User:Lrokos/Evaluate an Article

Which article are you evaluating?
Lemon shark

Why you have chosen this article to evaluate?
I chose this article because I wanted to evaluate something to with sea life (as it is where my interest lies). It is important to evaluate this article because they are a vulnerable species and allowing to have a better article written can help the general public understand and care more about their existence.

Lead Section
I would say that the lead section is actually pretty good! It discusses all of the points mentioned in the article; however, I think it could actually have a little more detail, as it is concise almost to a fault. For example, the article says "They are often found in shallow subtropical waters and are known to inhabit and return to specific nursery sites for breeding." I think that it could be more specific, mentioning that the nursery sites are typically in mangrove areas or coral reefs. Other than that, I think it is a really solid start.

Content
Just by glancing at the references, many of the sources used have been published in recent years, but reading the content overall sounds like it is up to date. I also believe that it is all relevant information -- it discusses their distribution, reproduction, habitat, relationship with humans, etc., which I think are all important aspects that need to be included in the article.

Tone and Balance
The article is very neutral, and I do not detect any biases present in it. I also do not see the authors trying to persuade the readers one way or another. If theories, hypotheses, or a debate among scientist is brought up, it is done in an objective way. For example: "one theory is that lemon sharks select mangrove habitats due to the abundance of prey that resides there, while another theory posits that mangroves provide a safe haven from adult lemon sharks that occasionally feed on juvenile sharks and are unable to enter the shallow waters." This is not trying to push the audience towards one theory, but is simply stating that these two exist.

Sources and References
As I previously mentioned, some of the sources are current. One of the big issues I kept running into is that some of the links provided in the references do not work. But, of the ones with working links, the sources seem credible and peer-reviewed.

Organization and Writing Quality
The article seems well-written for the most part -- I think some of the grammar could be better, and the sentences could be restructured to sound less choppy. My only issue with the organization is how the habitat selection section is set up -- it has information it in that deserves its own section. For example, the last couple of paragraphs discuss how lemon sharks feed, and that should not be included in that section. I think better organization will allow the article to flow easier and allow the reader to gain a deeper understanding.

Images and Media
The images are not well-captioned and are not laid out in an aesthetic way. Two of the pictures have the caption "upper teeth" and "lower teeth," and there should definitely be more detail describing them, even if it is present in the article. The images present to help enhance understanding, but I believe there could be many more images and/or different ones, specifically with one pertaining to habitat selection.

Talk Page Discussion
The lemon shark page is a C-Class article and ranked with low importance. This article was originally written by a student for class, which I think is really cool to see. A lot of the talk page is pointing out things that were missing -- diet, population, etc. -- but I believe those were fixed.

Overall Impressions
I think that article goes in-depth really well about habitat, feeding patterns/diet, and social behavior. I think that the article could flow better by rewording some of the sentences, as well as using less scientific jargon and writing it to a level that the general public can understand. I would also say some of the sources should be updated, and the layout/organization of the page could be different in order to enhance readability and engagement. But, this is a good start to a Wikipedia article -- it just needs to be improved a little more.