Talk:Ungulate

Wiki Education Foundation-supported course assignment
This article was the subject of a Wiki Education Foundation-supported course assignment, between 17 February 2021 and 28 May 2021. Further details are available on the course page. Student editor(s): McKenzieKay.

Above undated message substituted from Template:Dashboard.wikiedu.org assignment by PrimeBOT (talk) 11:58, 17 January 2022 (UTC)

Cetaceans and Hyracoids and Xenarthrans, oh my!
I am confused by the following statement, and am unsure exactly what it means: "Suggestions that Cetaceans and Hyracoids are not closest to at least some other ungulates are out of favour, and so is the suggestion that the aardvark is related to South American Xenarthrans." The author seems to be trying to cram too many bits of information into the same sentence, resulting in double-negatives and other confusing constructions. I'm unclear as to whether this is saying that it's currently favored (believed) that cetaceans/hyracoids are related to other ungulates, or that it's currently favored that they're not. I'm also unclear as to whether it's implying that the aardvark's standing is in some way related to the cetacean/hyracoid question. Also, in what way does the aardvark/xenarthrans question specifically apply to ungulates (is it being implied that if aardvarks are related to xenarthrans then they are ungulates? or is it that if they are related then they're not ungulates? or is this just a tangential issue?). Could somebody clarify a bit, as I'm lost here?

The whole "Relationships" section seems to be really confusing and could use some rework, in my opinion. I'd tackle this myself but I'm not sure what it's actually supposed to be saying in some bits, so... -- Foogod 22:39, 29 December 2005 (UTC)

Everything in that sentence is stated somewhere else in the realtionships section more clearly, so I'm deleting it. It means that whales(Cetacea) are considered related to the even toed ungulates(Artiodactyla), and hyraxes(Hyracoidea) are considered related to the elephants(Proboscidea) and sea cows(Sirenia). Aardvarks(Tubulidentata) are no longer considered to be closely related to the anteaters, armadillos, and sloths(Xenarthra). anonymous 17:30, 3 August 2006 (UTC)

Pandas are bears
I can only assume from the definition of ungulate here, and the definition of bear and panda, that the entry of pandas as a type of ungulate is vandalism that has been ignored for ages. Bears are not ungulates. There have been a few questions as to the exact genetics of the panda, but nobody suggests any relation between pandas and ungulates. Thank you. 131.212.62.99 00:16, 1 October 2006 (UTC)


 * Agreed that pandas are not ungulates, but what is this list doing at the start of the article in the first place? It seems to have been added just today, and looks misplaced.
 * Cephal-odd 01:48, 1 October 2006 (UTC)

Actually not even horses are ungulates, as it seems after all. Due to most other articles related to mammal orders Perittodactyla (horses, rhinos, tapirs) are more closely related to Carnivora (cats, dogs, bears, badgers, seals etc), Chiroptera (bats) and Pholidota (pangolins)... —Preceding unsigned comment added by 92.118.191.48 (talk) 14:52, 30 April 2008 (UTC)
 * Wrong: The term "ungulate" refers to any mammal with hooves. As such, all perissodactyls are ungulates.  The only problem is that the taxon "Ungulata" is a polyphyletic taxon.--Mr Fink (talk) 15:31, 30 April 2008 (UTC)

List of common names of ungulates
I think this article would be much more useful if it gave the common names of animals that are considered ungulates, instead of just the Latin names. For example, deer, camel, antelope, rhino (?), etc. The vast majority of people are not going to have any idea what the Latin names mean, and would appreciate a more accessible layperson's explanation. Amber Kerr 21:32, 15 January 2007 (UTC)Amber Kerr

Elephants are or aren't ungulates?
This is aways confusing me, why some say an elephant an ungulate while others say it's not. ERRRRRRRRRRGHH! Why cant they just make there minds UP!!!!!!!!!!!!! From 4444hhhh
 * Some experts regard only Perissodactyla and Artiodactyla as the only "true" ungulates, other experts regard Perissodactyla, Artiodactyla, Dinocerata, Embrithopoda, the South American "ungulates," elephants, and hyraxes as being ungulates.--Mr Fink 03:42, 28 February 2007 (UTC)

Oh, well, thank you! From 4444hhhh

Taxon
When I read this article I have no trust that is isn't a confused mess of several different views of ungulates (evidence and taxonomy). I find it difficult to have confidence in any of it. The "Orders & Clades" box has orders within orders within orders. Someone who knows about these matters should base the article on some specific modern classification (named and sourced) and discuss evidence and older classifications on that basis. 88888 15:02, 10 March 2007 (UTC)

Template and Project
Hi, if everyone sees my template that I made, well, I want some of you guys to suggest ideas about the template either on my page, or on this talk page, along with putting this on every page. Second, I think we should need a Wikiproject Ungulate as well, so we could make all the hoof mammal pages right. But, like I said, give me ideas. While thinking about it, I'm putting the template on each family page. From User:4444hhhh
 * I'm sorry, but the template is too large and it just has too many unnecessary links. We should make it into a portal, instead.--Mr Fink 03:30, 7 April 2007 (UTC)


 * It also was not a template. If you want to build a template it needs to actually be a template page.  If somebody wanted to update this template, it would have taken dozens of edits -- one to each page including the template. Second (I left these comments at Talk:Even-toed ungulate as well), it's just not accurate to call cetaceans ungulates.  Ungulate actually means "hoofed animal" which whales/dolphins simply are not.  They share that common ancestry, yes, but ungulate is not a purely (or even principally) taxonomic term.  But, moving forward, I'd be happy to help out with an ungulate wikiproject, as long as it wouldn't conflict with an existing wikiproject? --JayHenry 19:22, 7 April 2007 (UTC)

Yeah, it was my first time making one, so, I'm sorry about that, but I would love to make a wikiproject on ungulates! So, when do we start, now or later? From User:4444hhhh
 * Should we make a wikiPortal or a wikiProject? --Mr Fink 02:50, 8 April 2007 (UTC)

I think we should make a portal. From User:4444hhhh

You know what, I may start the portal. From User:4444hhhh

Merger proposal
I think we should merge unguligrade into this article. It is a stub that basically compares how ungulates walk with how other animals walk. George D. Watson  (Dendodge). Talk Help 11:18, 29 March 2008 (UTC)


 * I'm not really sure whether it'd be best to merge here or to Terrestrial locomotion. It seems that different people researching the term might be looking for two very different topics.  Perhaps it's best to leave as a stub that serves as a mini-disambiguation page?  I don't feel very strongly about it though... --JayHenry (talk) 03:42, 14 April 2008 (UTC)


 * Maybe a 'see also' at the bottom of that page? ...... Dendodge . Talk Help 11:47, 19 April 2008 (UTC)


 * As of July 2011 there is not a single part of this article that mentions this type of animal foot structure. This article at this time is clearly deficient in portraying or maintaining the concept.  Furthermore, there are other parts of the link space that clearly show real gaps because of a redirect to an article that clearly does not maintain the concept.  Terrestrial locomotion seems to expect that unguligrade exists, and the template at the bottom of the page looks deficient when it mentions ungulate, which now comes to this article, that now at this time doesn't say a thing about it.  Probably the most serious deficiency of this article can be seen with the 'See also' link in en pointe.  I motion that unguligrade be pulled out of redirect hell and be given its own article again, much like digitigrade.  The neglect in this article is producing noticeable fork death. 67.206.183.192 (talk) 14:10, 24 July 2011 (UTC)

Ungulates are no longer a taxonomic group
First of all, I am no expert in biology, so pardon me if I get some details wrong. However, it is definitely correct that "ungulate" carries no taxonomic significance.

This page, and thus other taxonomy pages, are woefully out of date. "Ungulate" is now considered a polyphyletic term, as it's been realized that the true ungulates (Perissodactyla and Artiodactyla) are not from the same order as paenungulates (Hyracoidea, Sirenia, and Proboscidea).

The original meaning of the word "ungulate" was a "hooved animal," but then it was realized that some of these hooved orders were closely related to some non-hooved orders, and so these were all placed under the infraorder "ungulata," stretching the definition of ungulate beyond hooved species. However, when it was discovered that Ungulata is not a true infraorder, the term has reverted back to its simple descriptive meaning.--129.2.165.42 (talk) 13:24, 24 April 2008 (UTC)


 * Well, phenetics actually are a type of taxonomy, but I think everything you're saying is correct. Aside from the presence of ungulata in the box at the top of the page, is there any information in this article to which you object?  It looks to me like the article already says all the things you just said.  I looked at a number of other articles and don't see any instances where they cite Ungulata as part of their taxonomy.  If there are articles that do claim Ungulata as a superorder, we should fix this, so please point such examples out! --JayHenry (talk) 04:01, 25 April 2008 (UTC)

Problems with the inter-wiki links
Some of the inter-wiki links of this article are wrong, e.g. zh, ja and ko. I fixed the zh link but not every languages, someone who know this topic well please help to fix it. Thanks.--Lokionly (talk) 03:47, 25 February 2013 (UTC)


 * Talk to whoever runs User:Addbot -- they are migrating all interwiki links to some central repository across all wikimedia projects, and apparently the error is at that end. I'm clueless about how this all works, but they seem to be doing this to every single article in wikipedia, as far as I can tell.   Montanabw (talk) 19:44, 25 February 2013 (UTC)

Number of toes

 * "While the two orders of ungulates colloquial names are based on the number of toes of their members (“odd-toed” for the perissodactyls and “even-toed” for the terrestrial artiodactyls), it is not an accurate reason they are grouped."

I've been reading all of the relevant articles to try to understand the significance of whether an ungulate has an even or odd number of toes. But besides being just a way to divide a larger group of animals into two smaller groups, I'm not sure whether having an odd or even number of toes affects animal behavior, anatomy, really, any factors beyond just the numbers of toes on each foot. So far, this is the only sentence I've found and it basically implies, it's a dump reason to group animals but we're stuck with it.

If there is more to this, it would be a great addition to the article. Liz Read! Talk! 17:10, 7 September 2013 (UTC)


 * You're right in that it has no major significance, that's actually why it's useful. If there were an advantage to one or the other (either generally or in particular habitats), you'd expect rampant convergent evolution, muddying the issue.  Because "even vs. odd" is entirely an artifact of ancestry, with no functional difference, it winds up accurately reflecting ancestry.  Of course, now they're grouped together based on DNA sequences, but it turns out the "even vs odd" thing still works, and is a lot easier to see than their DNA. HCA (talk) 21:48, 8 September 2013 (UTC)

Cattle?
The domesticated bovinae are surely the most common ungulates known but are unmentioned in the taxonomy or anywhere else. It seems they should be sub-listed under the Ruminants but, being a non-science type, I hesitate to edit the list myself. Orthotox (talk) 19:28, 20 February 2014 (UTC)


 * Cattle are part of Bovidae in the taxonomy. We probably shouldn't harp on too much about the domestication of just a few species, but you could add something to the intro like "Several ungulate species have been domesticated by humans for food and/or transportation purposes." HCA (talk) 15:07, 21 February 2014 (UTC)

Why is 2/3s of the lead about, for lack of a better term, a fringe theory?
The info about Cetartiodactyla is fine, but should really be moved out of the lead. I'm not sure where it should go, so I'm tagging this up for now. -- Kendrick7talk 02:59, 21 June 2014 (UTC)


 * "Fringe" is a blatant mis-characterization. While the issue is hardly resolved, and there is much discussion to be had about long-branch attraction, taxon sampling, mixed morphology/molecular trees, convergence, etc., the Cetartiodactyla hypothesis is one that not only has evidence, but has been tested and confirmed repeatedly (though not unanimously).  "Fringe" is crap like Aquatic Ape, birds not being dinosaurs, or Bigfoot.  This is an unresolved area with substantial evidence for various hypotheses and crucial methodological issues (not all of which are as simple as "good/bad methodology").


 * That said, it *does* receive way too much emphasis in the lead, especially considering that even aside from this, the group "ungulates" is probably paraphyletic at best, possibly outright polyphyletic. The lead should definitely be re-worked to be more "general biology" and less taxonomy. HCA (talk) 18:21, 21 June 2014 (UTC)


 * Heh, OK, I only said "fringe" for lack of a better term! I didn't just fall off the ungulate-pulled cart yesterday. But the term ungulate has long ago entered popular culture (q.v. kosher animals -- I leave it up to the Rabbinate to determine for their flock how many toes a dolphin has and whether Zero is an odd or even number). But besides all that, I agree that the lead puts undo weight on the latest thing per WP:RECENT. I am looking to you, HCA, to fix it, given that you are an expert in your field! -- Kendrick7talk 03:41, 24 June 2014 (UTC)

Sheep and goats
Though I applaud the evolutionary perspective and the resultant revelatory contrary-to-common-sense inclusion of whales and dolphins, it does feel a little odd to have dolphins mentioned at least ten times and whales nearly thirty in an article about hoofed animals, but sheep only in the phrase "sheep-sized" and never explicitly stated as ungulates by their common name, and goats only once. It seems as if sheep and goats ought to be mentioned in the lead section as examples of common, globally recognizable ungulates. Cynwolfe (talk) 15:48, 24 October 2015 (UTC)

should there be notes on the Orders and Clades in the Infobox?
What are the † and ? representing in the infobox? Should there be a footnote? - Paul2520 (talk) 03:38, 20 January 2016 (UTC)
 * "†" represents a wholly extinct taxon, while "?" means the taxon's placement is questioned.--Mr Fink (talk) 03:41, 20 January 2016 (UTC)

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Watch out for strong plurals
One hippopotamus, two hippopotami. Compare syllabus/syllabi.

Like most nouns borrowed from Latin, it forms the plural in English the same way it forms the plural in Latin. Thus, it is called a "strong plural" (or "strong noun").

Other strong plural paradigms include internal vowel changes, as in mouse/mice, goose/geese, etc.; the -en suffix, as in ox/oxen; and the -(e)ren double-suffix, as in child/children.

On the humorous side of things, one could say that "hippopotamuses" would be the offspring of a hippopotamus and one or more the Nine Muses. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 73.162.218.153 (talk) 07:05, 21 March 2016 (UTC)

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Pronunciation
I'm pretty sure "ung-yuh-lut" is a more common pronunciation than "ung-yuh-lait", and dictionaries I've looked at suggest that as well. I'd actually never heard the pronunciation in this article before. Is there a reason we're presenting the less common one as "the way" to pronounce it? TricksterWolf (talk) 02:10, 23 November 2020 (UTC)

Regarding the status of Ungulata
God, this is going to be a mess for people to address. Ungulata, similar to Insectivora, is now considered a polyphyletic group based on multiple sources from the 21st century, even if we consider that Paenungulata was already filtered out in the 1990s. In reality, Artiodactyla and Perissodactyla are confirmed to be part of the clade "Euungulata" which is part of the greater clade Laurasiatheria. The article "Testing the inhibitory cascade model in Mesozoic and Cenozoic mammaliaforms" for instance says that the group "Ungulata" is an abandoned term. According to sources like "Convergence of Afrotherian and Laurasiatherian Ungulate-Like Mammals: First Morphological Evidence from the Paleocene of Morocco", "First report and genomic characterization of a bovine-like coronavirus causing enteric infection in an odd-toed non ruminant species (Indonesian tapir, Acrocodia indica) during an outbreak of winter dysentery in a zoo," and "Placental glycotype of the caviomorph rodent Lagostomus maximus and its evolution within Eutheria," the valid clade name for Perissodactyla and Artiodactyla is "Euungulata." Not completely sure if this constitutes a new article and having this article be "abandoned" similar to Insectivora, just something I find worth considering. PrimalMustelid (talk) 18:45, 14 August 2023 (UTC)


 * Basically, "Ungulata" is the polyphyletic, invalid clade consisting of Artiodactyla, Perissodactyla, and the clade Paenungulata while "Euungulata" reduces it to just the former two. PrimalMustelid (talk) 18:47, 14 August 2023 (UTC)
 * I would consider the topic of this article to be Euungulata, or more broadly, any mammal more closely related to Euungulata that to other extant groups of Laurasiatheria. The vast majority of the use of the term "ungulate" refers to euungulates, so I don't think the term is as problematic as Pachydermata for instance. Hemiauchenia (talk) 18:56, 14 August 2023 (UTC)
 * Yeah, I would support the name "Ungulate" staying as long as the clade in the taxobox is renamed to "Euungulata." Also, that would require someone to write an article on the polyphyletic and now invalid "Ungulata," since the misconceptions seem to stem from people confusing it as still being valid instead of the newer clade name. For anyone wondering, this is the original source with the naming authority of "Euungulata." That said, I can make the "Euungulata" taxobox myself if that's okay with everyone. PrimalMustelid (talk) 19:09, 14 August 2023 (UTC)
 * I think the term "ungulate" in common parlance is equivalent enough to "Euungulata", that there is no need for a separate article, though obviously mentioning that the term historically included elephants and hyraxes is obviously warranted. Hemiauchenia (talk) 19:38, 14 August 2023 (UTC)

cetacean
Why are cetaceans like belugas or white whales or orcas considered even toed ungulates if they don't have hooves? My buddy and I had a convo about it, he said 0 is an even number, which is fair. But when my buddy did it, he told me it got reverted shortly after. So if it's not because of how 0 is even, then what's the real reason? Why are cetaceans even ungulates? 36.93.37.154 (talk) 04:45, 8 September 2023 (UTC)


 * because they're nested within the "Even-toed ungulates" as relatives of hippos. Theres currently a move req at the even toed ungulate article to move the title to "Artiodactyl" in order to avoid this confusion. Hemiauchenia (talk) 14:00, 8 September 2023 (UTC)
 * I understand now. Cheers! 36.93.37.154 (talk) 02:53, 14 September 2023 (UTC)