User talk:Invertzoo/Archive 18

ARCHIVE PAGE 18: June 2009

Melhus Church
Hi Susan, Thank you for your message. The article did not get to DYK not because of the hook (I came up with alt one "that Medieval runic inscriptions were discovered on the old portal of Melhus church (pictured)?), but because user:Orland complained that in article about Melhuc Church much more information was about Dass portrait than about the church. Here's what Orland wrote at the talk page of the article:

"I must ask User:Mbz1 to stop violating and renaming this article in search for a headline. Who has come up with the idea that the debate about the Darre/Dass-portrait should be the sole interesting thing about this church? Where is the part about other church art within this church? Where is the part about architectural history?

"The discussion about the portrait should be in the article about Petter Dass, certainly not here! As for me, I live relatively close to this church, which is i my home county. As an art historican and librarian i can confirm that the debate is real, but i think that the resume of it in this article is biased."

After reading this comment I got so upset that I nominated the article for the deletion, and it was deleted, but restored later. Of course I should not have nominated the article to be deleted first of all because you and others put your time and your work in writing of the article. I probably have nothing to say in my defense for behaving in such an irrational way, except maybe that all user Orland accusations are false and they put me off. As a matter of fact I am so ashamed of my outburst that I decided never again to ask you to help me with my English, if I am to write an article ever again. I put in the article practically everything I could find on the subject on the NET. It took me hours and hours to search and translate from Norwegian (and I do not know Norwegian at all) to get some information about the church. Of course I agree that controversy of the Petter Dass portrait takes the biggest part of the article, but it is not because I wanted to make a point, but simply because I found the biggest ammount of information about this particular matter. When I started working on the article, I did not know about this portrait at all, and once again I did not try to make any points. I simply put the information from very reliabale Norwegian sources in the article. You know what, if I'll be able to find somebody to verify Norwegian sources I'll try to renominate the article for DYK. I have nothing more to loose, so why not to try. --Mbz1 (talk) 16:22, 31 May 2009 (UTC)
 * I do not mind cleaning up prose on anyone's article, and certainly I do not mind doing it on any of yours. Don't feel badly about that, it's no problem to me. Best wishes, Invertzoo (talk) 00:05, 1 June 2009 (UTC)
 * Thank you, Susan. It is very kind of you. Tomorrow I'll probably will add another article for you to clean up my English. I'll let you know, when I do. Best wishes.--Mbz1 (talk) 04:31, 1 June 2009 (UTC)

DYK
Thanks for your clear and logical instructions. You are much needed by Wikipedia, as I think many of the instruction pages are written by people who may be very clever, but lack adequate communication skills.

I've filled out my little form, however, the photographic file is coming up in red, saying the JPG file doesn't exist. Sorry to bother you again, but please advise why this is so, and how I can get around it.

Cheers, PETE Poyt448 (talk) 05:03, 1 June 2009 (UTC)

Thorny Yellowwood
100x100px|
 * ... that the Thorny Yellowwood is a rainforest citrus tree with a spiky trunk?

Created by Poyt448 (talk). Self nom at 04:43, 1 June 2009 (UTC)

New article
Hi Susan. Here's my new article Dartmoor kistvaens. Please take a look, when and if you have a time. Thank you.--Mbz1 (talk) 18:33, 1 June 2009 (UTC)
 * And suggested hook is: "... that 94 % of Dartmoor kistvaens (pictured) have have the longer axis of the tomb oriented on a NW/SE axis in such a way that the deceased were facing the sun?--Mbz1 (talk) 19:45, 1 June 2009 (UTC)


 * Hi Susan. Thank you so much for doing the great work on the article! If the hook is OK with you, I would like to add it to DYK today. Thank you for your time.--Mbz1 (talk) 17:44, 2 June 2009 (UTC)
 * Here's the exact text from the book I refer to: " The whole of the Dartmoor kistvaens examined lie longitudinally north and south, or with variations east and west of these points, the object evidently being that the remains should face the sun." Thank you.--Mbz1 (talk) 19:44, 2 June 2009 (UTC)

OK. I tweak the article prose a bit to make it a bit less tentative, and made the hook slightly more tentative:

"... that 94 % of Dartmoor kistvaens (pictured) have have the longer axis of the tomb oriented on a NW/SE axis, apparently so that the deceased faced the sun?

If you think this is OK it can go up I guess.

Invertzoo (talk) 19:51, 2 June 2009 (UTC)
 * Thank you. That's fine.--Mbz1 (talk) 19:55, 2 June 2009 (UTC)

DYK for Thorny Yellowwood
Hi Susan,

I received another message from the people at DYK. They seemed to approve of our additions to the references of Thorny Yellowwood. However, they wanted me to add inline citations. I tried to do that, however, I got a strange error message. Which I unsuccessfully tried to correct.

Here is the error message:

Cite error: There are tags on this page, but the references will not show without a tag; see Help:Cite errors.

I attempted to fix this problem with the Wiki help menu, but this was of no use.

So, I sent the attached message below. Saying that inline citations are irrelevant, as they refer back to the original source of knowledge of this tree, by the Australian botanist, Alexander Floyd.

Only one reference to this plant was originally used. As the tree is not well known, other references just copy and follow on from Alexander Floyd.

What is most important to me is science, and the spread of knowledge. And I think the article on the Thorny Yellowwood should be seen my many thousands of people.

kind wishes, PETE

- "Thanks for getting back to me. The Thorny Yellowwood is a rainforest tree, seldom seen by anyone. The main reference to this tree is by the botanist Alexander Floyd.

Adding inline citations would all refer back to his book, Floyd, A.G., Rainforest Trees of Mainland South-eastern Australia, Inkata Press 1989, ISBN 0-909605-57-2. In my nearly 20 years of walking in rainforests of New South Wales, I have only seen ONE Thorny Yellowwood.

I attempted to add inline citations to the article on the Thorny Yellowwood, however, I received error messages. And I attempted to correct these with the Wikipedia assistance. However, this was not successful. Please put Thorny Yellowwood on the DYK page. It is a remarkable and beautiful Citrus tree. Scarcely known by anyone and worthy of further knowledge.

regards Pete Poyt448 (talk) 08:58, 3 June 2009 (UTC)"

Your Note
Thank you very much for the note. If a message I left came off as bitey I really appreciate it when people let me know, and I realize this may have happened. I dropped him a note thanking him for the submission and linking to documentation. I will check back and clean things up if he makes mistakes with the markup, which can be a nightmare at first. — Jake   Wartenberg  12:51, 3 June 2009 (UTC)

Naw, what you left him wasn't really a bitey message, It's just that he's so new and enthusiastic and ambitious, and has done so much good work already, that I want to protect him against getting really discouraged and giving up, which has almost happened once before. Thanks for being kind. Best, Invertzoo (talk) 13:42, 3 June 2009 (UTC)

thank you!
Dear Invertzoo,

Can't thank you enough for the medal and your wonderful support recently. Could not have achieved this success without you. The only time I was losing faith was when I couldn't add inline citations, otherwise I was fine. Sorry if I was asking too many questions or being a nuisance.

User:Hamiltonstone is insistent that I don't call the Thorny Yellowwood a member of the Citrus family. I won't argue and will let it be. I have emphatic confidence in the beauty and fascination of Australian plants and animals.

Can't wait to drive the 14 hours up to Tooloom National Park and see that thorny little tree again.

Today I walked down to Elvina Bay, photographed several more rainforest tree species. A large leech walked on my shoe, but there was no damage to me or to it. If I was confident the correct identification is Gnatbobdellida libbata, then I'll do leech stub.

kind regards Poyt448 (talk) 04:47, 5 June 2009 (UTC)


 * Hi again Pete, You are very welcome to all the help I can give you. As for the "medal", it is only a service badge, but it is pretty, and you are certainly entitled to it.


 * By the way, here is a reference from a botanical garden that you could maybe use to confirm in the Thorny Yellowwood article and in the Rutaceae article that Rutaceae is indeed referred to as the "citrus family".


 * When I need to find a ref for something like that I just google it. This time I put "citrus family Rutaceae" into the google search slot. Here is another ref, in case you prefer this one, this time it's from a Palomar college website in California.


 * You can go ahead and put one of those refs in both article if you want to. The article is not "frozen" as its DYK hook waits to go up on the main page, the article can be improved now or later on of course. Only the DYK hook is set and cannot be changed.


 * By the way, a very small thing, when you reply to someone's message right below it, you can "indent" your message a bit by putting a colon : right at the very beginning of your message or of each paragraph you write in the message. The little indent makes it easier to see who is speaking. I put one in on your message to Hamilton above so you can see how it works. Two colons will indent even further, three even more, and so on.


 * You are fortunate to have access to such lovely places. I live right in the heart of NYC. My nearest "nature" is Central Park. We don't have a car, but go places by bus or train instead.


 * All good wishes, Invertzoo (talk) 12:41, 5 June 2009 (UTC)

Howdy
Howdy! Thank you for inviting me to join the gastropod group. I'm kinda new to wikipedia, never created nor edited any article until very recently, as you may have already noticed. I'm trying to get used to the functions and stuff, slowly but surely! I'm a Brazilian student, graduate in Biology, and I've been working with natural history collecions and mollusca taxonomy for quite some time now. Loving the subject as I do, and having some experience in the area as well as access to a lot of specialized literature, I just had this urge to help building more precise and trustworthy wiki articles. I'll fill in my user page and other stuff later, for more info about myself and my work. I'm not a native speaker, so any help with the prose or grammar, as any kind of help, is always welcome! Thank you once more.

--Daniel Cavallari (talk) 15:04, 7 June 2009 (UTC)

service awards
Thanks! I see I have a whole bunch of editing to do before I can advance up the service awards so best I get straight on with it. regards Seascapeza (talk) 09:30, 8 June 2009 (UTC)

Caribbean tropical zone fauna
Heya! Yeah, in fact many species that occur in the western central atlantic are distributed from the caribbean to the south throughout all the brazilian coast, like S. pugilis as you may already know. If I can help you in any way, please let me know, and I'll gladly do so. It's good to know someone with enough dedication and patience to work on a book-length paper these days, Susan. In my humble opinion it is an admirable thing. I'm working on a book myself, about Conquiliology and Curatorial Methods regarding Shell collections. --Daniel Cavallari (talk) 21:23, 8 June 2009 (UTC)
 * Heya to you too! Yes, there are indeed a lot of species in common between the Caribbean Sea and Brazil. Thanks for the offer, help would be most welcome. You can email if you like, by using the link on the left in the "toolbox" when you are on one of my pages. I am a serious amateur or semi-professional, currently a volunteer at the AMNH, and was a Field Associate at AMNH for 2 years 2006-08. The AMNH malacology section has been closed for 3 years unfortunately. You can see what I have published over the years at: . I worked at the MCZ as a curatorial assistant for 2 years in 1980, and taught at Yale for one semester. I think it's great you are working on a book on conchology and the curation of shell collections. We need that. Best wishes, Invertzoo (talk) 23:27, 8 June 2009 (UTC)

Bynesian Decay/Byne's Disease, here:
Hi there Susan! I was browsing through wikipedia, and I realized there is no article about Bynesian decay in it... Have you noticed that? That's a subject I'm very familiar with, and of no small importance to any serious shell collector. I'll write it myself, I've got plenty of reference to support it... That's not directly related to gastropods, but it is related nontheless. Also, I'll try to concentrate myself on articles about Strombidae for the moment. I have a few Strombus and Lambis pictures from my personal collection to use (just learned how to upload them!). Oh, by the way, I couldn't find your email in the toolbox! I'm a little lost! —Preceding unsigned comment added by Daniel Cavallari (talk • contribs) 18:02, 9 June 2009 (UTC)


 * Ah yes, that's a really great idea for an article! It's a fascinating subject! In fact it is so interesting that I am thinking we could try to do a "Did you Know?" (DYK) on it for the Main Page perhaps. To see what "Did you Know"s are, take a look on the lower left area of the English Wikipedia Main Page at


 * Because we may want to submit it as a DYK, you may want to work on it first on a subpage of your main page, that way it will not appear in "mainspace" as an actual article until you are really ready to post it there. If you don't mind, will go ahead and create a subpage for you, so that you (or both of us) can work on it there if you want to. But don't rush, if you want to work on Strombidae first, that is fine of course.


 * Best, Invertzoo (talk) 18:23, 9 June 2009 (UTC)

Thank you for the help, Susan! I'm listing some of the articles I'm going to use as reference in the subpage. Some of them may be obtained easily on the net. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Daniel Cavallari (talk • contribs)

About Byne's Disease article and the e-mail
Hi there Susan! It seems I am too "new" around too use that funcion maybe. Nothing to do about it, except waiting. Oh, by the way, have you read Sally Shellton's 1996 paper? (it's listed there in the draft page) It provides good Bynesian decay historical data, describing important things that happened before and after it's description in 1899. It is worth taking a look, we may as well use some of that info on our own article. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Daniel Cavallari (talk • contribs) 01:16, 11 June 2009 (UTC)


 * Yes Daniel, in about 3 weeks' time you will be able to do that.


 * Oh by the way, just a small thing, but try to remember to sign your messages by putting this at the end: ~ . (Your previous message to me here was signed by a piece of robotic software called "Sinebot".)


 * I have to say that I have not got round to reading Shelton's full paper carefully yet: I just skimmed over it. As you can see, I have been writing text without using references to back it up. That might be laziness on my part, but it is one way to write, and it ends up with pleasant prose to read. Other people write an article by finding a useful piece of info in a reference, and then adding it with the ref in place, as they go along. Perhaps that is the better way to proceed. Anyway, we can take our time with this article, no hurry, but if we are going to try for a DYK, we will need to get references in place in the intro section. In particular, whatever fact(s) we end up wanting to use for the DYK hook, that fact or facts must be soundly referenced, and as early on in the article as possible. Oh, and on-line references are easier for WP editors to check than print only references. All good wishes, Invertzoo (talk) 15:34, 11 June 2009 (UTC)

Message from Pete
Hi Zoo,

I feel so crestfallen. I just received an e-mail from A.G. Floyd who was very annoyed with the e-mail I sent to him. As it took 30 minutes for him to download the photos I sent. (He's not on broadband). He said he hates to identify plants from photos. However, he did identify the plant I wanted from a photo:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eucalyptus_scias_subsp._apoda

All my botanical books are fairly new, but they are out of date, and all the best thoughts I could muster didn't come up to scratch. Study, study, think and study. But the books are wrong. And my assumption was understandable and logical. I couldn't figure out the answer as much as I tried. It's so humiliating to try as best as you can and still be wrong. The plant is a rare eucalyptus, which is some consolation to me.

Yesterday I walked in Ku-ring-gai Chase National Park and saw masses of slug trails over the sandstone. Perhaps I ought to put these on your mollusc pages. After all the rain, the slugs have been feasting on the microscopic algae on the sandstone. Perhaps they are the beautiful and gorgeous Red triangle slug.

By accident I found a 20 metre long Petroglyph. My photo on: Petroglyphs, in the Australia section.

Found by pure good luck and extra sensory perception. Also, near the slug trail and the petroglyph was another rare eucalyptus tree which I wrote about, Eucalyptus_luehmanniana

Thank for your support and saying I learned things quickly. As mentioned before I am not a scholar, didn't finish school. My sister regularly calls me an idiot. And I did an IQ test as a teenager. The psychologist said my IQ is "average".

However, I've seldom met someone who has a better general knowledge than me, and my head is always in books, I'm constantly in front of the computer. My mind is slow, but it eventually picks up things. It's a slow burning mind, with plenty of power and force. Another subsequent IQ test said I'm in the 140s. After all these years I am confident in my ability. And when I don't know, I call out for help!

Lately I've been hoping to climb the great Mount Royal again, however, the weather is too wet and windy. It snowed there a couple of days ago. The rainforest on the top of Royal is why it's part of the UNESCO World Heritage. I'm almost too old and too sensible to not climb these remote wilderness mountains anymore. All my friends are too old, too fat, too sensible, too busy, too lazy, too whatever to go with me. I bet there's plenty of fabulous Gondwana land molluscs up there. I've seen shells, but no live snails. So, I'll go by myself.

But after A.G. Floyd showed how wrong I am. It is a sobering lesson. I need to try harder, be more resourceful, be more sceptical, be more of a rational thinker.

Many thanks for your support again. It's wonderful.

Pete Poyt448 (talk) 15:02, 13 June 2009 (UTC)

Powell
I returned it. I've requested it again, and should have it in a couple of days. --Geronimo20 (talk) 00:18, 16 June 2009 (UTC).

Thanks for your work on all this stuff. I really appreciate it. Invertzoo (talk) 01:34, 16 June 2009 (UTC)


 * No, there is no issue with Hydatina and Powell. --Geronimo20 (talk) 23:23, 21 June 2009 (UTC)

Pictures for the Bynesian Decay article
Howdy Susan! I've recently conducted a small experiment trying to artificially simulate Bynesian Decay. I've exposed certain mollusk shells to an excessively humid and acidic medium with positive results, and obtained some pictures (as expected the efflorecence showed up quite quickly). I'll be submitting those pictures soon, so we can use them to better illustrate the article.

Best wishes! Daniel Cavallari (talk) 04:53, 17 June 2009 (UTC)

I'm back
Well, I'm actually still slowly clawing back time from other commitments. I have been going over old nudibranch articles and comparing them to the info sources. I spent 25 minutes on one trying to reword the description to further distance it from the cited source. I got frustrated and then stumped and then gave up and watched Kojak over a glass of red wine. I will take another crack at it.

You probably noticed the two new composites. All of the colours are natural. Now, as before, all of the top clades and groups have composites, thus completing that thing, (except maybe for the main gastropod article itself).

With my (still limited) time for Wiki, I shall try to get back to work stubifying some of the lovely nudibranchs on the gastropod front page. I hope you are well. --Anna Frodesiak (talk) 02:21, 19 June 2009 (UTC)

Mount Banda Banda
Dear Zoo,

I hope you are enjoying your weekend.

Yesterday I wrote an article on Mount Banda Banda, a remote wilderness mountain I've climbed five times before. The most recently was July 2006, where I came very close to disaster with my audacious and foolhardy climb off-track. I was searching for a rare eucaltyptus, which I found before.

I would have liked to nominate this article for DYK. However, one's own work that can't be verified is not acceptable for Wikipedia.

The person who discovered Eucalyptus scias subsp. apoda on the mountain is my own self. The text books and World Heritage reports missed this tree. I don't know how they missed it, it is right next to the track. The track is now closed and no-one goes there anymore. It's all overgrown, as the World Heritage people wish that the vegetation of Mount Banda Banda regrows to its natural state.

Recently the octogenerian Alexander Floyd crankily identified this rare plant. I knew at the time is was a minor discovery of some significance.

So, I hope no-one finds out it is my own work, and they don't delete it from the article. The photo of the eucalyptus tree is taken at home. The socks I am wearing right now are the background for the photo. Nice to put my other photos on this article too.

kind wishes Peter Poyt448 (talk) 04:35, 21 June 2009 (UTC)

Vandalism
Howdy Susan!

I undid a vandalism in Nerita melanotragus article, by user:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Special:Contributions/203.89.172.66

What can be done about this guy? I really don't know, but he has done it plenty of times. Oh by the way! Did you like the pictures I updated for the Bynesian decay article?

Best wishes --Daniel Cavallari (talk) 10:50, 22 June 2009 (UTC)

Watched Pages Comment
Dear Susan,

Thank you so much for helping me to understand how watched pages work. Perhaps you took interest in my mundane Wikipedia question because you mistook my slow pace in learning to be that of some kind of new mollusk buried in the vast sands of Wikipedia. Indeed, your comments were most helpful.

Best regards, JDHeinzmann (talk) 01:51, 23 June 2009 (UTC)

small one


Hello, I started Reproductive system of gastropods article. Could you help me with the marine gastropod section, please? Thanks. --Snek01 (talk) 19:05, 28 June 2009 (UTC)

Bynesian decay: List of archival materials
Howdy Susan!

I was thinking about something. Shouldn't we assemble a list of Archival/Non-archival materials, and display it in the article? We could create some tables or such, in the Prevention session... What do you think?

Best wishes --Daniel Cavallari (talk) 16:51, 29 June 2009 (UTC)

Some sort of mirage?
Hi Mila, I wanted to show you this image if you didn't see it before which looks weird and appears to show an inversion layer near the horizon. I assume there is some kind of odd optical effect going on but I don't know which kind? Chicago is 50 miles away and the photo is taken at beach level. Best, Invertzoo (talk) 14:51, 28 June 2009 (UTC)

Hi Susan. Thank you for your message. This phenomenon is not considered to be a mirage. There's no inverted images are present as much as I could see. I believe it is looming and/or towering. Please take a look at my image: The image was composed out of the three frames taken from the same place of the same place ([w:Farallon Islands]). The difference in the appearance was kindly explained by Dr. Andy Young: "Mila has an illustration, containing 3 different views of the south-east Farallons with different refraction conditions: the top image shows just looming; the middle, looming with towering; and the bottom, a 5-image mirage, with the uppermost erect image severely stooped. These pictures were taken at heights of 40 to 66 meters on Point Lobos, near the Cliff House (San Francisco). The nominal distance to the sea horizon from a height of 40 meters is just about halfway to these islands and rocks, so only their parts above about 40 m height should be visible. An eye height of about 150 m would be required to put the sea horizon at the islands, assuming standard refraction. Even from 66 m, the lower peaks, such as Seal Rock (the isolated feature at the left of the photographs), which is 25 m high, should be almost completely hidden. However, a picture taken from a ship near the islands shows that everything is visible in Mila's pictures, even the low flats a meter or two above the sea. So looming is present in all the pictures taken from San Francisco." If you are interested to learn more about phenomenon,here's the page to read. Maybe one day I'll try to write a short article about that phenomenon, and then once again I might ask for your help with English. :) Best wishes.--Mbz1 (talk) 14:27, 30 June 2009 (UTC)

Painters of snails
Hello, who made the images in the book Land and Freshwater Mollusca (1890-1901) by Eduard von Martens? Some were made by "Eug. Duval" and some were made by "Fr. H. v. Zglinicka". I do not know the exact names of these authors and their date of death so I do not know if their images are public domain or not. I am not able to confirm or refutate even if "Eug. Duval" of these images is a French painter Eugène Emmanuel Amaury Pineux Duval also known as Amaury Duval (1808-1885), or if it is a different man. Thanks. --Snek01 (talk) 17:16, 30 June 2009 (UTC)

A new account for a friend
I created an account User:Suzoot for a friend, Sue. (Considering your name and username it is somewhat of a coincidence. She wanted Suzo, an old nickname, but it was taken. Suzoot is her second choice.) I registered for her to get her started. She plans to start in a month after a holiday collaborating with me on food-related articles. Of course I will not edit with her account and have asked her to change her password. I am just wondering if I am breaking the rules.--Anna Frodesiak (talk) 02:36, 1 July 2009 (UTC)

Wiki-Conference New York Update: 3 weeks to go
For those of you who signed up early, Wiki-Conference New York has been confirmed for the weekend of July 25-26 at New York University, and we have Jimmy Wales signed on as a keynote speaker.

There's still plenty of time to join a panel, or to propose a lightning talk or an open space session. Register for the Wiki-Conference here. And sign up here for on-wiki notification. All are invited! This has been an automated delivery by BrownBot (talk) 03:16, 1 July 2009 (UTC)

Red palm mite
I submitted Red palm mite for DKY Template_talk:Did_you_know and could use a suggestion for the hook. It currently reads ... that the red palm mite (pictured) is the biggest mite explosion ever observed in the Americas? This seems logically flawed as a mite cannot be a mite explosion. I'm thinking ...that the spread of the palm mite is the biggest... Any thoughts? All the best, slightly less itchy Anna. --Anna Frodesiak (talk) 06:32, 1 July 2009 (UTC)

Would you like to write an article?
Hi Susan, at least I was able to get ID for my school of fishes. I do not think we have an article here. Would you like to write one? Best wishes.--Mbz1 (talk) 05:33, 2 July 2009 (UTC)


 * Yes Susan, that's a nice picture - I already use it in articles. I'll write the article (in about a weeks time). --Geronimo20 (talk) 00:19, 3 July 2009 (UTC)


 * So Mila, my friend Geronimo will write the article, next week. He is a really good fish person. Best, Invertzoo (talk) 00:38, 3 July 2009 (UTC)
 * Thank you, Susan, thank you, Geronimo20! Best wishes.--Mbz1 (talk) 15:52, 3 July 2009 (UTC)
 * So there it is, goldband fusilier. Didn't find much, and I think the photo I found is about to be deleted :/ --Geronimo20 (talk) 10:03, 8 July 2009 (UTC)
 * Thank you very much to both of you! Best wishes.--Mbz1 (talk) 16:55, 8 July 2009 (UTC)