Wikipedia:Featured list candidates/List of Eurasian nuthatch subspecies/archive1


 * The following is an archived discussion of a featured list nomination. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the article's talk page or in Wikipedia talk:Featured list candidates. No further edits should be made to this page.

The list was promoted by Crisco 1492 09:20, 9 June 2014 (UTC).

List of Eurasian nuthatch subspecies

 * Nominator(s):  Jimfbleak -  talk to me?  09:09, 16 May 2014 (UTC)

This was hived off from the Eurasian Nuthatch FA to reduce the level of detail in an already lengthy article. It has only two sources, but it's difficult to see what else could be needed  Jimfbleak -  talk to me?  09:09, 16 May 2014 (UTC)

Comment from Aa77zz
In this specialized article it might be appropriate to cite the authorities for the different subspecies. Some of them will be available online and the interested (multilingual) reader can read the original descriptions. The references are given in the Check list of Birds of the World here I tried finding the articles but is very tedious. One has to first work out the abbreviated journal title.

Here is Wolf, 1810:



Witherby, 1913 is:
 * Bulletin of the British Ornithologist's Club vol 31 page 78 - issue missing on BHL here

Sachtleben, 1919. is Anz. Orn. Ges. Bayer 1 7.

I'm giving up. I notice that a French version of the subspecies list has been created.

Aa77zz (talk) 17:39, 21 May 2014 (UTC)
 * OK, thanks for that. Zoonomen is good for journal titles, I'll add over the next couple of days.  Jimfbleak -  talk to me?  19:13, 21 May 2014 (UTC)

Here are three more.

S. e. levantina, Hartert, 1905
 * Date doesn't agree. Perhaps published in sections and now bound together.
 * That appears to be the case, volume 3 is the required one, I'll add data, fix link later  Jimfbleak  -  talk to me?  13:57, 22 May 2014 (UTC)

S. e. persica, Witherby, 1903

S. e. caucasica, Reichenow, 1901 Aa77zz (talk) 22:04, 21 May 2014 (UTC)

I'm looking more closely at the text:

Ended with full stops now  Jimfbleak -  talk to me?  06:49, 27 May 2014 (UTC) as above  Jimfbleak -  talk to me?  06:49, 27 May 2014 (UTC) All the typos and infelicities above fixed  Jimfbleak -  talk to me?  06:49, 27 May 2014 (UTC)
 * The formatting in the Description column is confused. I'm aware that one doesn't use full stops in figure legends that aren't sentences but to my eyes it looks slightly odd not ending with full stops when one uses full stops as delimiters within the text such as in europaea, takatsukasai and sakhalinensis. Perhaps only use commas as delimiters - or end with full stops.
 * arctica ends with a full stop
 * arctica has a cite. Why only this description?
 * arctica and baicalensis start with a lower case character
 * bedfordi has a semicolon
 * bedfordi mentions seorsa - is this a mistake?
 * bedfordi has asiatica not in italics rather than S. e. asiatica
 * takatsukasai has an unpaired right bracket
 * amurensis missing a comma
 * asiatica has an full stop followed by a lowercase letter
 * hondoensis ends in a semicolon
 * Why in the citations do you sometimes link the page number and at other times link the title (using url=)?
 * With some sources, it's possible to link to the exact page that contains the text, and I have done so where I can since that seems more helpful than, in some cases, linking an entire book. Where it is not possible, I've linked to the article or journal as appropriate  Jimfbleak - </b> talk to me?  06:49, 27 May 2014 (UTC)


 * The lead has "the precise number is disputed." I think you should say more about this. How have you selected which to list? Which are the subspecies which are contentious? Who lists more subspecies and who lists less?
 * Rephrased, it's not really disputed, since the print version of HBW on which the on-line resource is substantially based was written by Harrup, so the change in taxonomy largely represents his up-dated view. The differences between the 2013 and 1996 treatment are already in the footnotes <b style="font-family:chiller; color:red;"> Jimfbleak - </b> talk to me?  06:49, 27 May 2014 (UTC)

Aa77zz (talk) 16:42, 26 May 2014 (UTC)
 * OK, thanks for that, I'll work through them tomorrow <b style="font-family:chiller; color:red;"> Jimfbleak - </b> talk to me?  19:14, 26 May 2014 (UTC)

Support meets the criteria. I've a couple of outstanding points: https://archive.org/stream/birdsEuropeIIIGoul#page/236/mode/2up Sorry I've been slow. Half-term. Small grandchildren now passed to other set of grandparents. Well done. Aa77zz (talk) 09:33, 28 May 2014 (UTC)
 * I still don't understand the choice of linking methods: compare 4 Witherby with 20 Ogilvie-Grant.
 * FN 11 Gould 1837. S. e. asiatica. It might be useful to link to the page, especially as the pages do not appear to be numbered. The link is:
 * bedfordi - belly is mentioned twice. Check source to see whether descriptions of different subspecies have been concatenated.
 * Thanks for help and support, I've moved all links to url, added Gould page and fixed bedfordi. We have just acquired baby grandaughter for a few days, so I know what it's like! <b style="font-family:chiller; color:red;"> Jimfbleak - </b> talk to me?  17:08, 28 May 2014 (UTC)

Comments by Tomcat
The Russian titles should be in original cyrillic script, not latinised and transcribed, as it produces unneeded problems. Imperatorskago petrogradskago obshchestva estestvoispytatelei does not make sense since it is in genitive case and additionally has punctuation errors; literally it would be "of the Imperial Naturalist Community of Petrograd". Both in contemporary and pre-reformational Russian it would be Императорское Петроградское общества естествоиспытателей (Imperial Naturalist Community of Petrograd). "Trudy Zoologicheskogo Instituta Akademii Nauk SSSR" means "Works of the Zoological Institute of the Academy of Sciences of USSR", but it would be better "Zoological Institute of the Academy of Sciences of USSR". Do you agree that a journal title should be in original Russian and the translated title in brackets? --Tomcat (7) 15:53, 24 May 2014 (UTC)
 * Fine with me, but my knowledge of Russian is near zero, and basically I put in what I could find, which was itself less than straightforward. Although the article was referenced adequately by the first couple of refs, I was trying to provide links too the original descriptions where possible as Aa77zz suggested above. <b style="font-family:chiller; color:red;"> Jimfbleak - </b> talk to me?  18:54, 24 May 2014 (UTC)
 * Support deserves featured status. Regards. Tomcat (7) 12:31, 26 May 2014 (UTC)
 * Thanks for your help and support <b style="font-family:chiller; color:red;"> Jimfbleak - </b> talk to me?  12:52, 26 May 2014 (UTC)

Some comments. I apologize for my ignorance of ornithology:
 * These may have been geographically isolated from each other until relatively recently. What happened?
 * It's probably due to the retreat of the ice sheets allowing separated populations to expand, but the sources don't actually say that, so it's just my OR <b style="font-family:chiller; color:red;"> Jimfbleak - </b> talk to me?  06:02, 6 June 2014 (UTC)


 * The two photos could use alternate text, I wouldn't call them purely decorative.
 * Done <b style="font-family:chiller; color:red;"> Jimfbleak - </b> talk to me?  06:02, 6 June 2014 (UTC)


 * The "Subspecies" and "Authority" section should be sortable.
 * I'm not keen on that. I've tweaked the captions to make it clear that the ssp are arranged in geographical order, as in the sources (and it's normal for such lists, since it makes it easier to see the differences between neighbours). Sorting only gives the trivial alphabetical arrangement, which loses useful information <b style="font-family:chiller; color:red;"> Jimfbleak - </b> talk to me?  06:02, 6 June 2014 (UTC)


 * Add ! scope="col" and ! scope="row" tags where appropriate, see MOS:DTAB for more information. Seattle (talk) 02:11, 6 June 2014 (UTC)
 * Done, please check that I've got it right <b style="font-family:chiller; color:red;"> Jimfbleak - </b> talk to me?  06:02, 6 June 2014 (UTC)
 * Thanks for reviewing. No apology needed; an article should be accessible to non-specialists, and if it only makes sense to experts there is probably something wrong <b style="font-family:chiller; color:red;"> Jimfbleak - </b> talk to me?  06:02, 6 June 2014 (UTC)


 * Support meets featured standards. Seattle (talk) 12:27, 6 June 2014 (UTC)
 * Many thanks, <b style="font-family:chiller; color:red;"> Jimfbleak - </b> talk to me?  16:06, 6 June 2014 (UTC)


 * Hi Jim, this looks about ready to pass, but before I promote there's a few minor issues
 * If it's not a sentence, it should not end with a period (check your tables)
 * Done <b style="font-family:chiller; color:red;"> Jimfbleak - </b> talk to me?  08:40, 9 June 2014 (UTC)
 * The female is usually slightly duller with a brown tint to the eyestripe and paler underparts - If there are certain subspecies in which this is not true, you may want to note that. Otherwise I'd nix the "usually"
 * Added an exception <b style="font-family:chiller; color:red;"> Jimfbleak - </b> talk to me?  08:40, 9 June 2014 (UTC)
 * Perhaps a little discussion of alternative differentiations (you talk about Tits, Nuthatches and Treecreepers a little, but are there any other mainstream identifications of subspecies)? — Crisco 1492 (talk) 06:08, 8 June 2014 (UTC)
 * AFAIK, most sources more or less follow Harrap, who also wrote the earlier version of HBW. I've added a bit on an earlier treament which differentiated many mnore form <b style="font-family:chiller; color:red;"> Jimfbleak - </b> talk to me?  08:40, 9 June 2014 (UTC)
 * Apologies for delay, my broadband has been down for two days, but is playing nicely at present (everything crossed!) <b style="font-family:chiller; color:red;"> Jimfbleak - </b> talk to me?  08:40, 9 June 2014 (UTC)


 * Delegate's comment - This nomination has been promoted. — Crisco 1492 (talk) 09:20, 9 June 2014 (UTC)


 * The above discussion is preserved as an archive. Please do not modify it. No further edits should be made to this page.