Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Bergman's bear


 * The following discussion is an archived debate of the proposed deletion of the article below. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the article's talk page or in a deletion review).  No further edits should be made to this page.

The result was delete. Spartaz Humbug! 08:32, 2 January 2020 (UTC)

Bergman's bear

 * – ( View AfD View log  Stats )

Fails GNG due to lack of RS coverage. Current article is, and has always been, sourced to a writeup on cryptozoology.com. BEFORE search returned only fringe sources and a few unrelated books by Bear Bergman. –dlthewave ☎ 22:46, 24 December 2019 (UTC)
 * Note: This discussion has been included in the list of Animal-related deletion discussions. Shellwood (talk) 23:14, 24 December 2019 (UTC)


 * Keep - The bear has been the subject of considerable scientific interest as mentioned in the CryptoZoology article and sources may not be easily accessed because they are not recent, and therefore not online, and may be in Russian. Cwmhiraeth (talk) 11:03, 25 December 2019 (UTC)
 * ❌ cryptozoology.com is not a reliable source and does not cite any reliable sources. If you're aware of Russian-language sources, please list them here so that we can evaluate them; otherwise this is just "there are probably sources out there" hand-waving which is not a valid Keep rationale. –dlthewave ☎ 14:31, 27 December 2019 (UTC)
 * Note: This discussion has been included in the list of Russia-related deletion discussions. Coolabahapple (talk) 14:50, 26 December 2019 (UTC)


 * Keep - Adding a number of sources, certainly appears in various works as an example of either a possibly extinct animal, or a notable instance of confusion over subtypes. Clears GNG with RS coverage. BEFORE search was perhaps not quite as thorough as it might have been. Spokoyni (talk) 09:41, 27 December 2019 (UTC)
 * The sources you've added did come up in my BEFORE search, but most were dismissed per WP:NFRINGE ("The notability of a fringe theory must be judged by statements from verifiable and reliable sources, not the proclamations of its adherents") or other reasons.
 * ❌ Cryptozoology A-Z is written by Loren Coleman and Jerome Clark, both fringe cryptozoology proponents.
 * ❌ Mysterious Creatures: A Guide to Cryptozoology is written by George M. Eberhart, another fringe proponent.
 * ❌ Bear Conservation doesn't cite any sources and appears to be lifted from Wikipedia. Compare the April 2019 archive (last updated 16 September 2017) to the December 2016 version of our article. The archive doesn't go back far enough to be conclusive, but in my experience the use of "alleged subspecies" is a dead giveaway. I've never seen anything called an "alleged species" outside of poorly-sourced cryptozoology-related Wikipedia articles.
 * This leaves us with one good source, The Eponym Dictionary of Mammals, which points out that the proposed species is based on a single specimen and its status as a valid taxon is uncertain.
 * We're down to a single paragraph in a single source, which might carry enough weight to merit a mention at Subspecies of brown bear. –dlthewave ☎ 14:24, 27 December 2019 (UTC)


 * Comment All papers I can find referencing subspecies piscator are clearly about the Kamchatka brown bear . -- Elmidae (talk · contribs) 22:55, 29 December 2019 (UTC)
 * To make that into a !vote: Merging one sentence based on the eponym dictionary source to Kamchatka brown bear would seem sensible; it's an interesting taxonomic footnote. -- Elmidae (talk · contribs) 20:24, 1 January 2020 (UTC)


 * Delete: the alleged species, "Ursus arctos piscator", is Kamchatka brown bear which is not extinct; see scholarly articles: . "Piscator" is one of the variants of the species name, per the Kamchatka bear article. In any event, the sources in the article are either not RS or insuffient, such as www.bearconservation.org.uk, fringe cryptozoology books, and so on. K.e.coffman (talk) 02:42, 31 December 2019 (UTC)
 * '''Merge with Kamchatka brown bear.Slatersteven (talk) 13:47, 1 January 2020 (UTC)
 * Delete or redirect to Kamchatka brown bear. &#58;bloodofox: (talk) 19:26, 1 January 2020 (UTC)
 * Comment
 * supposedly in can't find anything online and probably not a good source anyway
 * Delete Wow, how little it takes to spawn a cryptid. "Malaise has told me that on one occasion he saw the skull of a gigantic bear of the black kind; its teeth were perfect, and hence it could not have been that of an aged individual. On another occasion he also measured and photographed a bear's foot-print that was 37cm. long and 25cm. broad, so that the animal must have been a veritable giant. There is much, then, that speaks for the existence in Kamchatka of a quite black, gigantic bear, in addtion to the ordinary brown type; but this question must remain an open one."
 * Delete Wow, how little it takes to spawn a cryptid. "Malaise has told me that on one occasion he saw the skull of a gigantic bear of the black kind; its teeth were perfect, and hence it could not have been that of an aged individual. On another occasion he also measured and photographed a bear's foot-print that was 37cm. long and 25cm. broad, so that the animal must have been a veritable giant. There is much, then, that speaks for the existence in Kamchatka of a quite black, gigantic bear, in addtion to the ordinary brown type; but this question must remain an open one."


 * almost as bad as the guy that fell in a river and saw a bat or something. removed from Bergman's article.&mdash;eric 21:49, 1 January 2020 (UTC)


 * Delete - Normally for actual species I'd support a rename or merge but it seems that the few sources that could be reliable don't agree with eachother. Other sources are so far in-universe.  — Paleo  Neonate  – 06:45, 2 January 2020 (UTC)


 * The above discussion is preserved as an archive of the debate. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the article's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this page.