Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Tree of Life/Archive 16

Eucalyptus indentification
Can someone please identify these eucalypts. If these photos are not sufficient for identification, I can quite easily go back and take more - just tell me what of.

Thanks! --Fir0002 10:03, 1 October 2005 (UTC)


 * Hi Fir - it won't be easy, with there being over 500 species in the genus. Your best option is to collect a foliage sample, with flowers and fruit if possible, and send it (with these bark/tree photos) to Melbourne RBG for them to identify - MPF 00:10, 3 October 2005 (UTC)


 * I think I'll just leave as eucalyptus' and just put them in the Commons --Fir0002 08:08, 9 October 2005 (UTC)

Acacia Flowers
I'm pretty sure these are acacia's but I would like postive ID, and maybe something more specific than just "acacia" (it looks similar to Image:Koeh-004.jpg, but that species lives in Africa)

Thanks, --Fir0002 07:22, 3 October 2005 (UTC)


 * Hi Fir - same problem as with the Eucalyptus, there's '00s of species to choose from. Of the ones I know, it isn't far removed from Silver Wattle (Acacia dealbata), though the leaves don't look glaucous enough for this species. Again, I'd guess it would be worth mailing a sample to Melbourne RBG - MPF 09:25, 3 October 2005 (UTC)


 * Thanks for your comment MPF, I'll try email something to the Botanical Gardens, but as much as I'm devoted to the project, I'd have to cycle a fair way to get samples, plus as a student at my age I don't have too much loose change for posting things for identification :-) --Fir0002 08:07, 9 October 2005 (UTC)

Palaeontological ranges


For groups known from the fossil record, we should consider adding the time periods they are known from to the taxobox. This is something that has been suggested on occasion, but I don't recall any real decision on the matter being made; recently it was brought up again at talk:dinosaur. In general, I think this is exactly the sort of information that should be provided in taxoboxes, provided we apply the usual caveats - i.e. it should be left out in cases where it is uninformative or controversial. Possibly it could go in the header in place of, or as an augmentation to, the conservation status, as shown. Josh


 * Good idea in many respects, though if only done for fossil taxa it would leave extant taxa with a long history in a bit of a limbo by comparison - e.g. Ginkgo (Permian to Present) - MPF 10:41, 4 October 2005 (UTC)
 * StatusFossil2 takes a single "when" parameter. Others could be given the same treatment. - UtherSRG (talk) 10:44, 4 October 2005 (UTC)

I think giving a full range of dates is necessary. It's possible to do that using the fossil2 template - I've changed the above table to do so - but as you can see, the result is cramped. The periods should be on their own line; we could add a newline to the template, but that might be inconsistent with extinct2. I do think this belongs in the header, though, since it relates to the existence of the group.  Conservation status: Endangered Fossil range: Permian - Recent

If we want to be able to mix and match with any conservation status, then we should probably add this as a separate item instead of multiplying the existing templates. Possibly something like the table shown here - note Ginkgophyta and Ginkgo should be split once we start discussing extinct members. Does this sound good to everyone, and does anyone have any ideas on how to improve it? Josh
 * I think it's a great idea. I also think it's very important yet straightforward and standardised information that's perfect for taxoboxes.  I would suggest adding something such as "Range:Permian-Recent", "Palaeontological Range:Permian-Recent", "Pal. Range:Permian-Recent", or "Fossil Range:Permian-Recent".  I think separating Ginkgophyta from Ginkgo will take care of itself as articles on fossil taxa are written.  The specific article should pertain to the lowest taxonomic unit (Ginkgo) and the range should also relate to just that unit.  It does emphasize that although only a single extant taxon is in a higher taxonomic group, there may be call for a separate article for the higher group that describes the characteristics and lists both extant and extinct taxa.  --Aranae 20:45, 4 October 2005 (UTC)

None of the books I have use a label, but I like fossil range - it clearly refers to when remains have been found, rather than speculation about when the group actually originated. I've added it to the table. I'll wait a little while longer to see if there are any further opinions, but if there aren't I'll go ahead and add this version to /taxobox usage. Josh


 * I agree that the StatusFossil2 template makes things crowded.... but that could be changed so that the new concept works better. Nothing's set in stone here. *grins* Um... except the fossils. *grins* I think I like "fossil record" better than "fossil range". It gives the same information a slightly different context. Things don't range through time, they range through space moving here and there and back again. Records have a time element to them saying when they were created or died or (in this case) fossilized, as the case may be. - UtherSRG (talk) 11:35, 6 October 2005 (UTC)

I understand your point, range usually means geographical range. But record doesn't really imply dates, and ranges can be temporal or even more abstract; the few times I've seen this labelled, it's usually something like stratigraphic range. Feel free to change it as you see fit; I think making this part of the standard is more important than fixing the exact terminology. I'm certain it shouldn't be added to the status templates, though; we would have to add the same thing to each one, and that's a sign things should be modular. Josh


 * I think range is the better option. Range is a numerical term indicating from X to Y (linearly) or all points within a region in space defined by exterior points (X,Y), (V,W), (A,B), etc.  It's valid for both space and time.  Using the term record followed by a range of dates implies that fossils for the taxon have been found at all points in between.  A taxonomic group may range from the Paleocene to the Recent, but fossils may have only been found in the Paleocene, Pliocene, and Recent.  --Aranae 20:55, 6 October 2005 (UTC)

Ok, for the time being I've added this as-is to the taxobox page. I'll also go ahead and add it to a few pages, to see if there's any comments. Josh


 * I included it on a new page, Bristle-spined Porcupine and found that I needed a  between the status and fossil range.  Sandboxing it suggested that adding the   in an instance where the status is fossil would add an extra blank line.  Yet StatusFossil alone without fossil range doesn't insert the extra line.  Everything's great on another new page, Spiny rat which is a higher group and therefore has no cons. status.  --Aranae 20:00, 7 October 2005 (UTC)

For extant groups that are exclusively recent, Aranae, I think the fossil range should be left out. You're right about the &lt;br&gt; tag. The templates were internally inconsistent, so some added an extra line, but I've fixed this. Josh

Recently I have become interested in grouping the extinct living things by Epochs in Categories. I do really like the presentation of the StatusFossil taxobox options, but I think it would be beneficial to compose categories for these animals to provide context for people interested in these epochal periods. This, I believe, would allow people to see what other animals were around at the time and what the evolutionary progression over time looked like. I have already begun with many of the homonids and the few Pleistocene mammals I was able to find. I will gladly take it on myself, but since there was already a community discussing listing their epochs I figured I would mention it so people were aware of it. --aremisasling 17:55, 9 December 2005 (UTC)
 * Just make sure that if you put it in a category (such as Category:Eocene mammals), which belongs to a higher category (such as Category:Prehistoric mammals), that the article appears in only one of those categories. - UtherSRG (talk) 19:43, 9 December 2005 (UTC)

Old Taxonomy terms
I am assembling a list of taxonomy terms from the 1911EB list, many of which may be obsolete. I wouls like to invite anyone interested to glance at them and help decide whether to keep or discard them. Any comments on these terms are appreciated. See 1911 Encyclopedia topics/15. --DanielCD 15:31, 4 October 2005 (UTC)

It has now been greatly expanded as well. --DanielCD 14:41, 6 October 2005 (UTC)

Use of Italics
(Query moved here from Wikipedia talk:How to read a taxobox. Gdr 13:43, 5 October 2005 (UTC))

In the past, when editing some botanical pages, I have italicised plant Families (following the standard procedure of the British RHS (Royal Horticultural Society) in all of its publications). In some cases this has subsequently been reverted, and I now see that the families in "How to read a taxobox" are in roman rather than italics. Is this the internationally accepted format? SiGarb 20:45, 20 September 2005 (UTC)
 * I've never seen any such standard. But evey Journal has its own set of standards (or more correctly formatting) that it adheres to for consistency appreciated by subscribers.  These are not standards that extend beyond the publication. - Marshman 18:27, 5 October 2005 (UTC)
 * And being that Wikipedia is a publication of a sorts, we've set the standard as italics on Genus level or below. - UtherSRG (talk) 19:40, 5 October 2005 (UTC)
 * Roman type for suprageneric ranks of plants is a very common publication style, so much so as to be very nearly universal. I'm actually very surprised at the example of the RHS - the New RHS Dictionary of Gardening uses Roman type, as does the RHS Plantfinder and the Garden, unless they've changed very recently - MPF 22:43, 5 October 2005 (UTC)

The ICBN itself italicizes all ranks, which is probably meant to be exemplary, although not many things follow it. I might note that italicized families and orders are fairly common when discussing bacteria, but I don't think I've ever seen them used for animals or protozoa. Josh


 * Indeed there is no universal standard for botany. There are many books that use italicization for all botanical names. However, there are also plenty of works that don't consistently use italicization for species and genera. Every publication sets its own standard, and very often this depends on the purpose of the publication, or what looks good in that particular spot. It is not uncommon to see new names in bold face (not italicized).
 * Indeed the ICBN uses italicized names throughout, and this is deliberate
 * For less specialized works it is quite common practice to italicize names of genera, species and lower taxa and not to italicize family names. Names at levels higher than family are not all that much used.


 * Looks to me that italicization should be used where it serves a purpose. Brya 18:15, 4 November 2005 (UTC)

Conservation status tag format errors
There's a format error in, and  , in that they force a carriage return after them (the other status tags don't). Could someone who knows how to edit these please correct them! - Thanks, MPF 01:05, 7 October 2005 (UTC)


 * Are you sure? All the status tags I tried seemed to force carriage returns, and they don't seem different internally. Josh
 * I was going on the page layout resulting at Tadorninae, where Prehistoric, Extinct and Endangered are followed by large gaps in the list, while the others aren't - MPF 10:52, 7 October 2005 (UTC)
 * Fixed by removing the blank lines. JoJan 12:44, 7 October 2005 (UTC)
 * Thanks Jo, though there's still gaps after Réunion Shelduck and Mauritius Shelduck, which aren't there in the edit page - I'm baffled - MPF 18:29, 7 October 2005 (UTC)
 * So am I JoJan 19:47, 7 October 2005 (UTC)

The problem was that some of the templates contained an extra line before the comment, which broke up the bulleted list. I've fixed it. Josh
 * Thanks, that's got it! - MPF 23:08, 7 October 2005 (UTC)

Unknown Plants
Some more plants to identify:

--Fir0002 08:18, 9 October 2005 (UTC)


 * My idents added to each photo - MPF 12:20, 9 October 2005 (UTC)
 * Thanks as always for your accurate and prompt responses MPF! --Fir0002 11:03, 10 October 2005 (UTC)

Domestication
I remain uneasy about conservation status for chicken, domesticated goose domesticated turkey etc. Instead of "secure", why not have a status "domestciated"????. jimfbleak 05:27, 10 October 2005 (UTC)
 * I'd be good with that. - UtherSRG (talk) 11:35, 10 October 2005 (UTC)

Identification of fish and seaweed
Hi there! It seems we have some fish and seaweed on the WP:RD/SCI subpage of the reference desk. Could someone go over and take a look? Thanks for your help! --HappyCamper 01:31, 14 October 2005 (UTC)

Dicot flowering plant taxoboxes
These all still contain the paraphyletic taxon Magnoliopsida. I think it is about time we instituted at least a change to Rosopsida for the orders in that taxon, which is well established as monophyletic. Anyone want to set up a robot to do the task?

It means changing

to

for the relevant orders (see list at Eudicots)

Whether the remainder should have Magnoliopsida changed to Magnoliopsida is more difficult; that group is still paraphyletic, but not all of the formal class names have been sorted and published yet.

MPF 01:40, 20 October 2005 (UTC)


 * Is any of this actually published? I don't see any citations in Eudicots. Verifiability doesn't allow us to use preprints as sources... :-) Stan 23:08, 21 October 2005 (UTC)


 * Rosopsida Batsch, Dispos. Gen. Pl. Jenens.: 28. 1788  is a published name, so we can use that safely. I agree the others are difficult, though Magnoliopsida can safely be used for the magnoliid orders, and some of the others appear to be published (second ref above, scroll down to "Higher Taxa Accepted by Reveal with Authorships") - MPF 23:41, 21 October 2005 (UTC)


 * I wasn't thinking of the name itself so much (sometimes it seems every imaginable name has been published by somebody :-) ), as the "well established" part. What do we say if some contrarian comes along and points to a giant pile of current literature that doesn't use Rosopsida? Stan 05:46, 22 October 2005 (UTC)


 * Pretty much true about everything being published! Reveal is a very highly respected botanist so it would be reasonable to say we're following his lead. I'm not aware of any large body of (recent) literature that uses anything else; it is a sibling taxon to Liliopsida which we do use, so it actually looks odd now not to use it. - MPF 09:43, 22 October 2005 (UTC)


 * It is still a bit confusing, e.g. the University of Hamburg (Germany) still gives three classes  : Magnoliopsida, Rosopsida and Liliopsida (see here : ). And AGP II doesn't even mention the word Rosopsida, but goes directly to Eudicots etc... . I have no personal preference but I think this whole question should be thoroughly discussed first, unless we attract adverse criticism. Can we rely on a recent scientific publication or on enough recent reliable sources ? JoJan 12:52, 22 October 2005 (UTC)


 * Eudicots and Rosopsida are the same taxon - they are effectively a common name and a formal scientific name respectively (like comparing Monocots and Liliopsida) - MPF 14:09, 22 October 2005 (UTC)


 * Let me try and insert a few comments
 * At the higher ranks, indeed, a very great deal of names are "validly published" and a name like Magnoliopsida can be applied to any group whatsoever (provided it does include Magnoliaceae). It has been used for the Angiosperms, for the dicots, and for who knows what other groups.
 * At the ranks above family the principle of priority is not mandatory in the ICBN, so any taxonomist publishing a system can choose almost any name he prefers.
 * The availability of names is not really an issue here as wikipedia is not a publishing taxonomist but claims to follow APG 2. Following APG 2 is a very sensible decision as this is the best published and most widely accepted system. However, if wikipedia follows APG 2 it also must use the names that APG 2 uses. Otherwise wikipedia does not follow APG 2, but is striking out on its own. Also, if wikipedia were going to adopt, say, Rosopsida what will be the formal publication this will be based on? Which of the many possible circumscriptions of Rosopsida does this refer to?
 * The APG system is quite clear in the names it uses, which above the level of order includes such names like "angiosperms", "magnoliids", "monocots", "eudicots", "rosids", "asterids" (not capitalized). One might argue about the status of these names (see below), but there is no doubt whatsoever which names APG 2 uses.
 * As to the status of these names, I suppose one might argue that these names are, or could be, formal names according to the ICBN, but there is (tacit) agreement that this is not the intent. APG 2 deliberately uses these names, and there is no suggestion that these are formal names or that formal names are going adopted (it is not hard to imagine the reasons why APG refuses to adopt 'Latin names' at these levels, and these are good reasons). It is true, that the APG-names might become formal names under the PhyloCode if this ever comes into effect. For the moment categorizing the APG names is a nice exercise in semantics: in the literal meaning of the word these are "scientific names" through-and-through. They may become formal names according to the PhyloCode, or for that matter according to the ICBN. For the moment exact status of these names is unclear, and nobody cares.
 * Actually I don't see why wikipedia should not actually do what it claims to be doing: follow APG 2. In the taxobox the rank of "class" can be substituded by "APG-name" ("APG-group" or "APG-clade") and then the relevant APG-name.
 * A taxobox is intended to help the user place the taxon in question, preferably at a glance, and the APG names are fairly distinctive and easy to remember. It is a lot easier to see "eudicots" (perhaps look up the meaning of that, once) and know where the plant belongs. Seeing Magnoliopsida the reader will, firstly, hate the long 'Latin name'; secondly, he will have to know the system being used to have a frame of reference: Magnoliopsida can be the flowering plants, the dicots, or as somebody suggested above, the "palaeodicots" or more logically the "magnoliids" ("magnoliid complex"). So, Magnoliopsida is as unhelpful and as unclear a name as one can encounter. I don't see what business it has being on wikipedia, at all (other than as a single entry)?
 * Also interesting is the name at the rank of division. According to the ICBN names such as Angiospermae and Anthophyta may be used (both are explicitly mentioned in Art 16 Ex 2) as well as Magnoliophyta or Magnoliopsida. Obviously Cronquist uses Magnoliophyta and anybody following Cronquist will use this name as well. The APG-group obviously uses "angiosperms", which is a very well known name. So, personally I would be in favour of either "angiosperms" or its equivalent Angiospermae. The latter would not be quite APG, but it looks pretty close to me. Brya 13:33, 4 November 2005 (UTC)

Regarding the taxoboxes you use for animals, plants etc.
You might want to take a look at Wikipedia:Village pump (technical)#Template behavior changes: Default and arg transclusion, start reading at For those interested. You could potentially redesign the taoboxes you use using this new syntax. —Ævar Arnfjörð Bjarmason 19:40, 20 October 2005 (UTC)


 * Unfortunately having to list all optional parameters seems to prevent them from being useful for taxoboxes, where the number of items varies drastically. I notice, though, that templates can now be chained.  When we started, we would have liked to use a single taxobox_entry template that took two parameters, as shown at right, but it wasn't really possible at the time.  I think we should adopt this; we could also add a second taxobox_entry_authority template. Josh


 * The reason why we couldn't is because there was a limit (5?) on the number of repeated uses of a template in a single article. A you can see, that limit is no longer an issue. I think we need a bot to make a assive change....... - UtherSRG (talk) 02:19, 21 October 2005 (UTC)


 * Actually you don't have to, see the hack that was posted to get around it. —Ævar Arnfjörð Bjarmason 08:37, 21 October 2005 (UTC)


 * (See the village pump page for the example that avar is talking about). That's awesome... combining the new code with old "if defined call" hack means that we can finally create a taxobox that separates data from presentation. The implementation might be a little complex under the hood, but this wont effect end-users creating new taxoboxes much. I strongly recommend we move to this model. Pcb21| Pete 09:05, 21 October 2005 (UTC)




 * Sorry, I guess I should have been paying more attention. I've created a new template using optional parameters; the Lamiales and black-footed ferret boxes to the side use it (I've removed another taxobox to make room).  It also has options fossil_range, range_map, and trinomial, which I think covers everything we need.  The only problem is that the subdivision list gains extra spaces when it's split over multiple lines in the page source.  Note I've used HTML tables instead of wikitables, which don't seem to handle whitespace intelligently enough to be used with the optional parameter templates.  What do people think? Josh
 * Great work, but you might want to use pure wikitext tables instead of html tables, unless that's troublesome, please move this to Template:Taxobox (which is unused in the article namespace) so that we can start using it on articles immitiately. —Ævar Arnfjörð Bjarmason 04:43, 22 October 2005 (UTC)

Here's the problem I'm having. If I put each If defined template on a separate line of text, the linefeeds persist when the parameters aren't defined, creating a lot of extra whitespace in the table. As such, I've been putting them all together, without whitespace. Wikitext tables don't work that way, since they can only have a single |- per line. That's why I've been using HTML tables, and I thought I had the problem solved. However, revisiting this page now a lot of whitespace has appeared in the Lamiales table (which omits more parameters), without anyone changing anything. Before we can start using this, I need to figure out what happened and see how it works for other people. Any insights would be greatly appreciated. Josh


 * I fixed that problem, it was that someone had put on a seperate line in some of the if defined templates that introduced an extra whitespace, which I removed, I also rewrote your templates to use wikitext rather than html and didn't encounter any of the problems you mentioned, to the side here is my template fed with your data (as you can see they produce identical results, with no whitespace). —Ævar Arnfjörð Bjarmason 15:57, 22 October 2005 (UTC)

That looks good - the empty comments you've put in seem to fix the problem. I've copied the whole thing to the article namespace, as requested. It took some tweaking; it seems there needs to be an empty line at the start of Template:Taxobox_entry, but that doesn't persist when you edit, so I've marked it with another comment. I've change the two samples to use it, and I think all the remaining problems are solved. Unless someone has problems with the display, we should start using it. Thanks very much, Ævar.

One minor note. I've changed it so the new templates won't automatically italicize the name in the binomial section. This is partly because it makes it hard to do Candidatus species, and partly because for consistency with the other arguments. --Josh

I still have one problem with it, the image syntax, currently it's: but I think it should be Comments? —Ævar Arnfjörð Bjarmason 15:31, 23 October 2005 (UTC)
 * image=[[Image:hermelin_winterfell.jpg|200px|Stoat]]
 * image_caption=Stoat
 * image = hermelin_winterfell.jpg
 * image_width = 200px <- optional, the default would be 200px
 * image_caption = Stoat <- optional, this would be usd as the alt text for the image as well as for the the caption
 * I went ahead and changed it, passing image_caption optionally works but image_width doesn't at all for some reason. —Ævar Arnfjörð Bjarmason 16:21, 23 October 2005 (UTC)

Some further comments: —Ævar Arnfjörð Bjarmason 16:36, 23 October 2005 (UTC)
 * When you include you shouldn't have to add &lt;br&gt; to, the template should take care of that
 * In order to make copy-pasting these to other languages easier we shouldn't have anything like  but rather , the same for ,  etc.
 * } should be split into and
 * The italics/bold/italics-bold on, and  should be added by the template, not passed to it in order to maintain a uniform look.

I disagree on several points.
 * Bold is used for groups that only contain the organisms being discussed. For Lamiales this is the order, for stoat the species, for something like Symbion everything from phylum down.  Because it varies, it can't be part of the template behavior.
 * OK —Ævar Arnfjörð Bjarmason 19:37, 23 October 2005 (UTC)
 * Automatic italicization for genera and species is usually ok, but as I said it makes it difficult to handle Candidatus species (e.g. Phytoplasma, Pelagibacter). Since names have to be italicized separately in the name and subdivision fields, I think it actually makes things simpler to have them manually italicized everywhere.
 * OK —Ævar Arnfjörð Bjarmason 19:37, 23 October 2005 (UTC)
 * Giving the date separately makes it hard to handle cases where the citation has a different form, such as when it is in parantheses (e.g. black-footed ferret) or has been notably emended (e.g. Amoebozoa). I don't really see the benefit.
 * The benefit would be that copying it to another language which doesn't use the format "$NAME, $YEAR" would be easier, but if it creates trouble it's probably not worth the effort. —Ævar Arnfjörð Bjarmason 19:37, 23 October 2005 (UTC)
 * I do support making things easier to transport between wikis; that's why most ranks are in Latin. Still, we want to make things easy to edit here, too.  It might be a good idea to have -type templates in some cases, but requiring them for every taxon would be sacrificing usability, and as such it the need shouldn't be built into the template.  Blind copy-and-paste should be discouraged anyways, since taxoboxes often have English comments in them.
 * I meant that we should pass them as, or   or something like that, when that would mean that when they're copied to another wiki the names only ever have to be translated once, which belive me is a huge benefit (I've been translating a lot of animal articles to iswiki, this could still be left out in the cases where comments or something else is needed although   should work. Another huge atvantage of this is that we'd automatically build a multilingular dictionary of taxon names which could be spidered by a bot and moved to wiktionary. —Ævar Arnfjörð Bjarmason 19:37, 23 October 2005 (UTC)

I agree with you about the tags in theory, but the pre-existing templates don't include a linefeed, and I wasn't sure it was worth creating a second set over. You can experiment with it, of course. When you're done, though, I think we should protect the new templates and start using them, since nobody else seems to have any comments or objections. Josh
 * I inserted a hack so that &lt;br&gt; is inserted between the two if is defined so there's no need for passing a linebreak manually. Please don't protect the template as non-administrators (such as myself) may want to work on improving it. —Ævar Arnfjörð Bjarmason 19:37, 23 October 2005 (UTC)

Well, once we start using it in many places it will probably have to be protected, but I'm happy to leave it for now. I've rewritten the guidelines to use the new template at /taxobox usage new, and if nobody objects, I'm going to move them to /taxobox usage and the old stuff to /taxobox usage old. It's funny how little input there's been for such a fundamental change, but I'll assume it means there's no problems.


 * Why? Just because something is widely used doesn't mean it has to be protected, protection is a temporary tool to use against vandalism, not something that should be permanent on certain pages/templates. Anyway, sure, move the usage thing. —Ævar Arnfjörð Bjarmason 21:39, 24 October 2005 (UTC)

One more thing I noticed: takes a when argument. You know more about piping than I do - is there a way to provide that in the current framework, or do we have to nest the status inside another template to accommodate this? Thanks again, Josh


 * I don't know, perhaps have two paramaters? status =  and extinct = ?—Ævar Arnfjörð Bjarmason 21:39, 24 October 2005 (UTC)

I don't think there's a way to send named parameters through an if. After some thought, I've changed things to send the status through another template. That way the &lt;br&gt; tag is taken care of, and the status templates can be used regardless of what parameters they take, just like the other arguments. I've started using the new template on some pages. Josh


 * At the moment, the new taxobox has no equivalent for the old Taxobox section binomial simple, so I still have to include an empty binomial_authority argument. The result is fine (see Late figwort for example), but it is a bit clumsy. I don't really understand the new taxobox code, so I can't fix it myself, but I'd appreciate it was fixed. Eugene van der Pijll 10:30, 29 October 2005 (UTC)

Good catch, I've fixed it. Josh

Wrong place?
This is probably the wrong forum, but I'm not sure of the correct one, so apologies.

At present articles have the time and date of the last edit at the bottom of the page. Would in be possible, or indeed desirable, to add, either there or on the Page history statistics, the current size of each article? jimfbleak 05:48, 22 October 2005 (UTC)

Separate taxonomy from systematics!
Wasn't taxonomy about classification and name-giving taxa, and systematics the study of organisms' evolutionary relationships? The latter is a research program and the former a practice.

Quoting :

Systematics: the science of organizing the history of organismal evolution the science of ordering Identification: recognizing the place of an organisms in an existing classification Use of dichotomous keys to identify organisms Taxonomy (Nomenclature): assigning scientific names according to legal rules Recall discussion of ICZN Green Book (see also Phylocode homepage) Classification: determining the evolutionary relationships of organisms A "Natural Classification" will accurately reflect phylogeny Classification should be a hypothesis of evolutionary relationships

Shouldn't we divide taxonomy from systematics more clearly? Even in the taxoboxes? I noticed that the French wikipedia put a 'classical classification' (with Linnean categories) in their taxoboxes as well as a 'phylogenetic classification' (without Linnean categories). This seems like a good practice. Maybe we can do the same at other wikipedia's but call these Taxonomy and Systematics respectively. Fedor 09:41, 1 November 2005 (UTC)


 * I think that some professionals and near-professionals in this field use "taxonomy" to include much of what is called "systematics" above. I am sure that "taxonomy" was regualrly so used in the popular essays of Stephen Jay Gould for example. I am not sure what the usage is in actual professional publications. DES (talk) 18:48, 1 November 2005 (UTC)
 * Molecular biology is the great mangler of technical language (just consider the mangling that "homology" has gone through *sheesh*), and "taxonomy" has not escaped being a victim. Professional molecular biologists can be found to often use "taxonomy" to refer to organismal relationships, despite its improper usage ... another example of "proper is as proper does" unfortunately. Courtland 01:56, 2 November 2005 (UTC)


 * taxobox is part of WikiProject Tree of Life. Perhaps this belongs on their Talk page.  (SEWilco 02:38, 2 November 2005 (UTC))


 * I think it would be useful if you created an example or two of your proposed changes. Pcb21| Pete 11:23, 2 November 2005 (UTC)


 * The usage of taxonomy versus systematics is slippery. Actually there are three elements: systematics, taxonomy and nomenclature. Taxonomy is the real work of dealing with organisms, defining taxa and giving them a name. Taxonomy happens in Herbaria and Natural History Museums. Systematics concerns itself with evolutionary relationships, and these days this means DNA and cladistics. Nomenclature deals with the framework of names, that taxonomists have to deal with. Systematics and nomenclature cannot exist without taxonomy, and taxonomy is not immune to the results of systematics and nomenclature. The exact boundaries and exact usage are slippery. Brya 08:00, 5 November 2005 (UTC)

Whitespace problems in new taxobox
User:Snottygobble added diversity and synonym templates to the new taxobox, with the effect that some ugly whitespace was added to taxoboxes without these parameters. Trying to remove this whitespace, I totally broke the Banksia page (see ). Does anyone know how to solve this? -- Eugene van der Pijll 17:54, 4 November 2005 (UTC)
 * It's solved. Thanks, Josh! Eugene van der Pijll 10:26, 5 November 2005 (UTC)

Cultivar Infobox
I've added a new cultivar infobox, as shown at right. It's a single template, but should match the appearance of the older multi-template version. Since there are only a few articles on cultivars, I've taken the liberty of updating them all. Let me know if there are any problems with this, or any other templates that should be redone. Josh

Article layout
Check out Featured article review, particularly Featured article examples. The goal is to standardize the basic layouts of featured articles of a specific type. There doesn't appear to be any real standard section divisioning for organisms, though three featured articles were similar enough that I tweaked them to be in the same format. Do the participants of this project think it would be useful to come up with a standard? Tuf-Kat 02:52, 27 November 2005 (UTC)

Stub proposals

 * Copied over from Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Plants - MPF 21:43, 27 November 2005 (UTC)

This seems a good place to mention that the Stub sorting project is proposing two new subcategory stubs to break up the 8 page monster listing under. Specifically, I've proposed   and   . If you have an opinion in the matter, just post it on the Stub proposal page under the appropriate header. -- EncycloPetey 16:15, 27 November 2005 (UTC)

Fern Identification
Hi! I've got some fern photos for identification. Thanks! --Fir0002 22:31, 4 December 2005 (UTC)



Image Placement
Hi! Could someone tell me where the best place to put this image is? It was taken at the National Botanical Gardens in Canberra, and it looks like some kind of parasite, but I'm wondering if there is a better article than "parasite"? Thanks --Fir0002 06:02, 5 December 2005 (UTC)
 * Platycerium bifurcatum is an epiphytic Australian staghorn fern (and not a parasite). Unless you want to write an article about the species, you could place the photo at the Platycerium article. JoJan 14:32, 5 December 2005 (UTC)
 * Thank you! --Fir0002 06:13, 6 December 2005 (UTC)

Standardize Taxonomy
So far, looking through pages for various reptile lineages, I've found class Reptilia, class Sauropsida, class Archosauria, and class Aves. Various archosaurs are listed under each of these classes--birds obviously are Aves, dinosaurs and pterosaurs are currently Archosauria, crocodiles are Reptilia, and the entry for Archosauria itself is Class Sauropsida! This is needlessly confusing. Someone on Talk:Sauropsid had the idea to use the taxonomy presented in Benton's textbook Vertebrate Paleontology, which is widely used and well respected. While I personally have a few minor quibbles with that taxonomy (found here ), I think it would be an excellent starting point to implement in order to reach some form of standardization within Wikipedia entries. Who's with me? Dinoguy2 20:13, 9 December 2005 (UTC)


 * I am happy with that. My only caveat is that, in the relevant places, you make clear what the alternative classifications have been used in the past and why they are no longer the most preferred. Pcb21 Pete 23:48, 9 December 2005 (UTC)


 * It's a good idea to have this information somewhere, but I'm not sure on which page it would best fit. It would be a little redundant to have it repeated over multiple pages. Maybe add a new section on this to Taxonomy, or to How to read a taxobox, or both? Dinoguy2 00:05, 10 December 2005 (UTC)

This isn't a general taxonomy problem, just one for the vertebrates. Notes on alternate systems should be given on pages they apply to - like vertebrate and reptile. I think Benton's looks like a good standard to follow. Josh

Dinosaur is a FAC!!! Yay!!
Hi, Just a friendly reminder that Dinosaur is a FAC. Please vote & leave comments here, Featured article candidates. Plus, if you want to see it appear on the main page, don't hesitate to lend a hand to improve the article. Thanks, Spawn Man 22:44, 11 December 2005 (UTC).

Authority of Moreton bay bug
The authority given in the Moreton bay bug taxobox is "(Lund, 1793)". Currently, Lund (taxonomy) redirects to Peter Wilhelm Lund, born in 1801. This is obviously incorrect. Does anyone know the correct reference? Eugene van der Pijll 08:43, 12 December 2005 (UTC)


 * Should be N.T. Lund --nixie 08:49, 12 December 2005 (UTC)
 * Thanks. I've changed the link in that article. But that means there are two zoologists both cited as "Lund". Is that possible? Should Lund (taxonomy) now be a disambiguation page? Eugene van der Pijll 09:25, 12 December 2005 (UTC)
 * Yes, and I've just made it so. - UtherSRG (talk) 12:07, 12 December 2005 (UTC)

Bird Identification
Hi! Can any identify these photos? I think it is a crow but then I think just about all black birds are :-)! --Fir0002 07:19, 14 December 2005 (UTC)


 * Hi! Its a Pied Currawong (Strepera graculina) - see . Richard Barlow 10:39, 14 December 2005 (UTC)


 * Btw, the pic on the left is a good image of the bird from an unusual angle - maybe it could be used on the Currawong page? Richard Barlow 12:51, 16 December 2005 (UTC)

Indicating missing images in taxoboxes
Hi folks. There are lots of people who take and post pictures of various species of plants and animals(see ) and they would be willing to contribute to taxobox images if they knew there was a need. The species taxoboxes without images do not make this apparent. I notice that the french wikipedia uses an image with a stub message (see Houlock) that makes the lack of the image apparent. I have recently started to add a similar placeholder image, but I understand that it is not very nice. I imagine that it should be possible to put up a default text when the image is missing. Would appreciate your opinions on the matter. Shyamal 12:01, 16 December 2005 (UTC)


 * Sounds like a very good idea... a "taxobox wanted" stub might not be a bad idea either.


 * I don't particularly like the idea. I think there are more taxa for which getting a picture will be extremely difficult than there are easy ones.  This means that most articles will basically be marked as defective for the forseeable future.  I'm all for a drive to get more images, but, short of the more visible plants and animals, free use images for most species will be hard to find.  Any list generated by these tags will be unmanageably large and alphabetised by article title and therefore of limited use.  --Aranae 18:28, 16 December 2005 (UTC)

 StatusEndangered

...


 * I don't like the idea either. We write the articles for our readers, not for the editors; this request is addressed to us editors, and should therefore go on the talk page. As it is, it's a particularly ugly image that immediately grabs the attention of the reader (see right). For the large majority of readers that do not have a picture of the subject, this means their attention has moved from the useful information that is available, to the useless message that something is not available. Have I mentioned that the image is also hideously ugly? Eugene van der Pijll 22:40, 16 December 2005 (UTC)

Yes, enormous ugly images in taxoboxes are not a very good idea. de: has a list of articles without images (de:Portal:Lebewesen/Artikel ohne Bilder) split to the categories in which they belong. These lists were made by Benutzer:Aka; maybe someone can ask him to make this lists also on other wikipedias. Ucucha (talk)  06:06, 17 December 2005 (UTC)


 * I have made a list of all articles with a taxobox in the 2005-12-11 database dump, that do not have an image. I've put it at WikiProject Tree of Life/Articles without images. Eugene van der Pijll 14:31, 17 December 2005 (UTC)


 * Great, thanks all. The decision is clear. Shyamal 04:21, 18 December 2005 (UTC)

Identification of a chicken
Can someone please identify this photo: Image:MG 9563.jpg, it's one of those fluffy chooks --Fir0002 02:23, 18 December 2005 (UTC)

Seeing other language names
I hadn't even noticed that there are names from other languages until someone edited them on a page I was watching (I saw the "in other languages", just hadn't noticed that the links pointed to common names). Is there any way I can set the controls so I can see them without going into the edit page? Otherwise, why aren't they just visible, perhaps next to the language links? I like seeing other names, particularly for plants native to other regions, as there are often etomological hints to old usages, etc.SB Johnny 11:11, 18 December 2005 (UTC)


 * They are actually interwiki links. You can see them by moving your mouse over the links at the sidebar. Ucucha (talk)  13:35, 18 December 2005 (UTC)


 * That works, but is kind of a pain. Is there any great reason why they shouldn't be visible? SB Johnny 13:32, 24 December 2005 (UTC)

Articles that need taxoboxes
Does anyone support the use of a template to mark new and exisitng pages that need a taxobox/ distinct from the ToL cleanup template (if it still exists)? --nixie 04:01, 19 December 2005 (UTC)
 * That would be nice for people like me who don't do taxoboxes :). SB Johnny 17:08, 19 December 2005 (UTC)

How's this look? This article could be improved by the addition of taxonomic information. If you are familiar with the organisms taxonomy, please add a taxobox. Category:Tree of Life taxobox cleanup --nixie 13:56, 21 December 2005 (UTC)


 * "Tree of Life taxobox cleanup" is ambiguous (it sounds like the taxobox is wrongly coded). "Articles needing taxoboxes" would be better a name, I think.Circeus 06:52, 1 January 2006 (UTC)

Remember to put boxes like this on the Talk page. Gdr 10:34, 1 January 2006 (UTC)
 * I'd agree that these should be put on the talk page or just the included on the main article. Either would create a list for people to work from without putting another template box on lots of articles. As to the taxoboxes themselves... there are a few versions floating around as a result of the meta-templates issue. I think there's a possibility of coming up with a single template ( that should satisfy everyone soon. Hoping for more input from the people who put together the taxoboxes in the first place. --CBD ☎ ✉ 12:39, 1 January 2006 (UTC)

Identification of cows
Can someone please identify the photos of these cows: Image:MG 9351.jpg, Image:MG 9352.jpg ? Thanks --Fir0002 10:41, 19 December 2005 (UTC)


 * Wrong sex . . . it's a bull, not a cow ;-) It looks like a Charolais to me. - MPF 16:21, 24 December 2005 (UTC)

inactive project? WikiProject_Viruses
There's a inactive WikiProject tag on WikiProject_Viruses


 * 132.205.45.148 20:04, 20 December 2005 (UTC)


 * I wish the people who go round pointing these stupid pointless tags on things would spend their energy on creating content. Pcb21 Pete 14:05, 21 December 2005 (UTC)

Speaking of creating content...
Not sure whether this is proper wikiquette (sp?), but I have a request that whomever might have something to contribute come on over to the List of publications in biology, a page that needs some serious help. Since there are so many different sub-disciplines in biology, the more people who have a glance and add what publications they know have been influential, the better. -Safay 18:26, 21 December 2005 (UTC)

Help with classification
Hi. I noticed that the Alvord cutthroat trout page states that its trinomial name is Oncorhynchus clarki subsp. However, the Cutthroat trout page says that Oncorhynchus clarkii subsp refers to the Snake River fine-spotted cutthroat trout. Which one is correct? Also the Yellowfin cutthroat trout page says that it's trinomial name is salmo clarki macdonaldi but I found another website that says it is Oncorhynchus clarki macdonaldi. I have added that one to Cutthroat trout, but I'm not sure if that's right. Please help. Thanks. --Khoikhoi 07:57, 24 December 2005 (UTC)
 * "subsp." is just shorthand for "an unspecified subspecies" (so shouldn't be in italics). I'd guess a google search ["Alvord cutthroat trout" Oncorhynchus] ought to supply the relevant subspecies names without too much difficulty - MPF 16:26, 24 December 2005 (UTC)
 * Sorted. The two ones tagged "subsp." are both subspecies which have not been formally described, so they don't have trinomials yet. The name Salmo clarki macdonaldi is an old synonym from before the genus Oncorhynchus was split off from Salmo. - MPF 17:11, 24 December 2005 (UTC)

Unidentified Orchids?
Hi! Could someone help out in the identification of these photos:

Thanks! --Fir0002 10:19, 24 December 2005 (UTC)


 * Sorry, Blind Cervidae (no-eye deer) - I'm not very good on orchids - MPF 16:39, 24 December 2005 (UTC)


 * Have you any other ideas where I could go to get them identified? I kinda want to put one up on FPC and can't without naming it properly --Fir0002 21:46, 8 January 2006 (UTC)


 * Have you tried WikiProject Plants? It,snot very active ATM, though. Circeus 21:55, 8 January 2006 (UTC)

Unidentified plants
Hi! Back again (already!), here are a range of plants for identification:

Thanks for your expertise --Fir0002 10:40, 24 December 2005 (UTC)

Unidentified purple flower
Here is some more photos!

Merry Christmas! --Fir0002 01:52, 25 December 2005 (UTC)
 * Hi Fir - it is a Linaria species, not sure which one (there's about a hundred of them to choose from) - MPF 19:09, 25 December 2005 (UTC)