User:Mam045/sandbox

Thank you for your review! -Maw222
Thank you for your review. I am glad to hear that you agree with my ideas. I will defiantly try to make the article more cohesive because right now the article doesn't seem to have a logical flow, which is something that I would like to fix. Due to the lack of resources available to me through MUN's library, I unfortunately will not be able to add a section that provides an overview of Beach's original study since I cannot find this article; that was a great idea though. I agree that the empirical evidence section is lacking and I will defiantly try my best to expand on that as well. Thanks for the help! Good luck with your article!

Thank you for your review
Thanks for your review. You gave me some great ideas and I feel more confident about my topic. Your insight was very helpful and I'll defiantly refer back to your review as I continue to add to the article. Thanks again and happy editing! -Maw222

Peer Review by Maw222
First of all, your topic seems very interesting, and I look forward to reading your article once it is complete. When I first went to the Wikipedia article and saw that there only was a lead section and then read about the behaviour, I was concerned that there would not be enough research available, however, you seem to have found a number of good sources. One concern that I have is that one of your sources is National Geographic (NG). I would recommend sticking to peer reviewed journal articles or books. If you want to use the information provided on the NG website, try referring to the sources that they used for their article, that way you have the primary sources that their article was based off of. Also, going back to those primary sources may also provide you with additional sources that you could use. My second recommendation, while it is only minor, would be to link some of the words in your article to their appropriate Wikipedia articles. One example could be linking the word 'echolocation'. That way, if a reader is unfamiliar with the topic, they can refer to another Wikipedia article to learn more. A question that I have is will the two components of Carousel Feeding be all that you discuss in the article? Is there maybe more that you could contribute to the article? Is there maybe some history surrounding the topic that you could add? Finally, is this behaviour only specific to preying on herring? Can this behaviour be applied to other types of prey such as other types of fish? I know that Orcas prey on many species of animals so I was just wondering if this behaviour is specific to only herring.

Overall, I think you have great ideas and could make a significant contribution to the topic. I look forward to reading your article soon. Good luck!

Thanks!
- Thanks for the thoughtful review. You made a good point about sources so I'm going to track down the primary sources of the nat geo article. I still have some research left to do on carousel feeding to make sure I cover everything but I intend on adding a section on ecological impacts that will help broaden the article. As far as I know the behaviour is only used to hunt herring because it is specific to norwegian orcas but I will continue my research on that because I don't want my final article to be misleading.

Thanks for the help! - mam045

Carousel Feeding
Since the current article is basically only a lead section I'm going to rearrange it and add some details so it matches that article that I plan to write.

Carousel Feeding Draft
Carousel feeding is a cooperative feeding method used by Norwegian orcas (Orcinus orca) to capture herring (Clupea harengus). The term carousel feeding was first used to describe a similar hunting behaviour in bottlenose dolphins (Turslops truncatus) in the Black Sea. There are two main phases of carousel feeding in orcas, the herding phase and the feeding phase. In the herding phase the orcas surround a school of herring and herd them into a tight ball.They tighten the ball by blowing bubbles, flashing their white underside and slapping their tails on the surface. They move the ball of herring toward the surface of the water before initiating the feeding phase. During the feeding phase several orcas begin to eat while the others continue herding the fish to maintain the ball. The feeding orcas whip their tails into the ball to stun and kill several herring at a time. The dead and stunned herring are then consumed and their heads and spines discarded.

Herding
Carousel feeding begins when an orca pod comes across a school of herring. The matriarch orca leads the pod (group of 3-9) in splitting the herring school into a smaller more manageable group. The orcas then circle the herring forcing them into a ball shape. This tight ball differs in size, the diameter of the tight ball can range anywhere between two and seven meters. During this period the orcas are highly vocal including echolocation, clicks and whistling. Echolocation is important for the orcas to find a school of herring. Orcas can detect herring at a much greater distance than the herring can detect the predator. This gives the orcas an advantage over the herring. While tightening the herring ball the orcas push their prey towards the surface of the water. It has been speculated that surface feeding is beneficial because the animals do not have to deep dive so energy is saved, and the sea surface provides a barrier for the prey. During the herding process herring can be seen jumping at the sea surface. The final stages of herding include, blowing bubbles, flashing the orcas white underbelly and slapping the sea surface with their tails. Once the herring are tightly compacted into a conical or elliptical shape near the surface the feeding stage begins.

Feeding
The second stage of carousel is when the orcas get to consume their prey. A portion of the pod feeds while the rest continues herding, after a while the roles switch so all the orcas in the pod get a chance to feed. There are always more whale herding than there are feeding to ensure the herring ball stays tight. The feeding orcas whip their tails into the herring to stun and kill them. The stunning is a result of the loud noise and physical contact of the tail and the fish. In addition, the fish are debilitated by the pressure change and turbulence which makes it easy for the orcas to catch them. The orcas consume the stunned and dead herring and spit out the heads and spines. The orcas can catch and kill up to 15 herring with each successful slap. Once the orcas are satisfied they release the remaining herring. The carousel feeding duration can last from ten minutes to three hours.

Ecological Impacts
Cooperative feeding is common in social carnivores like orcas. Both orcas and herring are impacted by hunting methods. For orcas, carousel feeding teaches young individuals important hunting skills. This gives the orcas an evolutionary advantage that ensures survival of their young. In addition, the abundance of orcas in a particular area is related to the distribution of spring-spawn herring. Herring are such an important food source for norwegian orcas that their distributions influence each other. An important note for herring populations is that orcas never eat the whole herring ball. The herring that are not consumed are able to escape from the orcas. This means the orcas do not completely deplete their food source and potentially the strongest herring will survive the event. Carousel feeding can provide food for other species as well as orcas. For example, during a feeding event when the herring have been pushed to the surface of the water seabirds are often seen feeding on the herring from above. Possible references:

1.Surface and underwater observations of cooperatively feeding killer whales in northern Norway - T Similä, F Ugarte - Canadian Journal of Zoology, 1993

2.Sonar observations of killer whales (Orcinus orca) feeding on herring schools- T Similä - Aquatic Mammals, 1997 - aquaticmammalsjournal.org

3.Occurrence and diet of killer whales in northern Norway: seasonal patterns relative to the distribution and abundance of Norwegian spring-spawning herring

4.Echolocation clicks from killer whales (Orcinus orca) feeding on herring (Clupea harengus)- M Simon, M Wahlberg, LA Miller - The Journal of the Acoustical …, 2007

5. Killer whales (Orcinus orca) feeding on schooling herring (Clupea harengus) using underwater tail-slaps: kinematic analyses of field observations - P Domenici, RS Batty, T Simila… - Journal of Experimental …, 2000

6. Vocal behaviour of Norwegian killer whales, Orcinus orca, during carousel and seiner foraging on spring-spawning herring - I van Opzeeland, PJ Corkeron, T Leyssen, T Simila… - Aquatic …, 2005

7.Acoustic characteristics of underwater tail slaps used by Norwegian and Icelandic killer whales (Orcinus orca) to debilitate herring (Clupea harengus) - M Simon, M Wahlberg, F Ugarte… - Journal of Experimental …, 2005 -

8. http://ngm.nationalgeographic.com/2015/07/orca-feeding/carousel-graphic - keep this one as an additional resource but not as a citation

Topic Evaluation
Carousel feeding is an appropriate topic. Looks like you already have a handful of potential references for your contribution to the article. Jpethier (talk) 14:31, 13 October 2017 (UTC)jpethier

= Article Evaluation: Skinner box/ operant conditioning chamber = The opening paragraph includes an example of a modification on a skinner box using fruit flies as the subject. This section is not cited which is disappointing because it would be interesting to read the actual experiment that did this studies.

The section on Structure is missing a lot of citations. It has descriptions of many variations on these boxes but no citations to show where they are used.

The part about the urban legend that B.F. Skinner's daughter was put into a Skinner box does not seem to belong under the section Research Impacts. In addition, it does not seem to belong in this article since it was debunked and just speculation. The source cited for this is from Snopes, and the Snopes article references the original interview with Skinner's daughter. It would make more sense to just reference the interview as opposed to the Snopes article.

This article is part of the Wikiproject psychology and the Wikiproject Cognitive Science and in both of these it is in the start class. The article is missing a lot of detail and does not have great references so this rating makes sense.

After reading through the talk page I can see how the article has been edited. There is a lot of critique on the references and some of the wording was fixed. Also, the article was changed from skinner box to the more descriptive term operant conditioning chamber and the discussion about that is on the talk page.

Overall the article was fairly neutral in how it described how Skinner boxes work and the type of research they can be used for. The section on research impacts could be expanded since there is a lot more than what is mentioned.