Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Birds/Archive 2

message: I'm coming back to my Taxo-categorization. After doing :category:Caprimulgiformes, I hit something of a snag in Ardeidae, and am currently in the process of merging Heron into it.
Ardea redirected to Heron, which had almost all the info belonging in Ardeidae, only excluding egrets and bitterns. "Heron" as a name technically makes little taxonomical sense to be made distinct from ardeidae or even limited to a single genus, so heron now redirects to heron (disambiguation).
Are there opponents to this? Circeus 21:32, August 8, 2005 (UTC)
Since Bitterns only duplicated info from Ardeidae, it also has been merged and redirected. Egret, however, I can do with. Circeus 22:06, August 8, 2005 (UTC)
Damn! Looks like all family links for species in Ardeidae were directed into Heron or bittern. Adjusting that as I go. Circeus 22:15, August 8, 2005 (UTC)
Phew! Ardeidae is done. feel free to expand Ixobrychus and Botaurus.Circeus 22:51, August 8, 2005 (UTC)
:There is a similar problem with Crow and List of Corvus species. I linked the latter via categories as the reference page for Corvus; it is not a proper page, but it is satisfying from a taxonomical standpoint and links to the Crow page. The latter uses a weird way to list the species and besides, the title is not exactly accurate (even considering that crows and ravens are rather arbitraryly distinguished). Dysmorodrepanis 03:47, 28 April 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Ciconiiformes taxo categorization 

message: returning to do some taxo-categorization, I noticed that :Category:Wading Birds could use some population, but I seriously lack the competence to do that. Can someone have a look at it? Circeus 03:24, 28 December 2005 (UTC)
replies: text: Shouldn't it be :Category:Wading birds? This is unhelpful as a category anyway. Although wader in British English is a clearly defined taxonomic group ( = Shorebird in NAm), what is a wading bird? Does it include eg waders, stork, herons, flamingos Hammerkop, Boatbill, etc? I think that the tighter well-defined taxonomic terms are better. jimfbleak 07:33, 28 December 2005 (UTC)
replies: text: I hadn't even noticed that incorrect naming. I'll submit that through CFD later then. Circeus 07:41, 28 December 2005 (UTC)

text: In North America, at least, "wading birds" refers to the Ardeidae, Threskiornithidae, Ciconiidae, and Phoenicopteridae only - perhaps the Gruiiformes might be included, but not any of the Charadriiformes. (Population of :Category:Wading birds will begin shortly.) - Aerobird 03:50, 5 March 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Given as how the term has either includes or excludes shorebirds depending on where you are should we even use it as a category?Sabine's Sunbird 07:56, 5 March 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: I would say 'yes'; herons et al are undisputably "wading birds". Perhaps :Category:Shorebirds should be subcat to :Category:Wading birds (as well as :Category:Birds)? - Aerobird 15:49, 5 March 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Wading birds oddly empty 

message: The name of :Category:Controversial birds seems to be "odd" at best.  Any ideas for better names?  I'm too tired to come up with any alternatives at this point, but thought I'd point it out... Tomertalk 10:35, 15 March 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Please can you explain what you don't like about the current name? SP-KP 17:47, 6 April 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: I think the name is OK. The category is somewhat hodge-podge, true, but it is a wonderful repository for what is mentioned in the description (in fact, somebody was asking for exactly such a thing last week or so, only I can't seem to find the post now). I have added a number of taxa in the last few days, and think that ultimately the category would be split into sub-categories, like taxonomical uncertainties, population status uncertainties etc.Dysmorodrepanis 02:57, 28 April 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: To come bumbling back in 2 months later bli comment intertwixt, sorry 'bout that (I got a job, yay!,  so my wikitime has been severely reduced...), what I dislike about the name is that it makes it sound like the birds themselves are controversial, rather than that there is controversy about them within the scientific community.  A name like "controversial birds" brings to mind things like "should the bald eagle be taken off the endangered species list?" or "should turkeys be associated with thanksgiving?" or "what kind of rabbit lays easter eggs?".  A word other than "controversial" seems to be in order.  It may make sense within the hardcore ornithological world ("is the ivory-billed woodpecker really pecking away in Arkansas?", etc.), but the word "controversial" seems odd when applied to birds for "the rest of us".  TIA.  Tomertalk 04:45, 16 May 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  odd category name 

message: Hello guys. Please take a look at Wikipedia:Categories_for_deletion#Category:Alcidae_to_Category:Auks. Conscious 12:39, 3 May 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Category merging 

message: Two categories related to this project are up for deletion/merge. Please voice your opinions on the matter here. Joelito (talk) 18:41, 8 May 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Merging categories 

message: Apparently there was a misunderstanding about recategorization—"Avifauna of" categories got renamed to "Endemic birds of", so that, for example, the Eurasian Collared-Dove is now in Category:Endemic birds of Southeastern United States!  I asked User:Cyde to stop his bot from making the conversions (though I may not have been in time) and brought it up at WP:CFD, so you don't have to do that, dear reader.  But maybe somebody from this project needs to keep an eye on this recategorization.  And I'm not all that interested in categories :-)  —JerryFriedman 05:17, 3 March 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  "Endemic" birds categories 

message: The taxobox examples don't use the templates defined for Tree of life taxoboxes.  Is this simply because the examples predate the templates?  If so, shouldn't the examples be changed to use the templates?  In addition, it seems like there could be one or two custom taxobox_begin templates for Aves, that would fill in all the common fields and potentially even add categories.  For example, there could be a taxobox_aves_family template that does all of what is in the family taxobox up to and including the "Family:" line in the table, with a usage like .  Any article using this template could be categorized (in the template) into a category for the given order.  With 4 templates (for family and genus, with and without picture) the amount of "table" code in the articles for generating the taxoboxes would be significantly reduced.  If there's any interest in this, I could create the templates.  -- Rick Block 16:23, 6 Nov 2004 (UTC)
replies: text: Yes, no one has gotten around to updating the Bird examples. So feel free to go ahead and update at your leiure. I strongly advise against making specialized taxobox template, though. You might want to search the Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Tree of Life discussions and archives for the reasonings against the specialization. I believe it was discussed in regards to cetaceans, so that might be a good point to search for. - UtherSRG 17:29, 6 Nov 2004 (UTC)
thread_title:  taxobox templates 

message: Just wanted to say I have started to apply the new taxobox syntax through bird articles, at least those who have pictures (Yes, I am that biased...). I'm also sorting them down into families (sometimes even subfamilies) I've done gruiformes and started anseriformes (actually, Anatidae for the time being). I will likely go back soon and also apply it to unimaged taxoboxes. Circeus 01:26, Apr 26, 2005 (UTC)
:Okay, I might have done 2 very stupid things in implementing the new taxoboxes
:# I systematically removed the genus link because it wasn't in the base taxobox. While I won't add them back into all the gruiformes articles, I will no longer remove them , and rather add them when they are lacking.
:#I also reduced the width of the picture in the taxobox to 200px for higher level to bring them in line with the Species. I will also stop doing this (although I'd still prefer them to be the same width, I won't infringe on a previous consensus).
:Circeus 14:42, Apr 26, 2005 (UTC)
The genus should be linked (and not bolded) if the article does not describe the genus. The genus should be bold (and not linked) if the article is about the genus. This is true for all taxa. If the article is about the whole genus and is a single species, then both the genus and the species should be bolded and unlinked, etc. Please make any corrections. I'll help. *grins* - UtherSRG 14:52, Apr 26, 2005 (UTC)
You've made a few other mistakes...
# If there is no image, comment out the whole line so that there isn't a gap in the taxobox.
# The species entry in the taxobox should be G. species, not species or Species.
- UtherSRG 15:14, Apr 26, 2005 (UTC)
:Anserinae are done bearing the new coments in mind. Circeus 16:19, Apr 26, 2005 (UTC)
:dendrocygninae and tadorninae: check. Oh, and I'll stop putting the same things as captions and alt text for species boxes... Circeus 19:58, Apr 26, 2005 (UTC)
::If the image is more specific (such as male vs female plumage or winter plumage) then the caption should call attention to this detail. Otherwise, yeah, leave it out and let the taxobox title serve as the image caption. - UtherSRG 11:43, Apr 27, 2005 (UTC)
:::*Sigh* I am not going back to put back in these dozens of captions. Sorry. I'll happily resume putting captions in new ones, though. Currently wrapping up Anatinae with Aythya. I've just noticed quite a few genus names used to redirect (since I've now created the articles) to higher groups. Sounds extremely dodgy to me. Circeus 22:29, Apr 29, 2005 (UTC)
::category:Anatinae: done! Circeus 02:03, Apr 30, 2005 (UTC)
:Anseriformes: done!
I noticed that as of recently, the first taxon in species lists in genus taxoboxes (or ssp lists in species t'boxes) is marked with an asterisk instead of the usual unnumbered-list-square-bullet thing. E.g. here: Perisoreus. What gives? This is neither nice nor good - one could place the type species or nominate ssp in the first position to make it distinguishable, but it really looks like a bug to me. The code looks OK, and IIRC this phenomenon has only appeared since 3 weeks or so. Dysmorodrepanis 12:57, 15 June 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: It's an artifact of the bug "Fix" implemented by Brion VIBBER. I've re-opened the bugzilla report he listed in his edit to template:taxobox. - UtherSRG (talk) 13:37, 15 June 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  New taxobox implementation 

message: See Wikipedia:WikiProject Stub sorting/Criteria for a discussion of a new stub tag for bird stubs. —msh210 17:53, 8 Feb 2005 (UTC)
thread_title:  stubs 

message: I wonder if we can have a common structure for inclusion of sonograms. Shyamal 01:41, 16 October 2005 (UTC)
thread_title:  Structure - Sonograms 

message: Why exactly are bird names given in uppercase? I noticed that Britannia doesn't do this (they say "snowy owl", rather than "Snowy Owl" for example). Where did this style come from? Stevage 08:28, 6 April 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Thanks, and thanks for the note on my talkpage. I had actually looked at the Tree of Life wikiproject for a discussion on the subject and somehow missed that one. I see that the topic has been done to death, and that the conflict between "outside" Wikipedians such as myself (who want total consistency) and "insider" Wikipedians such as ornithologists etc (who want to respect existing conventions) is well known. Guess I'm just going to have to cry myself to sleep. Stevage 13:27, 6 April 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Upper case bird names 

message: User Amotis has been systematically adding a link to a site with videos on hundreds of articles about birds (see his contributions). Now normally whenever I see someone adding the same link to multiple sites with no additional content I remove that link everywhere they inserted it. However I hesitate in this case because I'm concerned it might actually be considered a valuable and relevant link. Could I get some opinions on this from the bird experts? Does the usefulness of this particular link outweight the fact that it was spammed? See here for my original post to the Spam project on this. Thanks much! --AbsolutDan (talk) 17:57, 25 April 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Ok thanks, I will leave them there - call it extenuating circumstances? --AbsolutDan (talk) 00:46, 27 April 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Amotis - linkspam or useful additions? 

message: User:Krun is changing article titles from Wikipedia standard Upper-case initial letters to a different standard. Would someone like to speak nicely to him and ask him to stop? SP-KP 21:26, 27 April 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Dsmdgold has made the request, and between us we've reversed all the changes. It's ironic that the well-intentioned but ill-informed take longer to deal with than the vandals. jimfbleak 05:54, 28 April 2006 (UTC)

text: If you want to find other places, try looking at bird guides and ornithological texts.  I see no grammatical justification, but an excellent clarity justification.  For example, there are seven blue jay species in America north of Mexico, but only one is officially called the Blue Jay.  —JerryFriedman 16:31, 10 May 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: The clarity justification is weak as most instances of confusion can be averted by rewording or the addition of a few words.  The gains are hardly enough to justify wholesale tagging of regular English words into proper nouns (this strange naming convention has even extended itself to cover mammal articles); it looks like an egregious violation of English convention to the grammatically-minded, and that damages Wikipedia's credibility, especially when I read articles that begin like this: "The Lion (Panthera leo), often referred to as King of the Beasts..."--Exeunt 23:35, 25 June 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Well, the credebility of Wikipedia would indeed be dented if we did that, fortunately the article in question actually goes goes "The Lion (Panthera leo), often referred to as King of the Beasts..." It's amazing how many times I find binomial names without italics, which to be honest is far worse that the 'crime' that ornithologists commit with their capitalisation conventions. Incidentally, surely King of the Beasts is a title rather than a name, and therefore would be capitalised, same as Lord of Ruin, or Privy Chancelor or sumpthin? Sabine's Sunbird  talk 07:19, 26 June 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: I searched Bartleby.com for the term "king of the beasts."  With the exception of Aesop's Fables, which used the term as a proper noun, various established writers use the lower case form in their works.--Exeunt 08:55, 26 June 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Huh. Well, I guess titles aren't capitalised for animals. I wonder what the reasoning is for that. Sabine's Sunbird  talk 17:40, 26 June 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Names 

message: Is there any guideline for how bird calls can be made available on the bird pages. I have a small but growing collection of ogg files waiting to be added. Is there any templates that help a person find an ogg player etc. ? Shyamal 03:53, 4 May 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: I do not know of any guidelines but there are many templates for audio such as , , and more. Joelito (talk) 04:13, 4 May 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Thanks, that should do. Shyamal 05:37, 4 May 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Calls 

message: Is there a standard for distribution map colours. Some of the maps I have added follow this
*light green for breeding range
*light blue for winter range
*yellow for summer range
*Oceanic birds can perhaps be marked in darker blue as is done for the marine mammals.
These are picked off the palette in M$Paint and does not follow any rigorous RGB specification. Would be good if standard colours can be suggested on the project page. Shyamal 12:22, 15 May 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Added a section - ?I thought there was already one, but did not find it. Wrote up what I remembered, but the use in literature is fairly consistent. Dysmorodrepanis 03:16, 23 September 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: It seems American literature is slightly different. From the various field guides I've read, the colours I "associate" are - red/magenta for summer, blue for winter, purple for permament resident, with newer guides using either yellow or grey for migration (and then there's the infamous "green dots of Sibley"...). - Aerobird 01:10, 28 December 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: In any case, using red and green in the same map (e.g. red for summer only, green for all-year) should be avoided and using a light red is preferable. This way, colorblind people can always make sense of the maps (so that the summer-only distribution is light grey or the winter distribution dark grey for the more common forms of colorblindness) Dysmorodrepanis 01:55, 28 December 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Distribution map colours 

message: Hi, I found this misidentified image: :Image:Laysan.teal.arp.750pix.jpg (see description for details). I have replaced it with a correct photo in Laysan Duck, but the new one is far less good than the old one (the bird did not want to be photographed, and I had to sharpen it to get it to a somewhat publishable quality at all). The misidentified image should be renamed, and if somebody has a good photo of a Laysan Duck, please add it to the article. Dysmorodrepanis 22:10, 12 May 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Misidentified image 

message: If people need images of a phylogeny based on articles that they have found, but can not copy due to copyright issues, I can make them on request. Kim van der Linde at venus 04:08, 22 May 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Phylogeny images 

message: Hi, I've found this strange move: Ou_(bird). The new title "Ǒ" means "or" or "of" in Hawaiian (if they would write their short vowels with a breve). I am especially puzzled because I elaborated at quite some length on the pronounciation to make it clear that the name is pronounced as two distinct sounds. What gives? Dysmorodrepanis 15:54, 27 May 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Does not make sense to me, no explanation given that is satisfactory. Move back as far as I am concerned -- Kim van der Linde at venus 16:22, 27 May 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Strange page move/redirect 

message: Formal common names are capitalised. Should alternative common names be capitalised or not? Nurg 05:48, 8 July 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: I agree with you there, but what about informal common names--say English Sparrow for House Sparrow?  Snowbird for Snow Finch, Snow Bunting, Dark-eyed Junco, etc.?   (Believe it or not, here in New Mexico many people call Black-billed Magpies "snowbirds".)  That one's less clear to me.  —JerryFriedman 16:15, 10 July 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: They could go into a trivia or another appropriate section, as they are more part of local folklore or tradition, especially if there are many such names. E.g. the old name "doughbird" of the Eskimo Curlew gives a hint at why they disappeared, or stuff like a "murder" of ravens. Capitalization should be for formal names. Dysmorodrepanis 23:51, 12 July 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Capitalisation of alternative names 

message: There is neither an universally recommended citation format nor one universally used (although they occasionally seem to infer that inline/footnote citations are preferred). However, I do not use footnote citations for scientific references, and here's why:
:They obfuscate the code. WAY. One can linebreak them into the text, but in general can seriously mess up readability, especially when linking abstracts via DOI and fulltext directly for example, where a reference will go over 5 lines in this format.
:It is not easy to maintain good order in the references, as they are not given in chronological order and can neither be sorted nor viewed at a glance in the edit window..
:Scientific references are not usually of immediate interest to most readers of the text as they are only given to provide a backup where to check information. Thus, the advantage of footnotes (being able to jump and jump back) is not really borne out that much.
:Footnotes cannot deal with general background references (like field guides or the like on which descriptions of species are usually based on).
But I do use footnotes occasionally in addition. Here's how I like to do it. Note how things that are of immediate interest to understanding of the text are footnoted, whereas the source publications of information in the article are Harvard-cited.
This is not to start a discussion or to unify the citing style (there are more pressing things to do), but merely food for thought. E.g. the Archaeopteryx article, which is already cluttered without end would become night uneditable when using footnote refs. Or what to do with Dromornithidae, which nearly exclusively uses "background info" refs? So to me, it seems the most flexible thing to use Harvard refs for background stuff and footnote refs for annotations.
As a general rule, always try to read, cite and if any possible link the original sources. For example, placing the Pink-headed Duck in Netta was originally claimed in the article to be based on molecular evidence, because that's how many of us "know" taxonomy is done nowadays. Turns out it was a morphological study after all, and it was not that new either, and the evidence is slim indeed. Dysmorodrepanis 08:43, 24 August 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Citing sources 

message: Should I take it from the lack of guidance on structuring articles that "free rein" is given, rather than any specific hierarchy of headings? Thanks--GRM 21:55, 2 March 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: I guess. The exact content varies depending on the article, and on what information is avaliable. The family pages I have worked on (for example Albatross, Procellariidae, Auk) have vaguely followed the structure of the family accounts. For species and families a fairly intuitive selections of headings arises, evolution, morphology (AKA appreance, description), habitat (and or range, and migration), behaviour (encompassing or as well as diet, breeding) and some stuff on x and humans (conservation, domestication and role in culture). Sabine's Sunbird  talk 23:07, 2 March 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  Standardized content structure 

message: Charadriiformes organisation is a mess that is very hard to work with for someone lacking good ornithological knowledge: levels missing (should I separate Vanellus as an article or leave the species in Vanellinae??) or weirdly classified (Scolopacidae is just plain scary!), and not to mention I utterly disagree with listing all related families and descendant species/genera in family articles!! Circeus 18:44, Apr 30, 2005 (UTC)
:I see the problem with lapwing, which is nearly, but not quite synomymous with Vanellus, not sure of best way to deal with it. 
:The groupings in the Scolopacidae article are those given in Shorebirds, the standard text, and has  the advantage that similar birds are grouped together. The alternative would be to have articles for each genus, which for most groups, like Woodcocks, would make no difference, and for Calidrid would be unimportant. The problem would be for groups like snipe. You clearly need this article, since the snipes cover more than one genus, but a distinct Gallinago would virtually repeat the material, but without Jack Snipe. Same problem as with lapwing really jimfbleak 04:57, 1 May 2005 (UTC)
replies: text: I updated the charadriiform taxonomy to current standards. One or two things might be shaky - although they are a field where molecular systematics apparently had a real field day (suddenly, it all falls into place), there seem to be no taxonomists among the people who did the papers. So I might be wrong with Chionidi, for example, but as far as I could tell, it is the "correct" name (if there is such a thing for suborders). Dysmorodrepanis 20:07, 28 August 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Charadriiformes a mess 

message: I'm in the process of trying to get the albatross article up to FA status, something I imagine will take some time. One of the things I'm going to do is write a article for each species, and each genus, so as to cut down on all the red links that would otherwise be there. Thing is, the current species list (which has 16 species) doesn't seem to match any existing species list out there. It doesn't currently follow HBW, although this is good thing (to my mind)considering the recent, widely accpeted split of the group into 4, not two, genera. Any huge objections to my doing the list based on the one the IUCN uses for assessing their red list status? It seems to be the most commonly accpeted on I can find, and I don't mind doing the 17 articles needed (plus expanding a few of the existing ones). Sabine's Sunbird 04:47, 16 September 2005 (UTC)
thread_title:  [[Albatross]] species list 

message: So is there a consensus that the kingfishers are separated?  I assume we're following HBW, but few other sources seem to split the families as of yet.  Also there's oddballs like the Nicators, Donacobius, and Olive Warbler, what, if any "revolutionary" information should be followed?  They're changing the taxonomy on these birds constantly, and since HBW was started in 1998 there's some danger our info is already obsolete.
Just a concern, and largely for the sake of curiosity, not something too serious or critical. - Miwa 04:15, 6 January 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Kingfishers and other errata 

message: ::crossposting this from user talk (with minor edits for context), hoping someone else might have some ideas:
I need some help with this... the Vampire Finch (Geospiza nebulosa), which seems to be the Wolf Island (Galapagos) subspecies of Sharp-beaked Ground Finch (Geospiza difficilis), is not listed on the website you gave me.  That said, some sources on a google search seem to call the Sharp-beaked Ground Finch Geospiza nebulosa instead of Geospiza difficilis, which is adding to my confusion.  Anyhoo, I'm thinking maybe it would be prudent to find some more authoritative source on Darwin's finches before proceeding with more articles, but meanwhile there are some question marks I've left in the Vampire Finch taxobox.   Tomertalk 03:01, 26 January 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Vampire Finch certainly seems to be a subspecies, but I'm not sure of what, so I can't correct the article. There seems to be general agreement that the other six Geospiza species are good. Smallweed 09:19, 27 January 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: From what I've read, the Vampire Finch is the Wolf Island subspecies of the Sharp-beaked Ground Finch... Do you happen to have access to either of the offline sources mentioned in the Darwin's finches article, or to any other possible sources that discuss the Vampire Finch?  I'd like to track down where this comes from...if the only thing that distinguishes them from the Sharp-beaked Ground Finch is their diet, I find it odd that they'd be assigned to a distinct species.  Tomertalk 09:25, 27 January 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: After a great deal of digging around, I find that a number of places call the species Geospiza difficilis and others Geospiza nebulosa, but only one that lists both.  Since none of the sources I've seen list either name as specifically referring to Sharp-beaked Ground Finch any more than to Vampire Finch (nor vice versa), it seems that there are 2 competing names.  What remains then, is to figure out which sources are more authoritative... and if there is a genuine disagreement within the scientific community over what the name of the bird should be, that can be covered in the article, but for right now, what I'm seeing is that they're the same species, with 2 different names.  A google search for Geospiza difficilis (excluding wikipedia and mirrors) returns 402 hits(), while Geospiza nebulosa (excluding wikipedia and mirrors) returns only 55().   I ran the search that way because I was thinking maybe this difference had started on wikipedia, but running the search without excluding WP and mirrors returns 466() and 67() respectively.  Conclusion:  at first blush, I see a non-wikipedia-influenced 88% usage of difficilis and a wikipedia-influenced 87.4%, I doubt that this is an inconsistency that was spawned by malicious editing on WP.  Somewhere, an additional (significant minority) name was given to this bird, and I can't figure out where or why.  I really don't have the resources available to me to figure this out on my own.  Thanks for your time, Tomertalk 10:33, 27 January 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: According to the Avibase website, Geospiza difficilis is the name used in all recent checklists for Sharp-beaked Ground-Finch. It lists three subspecies including Geospiza difficilis septentrionalis. According to the book Birds, Mammals and Reptiles of the Galapagos Islands by Andy Swash and Rob Still, this is the subspecies known as the Vampire Finch and is found on Darwin island as well as on Wolf. Tigershrike 16:21, 12 February 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Taxonomy help request 

message: I was wondering what people thought about merging the two. Is there any meaningful distinction between the two? At the moment the term petrel is used inconsistently in wikipedia - it seems to denote either the procellariids, or the gadfly petrels (as distinct from the prions, shearwaters etc) or all tubenoses. Given as how the page itself describes the petrels as being the Procellariiformes, surely a merge is in order. Which begs the question, which should merege into which? Sabine's Sunbird 09:32, 7 March 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Perhaps petrel would be better as a disamb page. I don't think a straight merge is the answer, since some procellariid birds, such as shearwaters, are rarely described as petrels, and there are the diving-petrels in a different family to the true petrels. jimfbleak 06:51, 8 March 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Well, that is the problem - petrel seems to either mean non-shearwater procellariid or all the procellariiformes. And both meanings seem to crop up in usage on different pages on wikipedia. The usage denoting all tubenoses is the most common one I have encountered in journals and books while re-writing the Albatross and Procellariidae pages, Warham, Brooke and others all use the term to encompass the whole order. And it is a more usefull usage than non-shearwater procellariid, since we already have words for them seperately, (gadfly petrels, prions and fulmarine petrels). The usage for just procellariids is also almsot always prefaced by the word true (as in Storm-petrels, diving-petrels, true petrels). Sabine's Sunbird 08:59, 8 March 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  [[Petrel]] versus [[Procellariiformes]] (merge?) 

message: ok, sorry if I'm being picky, but I noticed that instead of "blue-crowned conure" the artcle is "blue-crowned parakeet" maybe it's a UK/US thing, but I'd never heard the parakeet name before before I found it on wikipedia. Jedi of redwall 20:25, 30 March 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: I'm in favor of being picky.  In this case I don't think it's a UK/US thing.  Where aviculturists say "conure", scientists and the general public say "parakeet".  Wikipedia pretty much goes with scientific usage.  (There's probably a policy on this somewhere.)  But articles on the birds listed at conure should have a redirect from the conure name (this one doesn't) and should mention the conure name(s) in the first sentence (this one does, as you know), in my opinion.  —JerryFriedman 21:50, 30 March 2006 (UTC)

text: Ornithologcally speaking, there is no such thing as a "Conure" (or, for that matter, an "Amazon"). They are all 'offically' "Parakeets" or "Parrots". (IMHO the "generic" names are rather silly, but nobody asked me...) - Aerobird 03:46, 31 March 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: That reminds me, why is Pyrrhura molinae listed as Green-cheeked Conure?  HBW lists it as Green-cheeked Parakeet.  Should it be moved?  Can an admin do something about that?  —JerryFriedman 19:59, 31 March 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Done. - UtherSRG (talk) 20:12, 31 March 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: "Ornithologcally speaking, there is no such thing as a "Conure"" - well, ornithologically, there are Linnean names which are unambiguous, and more or less ambiguous vernaculars. "Conures" is basically "short" for "Aratinga/Pyrrhura parakeets (and the occasional oddball monotypic genus). In German, we have Keilschwanzsittiche for much the same group of long-tailed American species (though the Quaker Parakeet is a notable exception which is a Keilschwanzsittich but not a Conure. Note also that the Gemran term is only applied to the entire group of Arini parakeets, not to single species). It is a matter of taste, basically - using parakeet indiscriminately for a Aratinga, a Psittacula and a Psephotus is just as arbitrary. I for one do not have a firm opinion on that matter, although I usually use "conure" for my private work.Dysmorodrepanis 02:51, 28 April 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  blue-crowned conure/parakeet  

message: Hi. I recently wrote an article on the Elfin-woods Warbler. I submitted this article to Peer review but it only got 2 superficial replies. I would like for people here to take a look and make suggestions/recommendations. I also wrote Puerto Rican Spindalis for which I would also like suggestions/recommendations. Joelito 14:34, 3 April 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: You might want to peruse (and cite & link, since they are available freely) these papers   on the warbler's ecology.Dysmorodrepanis 02:42, 28 April 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Help needed with bird article 

message: I'm new here but already I am confused. I don't have access to Handbook of Birds of the World so I have no way of knowing what it says but the AOU, and ITIS assign the family Trochilidae to the order  Apodiformes and not Trochiliformes. I notice that Wikispecies uses the older taxonomy. I know that there is not just the one taxonomy but don't think it's Wikipedia's roll to define the standard. Why not just go with Wikispecies and let them fight it out. Could someone help me with this. --Droll 04:54, 17 April 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: With no standard, then it wod be very difficult to have a single set of consistent taxoboxes, and every article about birds would need to make ome mention of the different classification schemes. Instead, a single scheme was picked, and the differences between the schemes is described in one article.... which I can't at this moment put my finger on it. - UtherSRG (talk) 05:03, 17 April 2006 (UTC)

text: Ah... here it is.... Sibley-Ahlquist_taxonomy... and you'll see that it's linked to from quite a number of articles. - UtherSRG (talk) 05:06, 17 April 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Notice that the Wikipedia article states that "the Sibley-Ahlquist taxonomy is a radical bird taxonomy." (emphasis added) To me it does not sound like a NPOV.  WikiProject Birds states the Sibley-Ahlquist taxonomy "should be used for all articles except for those dealing with a country or region, where the appropriate local official list should be used, as in List of North American birds and British birds." So should the Project page be changed? I take it that "List of North American birds" is the AOU list. I'm not just trying to cause trouble. I think this is a really important issue. I think the project should go with Wikisource or ITIS or Species 2000 which are conservative. I know I'm coming in late in the game and I'll keep quite after this if I am alone in my POV. --Droll 06:17, 17 April 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: I don't think that there are even many libraries that have the whole of HBW, and the series isn't even complete yet. However, the bird list we use is avaliable here on their website. I find it hilarious that you want to go to a more conservative taxonomy as I've been agitating to go to one that is less conservative and actually reflects some science done in the last 15 years. Sabine's Sunbird  talk 06:55, 17 April 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: OK, I checked the web site you mention and Trochilidae is in Apodiformes and not Trochiliformes. That was my original point. As a mater of fact it is not the Sibley-Ahlquist taxonomy at all. My rant was about the Sibley-Ahlquist taxonomy. --Droll 19:15, 17 April 2006 (UTC)

text: I just checked the page List of North American birds which says it follows the AOU checklist but it does not. Check out how hummingbirds are classified. Something is fishy in the bird world. --Droll 19:46, 17 April 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: I changed the NA List to put Trochilidae into Apodiformes and to list the Bananquit as genus Incertae sedis rather than Coerebidae. This should bting the NA list into line with the AOU as far as down as family. If you see any nore discrepancies please let me know, or correct it yourself. The NA list should follw the AOU as the article states. It will take more time to comb through the article to make sure that the genus and species presentation is also in line with the AOU, but I will do that as time permits. I will also bring the state bird lists into line with AOU taxonomy. Dsmdgold 14:24, 18 April 2006 (UTC)

text: IMHO, all articles pertaining to birds in North America should use the American Ornithologists' Union taxonomy. I'd guess that the only Sibley familiar to 95% of NoAm birders is David Sibley of the field guide. - Aerobird 12:21, 18 April 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: WikiProject Birds actually says The de facto standard for Wikipedia bird articles is Handbook of Birds of the World for the northern hemisphere, and the Handbook of Australian, New Zealand and Antarctic Birds () for exclusively southern groups. It should be pointed out that like the rest of wikipedia the whole project is very much a work in progress and there are a great deal of inconsistencies, for example breaking the kingfishers into three families (something Wikipedia does that HBW does not.) And Aerobird, the reason for picking one standard rather than regional standards is the large number of birds, to use your example, that North America and Eurasia share. (Not to mention the AOU's tendency to split and lump the same species repeatedly (yes, I'm looking at you Northern Oriole)).Sabine's Sunbird  talk 12:30, 18 April 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: The problem is does HBW have any "official" status taxonomically? The Clements world checklist, used by the American Birding Association for non-American lists, would seem to be a better choice IMHO. - Aerobird 00:21, 19 April 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: The Clements list isn't online, HBW is. We need a list we can all look at. (I'd suggested using the IUCN list myself, but after the choice was made.) At this point, much as I hate HBW's overly conservative taxonomy, it's as good a standard as any. Talking about "official" lists strikes me somewhat (and I mean this in the nicest possible way, as a birder and friend of the birders myself) as birder-speak for "can I count it on my life list?". I don't think any of the lists are peer reviewed so they aren't "official" official; and outside Oz, SA, and Europe the region lists are not vetted by teams of ornithologists in the same way the AOU list is. Sabine's Sunbird  talk 06:47, 19 April 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Although the Clements list is not available in the Internet as a whole, the Clements checklist is available for specific regions at this site. I used this site as a reference for List of Puerto Rican birds. Joelito 16:40, 19 April 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Another question about taxonomic authorities 

message: Shouldn't :Category:Otidae be :Category:Otididae as per HBW? SP-KP 19:10, 1 July 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: It should be. Joelito (talk) 19:22, 1 July 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: OK, I've listed it for speedy renaming SP-KP 19:35, 1 July 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: It does not qualify for speedy. Joelito (talk) 19:52, 1 July 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Not under criterion 1? SP-KP 19:53, 1 July 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Is it a typo?...or is that family called by different names? Joelito (talk) 19:58, 1 July 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: I think it's a typo, but feel free to object at speedy renaming if you like, and make it a non-speedy SP-KP 20:03, 1 July 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Bustards 

message: === Hybrid Ratites ===
Does anybody know of any instance of hybridization between ratites (Emu X Cassowary, Emu X Ostrich, Northern Cassowary X Southern Cassowary, Ostrich X Rhea, Greater Rhea X Lesser Rhea, etc.)? I have searched the internet endlessly and have found nothing on the subject. Has it been tried by ratite farmers? If nobody knows, I would at least like to hear opinions on the matter. - 17:37, 7 July 2006
**It seems nigh on impossible for the rhea/ostritch or cassowary/emu etc. The ratites are nominally in the same order but are in different families - as far as I know there are no records of any hybrids in anything other than members of the same genus. Even within familes hybrids are unusual, so between families, no, it wouldn't happen. Between the rheas (Greater/lesser), or between the cassowaries, maybe, I haven't seen anything on it. Sabine's Sunbird  talk 22:03, 7 July 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Nowadays considered a subspecies of the Dwarf Cassowary. Might change due to molecular studies though, cassoweary taxonomy has always oscillated between over-splitting and (as currently is the case) over-lumping. Dysmorodrepanis 14:37, 6 October 2006 (UTC)
thread_title: Ratites

message: Does anybody know of any instance of hybridization between ratites (Emu X Cassowary, Emu X Ostrich, Northern Cassowary X Southern Cassowary, Ostrich X Rhea, Greater Rhea X Lesser Rhea, etc.)? I have searched the internet endlessly and have found nothing on the subject. Has it been tried by ratite farmers? If nobody knows, I would at least like to hear opinions on the matter. - 17:37, 7 July 2006
**It seems nigh on impossible for the rhea/ostritch or cassowary/emu etc. The ratites are nominally in the same order but are in different families - as far as I know there are no records of any hybrids in anything other than members of the same genus. Even within familes hybrids are unusual, so between families, no, it wouldn't happen. Between the rheas (Greater/lesser), or between the cassowaries, maybe, I haven't seen anything on it. Sabine's Sunbird  talk 22:03, 7 July 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Hybrid Ratites 

message: I believe the Ratite article could use more info. particularly in regard to farming. I can't do it as I am good with details, but not with large-scale information. I was hoping that someone with more knowledge on the subject could do it. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 64.237.252.122 (talk • contribs) .
By the way, is the Westerman's Cassowary (Casuarius papuanus) a species in it's own right or a subspecies of the Dwarf Cassowary (Casuarius bennetti)?. Please Reply. - 17:32, 31 July 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Nowadays considered a subspecies of the Dwarf Cassowary. Might change due to molecular studies though, cassoweary taxonomy has always oscillated between over-splitting and (as currently is the case) over-lumping. Dysmorodrepanis 14:37, 6 October 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Additional Ratite Info. 

message: I find the present setup (ratites = Strithioniformes) fairly untenable; it is not supported by current molecular and morphological phylogenies. Altogether, the page should be split, but there is need to collect many references first. These can be collected e.g. in my sandbox, either under "General" or "Ratites". Dysmorodrepanis 13:28, 8 February 2007 (UTC)
thread_title: [[Struthioniformes]]

message: I have yet to recieve a reply to my last post & I was wondering if anybody read it. If not, here it is again:
I think that there should be a page on hybrid macaws as they are becoming more numerous in aviculture. http://animal-world.com/encyclo/birds/macaws/information/hybrid.htm has plenty of photos & info. on them.
:Maybe you're expecting this, but… go for it!  Since you've got a good source, I'll bet you'll find it much easier to write the article yourself than get someone else to start it.  Hybrids in aviculture aren't an interest of mine, so I'm not going to write it.  —JerryFriedman 00:59, 18 July 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: The clean-up is done too, including the work on the rest of the article.  I have a couple of questions—please see the discussion page.  —JerryFriedman 01:43, 26 July 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Macaws 

message: I have big problems with the revert done to the Scrub Jay page after my revisions.
First of all, Unicolored and Mexican jays (especially the former) are NOT scrub jays!  They are Aphelocomoa yes, but that doens't make them scrub jays.  For one thing, Unicolored Jay inhabits cloudforests--nothing like dry scrub.  I realize that there should be a page for Aphelocoma, but I highly suggest making it different from the page for "Scrub jay."
How does editing this stuff work?  I see the potential for editing wars . . . —The preceding unsigned comment was added by Natureguy1980 (talk • contribs) .
:How about moving scrub jay to Aphelocoma (currently a redirect to scrub jay), so that 'scrub' isn't in the page title? I'd be happy with that - MPF 17:59, 23 July 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: I've moved it, and made a few edits. Natureguy will probably want more edits made, and tht's fine. - UtherSRG (talk) 00:32, 24 July 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Cool, I'll take a look.  Thanks for your comments earlier today! -Natureguy1980 06:11, 24 July 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Scrub Jays 

message: This page attempts to present a comprehensive synonymy of (eventually) all modern bird taxa (excluding prehistoric extinctions). It is a very helpful tool indeed, including data from such hard-to-find works as Sharpe/Hartert/Salvadori's BMNH catalog! Note that other information in the species accounts is not reviewed, so use with care. The synonymies, when present, are thorough though (the main purpose of the page in fact) Dysmorodrepanis 17:20, 15 August 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Synonyms 

message: If someone feels like it, this is the last important high-level clade in avian evolution (save for the non-taxon "Graculavidae" which would need a specialist's hand anyway, to result in an article similar to "Odontornithes") for which no page exists. 2 points of note however:
- IONO whether the list mentioned by Kim here would suggest higher-level taxonomy according to recent knowledge; these days any "definite" list is bound to be obsolete in one point or another half a year later. Also IONO in how far it is referenced.
- I would not go as far as to say that the Galloanserae are verified by evidence. What the evidence suggests is that during the mid/late Cretaceous, the galliform/anseriform lineages split from the "remaining Neognathae" lineage. That much is fairly clear. What is not clear is whether the split between galliforms and anseriforms occurred around the time of their divergence from "higher Neognathae" or later enough for them to share a distinct lineage of common ancestors separate from the other Neognathae; I would tentatively go with the former which does pose a problem if cladistic methodology is applied strictly: the hardcore cladist's assumption would be that no lineage split will occur before the preceding one has been finalized, but that this assumption is generally valid and aptly describing evolutionary reality is obviously preposterous (consequently, its major role is in debate between different schools of systematicists). But there is no real reason, considering most niches were at that time already well staked out by Enantiornithes (the arboreal land bird niches especially), why there should have been such a winding road of adaptation and re-adaptation and drastic niche shifts (bear in mind that forms we consider "primitive" in systematics are primitive only in regard to some peripheral features of lesser adaptive significance - analysis of plesio- and apomorphies should ideally be based on characters with as little adaptive value as possible), and in reality were just as well-adapted for their particular mode of life as our birds are today, only that the mode of life was more jack-of-all-trades. The one thing very rarely found in "primitive" forms indeed is a drastically derived morphology related to opening of entirely new niches, like a hummingbird's shoulders, by the oddly "modern" presbyornithids, which at the C/T boundary already had specialized into a niche today all but closed to anseriforms, suggest that these in fact do occur time and again.
What we can say is that by the C/T, ancestral modern birds as far as anyone can tell existed as the anseriform lineage (fact), the galliform lineage (most likely), and anything from one to a handful of other lineages which in the Paleogene split up into the immediate ancestors of today's families. Many of these were of the "graculavid" shorebird type, but these apparently represent both ancestors of all kinds of unrelated modern families which share the "amphibious" ecotype, and in all likelihood some lineages that went extinct later. As far as anyone can tell, arboreal Neornithes did either not yet exist by the C/T, or, more probably but only based on circumstatial evidence, existed as some small lineages barely holding their own against the Enantiornithes et al. To be sure, a Late Cretaceous observer arguing along the lines of reasoning given today by people with a half understanding of evolution would have considered the ancestors of the Passeriformes, probably the most successful birds ever, a marginal lineage almost certainly doomed to extinction. Reality proves that the success (i.e., species- or ecotype-richness) of a lineage at any point of time cannot provide an appropriate assessment of their future success at all. Dysmorodrepanis 19:15, 29 September 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: I have started building Galloanserae at fowl. Galloanserae redirects there. Luckily, the English language distinguishes between "fowl" and "poultry". Dysmorodrepanis 04:16, 10 January 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  [[Galloanserae]] 

message: I think it should go back under Rhodonessa. Livezey's review is the only one suggesting it goes into Netta, and while this was de rigeur for some time, Collar's critique - that the taxon is simply to aberrant to justify this - seems a very valid point to me. Molecular data won't be upcoming in the foreseeable time in all probability. Dysmorodrepanis 09:38, 13 November 2006 (UTC)
thread_title: [[Pink-headed Duck]]

message: Hi folks, I just completed most of a systematics/taxonomy review of the Anseriformes. There is still some stuff I have not read, but apart from disassembling the Goose/Anserinae pages, the taxonomy (which was like 10 years obsolete) is now fairly up to current standards. Much uncertainty remains, which all is discussed in the articles, but better to be equivocal when the data is than to give potentially false information. Especially the Anatidae page is now far more robust as regards taxonomy and systematics. Dysmorodrepanis 13:10, 17 November 2006 (UTC)
thread_title: Anseriformes

message: I have created a stub for Streak-headed Mannikin Lonchura tristissima, lumping White-spotted Mannikin L. t. leucosticta in with it because of info in Coates (see ref).  If anyone has better or more recent info that suggests the latter needs needs full species treatment, please let me know.  Thanks. Maias 05:30, 3 February 2007 (UTC)
thread_title: Streak-headed Mannikin

message: Hi y'all, I have gone over the Evolution section and reviewed last year's papers for it. Basically, the evolutionary history of the modern penguins is as clear as it can possibly get in the absence of fossils for the first lap (good luck trying to dig stuff up in Byrd Land - incidentially the place of origin of more stem-group lineages of living birds than any other place in the world it seems). FWIW, it could be useful to add a phylogenetic drawing; the Baker paper has a nice one, but caveat emptor - the divergence times must be seen with some bit of leeway as they are not based on material evidence. And it would be very nice to add maps, but the paleomaps available either are cylindrical projections or not true paleomaps at all as they show the continent's modern shape. At any rate, enjoy. It is very nice to have in mind in case you need to go mano a mano with some creationist; morphology, DNA, geography, climate, it all just so nicely fits together. Dysmorodrepanis 21:48, 4 February 2007 (UTC)
thread_title: [[Penguin]]

message: Two new pictures that might inspire someone to write an article: :Commons:Image:Syrigma sibilatrix.jpg and :Commons:Image:Scarlet-headed Blackbird.jpg.  I'm mentioning this at the request of the photographer, Ken Erickson.  Anyone have a South American book?  —JerryFriedman 19:39, 16 February 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: I can do the heron one as I have the HBW that covers them. Give me a day or two. Sabine's Sunbird  talk 20:32, 16 February 2007 (UTC)

text: Who would have thought?  The page on this species from Ridgely and Tudor is one of the few pages of that book visible at Google Book search.  So Scarlet-headed Blackbird is started.  —JerryFriedman 00:11, 20 February 2007 (UTC)
thread_title: New pictures

message: See my comments under :Image:Piping guan.jpg. I shall whip up a quick stub for Aburria, because the cracids are all messed up regarding redirects etc. Dysmorodrepanis 17:25, 26 February 2007 (UTC)
thread_title: Another cracid ID request

message: Anyone want to improve Mixed-species feeding flock?  I put some open questions on the Talk page.  —JerryFriedman 20:10, 24 February 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Mixed-species flocks 

message: And while you're at it, I tagged Bird song for cleanup.  I'm thinking that we need an article on Bird sounds that covers calls and non-vocal sounds and has a link to the article on song, but maybe all of it should be under one title.  (At present "birdcall" and "bird call" redirect to Bird song.)  —JerryFriedman 02:22, 2 March 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Bird song 

message: Is there any general guideline on how large or small a region can be for which a regional list could be considered worthwhile ?
Also if regional lists are worth having, it might be a nice idea to have more than mere links by having seasonal status histogram bars for each species. A template to make histograms for each month along with breeding status would be useful for that. An example here  Shyamal 03:59, 8 March 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: There are a number of lists at US state level, and one for a Califrornian county, although I personally would not consider the latter justifies an enc article. The histogram is a good idea, but would involve a lot of work, and might make articles for countries with a large avifauna too large - witness the problems with the to-do list that became so large it could not be opened. jimfbleak 06:51, 8 March 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Another problem with histograms is where do you get them from? I would think lifting the bar-charts out of the back of A Birder's Guide to Florida, for instance, would be copyvio... - Aerobird 16:59, 8 March 2006 (UTC)

text: It depends on the number of status levels. Most regional lists have at least subjective rankings of commonness. I think we are using information here and not content itself and therefore not be a copyvio but  fair use. Otherwise by the same token, we would not have a right to produce even distribution maps based on what are given in the books. Shyamal 03:33, 9 March 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Regional lists of birds and seasonality 

message: Many of the parrot articles contain substantial inforamtion about parots as pets. Most of the information is roughly the same, comlemented with some species specific information. Would it be a good idea to combine the pet information in a seperate article (Aviculture (parrots)), and link this from the obvious candidate pages as a disambig link. I think this can become in the first place a much better page than just have snippets here and there. Furthermore, it will free the species pages from duplicated stuff. What do others think about this? Kim van der Linde at venus 22:56, 10 May 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: This would be a good idea.  I assume that there would be a section on the page for each type of bird and the special considerations of that bird as a pet.  Another option would be to have a separate article on each bird such as (Lesser Sulfer Crested Cockatoo (Pet)) as well as the article on the bird in general.--Counsel 23:40, 10 May 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: The way I see it is that there is first a general section, after which each species gets its species specific header. We can than make a template that full automatically makes a link at the top of the species article linking to that section. Kim van der Linde at venus 02:39, 11 May 2006 (UTC)

text: To add, I can see that species with substantial species specififcc pet info get their own page, but that is to be seen. The sections have generally a high how-to and low encyclopedic value, so I think this won't be an serious issue. Kim van der Linde at venus 04:33, 11 May 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: I'd prefer to have no separate articles.  Instead, Parrot could have all the information on keeping parrots as pets, Amazon parrot could have all the additional information that applies just to amazons, Yellow-headed Parrot could have all the information that applies just to that species, and so forth.  I know that some disagree, but I'm in favor of having all the encyclopedic information on one taxon in one article. —JerryFriedman 18:58, 11 May 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Parrot general information and parots as pets are two really different things, so I view them as two seperate subjects. Kim van der Linde at venus 19:06, 11 May 2006 (UTC)

text: After a good night sleep, I realised that your proposal will lead to the situation that a person starts with the species page, finds the speciesi specific info, get forwarded to the genus page for the genus specific info, and finally gets forwarded to the parrots page for everything that is parrot general. As I think most current information at species pages is actually more general, this will result in many of these constructions. To avoid sending the reading around in wikipedia and the need for those people to combine the information themselves, bringing stuff together in one article, with a redirect direct at the top of the page, will make it easier for those people top find the pet related information (which in my opinion now has to often a level of howto, and instruction). Kim van der Linde at venus 12:13, 12 May 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: That's the construction we usually have.  For instance, Yellow-headed Parrot doesn't say they're zygodactylous.  You have to go to amazon parrot for that, and I see no particular reason to have the information there.  Why not have it at parrot only?  So readers are sent around and have to combine information themselves; the alternative is to say at every species article that parrots are zygodactylous.  I don't see why the pet information should be different.  I agree with you that a lot of the pet information is of the how-to kind, though, and the policy is not to have that.  —JerryFriedman 16:21, 12 May 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: The difference I see is the type of people looking for information. Parrot lovers just want "how to" information, and for that reason, I can see a single page to satisfy them, instead of just removing all that stuff from articles. I will see what others think of this before going this far, but I think I will start moving general information to parrots. Kim van der Linde at venus 16:47, 12 May 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Parrots as pets 

message: The Feathers Category is a bit of a joke. Every article within it is a stub, and there aren't particually that many of them. I think they should all be merged into feather, or at least a new "types of feathers" article, and should form a key part of the proposed series for bird anatomy. Or at least thats what I think. Anyone else agree? mastodon 01:26, 27 May 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Feathers 

message: :Copied from Talk:Bird#Split_into_Bird_anatomy:
I suggest that a new article should be created to deal with this broad subject. There is already a bird skeleton article to deal with such a narrow subject, seems pointless to clutter the bird article with so much detail that will enevitably be added. I have ordered the current article to deal with the information as it stands, but it will not do for long. I say split; comments welcome - mastodon 21:00, 7 May 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Split into [[Bird anatomy]] 

message: Could someone with some background in aviculture take a look at the softbill article?  There is a new editor there who insists on completely deleting the existing article's text and writing his own article from scratch.  Moreover, his new article is not in Wikipedia format and does not cite references within the article.  
His totally new article is rather at odds with the previous article and I am not knowledgeable enough to determine the truth, although his attitude ("What, me format?") is enough to cause me to revert back to the original.
In other words, help!  Thanks, Oscar 04:12, 15 September 2006 (UTC)
thread_title: Help at [[Softbill]]??? 

message: Small thing: can someone confirm that this is a male? :Image:Tufted titmouse perching 2006-11-23.jpg Thanks, — coelacan talk — 19:10, 26 January 2007 (UTC)
thread_title: Please confirm

message: Hi, I'm a member of the Wikipedia:Version_1.0_Editorial_Team, which is looking to identify quality articles in Wikipedia for future publication on CD or paper. We recently began assessing using these criteria, and we are looking for A-class, B-class, and Good articles, with no POV or copyright problems. Can you recommend any suitable articles? Please post your suggestions here. Cheers, Shanel 20:19, 9 March 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Yes, thanks there looks to be some Bs, and Seabird looks like a very nice A (maybe an FAC?).  We have a table of articles here, feel free to update your list if you find other suitable ones.  I'm very busy right now, but we'll add your picks to the list soon. Thanks again, Walkerma 05:17, 24 March 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Articles for the Wikipedia 1.0 project 

message: List of Puerto Rican birds is up for a peer review. Please leave your comments/suggestion here. Joelito (talk) 16:18, 12 May 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Peer Review 

message: Kakapo, Albatross and now Elfin-woods Warbler have made the grade as Featured Articles - but we don't appear to have many bird articles listed yet as Good Articles, the relatively new stepping stone category on the way to FA status - just Australian Ringneck and bird itself. I'm sure we have plenty of potential candidates - if you can think of some, can I encourage you to nominate them at the nominations page. I'm happy to review nominations - just leave a note on my talk page. SP-KP 21:15, 24 June 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Good bird articles? 

message: As well as the main Wikipedia collaboration of the week, there are topic-specific collaborations e.g. the "New Zealand collaboration of the fortnight" - would there be an appetite for something similar on birds? SP-KP 15:50, 25 June 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Sure, why not? Can be combined with the "Good Articles" quest above too. Dysmorodrepanis 19:22, 4 July 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Collaborations 

message: I have submitted Albatross for Featured article status, I'd appreciate comments or support. Sabine's Sunbird  talk 15:18, 9 March 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Albatross FAC 

message: I'd appreciate either support or comments! Thanks. Check it out here. Sabine's Sunbird  talk 08:22, 9 August 2006 (UTC)
thread_title: [[Procellariidae]] FAC 

message: I've started a second peer review for seabird, hopefully I can finish the bugger off. Sabine's Sunbird  talk 06:41, 14 August 2006 (UTC)
thread_title: Seabird

message: I really did not know where to put this discussion so if anyone feels it belong in another category feel free to move it. I feel like we need to start assessing the articles under this WikiProject and that we should start to collaborate more between ourselves. 
To kick this off I made some changes to the  template. There are new parameters to help assess the importance and quality of bird-related articles. Also I am in the process of creating some sub-pages to help us in these tasks. 
We now need to start discussing the definitions for article importance. Quality definitions have already been discussed at length in Wikipedia so there won't be much need to discuss them. We need to start thinking which articles should be Top importance, High importance, etc.
When the sub-pages are ready I will post the links for them here and will create a navigational bar. 
Also there will need to be a discussion for the categories' names. For example :Category:FA-Class Birds articles or :Category:FA-Class Bird articles or :Category:FA-Class birds articles. Joelito (talk) 21:28, 17 August 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Importance is always going to be kind of subjective, though I'm sure we can thrash out a hieracarchy of sorts. I'd suggest that families are more important than species, which is why so much of my efforts go towards them. Bird deffinetely rates the highest importance though, and perhaps is a good collaborative target for FAC, other contenders for important articles in my mind would be bird song, bird migration, bird anatomy, bird flight, Archaeopteryx and the as yet uncreated bird behaviour (or bird behavior for editors of an American inclination). I'd also be mighty tempted to put Passeriformes in the top category too. Sabine's Sunbird  talk 06:04, 18 August 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Actually, I just noticed that Archaeopteryx is currently claimed by the wikiproject that deals with dinosaurs. Perhaps a joint custody arrangement is in order? Sabine's Sunbird  talk 06:26, 18 August 2006 (UTC)

text: Agreed. Also, well known familes or genera, what people think of when you say bird, should be high status (to my mind) - duck, eagle, flamingo, sparrow, gull, swan, that kind of thing. Sabine's Sunbird  talk 17:44, 18 August 2006 (UTC)

text: Well I would not include orders as Top priority since Top is defined as "This article is of the utmost importance to this project, as it forms the basis of all information.". I believe articles such as Bird, bird migration, bird anatomy, etc are og utmost importance. Orders I would classify as High since they fall under the definition of "This article is fairly important to this project, as it covers a general area of knowledge.". Joelito (talk) 22:40, 18 August 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: I think the definitions could perhaps do with some more thought, in that case. I do think we need at least the four levels - one for each major taxonomic rank - if not, which two would you lump together? Placing only "bird" in the top-level category seems like a waste of potential. SP-KP 22:47, 18 August 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: The definitions are standard for the entire Wikipedia. We will have to figure our what we can lump together. Maybe genera and species can be classified as low. Joelito (talk) 22:55, 18 August 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: I realise they are standard - what I mean is we ought to think about whether they need to be tailored here, given that we have an atypical situation. Alternatively, we could go for the lumping option as you suggest, but genera and species are the two largest groups of articles - doesn't it make more sense to lump the two smallest - orders and families? SP-KP 23:07, 18 August 2006 (UTC)

text: We will have to check if a bot could do it. Joelito (talk) 22:55, 18 August 2006 (UTC)
thread_title: Major changes

message: I seem to have become an involuntary arbitrator in some edit conflicts on that page (see talk:guineafowl). Peace temporarily has descended, but I'd welcome a second opinion, especially on the cookery issue. jimfbleak 13:10, 18 August 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: I left a comment and have added the page to my watchlist. Sabine's Sunbird  talk 07:42, 19 August 2006 (UTC)
thread_title: [[Guineafowl]]

message: Arctic Tern is on peer review. Please leave comments here. Thanks. Miss Madeline | Talk to Madeline 23:03, 1 September 2006 (UTC)
thread_title: Arctic Tern

message: I've nominated seabird for FA status. I'd appreciate support or comments. I can't wait to get this one featured so I never have to look at it again. Sabine's Sunbird  talk 05:57, 2 September 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  [[Seabird]] FAC 

message: I have included numerous useful links to free to view journals and other online sources of reliable information in the Taxonomy and references section of this project page. If you know of any other free journals that are worth including please add them. Sabine's Sunbird  talk 21:54, 10 September 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Online resources 

message: Seeing Homo florensis get the FAR treatment today made me think that our earliest featured article, Kakapo, could probably use a spring clean. Its a little citation light by todays standards, and we should maybe work on it a little to keep it featured. The current issue of Notornis, here, is actually entirely about the natural history and conservation of the species. It would be good to catch it before it goes to FAR. I'll start looking at it tonight. Sabine's Sunbird  talk 02:16, 13 September 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  [[Kakapo]] 

message: I've nominated Arctic Tern to be a Featured Article. I'd appreciate any comments or support you may have. Please see it here. Thank you, everyone. Miss Madeline | Talk to Madeline 22:39, 17 September 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Arctic Tern FAC 

message: Hi. If you still have work to do tagging talk pages and assessing articles, my AWB plugin might be of interest to you.
The plugin has two main modes of operation:
*Tagging talk pages, great for high-speed tagging
*Assessments mode, for reviewing articles (pictured)
As of the current version, WikiProjects with simple "generic" templates are supported by the plugin without the need for any special programatic support by me. I've had a look at your project's template and you seem to qualify.
For more information see:
*About the plugin
*About support for "generic" WikiProject templates
*User guide
*About AWB (AutoWikiBrowser)
Hope that helps. If you have any questions or find any bugs please let me know on the plugin's talk page. --Kingboyk 11:59, 20 September 2006 (UTC)
thread_title: Tagging talk pages and assessing articles

message: Barring changes, Procellariidae will appear on the Main Page as today's featured article on October 22. To help fight vandalism, click here to start watching the page if you have not already started. Miss Madeline | Talk to Madeline 15:24, 19 October 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: I changed the layout of the evolution/taxonomy section. It was very bulky and heavy to stomach for people w/o prior knowledge, and I think it reads more fluent now as the sections are more recognizable. Also some add info. Check it out whether its OK. Dysmorodrepanis 22:48, 19 October 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: The layout's nice and more understandable. Miss Madeline | Talk to Madeline 00:34, 20 October 2006 (UTC)
thread_title: Procellariidae on Main Page soon

message: A current featured article candidate, Amchitka, needs a little help. Would somebody mind writing a paragraph or two on the birds of this island? Two possible sources I've found are Birds of Amchitka Island, Alaska and Notes on the Birds of Amchitka Island, Alaska. Thanks, Jakew 11:44, 21 October 2006 (UTC)
thread_title: Birds of Amchitka

message: Please comment on the move and reversion jimfbleak 05:48, 22 October 2006 (UTC)
thread_title: [[Talk:List of regional bird lists]]

message: I have placed Mourning Dove on Peer review. Please leave comments, input, and suggestions here. Thanks. Miss Madeline | Talk to Madeline 21:21, 25 October 2006 (UTC)
thread_title: Mourning Dove on peer review

message: Hello. The WikiProject Council has recently updated the Wikipedia:WikiProject Council/Directory.  This new directory includes a variety of categories and subcategories which will, with luck, potentially draw new members to the projects who are interested in those specific subjects. Please review the directory and make any changes to the entries for your project that you see fit. There is also a directory of portals, at User:B2T2/Portal, listing all the existing portals. Feel free to add any of them to the portals or comments section of your entries in the directory. The three columns regarding assessment, peer review, and collaboration are included in the directory for both the use of the projects themselves and for that of others. Having such departments will allow a project to more quickly and easily identify its most important articles and its articles in greatest need of improvement. If you have not already done so, please consider whether your project would benefit from having departments which deal in these matters. It is my hope that all the changes to the directory can be finished by the first of next month. Please feel free to make any changes you see fit to the entries for your project before then. If you should have any questions regarding this matter, please do not hesitate to contact me. Thank you.  B2T2 23:42, 25 October 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Project directory 

message: I listed American Crow for peer review at Wikipedia:WikiProject Birds/Peer review/American Crow. - Elliskev 23:25, 25 October 2006 (UTC)
thread_title: American Crow peer review request

message: There is currently a barnstar proposal at :Wikipedia:Barnstar and award proposals/New Proposals#Wildlife Barnstar for a barnstar which would be available for use for this project. Please feel free to visit the page and make any comments you see fit. Badbilltucker 15:25, 15 November 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Wildlife Barnstar 

message: Hi. Just to let you know that Surfbirds made it onto the Spam blacklist here; I've got it removed, hopefully this will be permanently but it's possible that it'll get re-added. One to watch for when adding external links, references etc. SP-KP 19:55, 16 November 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: I can't understand why it was ever listed as spam, jimfbleak 06:32, 17 November 2006 (UTC)
thread_title: Surfbirds on (but now not on) spam blacklist

message: Beginning cross-post.
:See Wikipedia talk:Version 1.0 Editorial Team#Stablepedia. If you wish to comment, please comment there. ★MESSEDROCKER★ 03:36, 26 November 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Stablepedia 

message: This article needs more despite being graded a good article. The structure of the article and sections need to be thought of more carefully and citations need to be improved. All the group level animal articles need a little more attention in general - since these are going to popular starting points and their organization/structure can really help people forage for additional information. Shyamal 03:57, 29 November 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  [[Bird]] 

message: There is now a proposed project at Wikipedia:WikiProject Council/Proposals#Veterinary Medicine to deal with matters of veterinary medicine, a subject which currently has disproportionately low content in wikipedia. Any wikipedia editors who have an interest in working on content related to the subject are encouraged to indicate as much there. Thank you for your attention. Badbilltucker 22:09, 6 December 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Proposed Veterinary medicine project 

message: One of your flagship pages Parrot needs a bit of a clean up, I think.  Snowman 00:09, 7 December 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: It does indeed. But even professional scientists are in disagreement about what to make of them. Slowly but surely, I'm gonna work through the systematics part. Dysmorodrepanis 14:30, 7 December 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Parrot 

message: Hello, all. It was initially my hope to try to have this done as part of Esperanza's proposal for an appreciation week to end on Wikipedia Day, January 15. However, several people have once again proposed the entirety of Esperanza for deletion, so that might not work. It was the intention of the Appreciation Week proposal to set aside a given time when the various individuals who have made significant, valuable contributions to the encyclopedia would be recognized and honored. I believe that, with some effort, this could still be done. My proposal is to, with luck, try to organize the various WikiProjects and other entities of wikipedia to take part in a larger celebrartion of its contributors to take place in January, probably beginning January 15, 2007. I have created yet another new subpage for myself (a weakness of mine, I'm afraid) at User talk:Badbilltucker/Appreciation Week where I would greatly appreciate any indications from the members of this project as to whether and how they might be willing and/or able to assist in recognizing the contributions of our editors. Thank you for your attention.  Badbilltucker 17:14, 30 December 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Wikipedia Day Awards 

message: How do I join WikiProjectBirds? Teak the Kiwi 04:24, 2 January 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: Nothing formal - add your username to the Participants section on the main project page, have a read through and you're in! Richard Barlow 11:28, 2 January 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  New Members 

message: Kakapo has been nominated for a featured article review. Articles are typically reviewed for two weeks. Please leave your comments and help us to return the article to featured quality. If concerns are not addressed during the review period, articles are moved onto the Featured Article Removal Candidates list for a further period, where editors may declare "Keep" or "Remove" the article from featured status. The instructions for the review process are here. Reviewers' concerns are here.
SandyGeorgia (Talk) 01:22, 8 January 2007 (UTC)
thread_title: Kakapo FAR

message: A modest proposal:

   
- Aerobird 21:54, 10 January 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: Gladly thunbs-up. Dysmorodrepanis 06:24, 3 February 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: Have changed icon width so that it fits with the other ToL userboxes. Rv if you disagree. Also, everyone - would it be OK if this were listed on Wikipedia:Userboxes/WikiProjects#Animals? Dysmorodrepanis 16:05, 3 February 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  Project Userbox 

message: Please be aware of the proposed Species microformat, particularly in relation to taxoboxes. Comments welcome on the wiki at that link. Andy Mabbett 15:25, 28 January 2007 (UTC)
thread_title: Microformat

message: See Wikipedia:WikiProject Council/Proposals#Aviculture.  The purpose of this project is to help increase the amount and quality of content related to aviculture on wikipedia, and to maintain and organise articles relating to the subject, eventually bringing as many as possible up to good- or featured-article status. I feel that is sufficiently different to WikiProject Birds (aspects of ornithology and biology) to need a separate project. Snowman 17:00, 28 January 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: I would agree with this.  It could also be argued that WP Birds could be split three ways into ornithology, birding and aviculture. Maias 23:35, 28 January 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  Aviculture WikiProject proposal 

message: I'm working on a page for the Rock Wren of New Zealand, which has exactly the same name as the Rock Wren of North America (even on the HBW website). I'm wary of using the name suggested on the New Zealand wren article (New Zealand Rock Wren) as I've never seen that name anywhere else. So, do we go for the clunky New Zealand Rock Wren or do we have Rock Wren (New Zealand)?  (p.s. yes, I might finally be back) Sabine's Sunbird  talk 04:59, 12 February 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: We could use "South Island Wren". It's the name used in the Clements and Sibley & Monroe checklists and also used in the Birdlife species factsheet Tigershrike 13:29, 12 February 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: That would work... Sabine's Sunbird  talk 19:28, 12 February 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: HANZAB gives Fiordland Rock Wren as an alternative. Maias 03:01, 13 February 2007 (UTC)
replies: text:  I went with South Island Wren and created redirects for the other names (as well as changing any links into Rock Wren that were refering to this species). A bit annoying for Kiwi birders though, since they all seem to refer to this species as the Rock Wren. Sabine's Sunbird  talk 03:41, 13 February 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  Naming conventions for shared names? 

message: Hi! I am a new member of WikiProject Birds. Recently i am trying to categorize African estrildidae according to countries which they are native in. However, it was proposed to merge all of the subcategories into :Category:Birds of Africa. I was wondering if any of the experts here have any idea to organize the category/ subcategories? See Wikipedia:Categories for discussion#Category:Birds of Africa, for discussion. Luffy487 04:05, 14 February 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  Hi 

message: I was wondering if there is any subspecies taxobox example available? See Green-backed Twinspot, Solitary Tinamou and Star Finch, for examples. Luffy487 06:38, 15 February 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: Hi Luffy. There is a subspecies taxobox at Bonin Nankeen Night Heron‎. Is this what you are looking for? Maias 11:41, 15 February 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: Sorry for the late reply. I was away for quite sometime. Well I am looking for taxobox which can provide more than one example of subspecies. Thanks by the way. Luffy487 08:13, 24 February 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  Subspecies taxobox example? 

message: Hi all,
Recently, the WikiProject Dinosaurs team has been working to improve Archaeopteryx. Since this article is partially under the purview of the Bird folks, I thought I'd stop by and drop an invite to you all to come help improve or refine the article in any way you can. Best wishes, Firsfron of Ronchester 04:40, 27 February 2007 (UTC)
thread_title: ''[[Archaeopteryx]]''