Template:Did you know nominations/Meles (genus), Saint-Vallier, Drôme

Meles (genus), Saint-Vallier, Drôme

 * ... that Saint-Vallier, Drôme is one of only two sites at which fossils of Meles thorali, an extinct species of badger, have been found?
 * Reviewed: Northern Area Command (RAAF)
 * Comment: Also reviewed Template:Did you know nominations/Camille Levin

5x expanded by Cwmhiraeth (talk). Self nominated at 17:48, 12 September 2013 (UTC).


 * Long enough, new enough. A few quick comments: ref 1 points to the community's website; if I'm not mistaken, the relevant information is found on a subpage, http://www.saintvallier.com/-05-Historique-. I think the ref should reflect that. Also, I am not convinced by this reference for the mistress bit: surely there are more reliable sources than a plot summary of a film on a website belonging to a non-notable society. I haven't gone through to check for plagiarism and all that, but I will; in the meantime, I hope some better sources are found. Drmies (talk) 15:39, 14 September 2013 (UTC)
 * Oh, I didn't realize until just now that this was a double. I've not yet looked at the badger. Drmies (talk) 17:49, 14 September 2013 (UTC)
 * Thanks. I have dealt with the sources you mention above. Cwmhiraeth (talk) 18:16, 14 September 2013 (UTC)
 * You picked (first Google hit) a self-published book (iUniverse), a fictional first-person account. I found a book published by Yale UP, with a 40-page chapter on the person, and after reading that chapter replaced your source with mine. I hope that's OK. Drmies (talk) 02:16, 15 September 2013 (UTC)
 * Symbol possible vote.svg OK, I also don't see how this (which is an empty main page, containing nothing but the option for English or French) verifies so much of the "History" section. If any other page on that website does I don't believe it to be reliable sourced. The rest of the paragraph cites this as a source; it does not verify the information cited in our article--and there is no way one can claim it a reliable source. Now, the geography section is likewise poorly sourced (the website of the commune), and not all of its contents are geographical anyway. The page I suggested above actually doesn't verify all of this content, and the few other pages I browsed on that website don't either. Then, the Fossil site paragraph is difficult also. With the reference given from Lethaia (the doi appears to be incorrect, but I got it through Academic Search Premier) one could build some really interesting content since it's an important site and the reference for the Middle Villafranchian biozone (MN17), but our article has nothing to say on the topic--and that, basically, it's important because the bones indicate the age of the sediments is a bit odd (it's not an issue here) and the article in Lethaia doesn't say that. That leaves the claim of "one of only two locations"--I might be wrong, but the only statement in the cited reference that comes close to that is "Tooth characters of fossil badgers from two localities Saint Vallier in southeastern France and Binagady in Azerbaijan were studied." In other words, the "one of only two" is not verified, as far as I can tell.  Put all this together and we have an article that, in my opinion, should not go on since it's simply not ready. Drmies (talk) 03:08, 15 September 2013 (UTC)
 * OK. Let's forget the Saint-Vallier nomination. I only did that as a side article, hoping to use the French equivalent but then finding it had virtually no references. You will see that I have put a tag to that effect on the talk page and I understood that that allowed a little more flexibility on the sourcing. So lets just treat this as a DYK nomination for Meles (genus) with the following hook -


 * ALT1 ... that there are three living and two extinct species of badger in the genus Meles? Cwmhiraeth (talk) 05:11, 15 September 2013 (UTC)
 * But there are eleven species of badgers--says Badger. Drmies (talk) 02:23, 17 September 2013 (UTC)
 * Symbol question.svg Well, it's new enough and long enough, found no obvious plagiarism, etc. Badgers are very cool animals, and I do love the word "snout". Now, there's a few issues in the article, and I marked them with "explain" templates (actually, I also don't understand the punctuation in the second sentence of the lead, that parenthetic statement). If you could clear those things up, that leaves only the lead--which says, on the surface, that there are three species of badger. Drmies (talk) 02:54, 17 September 2013 (UTC)
 * There are 3 extant species in the genus Meles. I have altered the text of the ALT1 hook and have made the suggested amendments to the article. Cwmhiraeth (talk) 05:12, 17 September 2013 (UTC)


 * Symbol confirmed.svg Drmies (talk) 19:30, 6 October 2013 (UTC)