis 08:23, 1 October 2018 (UTC)

P.S. In case there is a barnstar for finding the title, I'm going with Taxonomy of Panthera leo, although Taxonomy of Panthera sounds more interesting to me. My view is that 'taxonomy', as defined elsewhere [OED], also includes discussion of non-systematic names that arise; thorough sources often set aside a paragraph on who named an organism what, and when, and why [it is sociologically interesting, if nothing else]. A split to a new article may solve anything that may emerge as undesirable content forking, with a broader scope to elaborate on what has been proposed and accepted in notable sources. — cygnis insignis 11:10, 1 October 2018 (UTC)

Comment. With respect to the FAR I think there is a good case to review any article after a decade and thousands of edits. However, most of the issues with this article concern the subspecies and populations. This is a large article so only a short section on subspecies is necessary, with a mention that there have been many subspecies recognised in the past but current thinking only recognises two subspecies and some significant populations worth conserving within them. Then the details can go in a Subspecies of lion article, along the lines of Subspecies of Canis lupus. That way the historical and current thinking can be presented in more detail, along with the status of extinct lions as possible subspecies. I think this would include the information in an efficient and practical way and minimise potential disruption to the featured article. My position on the common names and populations can be found elsewhere and is more relevant to the broader discussion of lion articles that is sorely needed. <span style="font-family:Arial;background:#d6ffe6;border:solid 1px;border-radius:5px;box-shadow:darkcyan 0px 1px 1px;"> Jts1882 &#124; talk 08:44, 1 October 2018 (UTC)

Comment: I fully agree with and !! I had earlier tried to explain that there is no common name (yet) for the subspecies as redefined in 2017, see section, where I was repeatedly pinged. I searched libraries and internet for names like 'Northern lion', 'Southern lion', 'East-Southern lion', results: 0 scientific publication using any of these. I had also proposed possible solutions to end the dispute on lion taxonomy, see Talk:Panthera_leo_leo, including a page titled Lion taxonomy. But alas to no avail. True of course also is that there is plenty of scientific sources about lion ecology, behaviour, threats and conservation issues that have not been addressed in the mainspace yet. So I find it rather ridiculous to spend so much time on history of taxonomy and use of names. -- BhagyaMani (talk) 09:17, 1 October 2018 (UTC)

Comment: I have found names like "Eastern-Southern African lion". I would also like to say that there is an issue with the revision of subspecies by the Cat Classification Taskforce of the Cat Specialist Group: Uncertainty. They expressed uncertainty over subspecies of lions, besides subspecies of other felid species. Though they said that they currently recognised 2 subspecies, Panthera leo leo (referred to as the 'northern' subspecies by people like Bertola et al.) for lions in North, West and Central Africa and Asia, and Panthera leo melanochaita (referred to as the 'southern' subspecies by people like Bertola et al.) for lions in Eastern and Southern Africa, they admitted on Page 72 that "morphological diagnoses are currently unknown," and in the map with the caption "Distribution of subspecies of lion", they put a question mark over Ethiopia, which is in the Horn of Africa, a northern subregion of East Africa, saying that the contact zone between the 2 subspecies is somewhere in that country, and this is based on the work of Bertola et al., which suggests that the northeastern clade of the southern subspecies overlaps with the central clade of the northern subspecies in Ethiopia and Somalia in the Horn of Africa, and possibly northern parts of Kenya and Uganda, to form a genetically mixed population of lions, or at least that both subspecies are present in Ethiopia and this part of Africa. Leo1pard (talk) 10:11, 1 October 2018 (UTC)
 * I am not clear on why I was pinged here? These appear to be sources about what is known about the population and where uncertainty still lays, whatever improvement is being proposed is clouded by an unproductive and adversarial debate. — cygnis insignis 10:48, 1 October 2018 (UTC)
 * To put it simply, there is a big problem with the taxonomy of the lion, besides for other felid species, that is uncertainty, so the use of the scientific names isn't always going to be helpful. See the question mark that they used in Page 72.
 * forget the common names. As there appears to be confusion and a lack of consensus, any attempt to define a consensus (especially with the redefined subspecies) would be OR. So they should not be focussed on. Cas Liber (talk · contribs) 11:05, 1 October 2018 (UTC)
 * I have gone through the various references, and I can tell you that what I've said about is not OR. For example, the Cat Specialist Group used a question mark regarding their classification of subspecies of lions, and that's why I've been cautioning BhagyaMani about classifying populations that were found to be related to both the northern and southern subspecies, that is the Central African and Northeast African populations, against treating them as belonging to one subspecies each. Leo1pard (talk) 12:53, 1 October 2018 (UTC)
 * And Casliber, I have decided to avoid editing this article for the time being, because of the discussion, but you have used this opportunity to remove valid links including Panthera shawi? Leo1pard (talk) 12:53, 1 October 2018 (UTC)
 * Seealso lists are generally a bad idea - in about 99% of cases, either the item is linked enough to be discussed in the article or remote enough that it is irrelevant. Cas Liber (talk · contribs) 20:04, 1 October 2018 (UTC)
 * This isn't according to the rules, this is an WP:opinion. Leo1pard (talk) 08:13, 3 October 2018 (UTC)
 * WP:OPINION is about including points of view in articles. It is not relevant to opinions on talk pages about should and shouldn't go in articles. That is one purpose of talk pages. However, I agree that Wikipedia policy does not say "see also" sections are a bad idea (although they are discouraged in medical sections). MOS:SEEALSO states 'one purpose of "See also" links is to enable readers to explore tangentially related topics', i.e. that the section can contain links to indirectly related material that is not readily incorporated in the article. I think where possible it is better to include them as hatnotes in relevant sections. If no section is relevant enough, the relevance of the link should be questioned. This is subjective, though. <span style="font-family:Arial;background:#d6ffe6;border:solid 1px;border-radius:5px;box-shadow:darkcyan 0px 1px 1px;">  Jts1882 &#124; talk 09:23, 3 October 2018 (UTC)
 * Exactly - occasionally I find things worth sticking in a seealso section but it is pretty rare. Cas Liber (talk · contribs) 11:44, 3 October 2018 (UTC)
 * Strongly agree with that. I read 'See also' sections as content that might be incorporated into an article, and remove items in those when I have done that [or consider it off-topic]. They have a place in undeveloped articles, and I prefer any exception (eg, "copyright") to be directed from the 'External links' section of a peer reviewed article. — cygnis insignis 12:59, 3 October 2018 (UTC)

It's not like articles like Panthera shawi are unrelated to this. Leo1pard (talk) 18:15, 3 October 2018 (UTC)

Removal of other referenced content
Before I can edit it, may I ask what is the meaning of this? I used this reference to help to explain why it is the case that the size ratio of the elephant to the lion is significant as mentioned, I did add information regarding it, contrary to what you said. Leo1pard (talk) 12:56, 1 October 2018 (UTC)
 * For starters the book says "young elephants" not "even adult elephants", so the sentence you added does not match the source at all. And the sentences the new material splices are both referenced to the reference at the end of the sentence after. Cas Liber (talk · contribs)
 * It says that though it's usually young elephants that lions take, they can even team up to take down fully-grown ones, and even Compion and Power said that though they usually preyed on young elephants, that was not always the case. Leo1pard (talk) 10:44, 2 October 2018 (UTC)
 * Ok, I missed the part in the book you supplied. Still, the book is likely getting its information from the article, so we're essentially using two refs for the same thing. Hence the second one is redundant. Cas Liber (talk · contribs) 11:14, 2 October 2018 (UTC)
 * We can't assume that the book is using the same reference, even if likely (I can't access the reference section of the book). If they are, the book is a secondary source so would be the preferred reference by wikipedia policy (WP:SECONDARY). I think both references should be included. The paragraph on lions and elephants is fairly clear about lions occasionally hunting adult elephants and the observation about the diet sometimes being 20% elephant meat is one worthy of inclusion. <span style="font-family:Arial;background:#d6ffe6;border:solid 1px;border-radius:5px;box-shadow:darkcyan 0px 1px 1px;">  Jts1882 &#124; talk 12:06, 2 October 2018 (UTC)

Proposed merger of Northern lion and Panthera leo leo
Okay, I have gone and proposed a merger of these two articles, discuss at Talk:Northern_lion Cas Liber (talk · contribs) 09:35, 6 November 2018 (UTC)

African lion nominated for deletion
See Articles for deletion/African lion Cas Liber (talk · contribs) 20:09, 6 November 2018 (UTC)

Update: The discussion was closed with consensus to redirect to Lion.--SilverTiger12 (talk) 14:53, 16 November 2018 (UTC)

Proposed merger of Cape lion, East African lion and Southern African lion into Panthera leo melanochaita
I have also suggested Cape lion, East African lion and Southern African lion be merged into Panthera leo melanochaita  - see Talk:Panthera_leo_melanochaita Cas Liber (talk · contribs) 19:55, 6 November 2018 (UTC)

Proposed deletion of Physical comparison of tigers and lions
I nominated the article for deletion of the article for the second time. LittleJerry (talk) 23:52, 11 November 2018 (UTC)

An error occurred which I spoke to him about, so I think that it's in his interests that not too much attention to what he does is drawn, particularly by dropping a message on his space, because he made his IP address clear whilst doing this. Leo1pard (talk) 08:39, 12 November 2018 (UTC); edited 09:22, 12 November 2018 (UTC)