Talk:St. Croix macaw

Ara autochthones vs Ara autocthones
All reliable sources I can find have autochthones. Dysmorodrepanis 05:51, 29 August 2006 (UTC)

I'm curious what the sources are that support autocthones. Guettarda (talk) 20:55, 22 September 2008 (UTC)

Williams and Steadman autochthones, and do Olson and Máiz López. Based on that, I've made the change in the article. Guettarda (talk) 21:22, 22 September 2008 (UTC)

I don't know which of the latin names is the correct name. Pierce Brodkorb (source: http://fulltext10.fcla.edu/DLData/UF/UF00001516/file9.pdf) cited Alexander Wetmore and gives the name with Ara autocthones but Storrs Olson named it Ara autochthones. Unfortunately i haven't the original work by Wetmore, but i think the entry in Brodkorb's catalogue of fossil birds is the correct one. --Melly42 (talk) 06:31, 29 October 2008 (UTC)

Wetmore 1937: Ara autocthones
Ok, I have now a copy of wetmores article, and it is Ara autocthones. -- Kim van der Linde at venus 17:44, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
 * Yes, but "autocthones" is not a correct Latin/Latino-Greek spelling. Wetmore made a spelling error, and this has been corrected. Happens all the time, though most often with male vs female endings (see Lagopus) Dysmorodrepanis (talk) 15:26, 30 December 2008 (UTC)
 * Ok, ref where this is formally addressed? -- Kim van der Linde at venus 17:43, 30 December 2008 (UTC)
 * (Thanks DML!) I see, ICZN 32.5.1. considers an original error on behalf of the author not a lapsus. What did Olson (I presume) or whoever else was first revisor write (as per ICNZ 33.2.3.1.)? Dysmorodrepanis (talk) 22:04, 30 December 2008 (UTC)
 * Olsen & Miaz Lopez do not address this issue, and just cite the name as autochthones: Wetmore (1937) described and named a new species of macaw as Ara autochthones,.
 * ICZN 32.5.1:
 * If there is in the original publication itself, without recourse to any external source of information, clear evidence of an inadvertent error, such as a lapsus calami or a copyist's or printer's error, it must be corrected. Incorrect transliteration or latinization, or use of an inappropriate connecting vowel, are not to be considered inadvertent errors.
 * The error should be obvious in the original publication itself, and after reading it several times, it is not. The name is mentioned at page 12 and page 16, with the same spelling. Wetmore does not provide a logic for the name, hence there is no way of determining whether the name was wrong and the consistency within the paper suggest no obvious spelling error. Looks like a lapsus by Olsen & Miaz Lopez to me. The argument that it is incorrect Latin/Latino-Greek spelling is explicitly addressed as not a valid reason. Finally, gender fixes are a special case, as they happen with moving species from one genus to another and as such need to be addressed. See the Code: 34.2. and its introduction. There is a clear and obvious difference between gender and other 'errors'. -- Kim van der Linde at venus 01:46, 31 December 2008 (UTC)
 * Update, I have a response from Olsen himself stating that the name he used (autochthones) is a lapsus. -- Kim van der Linde at venus 15:23, 31 December 2008 (UTC)

DNA
Surely, unless DNA evidence shows otherwise, this species must be considered a hypothetical species. Also, there does not appear to have been any consideration that the specimens could have been a hybrid from, cultivated by the former natives of the islands from a mixed population of there captive birds over centuries from combinations of mainland parrots and possibly the Cuban Macaw. I note both finds of bones of this Ara are from former natives' villages. Snowman (talk) 10:53, 31 December 2008 (UTC)
 * No, DNA is not required to determine whether something is a valid species or not. Most species have been described using the morphological species concept. Or are all dinosaurs hypothetical species? Hypothetical species are species that are based on eye-witness reports only, with physical evidence. -- Kim van der Linde at venus 15:01, 31 December 2008 (UTC)
 * Most of some skeletons are available for some dinosaurs, and so morphology is easier. But, when it is only a few bones, it does not seem so clear. Much is made of the size of the bones. Surly there is a reasonable possibility that the villagers kept a line of hybrid or mixed species pet parrots, or kept hand reared parrots which can be smaller than parent reared parrots. It seems to me that neither of these possibilities has been considered with reference to the bones of parrots that were found with the archaeology of villages. Given that parrots were important to the former native islanders, it is likely there these were pet parrots. It is very likely that the villagers may have stolen chicks from nests and hand reared chicks on an unnatural diet and so the pets may have been smaller than the normal wild parrots. I am not sure if there is any reports of the former native islanders breeding pet parrots from there captive parrots, and I think that the paper would have been more complete if this was discussed. Surely, DNA would help to confirm or clarify the identify of these bones. Actually, I am surprised that DNA studies have not been attempted. There may not be much DNA in the bones, but DNA sequencing and knowledge of DNA is very advanced now. Snowman (talk) 17:30, 31 December 2008 (UTC)
 * Extracting DNA from sub-fossil bones is a monumental task, and prone to errors due to contamination with DNA of the handlers. Most cases of ancient DNA are either from the core of large bones or from specially excavated bones to avoid contamination with foreign DNA.
 * Many fossils are described from partial skeletons, often not more than a few bones and this is common in biology (have a look at the fossil parrot paper how much there is known about many of the fossils, you will be shocked). For us as wikipedia editors to determine what is actually enough for a description and with that to overrule the original author as well as subsequent authors is nothing less of original research. The literature considers this a real species, therefore we have to. -- Kim van der Linde at venus 17:54, 31 December 2008 (UTC)
 * Your point about quoting from references when adding to the wiki article pages is well established on the wiki. I have not added anything to the article page which is not in a reference. Critical appraisal of published papers is an accepted process, so think of my comments as that. My objective observations on the paper is that they did not consider the possibility that the birds were a hybrid pet bird line, were hand reared pet birds brought up on a suboptimal diet and becoming smaller than the wild-types, nor that the bones could represent a subspecies. The 2008 reference is new and it might be too soon to find published appraisal of the paper, and I would be interested to learn how the paper has been received. Snowman (talk) 18:20, 31 December 2008 (UTC)
 * I think that a weakness of this article is that it depends too much on one research publication. Review articles carry more weight on the wiki. Snowman (talk) 21:36, 8 March 2009 (UTC)
 * What is useless if there are no such review works, like in this article. The paper of Olsen is what comes closest to a review of what is know. -- Kim van der Linde at venus 23:40, 8 March 2009 (UTC)
 * My understanding of wiki lore is that in that the absence (for whatever reason) of a review tends to make the information less authoritative. May I add, that I think that it not in line with wiki guidelines that you as the main editor to the page rated the article, especially as there was major criticisms of the article on the talk page and there was no consensus about your proposed method of rating articles according to the page content as a % of that known to science on the topic. See Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Birds/Assessment. Snowman (talk) 23:52, 8 March 2009 (UTC)
 * Sure, if it is more convenient for you, I can just leave. As for the criticism, I still have to see any real criticism, all I have seen is misunderstandings and original research. Reliance on reviews is a attempt to eliminate original research in troublesome areas, but is much less an issue in areas where there is no conflict and the information is actually clear. -- Kim van der Linde at venus 00:07, 9 March 2009 (UTC)
 * My point regarding the article is that so much original research is out-on-a-limb, and reviews tend to iron out idiosyncratic research. Snowman (talk) 21:39, 9 March 2009 (UTC).
 * Sure, it's a solution to the the problem that amateurs try to write an encyclopaedia that is scientifically accurate. But this kind of things is my work, but we cannot have experts write on wikipedia, who knows, it might actually be good. -- Kim van der Linde at venus 23:21, 9 March 2009 (UTC)


 * (out dent) See WP:V for some of the wiki rules that you do appear to be familiar with. "Articles should rely on reliable, third-party published sources with a reputation for fact-checking and accuracy." Snowman (talk) 10:28, 11 March 2009 (UTC)

Ambiguity in article
When it talks about "Southwest Cape", does that mean the southwest point of St. Croix or of Puerto Rico. I don't think the article should assume so much knowledge of Caribbean geography – a gloss would be nice! Physchim62 (talk) 13:21, 9 March 2009 (UTC)
 * Saint Croix. Fixed it in the article and thank you for pointing that bout. -- Kim van der Linde at venus 03:14, 31 December 2010 (UTC)

Short articles
Mark Messier Leadership Award is an example of an article with brief content that has been reviewed and is part of a FT. I presume that there is not enough information about this topic to get it as far as GA, so it has been peer reviewed and accepted to be part of a featured topic. To me the "St Croix Macaw" article is another article where the known possible content is brief, and which will also never be able to get as far as GA. Snowman (talk) 19:57, 1 January 2011 (UTC)

FA withdrawn
I have withdrawn the FA for this article because it was not about the reader anymore, but about satisfying random criteria of some editors that had nothing to do with making the best article for the average reader interested in this topic. -- Kim van der Linde at venus 15:58, 22 January 2011 (UTC)


 * Since I've hunted it down, for anyone else interested, the FA nomination is here Featured_article_candidates/Archived_nominations/January_2011. --99of9 (talk) 06:17, 22 March 2011 (UTC)

Orphaned references in Saint Croix macaw
I check pages listed in Category:Pages with incorrect ref formatting to try to fix reference errors. One of the things I do is look for content for orphaned references in wikilinked articles. I have found content for some of Saint Croix macaw's orphans, the problem is that I found more than one version. I can't determine which (if any) is correct for this article, so I am asking for a sentient editor to look it over and copy the correct ref content into this article.

Reference named "Gala": From Cuban macaw:  From Lesser Antillean macaw:  From Martinique macaw:  

Reference named "Cuban Macaw": From Lesser Antillean macaw:  From Cuban macaw:  From Martinique macaw:  

I apologize if any of the above are effectively identical; I am just a simple computer program, so I can't determine whether minor differences are significant or not. AnomieBOT ⚡ 11:17, 22 August 2019 (UTC)

Copy edit queries
Hi. Apologies for taking so long to get round to this. I have had a first run through. It needed minimal changes. If you could come back to me on the queries below, I will give it another run through.


 * "Its bones are intermediate in size between those of smaller and larger macaws" I kinda get what you are driving at, but ... Maybe 'Its bones are intermediate in size between those of extant macaws' or 'Its bones are intermediate in size between those of the two main groups of extant macaws' or similar?
 * It is important to stress these are clusters based on size, not based on taxonomy, here is what the soruce says: "In size, most living species of macaws fall into two separate clusters representing large species and smaller species (Table 1). Ara autochthones is distinct in being intermediate between these two clusters". FunkMonk (talk) 17:27, 17 September 2019 (UTC)
 * OK. Offhand I can't think how to express that succinctly enough for the lead. I'll think on't.


 * "he found it best to name the species" I'm not sure what this is trying to say. 'he considered it best to name [it] a new species'?
 * Here is what he specifically said: "While many uncertainties accompany the bone from St. Croix, particularly its affinity with the forms that have been described from the accounts of early travellers, it has seemed best to designate it by name rather than to leave it without such identification." FunkMonk (talk) 17:27, 17 September 2019 (UTC)
 * OK. See what you think of how I have tweaked that.
 * Looks clearer, though it may be overstating things a bit; it is almost as if he names it simply so it can be easily distinguished for convenience when discussing the find, rather than as a clear cut taxonomic entity. Maybe "he thought it appropriate to designate it as a species"? Also, just noticed a typo, "that here were" should be "that there were"... FunkMonk (talk) 19:15, 17 September 2019 (UTC)


 * "Pomarrosa phase" This seems a pretty obscure phrase. When I Google it, the first link is the paper on this macaw! It needs explaining at first mention, or, better, rephrasing to remove it. Having just read the paper (which doesn't define it either, so I see your difficulty) I am happy to do the latter if you wish.
 * You are right, can't find references to it either... I'll see if there is anything in the paper's bibliography that can be used... FunkMonk (talk) 22:57, 16 September 2019 (UTC)
 * Ok, seems the 2008 source lists an unpublished thesis and a book chapter after the mentions of this phase, as well as this article, which doesn't mention it by name. So though I can't find other mentions, I assume it is covered in the book or the thesis. I'm inclined to let the mention stay; who knows, maybe someone will make an article based on those sources, or additional sources on it will be published, in which case removing the mention from here will be a loss of context. FunkMonk (talk) 17:27, 17 September 2019 (UTC)
 * Your choice. I am but a humble copy editor.


 * "as its tibiotarsus is identical in size to the holotype" Was that the only reason?
 * I assume they thought the proximity of the localities went without saying, but they only say the following: "The referred tibiotarsus is essentially identical in size with the holotype of Ara autochthones and the referred material from Puerto Rico is therefore identified as that species." FunkMonk (talk) 22:57, 16 September 2019 (UTC)
 * Scratches head. OK. That is clear, if odd.

Gog the Mild (talk) 21:53, 16 September 2019 (UTC)


 * Thanks for this, I'll answer the points tomorow. FunkMonk (talk) 22:57, 16 September 2019 (UTC)
 * Added more replies, . Thanks for also commenting here, since it was already a GA by the time I started working on it, I can't GA nominate this vastly expanded version, so any observations before FAC (the intended destination) are helpful. FunkMonk (talk) 17:27, 17 September 2019 (UTC)


 * Thanks FunkMonk. I am not sure that it needed a copy edit. It seemed FAC ready already to me. Ping me when you nominate and I'll more than likely comment. Gog the Mild (talk) 18:27, 17 September 2019 (UTC)
 * Always good to have more eyes look over something before nomination! FunkMonk (talk) 19:15, 17 September 2019 (UTC)

Another Review
Hi Congrats for the new FA, well-deserved! I was trying to review it but it seems I was a bit too slow with posting it, my apologies. I hope you would take my comments into consideration nonetheless.


 * so it is impossible to know whether species only known from bones or accounts were native or imported species. – I would never say "impossible". Below it is stated that paleontological evidence may solve the issue in the future.
 * Added "yet impossible", as no more information is known. FunkMonk (talk) 21:38, 5 November 2019 (UTC)


 * the West Indian – better link to West Indies rather than the people?
 * Changed the link, but that stub really ought to be a redirect or disambiguation page... FunkMonk (talk) 21:38, 5 November 2019 (UTC)


 * They considered autocthones "probably one of the worst possible choices" – This surprises the reader, as the previous sentence says the authors think it was endemic. Maybe add a sentence like "however, they found it unlikely that it was native to St. Croix or even Puerto Rico" before this sentence, for clarity. Because of this, I had to read the paragraph twice.
 * I changed the order in the sentence, how about: "Since they found it unlikely the bird occurred naturally on St. Croix, and questioned whether it could even have occurred naturally on Puerto Rico, they considered the name autocthones "probably one of the worst possible choices" for the species." FunkMonk (talk) 21:38, 5 November 2019 (UTC)


 * López conceded that macaws are unlikely to be found in cave deposits, and noted that fossils of the Cuban macaw have been found in aquatic deposits. – I can't follow - in which way is this an argument that the species was not native? How does this relate to the rest of the paragraph, where is the connection?
 * It is more conceding that they can't prove it wasn't native, it is unclear, but my interpretation is that prehistoric macaw fossils should not be expected to be naturally found in cave deposits, so their absence from there does not prove anything. Therefore, that Cuban macaw fossils have only been found in aquatic deposits rather than caves suggests that absence from terrestrial deposits on St. Croix doesn't prove anything. Here is what the paper says exactly: "Although fossil remains of both Amazona and Aratinga have been recovered from a number of prehuman sites in Puerto Rico (Olson, unpublished data), no fossils of Ara have yet been recovered. This is, however, not at all conclusive, as macaws are unlikely to occur in cave deposits on an island where the only known cave-inhabiting predator was a relatively small bam owl (Tyto). The only fossils of macaws found to date in a paleontological context in the West Indies are three bones of Ara tricolor, two of which were found in aquatic depositional environments". FunkMonk (talk) 21:38, 5 November 2019 (UTC)


 * indicates that the species was a small macaw – not "intermediate" as stated elsewhere? You mention this several times in the article (e.g., discussed again later in the text), so just removing this instance might be an option.
 * Wetmore specifically stated "the left tibio-tarsus of a small macaw" and "In size it is intermediate between such large species as Ara macao and A. militaris and the small A . severa." I changed to "While the holotype tibiotarsus appears to belong to a fully grown individual, the fact that the bone is slightly spongy at the ends indicates it was immature." to prevent the same contradiction. FunkMonk (talk) 21:38, 5 November 2019 (UTC)


 * Apart from this, its only distinguishing feature is that its proportions – This means proportional differences that are not menrioned yet? Can you name them?
 * Changed proportions to dimensions (as the paper does), the Wetmore paper just says "When compared with the tibio-tarsus of living macaws it is marked by slender form and a slightly greater posterior development of the proximal end. Aside from this its only peculiatity seems to rest in its dimensions which do not fall within those of any other species known." He does not go into more detail than that, and by this I guess he only means it is either smaller or larger than most other species, but he doesn't give measurements for those. FunkMonk (talk) 21:38, 5 November 2019 (UTC)


 * Apart from this, its only distinguishing feature is that its proportions do not fall within those of other known species – but more tibiotarsus features are mentioned later; are those not visible on the holotype one?
 * Wetmore doesn't mention the additional details, and Olson and Maiz Lopez don't exactly state the mentioned features are diagnostic, but also mainly distinguish it based on its size. Seems insufficient to me, but the abstract sums it up: "The species belongs to a distinctive intermediate size-class and was larger than the Cuban Macaw Ara tricolor." FunkMonk (talk) 21:38, 5 November 2019 (UTC)
 * In this case I would add "according to Wetmore" or similar, to mark it as an opinion and not an uncontroversial fact. This way it would be less a problem that the other account is somewhat contradicting. --Jens Lallensack (talk) 19:47, 7 November 2019 (UTC)

Thanks, --Jens Lallensack (talk) 07:28, 5 November 2019 (UTC)
 * Thanks, yes, of course (I was hoping for your comments all along), I'll try to implement this soon. FunkMonk (talk) 10:01, 5 November 2019 (UTC)
 * Now answered above. FunkMonk (talk) 21:38, 5 November 2019 (UTC)
 * Great, thanks. One answer above. And for the record: support ;-) --Jens Lallensack (talk) 19:47, 7 November 2019 (UTC)