Talk:Watersheds of Illinois

Completeness of list
I suppose this is none of my concern, but is there any way that you two could work this list completeness/incompleteness issue out on the talk page instead of reverting each other numerous times? See also WP:3RR. I would think that you both could list your arguments for complete/incomplete here and possibly come to an agreement or some kind of understanding. I would ask, what is the source material that indicates that the list is complete? If the list is incomplete, is there an example of what is missing? How much more detail does the list need beyond the current list? --Dual Freq 20:45, 3 June 2006 (UTC)
 * I suppose the list appears to be complete based upon the criteria of the Major watershed map cited on the front page. Is it incomplete because it doesn't list smaller rivers and streams in each major watershed? --Dual Freq 20:56, 3 June 2006 (UTC)

The watershed list lists all of the official "watersheds" used for regulatory purposes. This is somewhat arbitrary for the small direct tributaries of the Ohio, Mississippi and Lake Michigan. This displays the officially recognized classification.

This list is complete in the sense that it includes (so far as I can tell) every square inch of Illinois. You could list another thousand rivers, but they would all be a part of one of the listed watersheds.

There is a separate list of rivers of Illinois which is not complete. If you have a favorite river, list it there, write an article about it, and describe it by reference to the watershed list. There is no point in relisting all of the rivers of Illinois in this list of watersheds.

I don't care if people want to subdivide these watersheds. I think, however, if you want to do so, you should carry the complete watershed to the next level of subdivision, and not just stick in some random creeks.M dorothy
 * If you want this to be a list of "official watersheds" then you need to label this as such and provide an authority for it. To claim that it is complete while it is only a sub-set of the List of Illinois rivers is not correct. See the second half of List of Michigan rivers for an example of a "complete" list (at least to the level of named river). Rmhermen 01:45, 4 June 2006 (UTC)
 * Are you proposing a merger with List of Illinois rivers? List of Minnesota rivers is similar to Michigan's list not stating watershed, but sorting By Basin and Tributary. --Dual Freq 02:00, 4 June 2006 (UTC)

The list of rivers is sorted alphabetically, so the rivers are accesible that way. The list of watersheds is sorted logically, and conveys different information. The articles about most of the named rivers locate the rivers with respect to the watersheds. If you wanted to merge the lists, they should be preseved as two different lists, since they serve two different purposes.

The official watershed map is referenced as authority.M dorothy

Distinctiveness of watershed article vs waterbody article
I think that you ought to consider gleaning watershed facts from each Illinois waterbody article you've hyperlinked and put those facts on this page. The Ohio River article, for example, has a discussion of watersheds in its geology section, as well as a whole drainage basin section which could be absorbed into your article or a sub-article. You can create text discussing each watershed and sub-watershed from the perspective of them being drainage basins, with all of the associated pollution issues, etc, that go along with them. It would seem Wikilogical to minimize the details of watersheds and drainage basins in waterbody articles and maximize it in watershed articles, if we're going to have watershed and basin articles, that is. (And I think we should) There's no use having the latter if we don't add some new dimension to them over the current waterbody articles.

See if you get some ideas from Lake Erie Watershed (Pennsylvania) and Lake Erie Basin, which I put together fairly recently. They are still in the early stages and much remains to be done, but you can get the idea of how unique watershed information (and photographs) can be distinguished from information belonging to waterbody articles. Note in particular the discussion of Erie International Airport's de-icing mitigation requirements in order to operate near Lake Erie. Information such as that rarely makes it into waterbody articles. --Pat (talk) 12:43, 18 November 2007 (UTC)