Talk:Mustang/Archive 3
 | This is an archive of past discussions about Mustang. Do not edit the contents of this page. If you wish to start a new discussion or revive an old one, please do so on the current talk page. |
| Archive 1 | Archive 2 | Archive 3 | Archive 4 | Archive 5 | → | Archive 7 |
Other changes - prettyplease
No need for this to clutter up the other discussion
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Folks, while the capitalization debate above is raging, I would graciously ask two things:
Thanks Montanabw(talk) 10:23, 18 January 2015 (UTC)
Perhaps it will help to briefly discuss the politics: There is an ongoing tension in this article between the extreme views. A lot of people in the ranching industry - and they are connected to politically powerful western interests - essentially want to remove- and kill if necessary - all the "wild" horses to make room for grazing cows (and some sheep) on public lands. A BLM grazing lease is about 10% the price per head of a grazing lease on private land, and it allows the ranching industry an indirect subsidy at taxpayer expense. One reason they have historically used as justification to remove Mustangs was that Mustangs were "ugly" or "scrub" animals, useless parasites of poor breeding, The truth is that many of the protected feral populations (not all) have had DNA that clearly shows they descend from the Colonial Spanish Horse. Their "fugly" look is mostly due to their living conditions, not their genetics. The protection of "wild" horses and the BLM adoption program were attempts to stop this slaughter. ( Read Velma Bronn Johnston for background) The issue has been a concern dating back to at least the Great Depression. (Back in the 1930s, the BLM hired "mustangers" to try and round up all the wild horses; private mustang runners did this too -- the captured horses were generallysold for horsemeat, though some were just shot and left to rot) The current situation makes no one happy - cattlemen still want more grassland for their cows bot on the other extreme are some wild horse advocates think that there shouldn't be any cattle on public lands at all. There is also the debate between those who say the horse is a non-native introduced species and those who way the horse is a "restored" species once native to the continent (albiet 10,000 years ago). A third group argues (against all scientific evidence) that "wild" horses really do have some native ancestors and that the horse didn't really die out in North America. (which is, by the way, a fringe view I periodically have to edit out of here). I won't even bother to mention the animal rights crowd that thinks that riding animals is bad, but there's that bunch too. Just keeping this article neutral in tone is an ongoing monitoring problem. Hence, this is why I get tired of these little dramas, they just suck energy and don't do anything to expand the article in ways that would be useful. Montanabw(talk) 00:30, 20 January 2015 (UTC)
From the Zebra aricle  Lord Rothschild with his famed zebra carriage (sp. Equus quagga burchellii), which he frequently drove through London  Jumping an obstacle: riding a zebra in East Africa, about 1900
Can this just end right here, right now... please? This is not what I want to read on this talk page. Thanks. Fyunck(click) (talk) 00:33, 23 January 2015 (UTC)
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Protected edit request on 25 January 2015
Resolved issue
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The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.
Change instances of the word "Mustang" in upper case to lower case where used in sentence case and not referring to a specific substrain with wikilinked article. But keep the article under Full protection for at least another week or two. Montanabw(talk) 04:02, 25 January 2015 (UTC)
There is no other dispute currently under discussion. Since you are relenting on the caps question, there's no need to wait for the silly RFC to close; just unprotect the article and let us be back to normal. If people war over something else, protection may happen again, but I think people know not to do that by now. Dicklyon (talk) 04:06, 25 January 2015 (UTC)
I did the downcasing, with a few other nits that I don't think will bother anybody. Dicklyon (talk) 19:12, 25 January 2015 (UTC) The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.
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Move discussion
The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.
There is a move discussion in progress on Talk:Mustang (disambiguation) which affects this page. Please participate on that page and not in this talk page section. Thank you. —RMCD bot 04:45, 12 January 2015 (UTC)
- Move discussion is closed. [2] Dreadstar ☥ 03:25, 28 January 2015 (UTC)
The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.
Capitalization RfC
Hatting closed RfC for purposes of navigability and readability of rest of long talk page
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The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion. I'm cross-posting this to WT:MOS. Should this article refer to its subject as "Mustangs" or "mustangs"? For example,
Thank you for your consideration. Red Slash 17:33, 17 January 2015 (UTC) Comment here
@Fyunck(click):, if you would like to post to the projects, I'd be grateful. If I did it, I would probably be accused of canvassing. Montanabw(talk) 10:25, 18 January 2015 (UTC)
Return to question My original question/concern relates to why breed names are capitalised when this is contrary to WP:MOS. I chose to raise this on the mustang article, which in hindsight, may have been a mistake because there are other issues here (i.e. whether mustangs are a breed or not) which are side-tracking the main question. When I publish articles in science journals (including Nature), I read the "Information for authors" section which gives directions on style. I adhere strictly to that style so that my paper gets published. The WP:MOS indicates that groups of animals (which surely includes breeds) should not be capitalised. If I published an article on WP that capitalised breeds, I would expect it to be reverted.__DrChrissy (talk) 16:12, 18 January 2015 (UTC)
Capitalize Mustang. as breed. If we are writing an article about the breed in an encyclopedia using the best of sources, I assume sources from specialist horse organizations, possibly the equivalent of academic sources, should be definitive. (Littleolive oil (talk) 17:48, 22 January 2015 (UTC))
lowercase mustang - Sorry I'm late, but the bot just notified me five minutes ago. Thank heaven for dictionaries, as they save us a lot of time arguing about the meanings, spellings, and capitalizations of words. Except when we choose to ignore them. Here's the applicable dictionary entry and forgive me if I lack the time to read the whole discussion. There is nothing I see to indicate that this article is specifically about a breed to the exclusion of the animal as defined in the dictionary. If purists wish to create a separate article about a breed, they're free to give it a try. More reasonably, you could create a section about the breed in this article. ―Mandruss ☎ 00:14, 28 January 2015 (UTC) Btw, the organization of this RfC bites. It took me five minutes to decide where to put the above, and I'm still not sure I got it right. How are people supposed to easily find new !votes?? By reading diffs? We generally have separate subsections for !votes and discussion, and new !votes are added at the end of that subsection. Some discussion sometimes creeps into the !votes section, but it still works better than no organization at all. Thanks. ―Mandruss ☎ 00:37, 28 January 2015 (UTC)
Move to closeWith Montanabw relenting (see his protected edit request below), and lack of any plausible reason to capitalize, I suggest this be closed now. Dicklyon (talk) 04:08, 25 January 2015 (UTC)
I am willing to close this RFC but because of its extended nature I wanted to leave a note for 24 hours before closing in case there were any arguments left to make. SPACKlick (talk) 11:07, 27 January 2015 (UTC)
I will still wait 18 more hours to close in case of last minute objections.SPACKlick (talk) 17:17, 27 January 2015 (UTC)
Kiger Mustang and Spanish Mustangs both have identifiable breed registry groups. They are both considered one of the Colonial Spanish Horse breeds, substrains of theM/mustang in the eyes of some researchers and wholly separate breeds to others, but everyone agrees they are unique breeding populations. The Kigers are all descended from horses taken from a closely-bred group of feral horses found free on the range in Oregon, the Spanish Mustang registry contains a lot of animals bred in captivity for several generations. Thus, capitalization is appropriate. And let's just not get into the "are M/mustangs a breed" question. They definitely aren't a species beyond e. f. caballus and so let's not muddy up those waters. I'm beginning to lean toward classifying them as a group, akin to the warmblood group of sport horse breeds. But that will require that we please close this discussion so that those of us who actually have done research and written content for this article can get back to doing so. Please close? Pretty please with maple sugar on top? And fudge! And cinnamon! Beer? Whatever it takes, let's end this, please! Montanabw(talk) 04:19, 28 January 2015 (UTC)
The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.
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TPP
Just so those who care know, following this, I have requested temporary semi protection on this article. We have enough going on here, we don't need the kiddie vandalism too. Just posting so everyone knows I did this for the benefit of all and it had nothing to do with any of the issues above. Montanabw(talk) 22:04, 28 January 2015 (UTC)
Capitalisation of Mustang
Closed discussion; hatting for navigability on long talk page pending archiving
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The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion. Hi. I recently changed "Mustang" to "mustang" throughout this article. An editor who I have the very highest respect for and I certainly will not fall out with over this has reverted my edit. I am opening up the discussion as to whether "mustang" should have an uppercase M or not. If this has been discussed before, please could you indicate where.__DrChrissy (talk) 00:40, 10 January 2015 (UTC)
My reason for raising the issue is a general WP MOS found here [13] which I have copied below. Is mustang exempt from this? Common names Lower-case initial letters are used for each part of the common (vernacular) names of species, genera, families and all other taxonomic levels (bacteria, zebra, bottlenose dolphin, mountain maple, bald eagle), except where they contain a proper name (Przewalski's horse, Amur tiger, Roosevelt elk), or when such a name starts a sentence (Black bears eat white suckers and blueberries). As of May 2014, wikiprojects for some groups of organisms are in the process of converting to sentence case where title case was previously used. Some articles may not have been changed yet (this may still be true of bird articles, a few groups of insect articles and some plant ones, as well as a few on amphibians and reptiles). Names of groups or types The common name of a group of species or type of organism is always written in lower case (except where a proper name occurs): New World monkeys, slime molds, rove beetles, great apes, mountain dogs, Van cats This also applies to an individual creature of indeterminate species. I don't think mustang is either a species or a breed, so neither of those is directly applicable; the lowercase for groups of types does seem more fitting. But since it's overwhelmingly lowercase in sources, there should be no question. Furthermore, the cited sources mostly use lowercase, and it's hard to find any book that uses uppercase. Dicklyon (talk) 17:57, 10 January 2015 (UTC) Furthermore, style guides sometimes make an explicit example of it. Dicklyon (talk) 18:21, 10 January 2015 (UTC)
Suggestion – Someone should add a section about breeds, where it can be mentioned that some authors capitalized Mustang as a breed name, but that there are other more accepted breed names for various subtypes, or however you call them. Dicklyon (talk) 16:44, 13 January 2015 (UTC)
Fyunck, what is this "longstanding consensus" of which you speak? Did horse people come to some agreement about ignoring the MOS? Where can we find this discussion? Dicklyon (talk) 05:21, 17 January 2015 (UTC)
The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.
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Information is not the same
very long discussion
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This: "By 1900 North America had an estimated two million free-roaming horses" is not the same information as this "At their peak population, there was a maximum of two million free-roaming horses west of the Mississippi". so no need to replace one with the other. If we are gong to retain this "At their peak population, there was a maximum of two million free-roaming horses west of the Mississippi" Please supply a page number/numbers so sources can be checked by all. I don't see one given. Best wishes.(Littleolive oil (talk) 17:37, 27 February 2015 (UTC)) I can't supply page numbers for the 1900 date, because they doesn't exist. As I said in my edit notes, Dobie didn't say what is being attributed to him. What Dobie did say was: "All guessed numbers are mournful to history. My own guess is that at no time were there more than a million mustangs in Texas and no more than a million others scattered over the remainder of the West." (pages 108-9, of the edition I'm referencing-it's in the last paragraph of Chapter VI). So, if you want to use Dobie as the source for your numbers, it needs to be changed to reflect the fact that Dobie never gave a date for the maximum number, just the number itself. Unless I see a reasonable rebuttal within the next couple of days, I'm reverting it back. Lynn Wysong 08:10, 28 February 2015 (UTC)
1. I said the number was a "peak" because that's what Dobie, the source that was being referenced at the time, said: " at no time were there more than a million mustangs in Texas and no more than a million others scattered over the remainder of the West" 2. Why is the BLM being given credit for being the most "reliable source" on mustang history? It's a land management agency, for crying out loud, and one that doesn't even hire historians, like the National Park Service does. Why is what the actual source, written by an actual historian published by a University press, says now being repressed in favor of an interpretation of what the BLM is interpreting Dobie said? When, I made the edit, the Dobie book was referenced, now that reference has been removed in favor of the BLM website. Just quote Dobie, and then there is no argument about what he said, and the information goes back to the actual source, which is the practice of all good reference. But, I'll wait to change it until there's a resolution on the other article, because there should be consistency between the two. Lynn Wysong 08:12, 28 February 2015 (UTC)
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Protected
I've protected the article due to edit warring, work it out on the talk page; follow WP:DR. Dreadstar ☥ 00:55, 3 March 2015 (UTC)
Section rewrite
lengthy discussion
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I have made a draft rewrite of the History section hopefully to provide a balanced view with a little less extraneous detail. I am aware that some of these changes may be controversial so I have put the rewrite on te Talk page. Please choose/ignore any changes I have suggested. History Capture and husbandryThe first mustangs descended from Iberian horses[1] brought to Mexico and Florida. Some of these horses were sold, escaped or were captured by Native Americans, and rapidly spread by trade and other means throughout western North America.[2] Native Americans quickly adopted the horse as a primary means of transportation. Horses replaced the dog as a travois puller and greatly improved success in battles, trade and hunts, particularly bison hunts.[3] "Mustang runners" were usually cowboys in the U.S. and vaqueros or mesteñeros in Mexico who caught, broke and drove free-ranging horses to market in the Spanish and later Mexican, and still later American territories of what is now Northern Mexico, Texas, New Mexico and California. They caught the horses that roamed the Great Plains and the San Joaquin Valley of California, and later in the Great Basin, from the 18th to the early 20th century.[4][5] In the 1800s, horses belonging to explorers, traders and settlers that escaped or were purposely released, joined the gene pool of Spanish-descended herds. It was also common practice for western ranchers to release their horses to forage for themselves in the winter and then recapture them in the spring, along with any additional mustangs. Some ranchers also attempted to "improve" wild herds by shooting the dominant stallions and replacing them with pedigreed stallions.[citation needed] NumbersAccording to historian J. Frank Dobie "No scientific estimates of their (mustangs in the western U.S.) numbers was made...All guessed numbers are mournful to history. My own guess is that at no time were there more than a million mustangs in Texas and no more than a million others scattered over the remainder of the West."[6] During the late 1800s, most of these were moved north and east, or were removed for other reasons until, by 1934, there was just "a few wild horses in Nevada, Wyoming and other Western states".[7] Because mustang numbers can double every four years,[8] they were rounded up in large numbers. LegislationDuring culls, abuses linked to certain killing methods (e.g. hunting from airplanes and poisoning) led to the first federal wild free-roaming horse protection law in 1959.[9] This statute, known as the "Wild Horse Annie Act", prohibited the use of motor vehicles for hunting wild horses.[10] Protection was increased further by the Wild and Free-Roaming Horses and Burros Act of 1971.[11] From that time to the present, the Bureau of Land Management (BLM) is the primary authority that oversees the protection and management of mustang herds on public lands,[12] while the United States Forest Service administers additional wild horse or burro territories.[13]
NumbersAccording to historian J. Frank Dobie "No scientific estimates of their (mustangs in the western U.S.) numbers was made...All guessed numbers are mournful to history. My own guess is that at no time were there more than a million mustangs in Texas and no more than a million others scattered over the remainder of the West."[6] During the late 1800s, most of these were moved north and east, or were removed for other reasons until, by 1934, there was just "a few wild horses in Nevada, Wyoming and other Western states".[7] Because mustang numbers can double every four years,[8] and horses were no longer needed, for the most part, for their "horsepower", they began to be rounded up in large numbers to simply be eliminated because they competed with profitable livestock for forage. Lynn Wysong (talk) 14:52, 5 March 2015 (UTC)
NumbersAccording to historian J. Frank Dobie "No scientific estimates of their (mustangs in the western U.S.) numbers was made...All guessed numbers are mournful to history. My own guess is that at no time were there more than a million mustangs in Texas and no more than a million others scattered over the remainder of the West."[1] During the late 1800s, most of these were moved north and east, or were removed for other reasons until, by 1934, there was just "a few wild horses in Nevada, Wyoming and other Western states".[2] Because mustang numbers can double every four years,[3] and horses were no longer needed, for the most part, for their "horsepower", under the auspices of the Taylor Grazing Act federal land management agencies, that only recognized the value of cattle and sheep, (edit: with which the horses were competing for the forage) told ranchers they must remove their horses from the public rangelands. Thereafter, they began to round them up by the thousands for extermination
HA! figured out why my signature didn't work right!Lynn Wysong (talk) 02:22, 3 March 2015 (UTC) How do you keep the footnotes in the same section as the text? When DrChrissy put her's in, they stayed in the section, but when I copied and pasted a subsection, they went to the bottom of the talk page. [edit: never mind, figured it out Thanks!Lynn Wysong (talk) 06:26, 3 March 2015 (UTC) Wow! After reading through some of the archived discussions from a few weeks ago, I had no idea what a hornet's nest I had walked into. So, I can see why there was some, what I thought was unwarranted, hostility. I assure everyone here, that I'm here in good faith, that I have never had another account, and any blunders are due to the fact that the only other articles I ever edited (basically wrote) were biographies of obscure, long dead people, and didn't realize how easy it can be to step on toes. That being said, I have done extensive research on this subject (especially the history), and am aware of all the politics, and how they influence the writing of a page. So lets try to move forward and all learn from each other. I considered myself pretty well versed on this subject, but have already learned some things that are giving me a different viewpoint on some issues. (four tildes coming)Lynn Wysong (talk) 12:47, 3 March 2015 (UTC) That being said, I'm trying really hard to get this so that it's well written and accurate, and that everyone agrees is neutral. So I keep going back and editing it. Now what does everyone think? NumbersAccording to historian J. Frank Dobie "No scientific estimates of their (mustangs in the western U.S.) numbers was made...
I think it is also important to reflect, that by saying "removing thousands" it wasn't because there was hundreds of thousands to begin with. My own "guess" that what Dobie meant by "a few" was well under 100,000, probably less than 50,000. But, just saying, if there was 100,000 and the population was doubling every four years, 25,000 horses a year could be removed, and with other die off the population would slowly dwindle down to the 17,300 the BLM estimated in 1971.Lynn Wysong (talk) 14:45, 3 March 2015 (UTC)
How about this: "No scientific estimates of their (mustangs in the western U.S.) numbers was made...My own guess is that at no time were there more than a million mustangs in Texas and no more than a million others scattered over the remainder of the West."[1] During the late 1800s, most of these were moved north and east, or were removed for other reasons until, by 1934, there was just "a few wild horses in Nevada, Wyoming and other Western states".[2] As motorized vehicles and tractors became commonplace, horse populations were no longer being kept in check by the ranchers removing them for sell and use, and after decades of unregulated cattle, sheep and horse grazing, the range was becoming overgrazed. Upon passage of the 1934 Taylor Grazing Act federal land management agencies, that were issuing permits for the grazing of cattle and sheep, told ranchers they must remove their horses from the public rangelands because they were competing for the forage. Many ranchers left their horses on the range, and the BLM and the US Forest Service began to round them up by the thousands for extermination even though many ranchers objected to the eradication of "their" horses.[3] Lynn Wysong (talk) 01:03, 4 March 2015 (UTC) |
Summary
| Too much talking about each other in this section. Create a new section with specific content changes and sources. Dreadstar ☥ 22:37, 5 March 2015 (UTC) |
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OK, I am open to improving this article; I have long wanted to take it to GA. I acknowledge it is not yet ready for GAN, but it won't be until the article is stable. But, the above wall of text is just drama. So, I'm pretty much ignoring the tl;dr of User:SheriWysong (signing herself as "Lynn Wysong") as it's all second verse to what she was doing at Talk:Wild and Free-Roaming Horses and Burros Act of 1971 that got that article protected. By trying to insert material here she can't get in there, Wysong is "WP:ASKing the other parent" - Wysong continually keeps trying to insert the same badly formatted, irrelevant, and improperly sourced material here that she could not get into the legislation article (which got locked down due to her edit-warring). Because this user has a bad habit of playing fast and loose with the facts (see below) and loves to copy and paste long passages from other writers (see below), I am going to only address the actual status of the article as last edited by Dr.Chrissy. Here's what we have:
So. I'm open to concrete suggestions, not endless, lyric, unencyclopedic paragraphs filled with bad writing. Montanabw(talk) 21:59, 2 March 2015 (UTC)
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History Rewrite
Discussion prior to moving work to a sandbox
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Okay, here's where I was before on the Numbers Section: According to historian J. Frank Dobie "No scientific estimates of their (mustangs in the western U.S.) numbers was made...My own guess is that at no time were there more than a million mustangs in Texas and no more than a million others scattered over the remainder of the West."[1] During the late 1800s, most of these were moved north and east, or were removed for other reasons until, by 1934, there was just "a few wild horses in Nevada, Wyoming and other Western states"[2] on the public rangelands(range). As motorized vehicles and tractors became commonplace, horse populations on the range were no longer being kept in check by the ranchers removing them for sell and use, and after decades of unregulated cattle, sheep and horse grazing, the range was becoming overgrazed. Upon passage of the 1934 Taylor Grazing Act federal land management agencies, that were issuing permits for the grazing of cattle and sheep on the range, told ranchers they must remove their horses because they were competing for the forage. Many ranchers left their horses on the range, and the BLM and the US Forest Service began to round them up by the thousands for extermination even though many ranchers objected to the eradication of "their" horses.[3] That is an accurate, but general, portrayal of what happened. The latter part of the paragraph is all documented in the Amaral book. For the most part, todays's mustangs are descended from rancher's horses that had been left out on the range. A few herds appear to have survived from the Spanish horses that were found earlier.Lynn Wysong (talk) 10:39, 6 March 2015 (UTC) Lynn Wysong (talk) 10:39, 6 March 2015 (UTC)
rather than moving the article forward. I don't think you can expect other editors to "step up now"...they might be on holiday, busy with other articles, etc. Please suggest the text you would like to see in the article.__DrChrissy (talk) 15:22, 7 March 2015 (UTC)
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Sandbox Collaboration
Because collaboration is very edit intensive, the History section has been moved here: https://wiki.riteme.site/wiki/User_talk:SheriWysong/Sandbox2 for discussion and collaboration. Please feel free to comment, ask questions, and provide constructive criticism.Lynn Wysong (talk) 13:10, 10 March 2015 (UTC)
- This might be worth addressing in the article also: https://www.federalregister.gov/articles/2015/03/12/2015-05623/proposed-collection-of-information-on-wild-horses-and-burros-request-for-comments
Different approach
Long discussion with no resolution
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It makes no sense to rewrite the whole article here while it is locked down. We now have two sections above of copy and paste from the article and it is just bogging down things; there is so much verbiage that NO ONE can even tell what is or is not being proposed (See WP:TL;DR). It makes more sense to raise and discuss small, incremental changes and see if, step by step, they can be agreed upon. I suggest that we begin with the "citation needed" tags in the article and see if we can find sources for the information contained, or, if the material cannot be sourced, decide whether to rewrite or remove it. Then, we can decide if there are things that need to be added as a general concept. Third, we can discuss sources, but for now, we need to confine ourselves to sources most everyone can access (plenty of stuff is available on Google Books) so that we can all verify it. Montanabw(talk) 06:20, 8 March 2015 (UTC)
I have a couple of points I would like to make.
This thread is now seriously off what the Talk page is about. Is one of the editors willing to open a sandbox to continue?__DrChrissy (talk) 15:01, 8 March 2015 (UTC)
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Round three
Just want to note that my presence or absence at the sandbox page neither implies consent or opposition to any changes proposed, things worked on there may wind up being proposed as changes here, but the changes need consensus here. Montanabw(talk) 21:00, 12 March 2015 (UTC)
- That is totally understood by myself, and of course, other editors may also wish to contribute once it comes back to the Talk page and then into the article - if it goes there.__DrChrissy (talk) 22:59, 12 March 2015 (UTC)
- I can tell you right now that anything sourced to Frank Gilbert Roe, The Indian and the Horse is not going to pass muster, the book was first copyrighted in 1955. Even in snippet view it's clearly a "me Tonto you Kemosabi" tone book that is not going to be a reliable source for anything. And even if it was, a citation to "pages 11-32" is not going to be acceptable for even the most reliable source. A footnote is to one page, maybe two if it's a long discussion. Montanabw(talk) 02:00, 13 March 2015 (UTC)
- However, Richard Symanski, Wild Horses and Sacred Cows might be, at least in limited circumstances, but there will need to be page-specific citations so that the snippet view can be used to see if the material is in the general ballpark. Maybe before going live with its quotes a couple other editors can get it via Interlibrary loan to verify the material. Montanabw(talk) 02:04, 13 March 2015 (UTC)
- Young and Sparks Cattle in the Cold Desert may also be, much can be viewed via Google Books so that material can be verified. Important, though to not extrapolate beyond the source. Montanabw(talk) 02:07, 13 March 2015 (UTC)
- Here is my "note." I do not accept your dictates of what sources may or may not be used. Wikipedia states that all sources must be verifiable, WP:SOURCEACCESS but does not state that the source must be readily available to all readers. Many books, including the ones I have, are not in the public domain, still under copyright, and therefore google books does not offer full access to them. That being said, they are available through Amazon, either used or new, and in libraries. You are entirely misrepresenting Frank Gilbert Roe and his book, which was a scholarly work published by the University of Oklahoma Press. Your dismissal of any books published prior to whatever arbitrary date you have set is totally unjustifiable. Unless you can provide credible and independent sources that indicate that the information in a book is no longer valid, (don't bother with the game that you are trying in my sandbox, of averring that those sources are out there, but insisting it's my responsibility to find them; I know a wild goose chase when I see it. If they're out there, then YOU find them) there is no good reason to dismiss sources out of hand the way you are. The older books being used to source the proposed history for this article are the backbone of the history of the mustang, and I suggest that maybe you yourself should acquire them if you want to dabble in the subject.Lynn Wysong (talk) 12:45, 13 March 2015 (UTC)
- Actually - just because a source is reliable does not mean it has to be included in an article. Outdated/older sources are excluded from articles all the time. Would you use a book published before 1950 to cover the topic of plate techtonics? Same with historical subjects - often newer sources are better. That's a subject for debate on the talk page of the article - but in general for a popular topic (like mustangs and the west) ... newer sources will exist and should be favored. Ealdgyth - Talk 12:52, 13 March 2015 (UTC)
Like Montanabw(talk) 03:11, 15 March 2015 (UTC)
- As I said, if there are newer and better sources out there, they haven't been identified. Yes, sometimes newer sources for history are better, if they are based on unknown information that has come to light since the older ones were written. I'm currently writing a research article to that effect. But, in the absence of such new information, the old sources are fine. Even if there is some new information that might indicate an old source was wrong about a point or two (and I don't think there's a scholarly work out there for which that isn't the case) it doesn't invalidate the entire work. And, the subject of mustangs is not just popular, but controversial. Many of the newer books on the subject are not scholarly works; they wouldn't have a chance of being published by a University Press because they are poorly researched and highly biased, pretty much revolving around "oh look how magnificent they are". So, no, newer does not necessarily equal better, unless it is of same scholarly caliber, and I don't agree that they "should be favored" on that point alone.Lynn Wysong (talk) 13:13, 13 March 2015 (UTC)
- Actually, in this edit, some newer sources were identified. Ealdgyth - Talk 13:26, 13 March 2015 (UTC)
- You mean Sponenberg and Cothran? That was the wild goose chase I was talking about. Yes, they have both written extensively recently about the genetics and phenotype of a few feral horse herds indicating that they have a strong Spanish heritage, and that might belie both Dobie and Amaral, who indicated that the Spanish mustangs were so few in number earlier in the 20th century that it would be unexpected today to find any, but there's nothing they are coming up with that just outright contradicts what the
ythe older sources said. Even if Cothran is coming up with information that a lot of today's mustangs have some Spanish ancestry, that's not surprising. The Spanish horses that were rounded up in Texas were sold to farmers and settlers, and the descendants of many of those horses could well have been taken to the Great Basin, to go feral again. But, that's OR. Right now what we have are sources that say there were virtually no horses there until the settlers came and no know credible sources that contradict that, unless you want to start talking about the "horses really never went extinct in North America" notion.Lynn Wysong (talk) 13:51, 13 March 2015 (UTC)
- You mean Sponenberg and Cothran? That was the wild goose chase I was talking about. Yes, they have both written extensively recently about the genetics and phenotype of a few feral horse herds indicating that they have a strong Spanish heritage, and that might belie both Dobie and Amaral, who indicated that the Spanish mustangs were so few in number earlier in the 20th century that it would be unexpected today to find any, but there's nothing they are coming up with that just outright contradicts what the
- I'd say that DNA trumps guesses and romantic dreams from the past. Not sure your point. I'm not doing your research for you; you only seem to find new sources when other people point them out to you. Montanabw(talk) 03:11, 15 March 2015 (UTC)
- Did you know that on your sandbox page here: https://wiki.riteme.site/wiki/User:Montanabw/Spanish_horses_sandbox you have a link to one of my webpages of Sponenberg writings? I put it on over 10 years ago. So, yes, I have done my research, no, DNA does not "trump" previous historical research, only augments it, and lets not get in a peeing match over who has brought more new sources to the table here.Lynn Wysong (talk) 09:53, 15 March 2015 (UTC)
- So, if you want to put in genetic information, feel free to draft something up. This is your idea; there was nothing about it in the history before I started, and I don't see much need for it, so I'm not going to do it. If anything, it probably belongs in the ancestry section.Lynn Wysong (talk) 14:31, 15 March 2015 (UTC)
- So, I went looking for a credible newer source and found J. Edward de Steiguer'sWild Horses of the West: History and Politics of America's Mustangs (2011). Steiguer is described as "a writer and professor at the University of Arizona. He specializes in the federal lands of the American West and is an avid horse enthusiast himself." The book is published by the University of Arizona Press. Seemed worth buying, so I bought the kindle edition Guess what references he used? Frank Gilbert Roe, J. Frank Dobie, Walker Wyman, Hope Ryden, etc. He apparently missed Anthony Amaral. I also LOL'd because he used one of Sponenberg's paper's that I put online over ten years ago-and the URL for the article is mine. Steiguer is listed as a reference for this article, but is not footnoted once. I hae a feeling that what he wrote, which is write along the line of the history I have drafted, is pretty much ignored because it doesn't fit most people's paradigm. I will edit the history in my sandbox with some of his findingsLynn Wysong (talk) 13:10, 14 March 2015 (UTC)
- It's in Google Books, and at a cursory glance it seems to have potential. It's verifiable by all so we can take a look at various proposals. Usually, if something is not in a google books preview, the immediate sentence is available in snippet view, so we should be able to verify stats... Montanabw(talk) 03:11, 15 March 2015 (UTC)
- And by the way, I'm not paying much attention to your sandbox because am not interested in getting into arguments over sandbox text. I have made one suggestion for collaboration there; if we can agree on the wording for one paragraph, and jointly agree there is a consensus to add that paragraph, then there is hope for additional collaboration. I'm not real optimistic, but prove me wrong. Montanabw(talk) 03:11, 15 March 2015 (UTC)
- I believe there is some reasonable collaboration going on. If anyone would care to comment you can go here: https://wiki.riteme.site/wiki/User_talk:SheriWysong/Sandbox2#Taylor_Grazing_Act_Rewrite or ask an admin to bring the section over here. I'm fine with either.Lynn Wysong (talk) 12:24, 15 March 2015 (UTC)
- I am not fond of too many subsections because of how it clogs the TOC, but a "legislation" subheading is something I could support. As I have stated previously, material on the Taylor Grazing Act would be a useful addition to this article. Montanabw(talk) 02:16, 13 March 2015 (UTC)
I actually like this
Hatting a closed discussion
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With minor rephrasing, Wysong has sandboxed: "According to J. Frank Dobie, the peak would have been around the end of the Mexican-American War in 1848, but "No scientific estimates of their numbers was made...My own guess is that at no time were there more than a million mustangs in Texas and no more than a million others scattered over the remainder of the West."[6] --> ref to Dobie, p. 107-109. I propose the following tweak, which, if accepted, we can propose as a consensus edit to replace ONLY the first sentence of the the 6th paragraph of the history section in this article (i.e. the chunk were Dobie is mentioned): "According to historian J. Frank Dobie, the mustang population may have peaked around the end of the Mexican-American War in 1848, but he noted "No scientific estimates of their numbers was made...My own guess is that at no time were there more than a million mustangs in Texas and no more than a million others scattered over the remainder of the West." (with proper ref tag for Dobie, The Mustangs pp. 107-109). Acceptable? Solely for the purposes of flow, we probably need to slightly reword the next sentence, " However, no comprehensive census of feral horse numbers had ever been performed until the time of the Wild and Free-Roaming Horses and Burros Act of 1971 and any earlier estimates are speculative.[16]" to read "No comprehensive census of feral horse numbers was performed until the time of the Wild and Free-Roaming Horses and Burros Act of 1971 and any earlier estimates are speculative.[16]" (with citation unchanged) Can we collaborate and agree on ONE sentence?? Montanabw(talk) 04:32, 22 March 2015 (UTC)
Well, in both cases, more recent material is better than outdated material - people gather more data and revise their own work. Frankly, given your penchant for "extrapolation", synthesizing and, frankly, just making up stuff, I don't trust anything you propose that I cannot verify firsthand. So no 1970 editions or outdated print BLM documents - there are thousands of perfectly good sources online. To be honest, I think what you really need to do is go do your own writing out in the real world and stop trying to WP:SELFPUB and WP:SOAPBOX your own views (whatever they are, and I am not sure what it is you want other than to create drama) here. Montanabw(talk) 20:03, 28 March 2015 (UTC)
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References
So, in addition to the references already in the article, I would propose to add the following.
References
- Amaral, Anthony, (1977), Mustang: Life and Legends of Nevada's Wild Horses, Reno: University of Nevada Press.
- Lynghaug, Fran, (2009) The Official Horse Breeds Standards Guide Minneapolis: Voyageur Press.
- Morin, Paula, (2006) Honest Horses: Wild Horses in the Great Basin Reno and Las Vegas, University of Nevada Press.
- Roe, Frank Gilbert, (1955) The Indian and the Horse Norman, University of Oklahoma Press, Fourth printing, 1974.
- Ryden, Hope, (1970), America's Last Wild Horses, E. P. Dutton. Reprinted with Revisions, E. P. Dutton, 1978.
Sharp, Lee, (1984) "Overview of the Taylor Grazing Act"U. S. Dept. of Interior, Bureau of Land Management Idaho State Office, "The Taylor Grazing Act, 1934-1984, 50 Years of Progress".
- Sherrets, Harold, (1984) "Impacts of Wild Horses on Rangeland Management" U. S. Dept. of Interior, Bureau of Land Management Idaho State Office, "The Taylor Grazing Act, 1934-1984, 50 Years of Progress".
- Wyman, Walker D., (1945) The Wild Horse of the West, University of Nebraska Press. Reprinted, Bison Books, 1968.
- Young, James A. and Sparks, B. Abbott (1985) Cattle in the Cold Desert Logan, Utah State University Press, Expanded Edition printed, Reno, University of Nevada Press, 1992.Lynn Wysong (talk) 23:20, 19 March 2015 (UTC)
Comments
Does anyone know of any specific problems with these sources? If they are "old", does anyone know of any specific new information that would necessarily preclude them? Please make a reasoned case for why the new information invalidates the old source.Lynn Wysong (talk) 23:20, 19 March 2015 (UTC)
- We add sources when we have footnotes to attach to them. You don't just add a random "here are more sources" list to an article that is going to be improved to the GA standard; These may be fine for footnoting certain information, but it's all about context. Propose a paragraph where each may be added; for example, can we agree on wording for a Taylor Grazing Act paragraph? Montanabw(talk) 04:10, 21 March 2015 (UTC)
- If your concern is a TGA paragraph, go ahead and propose one. In the meantime, if anyone know of a problem with any of the sources, please speak out.Lynn Wysong (talk) 06:33, 21 March 2015 (UTC)
- Maybe I should say, these sources as a Bibliography, like here: Donner Party. Because, really, what are called "notes" on the Mustang page are "citations".Lynn Wysong (talk) 17:11, 25 March 2015 (UTC)
- Quite some time ago, the active editors of the horse breed articles decided to do "Notes" and "Sources" instead of "Footnotes" and "Bibliography" - same diff, whatever the headings are is not a huge deal to me, though consistency is nice. But you are missing my point: We don't need a random laundry list of "further reading" at this point - read WP:ELNO which is also applicable to books; things that are potential footnoted sources should become sources. You don't understand how to edit wikipedia yet and I really wish you'd just listen to me instead of creating all this worthless drama. Montanabw(talk) 20:03, 28 March 2015 (UTC)
- Sorry, but my experience with you is that I'm much better off reading wiki policy myself than "listening" to what you tell me.Lynn Wysong (talk) 20:38, 28 March 2015 (UTC)
- I see no evidence that you've read a thing; you are still insisting on the same nonsense you were a month ago. Montanabw(talk) 00:13, 29 March 2015 (UTC)
- I did propose a TGA paragraph, over in your sandbox, you didn't agree with what I proposed and refused to collaborate, in fact, I believe you kicked me out of your userspace now so I can't discuss anything further there even if I wanted to. So I'm not going to beat my head against the wall. It's really long past time for you to learn how to collaborate; I'm not going to bid against myself here. Propose your own paragraphs - but keep it short, simple, and be willing to do it properly and collaborate. Montanabw(talk) 02:25, 22 March 2015 (UTC)
- As to "problem with any of these sources" the problem is that it all depends on how there are to be used: What you fail to understand here is that for wikipedia, each item added to an article needs to be sourced to a reliable source with neither copy and paste, close paraphrasing, synthesis or original research. So a blanket "are these sources OK?" Is not a helpful question; each source may be good for some things, but not for others, it's going to depend on the context. We can't say that source foo is "OK," it depends on how it is used. Montanabw(talk) 02:25, 22 March 2015 (UTC)
- So, as a "further reading" list, some of the above sources have only a page or two to do with Mustangs; hence they may be fine as a specific footnote for something in the article, but they are silly to have as a "further reading" list. (See WP:ELNO) Other sources that are entirely about Mustangs (such as Hope Ryden) may be fine in a "further reading" list, but a) that book is already there (and you were complaining about it not being a good source a couple weeks ago, so could you kindly make up your mind?) plus b) if it becomes a source, then there is no need to include it as a "further reading" item; that's redundant and c) Some sources, such as Ryden, may be a RS for some things, but not a RS for others, it all depends on the context - hence it is best to use these as footnotes to article body text. Montanabw(talk) 02:25, 22 March 2015 (UTC)
- Okay, how about we take out Lynghaug, and put in McKnight? He wrote a great article that you can read by making a JSTOR account, which is free. Roe and Wyman are also debatable, not because they isn't a reliable sources, but they would only be minimally referenced. As far as Ryden, yes, she is not as reliable a source as most others, but since she is so well known, I still think she is a viable source, as long as her inaccuracies are explained.Lynn Wysong (talk) 13:39, 24 March 2015 (UTC)
- No "further reading" list. We need to work reliable sources in as footnotes and citations. Each source will stand on what it footnotes. You can't make a blanket statement that Foo is always and forevermore a reliable source for everything it contains. Things like Lynghaug or may be a best-available RS for a limited bit of info even if not 100% RS for everything. Montanabw(talk) 20:28, 24 March 2015 (UTC)
- Oh, sorry, didn't realize you were talking about a "furthur reading" list. That wasn't what I was talking about, so I guess all the previous discussion was for naught. What about the sources as references?Lynn Wysong (talk) 01:06, 25 March 2015 (UTC)
"New Source"
I'm taking a sabbatical from editing for a while to finish getting my research paper ready for submittal. In the meantime, I found an online copy of another good source. Proceedings National Wild Horse Forum April 4-7-1977. Lynn Wysong (talk) 15:06, 1 April 2015 (UTC)
- Thank you. If your article is accepted and published, let us know. Per WP:RS it might contain something that could be added here. I also think it's cool that you are writing for RL publication. I've had two things published that were inspired by the work I did on-wiki. Montanabw(talk) 17:00, 2 April 2015 (UTC)
Add category?
Closed per apparent consensus
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The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion. It's not mentioned by name, but the Landrace article mentions it as being one. Can we add the "Horse landraces" category to it?Artheartsoul1 (talk) 16:44, 21 March 2015 (UTC)
Definitions of "Breed"
How can "mustang", a term used in the Western United States to describe a feral horse, be a breed? Lynn (SLW) (talk) 23:16, 22 April 2015 (UTC)
My point is that the "breed" issue is contentious - not just for Mustangs but for other horse breeds as well (For example, is the Moyle horse a breed? I said no, I tried to AfD the article, and I lost). Thus, we cannot say that the mustang of the Americas is or is not a single breed, multiple breeds, or no breed. We can only take the assorted definitions, source them and then "teach the controversy" by explaining each argument. It is actually something I have wanted to do for a very long time, but every time yet another petty drama erupts on this article (last year there was a lot of IP vandalism by people trying to claim the horse never became extinct in North America), I get burned out on the issue and just get the article stabilized and then go on to edit other things. Montanabw(talk) 18:38, 23 April 2015 (UTC)
It is pretty clear that there is not an interest in collaboration and article improvement, this is simply about creating drama, and a very odd approach to it as well, having a conversation with a bunch of people who aren't there. Let's just close this discussion, as it is going nowhere. Montanabw(talk) 21:47, 24 April 2015 (UTC)
The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.
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Mustang is not a breed
Hatting discussion that has moved to a different talk page section
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One can only provide that background in this article if the references distinctly reference information in reference to mustangs otherwise we get into research paper territory and what WP might refer to as Original Research. Tricky.(Littleolive oil (talk) 00:16, 18 April 2015 (UTC))
It is correct, however, that it is probably necessary to balance sources as truly NPOV ones are very difficult to find; I have battled for years with advocates who keep trying to remove the word "feral" from the article, for example; these horses clearly are descended from domesticated animals and the horse clearly had died out in North America for about 10,000 years before horses were reintroduced from Europe. I think the main thing is to be careful to explain both/all points of view fairly and honestly. For example, at this version of Wysong's sandbox, you have a link to Range Magazine which is an interesting article from a very right-wing, anti-government point of view and contains some horribly sexist with cracks in at least six places about "women crying" over wild horses. But it also has a few good points. But we are never going to get this article improved if we keep fighting over things like the lead. Every time I get my hopes up that someone wants to collaborate here, they are dashed by nonsense like arguing over "breed" versus "landrace" and so on. Montanabw(talk) 22:39, 18 April 2015 (UTC)
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That all sounds fine and dandy, but the average reader (including knowledgeable equestrians) do not equate DNA analyses when they refer to "wild mustangs." As long as the ubiquitous terminology is defined in this article in a way the general populace can understand, there is no problem. WP is not a scientific journal. To most people "wild" means "untamed". The term "wild mustangs" is ubiquitous, therefore acceptable in defining the "untamed" or "feral" populations of mustangs per WP:PAG. Let's not make this complicated or controversial. It's easy enough to provide the explanation which is what encyclopedias are supposed to do. Atsme☎️📧 22:50, 13 May 2015 (UTC)
The continuing reverts re: the lead
I find it rather disappointing that proper phrasing of the lead is being reverted for reasons that are not substantive. Instead of reverting, can we please discuss it here first? Atsme ☎️ 📧 22:57, 9 May 2015 (UTC)
Moved from my talk page- “Because” is a subordinating conjunction, which another reason I changed that segment of the lead. Atsme ☎️ 📧 21:38, 9 May 2015 (UTC)
- I have just no idea what that has to do with the cost of cod. But thanks for (finally) starting a discussion, Atsme; I can't imagine why you didn't do so straight away.
- To the point: I suggest removing all the stuff about wild horses from the lead. As Ealdgyth said in an edit summary, "they are feral, not wild. No matter what the congressional act is called, all mustangs are descended from domesticated horses, and thus are feral not wild"; that sums it up. The mistake in the name of the act could be covered in an explanatory (foot)note. It could suitably read "No matter what the congressional act is called, all mustangs are descended from domesticated horses, and thus are feral not wild". Justlettersandnumbers (talk) 23:09, 9 May 2015 (UTC)
- No, because doing so would not be accurate. Please read the science because on WP, that is what prevails. What you are edit warring over now is semantics. See the following - [22] The wild horse in the United States is generally labeled non-native by most federal and state agencies dealing with wildlife management, whose legal mandate is usually to protect native wildlife and prevent non-native species from having ecologically harmful effects. But the two key elements for defining an animal as a native species are where it originated and whether or not it coevolved with its habitat. E. caballus can lay claim to doing both in North America. So a good argument can be made that it, too, should enjoy protection as a form of native wildlife." I will have more RS to back it up in the next day or so. I recommend collaboration to get the article right in lieu of the tedious process of DR. I hope you will agree. Atsme ☎️ 📧 23:34, 9 May 2015 (UTC)
- Atsme, this is not science, it's a opinion piece/blog post on an e-commerce site. Something like doi:10.1371/journal.pbio.0030241 is science, and raises some interesting questions. Justlettersandnumbers (talk) 11:40, 12 May 2015 (UTC)
- Thank you, Justlettersandnumbers - I didn't intend for that link to be used in the article and apologize if I left that impression. I used that particular article because it was handy, easy to read, and included references to RS. I apologize for not getting back to this in the "day or so" I mentioned above - the Taj Mahal and a few other issues derailed me - but I still have intentions to conduct further research and collaborate with the editors who have been working here. It is indeed an interesting topic especially for those of us who have been involved with horses most of our lives. I don't consider my interest in mustangs a COI because I no longer breed/raise horses but I do own a boarding facility which comprises a significant part of my ranch in Texas. Just wanted to make that known. Again, thank you for the reference. Atsme ☎️ 📧 12:15, 12 May 2015 (UTC)
- Atsme, this is not science, it's a opinion piece/blog post on an e-commerce site. Something like doi:10.1371/journal.pbio.0030241 is science, and raises some interesting questions. Justlettersandnumbers (talk) 11:40, 12 May 2015 (UTC)
- No, because doing so would not be accurate. Please read the science because on WP, that is what prevails. What you are edit warring over now is semantics. See the following - [22] The wild horse in the United States is generally labeled non-native by most federal and state agencies dealing with wildlife management, whose legal mandate is usually to protect native wildlife and prevent non-native species from having ecologically harmful effects. But the two key elements for defining an animal as a native species are where it originated and whether or not it coevolved with its habitat. E. caballus can lay claim to doing both in North America. So a good argument can be made that it, too, should enjoy protection as a form of native wildlife." I will have more RS to back it up in the next day or so. I recommend collaboration to get the article right in lieu of the tedious process of DR. I hope you will agree. Atsme ☎️ 📧 23:34, 9 May 2015 (UTC)
Last month the drama was about them NOT being wild horses. The article quite thoroughly goes over the "reintroduced extinct species" argument and it's in there. The article you linked, is not adequate science, per what JLAN said. Montanabw(talk) 05:02, 13 May 2015 (UTC)
- Well, if you'll read my response to JLAN, I explained why I grabbed that particular source. No need to keep repeating it. Atsme ☎️ 📧 09:56, 13 May 2015 (UTC)
- Livescience has a tendency to "report" on things that are pretty close to sensationalism, or at least, a bit to cutting edge for wiki. The question of the horse in post 1492 America is tricky. While it's clear that the Brumby was a wholly introduced species to Australia, the ancestral horse in North America was well-established - but it DID become extinct. So how a related subspecies fits into the question of fauna "native" to an ecosystem is a tricky one and given the wikipedia rules of WP:V, WP:OR and WP:SYNTH, it's one we probably can't answer here. Montanabw(talk) 18:41, 13 May 2015 (UTC)
- There seem to be three separate questions here: my answers are:
- Is it a wild horse? No, it isn't, it descends from animals that were domesticated for thousands of years (the Livescience page asks how it is different from Przewalki's Horse; same answer); should be covered in an explanatory note
- Is it a native species? Only by the most specious of arguments; but people are making that argument, so it should be in the article
- Does it matter here what kind of conjunction "because" is? Not to me. Justlettersandnumbers (talk) 19:34, 13 May 2015 (UTC)
- There seem to be three separate questions here: my answers are:
- Livescience has a tendency to "report" on things that are pretty close to sensationalism, or at least, a bit to cutting edge for wiki. The question of the horse in post 1492 America is tricky. While it's clear that the Brumby was a wholly introduced species to Australia, the ancestral horse in North America was well-established - but it DID become extinct. So how a related subspecies fits into the question of fauna "native" to an ecosystem is a tricky one and given the wikipedia rules of WP:V, WP:OR and WP:SYNTH, it's one we probably can't answer here. Montanabw(talk) 18:41, 13 May 2015 (UTC)
That all sounds fine and dandy, but the average reader (including knowledgeable equestrians) do not equate DNA analyses when they refer to "wild mustangs", much less the use of the word "wild". As long as the ubiquitous terminology is defined in this article in a way the general populace can understand, there is no problem. WP is not a scientific journal. To most people "wild" means "untamed". The term "wild mustangs" is ubiquitous, therefore acceptable in defining the "untamed" or "feral" populations of mustangs per WP:PAG. Let's not make this complicated or controversial. It's easy enough to provide the explanation which is what encyclopedias are supposed to do. Atsme☎️📧 22:54, 13 May 2015 (UTC)
- We do not dumb down wikipedia to pander to popular sentiment. Just like a schizophrenic is NOT a multiple personality, no matter that "most people" confuse the two, likewise, we do not call untamed feral animals "wild" where they are not biologically so. "Knowledgeable equestrians" all know Mustangs are feral animals and that the only true "wild" extant horse is the Przewalski's horse. (Romantic fools, on the other hand, like the wild horsie thing. Sigh...) Further, Mustangs are also not all untamed, there are also many adopted off the BLM, there are some that are part of clear landrace breeds and a few , notably the Spanish Mustang are established standardized breeds. This article just a month ago had drama about how these horses aren't wild and that we had too much pro-wild POV, now you show up arguing the opposite. Must mean this article is pretty darn NPOV because it pisses off everyone. Montanabw(talk) 17:11, 14 May 2015 (UTC)
- Schizophrenic is ubiquitous. I believe it was Dirty Harry who made it that way. <grin> I'm not here to piss anyone off, and I'm not saying to dumb anything down. I'm saying don't assume. Actually it's not me saying it because it's written unambiguously in WP:What Wikipedia is not A Wikipedia article should not be presented on the assumption that the reader is well versed in the topic's field. Introductory language in the lead (and also maybe the initial sections) of the article should be written in plain terms and concepts that can be understood by any literate reader of Wikipedia without any knowledge in the given field before advancing to more detailed explanations of the topic. While wikilinks should be provided for advanced terms and concepts in that field, articles should be written on the assumption that the reader will not or cannot follow these links, instead attempting to infer their meaning from the text. So if 90% (guestimate) of the articles and books use "wild", that is what the average reader will relate to first, and then once they're hooked, no holds barred. Horses (and the equine industry) are well within my area of expertise as so is writing so don't be concerned about me messing anything up. Regardless, I'm going to lay this aside for the time being because my main computer blew a graphic's card this morning and all I have with me is an original iPad which barely has enough memory to handle a full paragraph of text. Happy trails to you, til we meet again. --Atsme☎️📧 01:29, 15 May 2015 (UTC)
- So you think that the lead of schizophrenic should say :schizophrenics have a multiple personality just because it's "ubiquitous?" I'm sorry, but WP:RS and WP:V are absolutes here. We have wikilinks to the relevant concepts and I see no reason to debate this any further. I really doubt that you know much about horses or the equine industry if you insist on saying "wild" horses, when virtually every book in existence that discusses breeds and horse types explains that the free-roaming Mustang is a feral animal. Montanabw(talk) 19:32, 15 May 2015 (UTC)
- Further, per your concerns about explaining things, really, you cannot get any simpler than the current wording: The mustang is a free-roaming horse of the American west that first descended from horses brought to the Americas by the Spanish. Mustangs are often referred to as wild horses, but there is debate over terminology. Because they are descended from once-domesticated horses, they can be classified as feral horses.
- The personal attack was unnecessary. Such behavior usually rears its ugly head when there is no substantive argument to support questioned content. I am also concerned over what appears to be OWN behavior at this article. I suggest you restrict your comments to content, not editors. If the paragraph was acceptable as written, other editors wouldn't be trying to change it. Enjoy the weekend. --Atsme☎️📧 23:17, 15 May 2015 (UTC)
- You raised the idea that you are some kind of expert. So, if you open the door, don't be surprised if you get called on your claims. The paragraph as it sits at present has been changed in the past to reflect legitimate concerns. It teaches the controversy and is sourced within the article. If you really want to use bad science and inaccurate terminology, then present sources that at least raise the potential for an intelligent, learned discussion. Otherwise, you are engaging in tendentious debate with fringe claims. Montanabw(talk) 16:59, 16 May 2015 (UTC)
- Shall we add WP:Battleground and WP:Baiting to the list of WP:NPA? Why are you still going on and on after I said I was laying this issue aside for the time being? Horses are within my area of expertise and I really don't care if you believe it or not. Either way, my passing mention of it doesn't give you a free pass to violate behavioral policy by discrediting me when you have no clue what you're talking about. Focus on your own editing which you seem to think is so perfect that it needs no improvement instead of launching personal attacks and casting aspersions against me as you did above. If you have a problem with any of my edits or anything else I have done here, you are welcome to file an action at ANI. In the interim, please respect WP:NPA and focus on content.--Atsme☎️📧 17:32, 16 May 2015 (UTC)
- Honey, I'm not the one spending endless bandwidth arguing about unsupportable assertions. Take your own advice and go away. Montanabw(talk) 06:10, 17 May 2015 (UTC)
- As I requested of you above, restrict your comments to content.
- The mustang is a free-roaming horse of the American west - a ridiculous statement based in the misapprehension of the correct terminology. Example: a rough stock breeder (breeder of bucking stock for rodeos) has free-roaming horses on a 10,000 acre ranch in Colorado; some may have been wild mustangs captured by BLM and later adopted by that rough stock breeder. They are not wild mustangs any longer. They have been tamed and are in captivity.
- A breed of horse is developed by selective breeding programs (typically crossing recognized breeds of domesticated horses). Mustangs that run wild on the ranges of the American west are not domesticated. Their ancestry comprises once domesticated horses but they are now wild horses roaming the ranges of the American west. Those wild horses are called mustangs. This article is confusing because the terminology is confusing and incorrect.
- Mustangs are often referred to as wild horses - by whom and under what circumstances? Wild horses are often referred to as wild horses. Wild mustangs are wild horses until they are brought into captivity in a training program at which time they are domesticated, and then they are called trained mustangs or just plain mustangs if they happen to be DNA tested to be mustangs and not someone's domesticated Quarter Horse that escaped captivity 15 years ago and joined a wild herd. After domestication, when horses are turned back into the wild they quickly revert to being wild. That's what horses do regardless of how they are bred because it is an inherent trait built into their DNA.
- As soon as I get my laptop back, I will properly cite scientific/scholarly references that support the relaxed statements I just made. In the interim, stop telling me to go away. It is rude and demonstrates OWN behavior. You should be inviting collaborators to help improve this article, not trying to run-off editors simply because you disagree. --Atsme☎️📧 12:55, 18 May 2015 (UTC)
- First off, it's the lead- a summary of the article. See WP:LEAD you don't rewrite the lead until you have better stuff to source the article. If you have sources, great. Post them. Montanabw(talk) 07:43, 19 May 2015 (UTC)
Wild vs Wildlife
I thought I'd start a new section here because the last one is getting rather long. It seems to me that the debate over the term wild centers around whether or not mustangs could or should be considered wildlife, as opposed to feral and/or invasive species. Those that favor the idea that horses are native wildlife species, either because they never died out or that they died out so recently in geologic time that they should still be considered native prefer the term "wild". Those that consider horses to be invasive prefer the term feral.
My take on it? I'm not even going to go to the "horses never died out in the New World" theory. It's a fringe theory, with no real evidence but lots of excuses for why not. Next, can they still be considered native because they died out so recently in geologic time and because DNA comparisons of horses found in permafrost are very similar to modern horses? I still say no, because if the New World was the horse's native environment, they wouldn't have died out here. I don't think that early humans were directly responsible for their extinction-at the most humans just pushed a species imperiled by climate change over the brink. Now, I realize that horses in the Old World managed to adapt to the climate change, and thus some became well suited for the environment that is now typical of the Southern Great Plains and California. But, species and their environment must evolve together and create a balance. That was not the case for horses and the warm semi-desert regions in the New World. Horses had died out long before those environments became what they were like when the first white men set eyes on them, and began causing significant changes. So, while horses may have flourished there for a while, it's entirely possible that they would have eventually caused some environmental cataclysm had modern humans not set about eliminating them. And they certainly would in the Great Basin desert where most mustangs are found now. So, I'm feral and invasive all the way. Lynn (SLW) (talk) 21:59, 22 May 2015 (UTC)
- First off, Lynn and I happen to agree 100% (!) that the "horses never died out in the New World" thing is a WP:FRINGE theory. They became extinct. End of story. I also feel that horses in the Americas are unquestionably "feral" in that they are - 100% - descended from once-domesticated ancestors and as the BLM's Adopt-a-Mustang program demonstrates, they are fairly easy to "re-domesticate" once removed from the wild. So I agree that they are feral. Montanabw(talk) 07:06, 24 May 2015 (UTC)
- Second, there are multiple origins for the various herds today. Some have been well-studied and have a clear history, either via DNA (like the Pryor herd) or decent record-keeping of some of the more isolated populations (like the Kigers). I have long felt the one thing this article needs and doesn't have is a good chart of all the HMAs with sources about their populations, origins, etc. That's just an article improvement question. Montanabw(talk) 07:06, 24 May 2015 (UTC)
- Third, the real question for an article like this one is to look at the modern "preserve them all versus shoot 'em all" question - to this day, there is a battle between livestock interests and "wild" horse preservationists. This dispute needs to be handled neutrally and in a way that is fair to both sides, with good sources. I think so far the article tries to do this, though always room to improve. At least, given that more of the vandalism is from the "save the wild horses" side, I think we're close. It will always be a no-win battleground, like the abortion issue or something, because there are a lot of people who don't think there's any middle ground. :-P Montanabw(talk) 07:06, 24 May 2015 (UTC)
- Fourth, I think that the article can and should have a clear-eyed look at population and the actual environmental impact of feral, free-roaming horses. But sourcing must be meticulous and very carefully done. Horses obviously reproduce quickly and population control is needed. But it needs to be done with consideration of the reality that humans have changed any "natural" environment from what it might be, whether by overgrazing livestock generally, eliminating natural predators, adding cattle grazing (speaking of an "invasive" species... with the exception of bison), oil and gas development, mining, etc. And this must be done recognizing the political power of the beef cattle and natural resource extraction industries (both of which would like them gone). I figure that the BLM is a good place to start for basic info - they get it from both sides: The wild horse preservation interests think the BLM is part of a conspiracy in cahoots with the cattle industry, but an awful lot of Nevada cattle ranchers have sympathy for that Bundy standoff against the BLM. Montanabw(talk) 07:06, 24 May 2015 (UTC)
- Finally ... I split the difference on the question of "invasive" by saying "maybe, maybe not." I have said that I think it is clear that the Australian Brumby IS an invasive species in Australia, the horse never lived there, but I think horses in the Americas are a gray area. I think it worth looking at each side of the "can they still be considered native because they died out so recently in geologic time?" question. Put differently, is the modern horse more comparable to the native bison or the invasive domestic cow? A couple of books raise an interesting point about the climatic changes associated with the end of the last Ice Age affecting Eurasia and the Americas differently. For example, Stephen Budiansky's The Nature of Horses makes a rather compelling argument that the horse could have also died out in Eurasia were it not for domestication - the horse wasn't doing so well there against human hunters, either. It just would have taken a bit longer. In discussing animal domestication generally, Guns, Germs, and Steel noted that the east-west alignment of Eurasia allowed things like certain crops and domesticated animals to spread more easily due to the similarity of latitude, even if climate and altitude changed, day length and season length did not. In contrast, the Americas, aligned in a north-south geography, made movement of species - plant and animal - more difficult.
- So, at the end of the day, while perhaps the Great Basin isn't the best place for them now, for a lot of reasons, the same can be said for another completely invasive species - the modern cow - and no one talks about eliminating them, only controlling populations: So the real question isn't a palentological - or even biological - one, it's a political one. And, frankly, Kleppe v. New Mexico established the law of the land. So... now... onward? Montanabw(talk) 07:06, 24 May 2015 (UTC)
- First off, I think it's important to not go down a "horses vs cows" on the desert rabbit trail. It's unproductive. Because, there doesn't seem to be any disagreement over (at least by people that have any realistic grasp on the subject) they both must be managed on the Great Basin desert, which gets a total of about six inches a year of precipitation. You couldn't take either one and just turn them out, let them reproduce freely and expect desirable results. It simply is not suitable habitat for large herbivores, unless the grazing is intensely managed. When white man first explored the region, they noted there were no bison, and no wild horses (although at that time there was an abundance of wild horses on more suitable habitat in the western U.S.). The biggest thing out there was pronghorn, that aren't much bigger than a goat. There may have been scattered populations of deer and elk, but they weren't abundant.
- When white settlers came, they had to be very resourceful in their use of the land. Any crops needed irrigation, so they settled in areas where water was available. They would turn their livestock (INCLUDING horses) out on the desert (public domain) for the winter, but also feed hay grown under irrigation, because the land simply could not sustain year round grazing. Sheepmen were nomadic, just like those on other deserts in the world, and were constantly moving their herds to areas of ungrazed forage. Since they still would be limited to grazing in areas were there was at least some water for the animals, the sheep and cattlemen developed water sources, drilling shallow wells that pumped water with windmills, putting catchment dams in ephemeral washes that would then create ponds that had been lined with clay to hold the water, and digging down into springs and seeps, installing head boxes that would fill up with water that could be piped down to ponds. That was the only way they could make grazing work. In 1934, the Taylor Grazing Act was enacted to regulate the grazing on the public domain, because the Tragedy of the Commons was rearing its head. By that time serious environmental damage had already occurred from ALL livestock grazing, horses included.
- So, cattle and sheep grazing is intensely managed on the public lands in an attempt to keep it sustainable. Permits are issued, the range is monitored, and depending on the conditions, the number of animals and the timing of their use is adjusted. But, the settlers horses that had gone feral were not permitted nor managed. They were on the range year round, reproducing freely. The only way to manage them was to eliminate them. Finally, the WFRH&BA was passed to give the BLM the job of managing them, because the bottom line is, they must be managed. Regardless of whether or not there are cows and sheep out there, horses are still an invasive species on the desert. I know there are a lot of people out there that think that horses do not have to be managed, just take off all the cows and sheep to make room for them, and everything will be fine. Maybe turn some wolves out there too, to keep the population down. There is no scientific or historic basis for such a premise. Horses are not, and never have been, a natural species there. There may have been equines in the geographic region thousands of years ago when it was wetter and colder, but not since it became a desert, after the last Ice Age.
- So, to take it back to the "Wild". Are managed horses "wild" horses? Going back to Dr Chrissy's definitions:
- Definitions of "wild"
- Merriam-Webster: "of an animal : living in nature without human control or care : not tame"[8]
- Oxford dictionaries: Wild is "(Of an animal or plant) living or growing in the natural environment; not domesticated or cultivated:"[9]
- MacMillan dictionary: "a wild animal or plant lives or grows on its own in natural conditions and is not raised by humans"[10]
- The Wildness article: "[Wild] species experience their full life cycles without deliberate human intervention." but no reference given.
- It's a stretch to say that horses are wild under these definitions. 1) they aren't in their natural environment and 2) they must be subject to intense human intervention. I know that pretty much all wildlife species are managed these days because human activities have disrupted their environments, but horses are subject to a more intense management because of their special circumstances.
- Now, as to whether or not horses could be considered native or non-invasive in regions that could theoretically support large herbivores with little management, such as in the Great Plains, it might be a great philosophical discussion, but not really relevant except as part of the history of the mustang, because that's not where they are any longer. So, to get to the real meat of the issue: yes, this all highly political. And much of the controversy is due to a lot of misconceptions on the part of the public. This is why I feel so strongly that the wikipedia articles on this subject are as accurate and neutral as possible. This is where a large number of the public gets its information. If we (as a nation) are going to make decisions as to the management and fate of wild horses, it should be done with an true understanding of the issues. Lynn (SLW) (talk) 14:04, 24 May 2015 (UTC)
- Lynn, I think your statement "If we (as a nation)...." speaks volumes. First, this is an international encylopaedia, not a North American Encyclopaedia. Second, this is not a place to be promoting political points of view regarding how mustangs are to be managed in the future.DrChrissy (talk) 19:42, 24 May 2015 (UTC)
- Now, as to whether or not horses could be considered native or non-invasive in regions that could theoretically support large herbivores with little management, such as in the Great Plains, it might be a great philosophical discussion, but not really relevant except as part of the history of the mustang, because that's not where they are any longer. So, to get to the real meat of the issue: yes, this all highly political. And much of the controversy is due to a lot of misconceptions on the part of the public. This is why I feel so strongly that the wikipedia articles on this subject are as accurate and neutral as possible. This is where a large number of the public gets its information. If we (as a nation) are going to make decisions as to the management and fate of wild horses, it should be done with an true understanding of the issues. Lynn (SLW) (talk) 14:04, 24 May 2015 (UTC)
- I'm simply giving a basis for my feelings on the importance of accuracy and neutrality. If wikipedia's motivation for accuracy and neutrality are not the same as mine, we still have the same goals and objectives, so there's no reason for concern. And whereas wikipedia may be "international", the political issues here that underlie the current controversy of terminology are not. Lynn (SLW) (talk) 19:59, 24 May 2015 (UTC)
- I agree that the Mustang, as a North American type, and mostly a US type, is not in need of internationalization. But neutrality is critical. My take (as a contributor to multiple featured articles) is that we have to treat the views of both sides fairly. Montanabw(talk) 13:52, 25 May 2015 (UTC)
- I realize the Britannica is tertiary, but they have a very informative video (short) that demonstrates true neutrality as does their written article. I'm not suggesting copyvio but it doesn't hurt to extract ideas from such RS. Also, WP gives us the freedom to provide more in-depth information (general knowledge) which must be presented in compliance with NPOV. The article should focus primarily on the animal. [23] --Atsme📞📧 22:10, 24 May 2015 (UTC)
- I'm simply giving a basis for my feelings on the importance of accuracy and neutrality. If wikipedia's motivation for accuracy and neutrality are not the same as mine, we still have the same goals and objectives, so there's no reason for concern. And whereas wikipedia may be "international", the political issues here that underlie the current controversy of terminology are not. Lynn (SLW) (talk) 19:59, 24 May 2015 (UTC)
- Just as an aside most of today's mustangs are not eligible for registration in Spanish Mustang Registry nor the Spanish Barb Breeders Association. Some of the foundation stock from those registries came from herds that still exist today, but they were herds that were recognized as having survived the mass elimination of the Spanish herds, which were pretty much gone by 100 years ago. Today's herds consist mostly of settler's horses that starting going feral on the desert about the same time the remnants of the once plentiful Spanish mustangs were being gathered off the last grasslands remaining in the public domain in the early 20th century. They were sent to Africa for use in the Boer War and settlers claimed the lands for the wave of dry farming, setting up the region for the Dust bowl Lynn (SLW) (talk) 11:54, 25 May 2015 (UTC)
- PS: Also wanted to add the following from RS - (1) Oxford dictionary - mustang - Origin: Early 19th century: from a blend of Spanish mestengo (from mesta 'company of graziers') and mostrenco, both meaning 'wild or masterless cattle' [24]; and (2) "The Mustang is a feral horse found now in the western United States. The name Mustang comes from the Spanish word mesteño or monstenco meaning wild or stray." [25] (Atsme📞📧 added 22:19, 24 May 2015 (UTC))
- Can we compromise that the first mustangs, those that escaped from the Spanish and flourished on the Southern Great Plains could accurately be described as wild, since there was no human intervention in their life cycle, and they were existing on a natural (grassland) habitat whereas today's mustang's that escaped from the American settlers on the Great Basin and other desert regions in the West can only be considered feral, since they are existing on an unnatural desert habitat, with intense human management? Lynn (SLW) (talk) 11:54, 25 May 2015 (UTC)
No, the original Spanish horses were also estrays that bred on in wild conditiond, just like today's . By the "no human intervention" standard, even modern elk, deer, wolves and mountain lions wouldn't be "wild." This issue has been extensively debated at the feral article and I see no reason to beat this horse to death further. Plus, dictionary and encyclopedia definitions may lead us to sources, but given that there's a lot more on the topic, they are weak. Montanabw(talk) 13:52, 25 May 2015 (UTC)
- Well, if you see no reason to discuss it further, feel free to bow out. But I don't think it's been resolved to everyone's satisfaction. Lynn (SLW) (talk) 14:06, 25 May 2015 (UTC)
Definition of "wild"
- There seems to have been some discussion about use of the word "wild". Sometimes science can help us with words that are used quite casually. For example, an inbred strain is "A strain is defined as inbred when it has been mated brother x sister for 20 or more consecutive generations" I was hoping there might be something as clear cut for "wild", such as "never-domesticated" but I don't think there is. So, to make everything clear as mud, I offer the following -
- Definitions of "wild"
- Merriam-Webster: "of an animal : living in nature without human control or care : not tame"[26]
- Oxford dictionaries: Wild is "(Of an animal or plant) living or growing in the natural environment; not domesticated or cultivated:"[27]
- MacMillan dictionary: "a wild animal or plant lives or grows on its own in natural conditions and is not raised by humans"[28]
- The Wildness article: "[Wild] species experience their full life cycles without deliberate human intervention." but no reference given.
- For humour value, the UK Dangerous Wild Animals Act 1976[29] list of dangerous wild animals includes asses, horses and zebras (the donkey, domestic horse and domestic hybrids are excepted) or more scientifically, "Equidae, except the species Equus asinus. Equus caballus and Equus asinus x Equus caballus".
- Perhaps on the mustang article there needs to be a little expansion of these terms if use of the word "wild" is contested.
- DrChrissy (talk) 15:16, 18 May 2015 (UTC)
- Thank you, DrChrissy. Another somewhat humorous consideration is the fact that in 1971, the US Congress passed the Wild Free-Roaming Horses and Burros Act. Notice my bold and the fact it is not titled the Wild Mustang and Burros Act. My laptop is fixed - will pick it up in a few hours. --Atsme☎️📧 17:19, 18 May 2015 (UTC)
- The US Congress, as we all know, is not an arbiter of correct scientific terminology. And dictionaries fail to accurately define terms of art. These horses are feral because they have descended from domesticated ancestors and that's the beginning, middle and end of the matter. Anything else is a WP:FRINGE theory and there is a noticeboard about those. And FWIW, [30]: "The Mustang is a feral horse found now in the western United States." Montanabw(talk) 07:45, 19 May 2015 (UTC)
- There's also the example of feral cats versus actual wild cats...another example of a population (feral cats) descending from a domesticate animal while the actual wild cats (lynx, bobcats, etc.) were never domesticated. Just tossing out an example. Intothatdarkness 13:59, 19 May 2015 (UTC)
- Watch wild in a domestic situation and tell me, is it a feral bobcat and a feral coyote? The unapproachable "wild" - [31] --Atsme📞📧 17:25, 19 May 2015 (UTC)
- Hmmmm...they both look rather "tame" to me. The opening seconds of the coyote are a great example of what animal behaviouralists call a "displacement behaviour" This happens when an animal has competing motivations (here it is fight or flight) and does not know what to do, so an irrelevent behaviour is expressed. In humans, we scratch our heads when we don't know what to do. Am I correct in thinking that horses paw the ground in similar confrontations?DrChrissy (talk) 17:46, 19 May 2015 (UTC)
- DrChrissy, as you are aware, horses are prey so the herd would instinctually run like hell, unlike individual predators who may pause to evaluate a situation contingent upon their level of hunger. The herd stallion would have instinctively pursued (and perhaps killed) the bobcat. I have witnessed such behavior on numerous occasions, a few times in "domestic" environments (developed ranch land) with herds of domesticated (tamed) horses (recognized breeds) vs a few (abandoned) very hungry dogs (mutts, or feral dogs - you choose) who had their chops set on tender young horse meat. I've actually lost a foal or two to such activity. What I've noticed about some of the scientific research on horses (which admittedly has advanced significantly and has almost caught-up to, perhaps surpassed, some of the scientific knowledge on cattle) is somewhat limited to book knowledge and controlled trials (city slicker hand-me-down academics) rather than hands-on, in-the-field observations in varying environments over decades. Please feel free to correct me, but isn't the phylogenesis of a species based on genetic changes that are attributable to (and influenced by) natural selection (adaptability) and environmental conditions (displacement behavior)? So is the coyote and bobcat considered "domesticated" based on their "approachability"? Certainly the clades demonstrate what science perceives to be the evolution of a highly derived (and domesticated) species, but does it factor in instinctual behaviors that have not undergone any genetic or evolutionary changes as with the horse? --Atsme📞📧 19:19, 19 May 2015 (UTC)
- I mentioned the feral cat as an example of a domesticated species which has gone "wild" but is still identified as feral based on its origins. Habituated to the presence of humans doesn't have the same connotation. Intothatdarkness 17:54, 19 May 2015 (UTC)
- @Intothatdarkness By definition, a feral animal has to have been domesticated (at some time). Animals which have never been domesticated can still habituate to the presence of humans under a wide range of circumstances. For example, here in the UK, we have gray squirrels. I am not aware of these ever having been domesticated, but we have populations where they are easy to hand-feed - this has been called Self-domestication. @Atsme, I would not say that approachabilty means domesticated. Animals follow what is called the "final behavioural common path". An animal can only express one behaviour at a time - the common path. It is quite easy to think that the Bobcat and the Coyote considered the humans filming the confrontation as mere distractions, and that they needed to really focus on each other as a potentially dangerous opponent. As a consequence, the final common path was to "ignore the irrelevant humans, but attend to the much more potentially injurious furry adversary in front of me". It does surprise me though that the Bobcat trotted off in the direction it did - toward humans. But remember, we don't know the whole story - The bobcat might have been a mother with kittens, in which case she would very likely take the most direct route home, regardless. It really is so difficult to tell from just one film, but it is certainly very interesting.DrChrissy (talk) 19:45, 19 May 2015 (UTC)
- Hmmmm...they both look rather "tame" to me. The opening seconds of the coyote are a great example of what animal behaviouralists call a "displacement behaviour" This happens when an animal has competing motivations (here it is fight or flight) and does not know what to do, so an irrelevent behaviour is expressed. In humans, we scratch our heads when we don't know what to do. Am I correct in thinking that horses paw the ground in similar confrontations?DrChrissy (talk) 17:46, 19 May 2015 (UTC)
- Watch wild in a domestic situation and tell me, is it a feral bobcat and a feral coyote? The unapproachable "wild" - [31] --Atsme📞📧 17:25, 19 May 2015 (UTC)
- There's also the example of feral cats versus actual wild cats...another example of a population (feral cats) descending from a domesticate animal while the actual wild cats (lynx, bobcats, etc.) were never domesticated. Just tossing out an example. Intothatdarkness 13:59, 19 May 2015 (UTC)
This particular debate has been hashed over (repeatedly) at other articles, notably feral. Domesticated animals gone into the wild are "feral"; wild animals that have become habituated to humans are "tamed." (and sometimes "trained") There are clear biological and physiological indicia of domestication and merely living in the wild does not change that. For example, there is the Domesticated silver fox, and studies surrounding this animal, which are extremely interesting and help to shed light on this question of how a wild animal is domesticated. With horses, feral animals, even those several generations in the wild, re-domesticate quickly - most "wild mustangs" that are captured and brought into human ownership are generally quick to adapt to human life. For the ones that do not (often due to age at capture or negative experiences), their offspring generally can be trained. In contrast, the zebra has had individuals tamed and even trained, but it has never been domesticated and hence remains "wild." Montanabw(talk) 21:51, 19 May 2015 (UTC)
- I would also say that you only have wild animals where they are native. So, if you had a herd of (somewhat) tame ranch-raised elk, and they were released in the western U.S., their offspring would be wild. And no, I do not believe that horses are native to North America. They died out here because, unlike those that migrated to the Old World over the Siberian land bridge, they did not adapt to the warmer climates at the end of the last ice age. The horses brought to N.A. five hundred years ago had changed enough that they were able to flourish for a time on the Southern Great Plains, which was a similar environment to the Mediterranean region they came from. But, the Great Plains was not where they evolved and adapted to that environment, (and where other flora and fauna evolved and adapted to their presence) so they aren't native. Lynn (SLW) (talk) 20:35, 21 May 2015 (UTC)
- I'm not so sure I can agree with you there Lynn. Here in the UK, we have your US Grey Squirrel. It has never been domesticated (I think) therefore it is not feral here in the UK, some populations have been trained and will hand feed, but they are certainly not native. However, I think we could (at least we do in the UK) call it "wild".DrChrissy (talk) 20:54, 21 May 2015 (UTC)
- I think on this one, DrChrissy, I mostly (!) agree with LynnWysong. Your comment confuses invasive species with feral ones. The gray squirrel has never been domesticated anywhere, and LynnWysong makes a good analogy about farmed elk (Wapiti) - they are not domesticated, not feral, but truly wild animals. (No genetic changes, no physiological adaptations, they are essentially zoo animals that get hunted) Similarly, the "wild vs feral" horse question is actually quite simple. Clearly e. ferus caballus as a subspecies did not come into being in the Americas - horses were domesticated in Eurasia long after they became extinct in America. So I do partly agree with LynnWysong all the horses and donkeys in America today are technically feral - all are descended from domesticated animals. The "political" question, however, is thornier - are they to be managed as an invasive species or are they a reintroduced species - even though it was a different subspecies or an ancestral equus predecessor that actually lived here? For example, the Australian Brumby is clearly invasive; equus never lived in Australia until brought by Europeans. But in the Americas, ancestors of the modern horse did live on the continent until about 8-12,000 years ago and one theory holds that human hunting pressure was a contributing factor in extinction.. So, to that end, I can't quite agree with Lynn that the modern horse was adapted to a Mediterranean climate—it was domesticated in a steppe climate, though it did OK generally in drier ecosystems, even semi-arid ones like the Iberian Peninsula; nor can I state unquivocally that the ancestral horse didn't evolve on the Great Plains - fossil finds in places like Idaho clearly note that a probable direct line ancestor did exist here, adapted to a cold high plains ecosystem not unlike that of the Eurasian Steppes. So with that sharpening of the horns of the dilemma, I shall step back and invite further discussion. Montanabw(talk) 22:54, 21 May 2015 (UTC)
- I'm not so sure I can agree with you there Lynn. Here in the UK, we have your US Grey Squirrel. It has never been domesticated (I think) therefore it is not feral here in the UK, some populations have been trained and will hand feed, but they are certainly not native. However, I think we could (at least we do in the UK) call it "wild".DrChrissy (talk) 20:54, 21 May 2015 (UTC)
- I have sources for the idea that, upon reaching the old world, horses adapted into four different types, two that were adapted to cold climates (draft and pony types) and two for warm (Arabian and Barb types). The Barb type was found in the Mediterranean, was adapted to that environment, and was, not surprisingly, the kind of horse the Spanish brought to the New World. But, in the New World, instead of adapting to warmer climates, horses appeared to just keep moving north, following the ecosystem they were adapted to as the Ice Age receded, until they either ate their forage out of existence, or were finished off by humans.
- Whereas evidence of ancient horses can be found in the Great Plains, or even the Great Basin desert is really meaningless as to their place in those geographic areas in modern times. The ecosystems that existed during equine evolution were completely different during that time period. Evidence indicates that the last line of horses in the Old World were adapted to a cold grassland environment that may have existed quite far south during the Ice Age, but disappeared as the ice receded, leaving an environment in which the horses couldn't survive, or couldn't adapt to quickly enough to survive the pressure of human hunting. Lynn (SLW) (talk) 23:40, 21 May 2015 (UTC)
- Lynn, though I think you are correct that horses do adapt to whatever climate humans put them in, with the "types" you are referring to a variant of the now-partly-discredited Four Foundations Theory - which I once studied as well (Deb Bennett was a proponent of a variation on it, too). More recent DNA studies and evidence suggests a more mixed picture of multiple origins, see History of horse domestication theories. It's quite fascinating. Montanabw(talk) 17:15, 22 May 2015 (UTC)
- Not after domestication but before. Upon reaching the Old World, horses spread out and, depending on where they ended up, they adapted through natural selection to their environment. Horses in the north remained stouter for better heat retention. Horses in the south became more slender to better deal with the heat. Yes, there may have been a single locus for domestication, but once the idea of horses as beast of burden spread, humans began domesticating their local variant. Lynn (SLW) (talk) 21:17, 22 May 2015 (UTC)
- I'm not sure why you think I am confusing "invasive" and "feral" An animal can be one, or both of these. The grey squirrel has never been domesticated. It therefore, by definition, cannot be feral, but it is invasive here in the UK. We also have American mink here. These were bred for their fur (artificaially selected both in the US and the UK), therefore they are domesticated. They have now escaped/been released and formed breeding populations in the UK, i.e. they are feral. However, they were introduced into this country, therefore they are also invasive. I am not sure why the farmed elk is a good analogy, I simply don't know the details here. But, if the elk have been kept under the influence of humans, it is likely they have been selected for certain traits, meaning they are domesticated.DrChrissy (talk) 13:45, 22 May 2015 (UTC)ee
- I was thinking of your gray squirrel example, they aren't feral, they are wild, but you seemed to be using them as an example... but if I didn't understand what you were saying, then mea culpa. I haven't studied mink, but I can tell you that though there are attempts to farm Elk, it's mostly for "canned" hunting and they haven't really been "domesticated." I agree that there need to be genetic and physiological changes for domestication to be considered a possibility, but some animals, no matter how many generations are "tamed," simply cannot be domesticated - the zebra and Przewalski's horse being classic cases - god knows people have tried! But, that's a discussion for elsewhere, I suppose. Here we are just looking at horses. Montanabw(talk) 17:15, 22 May 2015 (UTC)
- I guess you could say that mustangs are both feral and wild, but feral is a more precise description, since they descend from domesticated stock. I think there's an attempt to limit the use of wild to animals that have never been domesticated, but that seems to be causing a lot of contention. Maybe it's time to rethink that. Lynn (SLW) (talk) 21:17, 22 May 2015 (UTC)
I realize the Britannica is tertiary but during the rethinking process, perhaps their encyclopedic entry will shed new light - [32], [33]. --Atsme📞📧 21:29, 22 May 2015 (UTC)
- According to the Domestication article, domestication is the cultivating or taming of a population of organisms in order to accentuate traits that are desirable to the cultivator or tamer. Let's forget the taming bit. There is no doubt in anybody's mind here that the ancestors of mustangs were selected to be x, y, z. Therefore, mustangs are domesticated horses. They always will be - the domestication process can not be reversed. Regarding zebras, if these have been selected to be tame, to pull carts, whatever, these zebras are domesticated. They might still be bloody awful at pulling carts, but this lineage is domesticated and and descendants of these are also domesticated. The farmed elk may have genetic differences due simply to living under the (extremely slight) influence of humans, such as a reduced flight zone, or the ability to survive in captivity. This means they are domesticated.
- Meriam-Webster defines feral as "used to describe an animal (such as a cat or dog) that has escaped and become wild". I think that says mustangs are both feral and wild. I would be interested to see a source of the argument that only native species can be wild.DrChrissy (talk) 22:38, 22 May 2015 (UTC)
- No, zebras are sometimes tamed, but never domesticated (the ones pulling the carts can "revert" in a flash and kick your head in!) There are physiological, genetic changes that accompany domestication. Horses are, zebras aren't. It's not behavior, it's deeper than that. It's most useful to say "feral but living in the wild" - or, "free-roaming." Montanabw(talk) 06:18, 24 May 2015 (UTC)
- I think you mis-understand me. Domestication is the process of cultivating for desirable traits (usually physiological and/or behavioural i.e. one or both). Taking this to its extreme, the F1 progeny of any parents that have been selected for a trait, have been subject to domestication. I do not know whether the zebra pulling the cart is F1 progeny or not, but if it is the result of someone who selected for a trait, technically, it is (being) domesticated. Yes, it may turn round and kick your head in, but domestic pigs, bulls and even broody hens will do that. We may have selected for an animal to be e.g. productive, but that selection may not have included selecting against aggressive behaviour. I am not saying that domestication is only behaviour. We have white lions and tigers in zoos. These have been selected for their white colour (because this makes money!), i.e. physiology, so they are domesticated, but I would not walk into the cage with a ball of wool to play with them because of their behaviour which I doubt very much has been selected for!
- I am of course taking this to an extreme. The Domestication page talks about "The term "domesticated" refers to an entire species or variety while the term "tame" can refer to just one individual within a species or variety." This is not terribly helpful though, because the wild boar and the domestic pig are the same species, as are the red junglefowl and the domestic chicken. (I am sure there are other examples.)
- The Domestication page also offers the terms "semi-domesticated" and "partially domesticated". Perhaps the zebra issue is not black-and-white (HA! The pun is definitely intended!). I'm not quite sure I know exactly what these terms mean, but maybe we should be thinking about them.DrChrissy (talk) 10:32, 24 May 2015 (UTC)
- I dispute that a F1 bred-in-captivity animal is "domesticated" - people might be trying, but it doesn't mean they have succeeded. Similarly, just because we can manage an animal doesn't mean we have domesticated it. Some species can be domesticated, others cannot. (Again, Jared Diamond had an excellent summary of the traits that make animals domesticatable or not.) I think the literature on the topic pretty much points to that one species of fox as the only new animal to be domesticated for thousands of years. (pretty much everything else seems to have been domesticated thousands of years ago - humans definitely have tried to tame everything, just not always with success) Cheetahs were an interesting case; you see images of them in ancient Egypt with collars and leashes, used to hunt down game. Yet we think of them as "wild" today. They are also a rather vulnerable species because they went through a genetic bottleneck at some point and have very low genetic diversity, which is a concern to a lot of zoos. Interesting. Montanabw(talk) 15:44, 25 May 2015 (UTC)
- So how would you define when an animal has been domesticated? What is "successful" domestication?DrChrissy (talk) 18:39, 25 May 2015 (UTC)
- I dispute that a F1 bred-in-captivity animal is "domesticated" - people might be trying, but it doesn't mean they have succeeded. Similarly, just because we can manage an animal doesn't mean we have domesticated it. Some species can be domesticated, others cannot. (Again, Jared Diamond had an excellent summary of the traits that make animals domesticatable or not.) I think the literature on the topic pretty much points to that one species of fox as the only new animal to be domesticated for thousands of years. (pretty much everything else seems to have been domesticated thousands of years ago - humans definitely have tried to tame everything, just not always with success) Cheetahs were an interesting case; you see images of them in ancient Egypt with collars and leashes, used to hunt down game. Yet we think of them as "wild" today. They are also a rather vulnerable species because they went through a genetic bottleneck at some point and have very low genetic diversity, which is a concern to a lot of zoos. Interesting. Montanabw(talk) 15:44, 25 May 2015 (UTC)
Politics and research and stuff
The endless discussion here is not moving anything forward, so I think research IS what moves things forward. I'm going to post stuff that looks to me like it has potential, not everything is going to be the word of god or anything. Even some source reliable for some things may not be for others. Discuss. Montanabw(talk) 16:50, 25 May 2015 (UTC)
- http://latimesblogs.latimes.com/greenspace/2011/06/wild-horses-nevada-blm-native-species.html Lawsuit over question of native species. My take is that the existence of a court case is an RS for pointing out that a hypothesis or POV exists. Doesn't mean it's scientifically valid, but it does mean that there are indicia of notability. Montanabw(talk) 16:50, 25 May 2015 (UTC)
- http://www.allgov.com/news/controversies/federal-court-refuses-to-oppose-wild-horse-roundupbecause-it-already-happened?news=843133 This appears to be a report on the outcome of the suit. Montanabw(talk) 16:50, 25 May 2015 (UTC)
- http://cdn.ca9.uscourts.gov/datastore/opinions/2014/05/12/12-17804.pdf and here is a copy of the decision itself,
- http://caselaw.findlaw.com/us-9th-circuit/1598963.html Here's another real interesting legal case, contains some useful findings of fact on the nature of roundups that should be an adequately neutral RS for the article if we want to use it. Montanabw(talk) 16:50, 25 May 2015 (UTC)
- http://www.wildhoofbeats.com/news/wild-horses-federal-court-dismisses-state-of-wyomings-anti-mustang-lawsuit and the latest drama out of Wyoming, which will probably go on to the 10th circuit. Montanabw(talk) 17:02, 25 May 2015 (UTC)
What if we just presented both sides? Write a blurb about how the controversy got started, then rebuttals, such as this one: http://www.biologicaldiversity.org/news/press_releases/anza2-25-04.htm
- I believe we already have a start at Mustang#Land_use_controversies and it is a section where expansion and good sources would be nice. (Has anyone who has commented here previously actually READ the entire article as it sits? Just wondering) While I generally respect the work of the Center for Biological Diversity, that particular editorial is nothing more than a polemic press release (words like "terrible" kind of defeat NPOV) and there are, no doubt, far better sources out there. I support the concept of balance, definitely, but I suspect that the BLM will be a better source for the "invasive species" position - surely a good GAO report is out there. Montanabw(talk) 18:41, 25 May 2015 (UTC)
- I don't think so. The BLM tends to stay out of those discussions. It's a land management agency that got blindsided 45 years with the task of managing horses, not a research agency like the USGS. And yes, I have read the article, and I believe this statement: "The environmentalist community is split over the position of the mustang within the North American ecosystem." is not really correct. I think that most environmentalist organizations do not believe wild horses belong where they are. It's the animal rights and mustang advocacy groups that push the "horses as native wildlife theory". Lynn (SLW) (talk) 19:28, 25 May 2015 (UTC)
- We can clarify that, fair enough - in some ways there are three competing factions, add in the cattle industry. I would say that there are nuances in the "native wildlife" argument, though - some people just argue that they are adapted to the prairie ecosystem, but some extremists don't even believe in the use of PZP for population control, and that's pretty nutty. Montanabw(talk) 21:53, 25 May 2015 (UTC)
- https://www.fort.usgs.gov/wildhorsepopulations "This unregulated growth can overtax vegetation and affect herd health as well as native wildlife populations." So, USGS considers them non-native. Lynn (SLW) (talk) 19:36, 25 May 2015 (UTC)
- Even though I believe you are correct, the use of "quotations" isn't proof - we need published analysis. It's out there. Try Google scholar. Montanabw(talk) 21:53, 25 May 2015 (UTC)
- https://www.hcn.org/blogs/issues/44.19/is-there-a-way-through-the-wests-bitter-wild-horse-wars "But they are also technically feral -- non-native transplants, like wild hogs or knapweed. That means that the government is charged with keeping their numbers in check, so that they don't graze arid valleys down to dirt, outcompeting livestock and native species.Lynn (SLW) (talk) 19:39, 25 May 2015 (UTC)
- Interesting article but the knapweed comparison is unfair - they were brought here deliberately! Montanabw(talk) 21:53, 25 May 2015 (UTC)
- http://joomla.wildlife.org/documents/policy/feral_horses_1.pdf "There are similarities between certain genes in modern horses and fossil horses from North America, but geneticists do not believe that they are identical or members of the same species.1 Lynn (SLW) (talk) 20:15, 25 May 2015 (UTC)
- Unless we want to (and we should but it will take time) drill down into peer-reviewed materials, we may have to use a balance of POV organizations' materials - that is pretty similar in tone to the wild horse preservation folks' stuff, just from the opposite view. I'm OK with it if it's balanced by a preservationist's work of similar type.
Good source material, I'll look it over. In the meantime, can you explain to Atsme why we can't just add random stuff into the lead without working it into the article? (I'm sort of in the middle of the Ahmed Zayat article, and it's sort of time-sensitive due to the Belmont ...) Montanabw(talk) 21:53, 25 May 2015 (UTC)
"Wild Horses as Native North American Wildlife"
This is actually an essay that, I believe, started the whole "horses as native species" debate. Jay F. Kirkpatrick brought it forth in 2003, and kept updating it until 2010, after which he seems to have abandoned the idea. However, it can still be found online on the websites of several mustang advocacy groups. About three and a half years ago, I did a fair use refutation of Kirkpatrick's essay that can be found here: https://www.facebook.com/notes/222601234474168/. Lynn (SLW) (talk) 14:19, 25 May 2015 (UTC)
- Hm, never heard of the guy. Facebook isn't a reliable source for anything. I really think it's time to look at what the literature says, not anyone's opinions. Montanabw(talk) 13:47, 25 May 2015 (UTC)
- @Lynn, as someone who is totally neutral (confused!) in this, I really think you might be setting yourself up for assucations of COI by this posting. You appear to be an expert in this field and an expert's views are always welcome, but I'm not sure drawing the readers' attention to "I wrote this" is the best way to do it.DrChrissy (talk) 13:44, 25 May 2015 (UTC)
- Lynn probably isn't an expert, she's just a person interested in the topic, like the rest of us. I do agree that linking to a facebook essay doesn't impress anyone. Montanabw(talk) 13:47, 25 May 2015 (UTC)
- I dunno. What do you consider "an expert"? Someone who's done a lot of research, which I have? Not trying to impress anyone, just trying to give some background into the debate. Dr. Kirkpatrick's essay is used as a source in this article (see Note 28, which goes to a dead link). My point is, not that what I put on facebook could be used as an RS, but that essay itself has issues and appears to no longer even be promoted by the author-which weakens the argument for considering horses to be wildlife. Lynn (SLW) (talk) 14:17, 25 May 2015 (UTC)
- We've all done a lot of research on stuff, that gives us a working expertise, perhaps, but absent credentials, we'd have a hard time convincing anyone of our "expert" status. And even then, on WP, as they say On the Internet, nobody knows you're a dog. (There's a credentialed "expert" that I run into sometimes on the Montana articles who might have a PhD but is also a POV-pushing ideologue, a credential and expertise still doesn't prevent someone from being full of s--t). That said, and I say this with respect, I think @DrChrissy: does have a PhD, which makes him an expert in something... ;-) but not Mustangs - all of which is why we do more research and keep working on improved sources. Montanabw(talk) 16:03, 25 May 2015 (UTC)
- Yup, I totally agree I am not an expert on mustangs. I used to teach vet students about horse behaviour but I would always have the throw-away line "These creatures should never have been domesticated - they are too bloody damn big!" Me and horses do not get on terribly well. What I have been trying to inject here is a neutral, biological approach to the use of terms that are biological, but seem to have been hijacked (not by you two) for political motives. You are both clearly passionate about your points of view and you are both expending considerable energy on arguing these. Editing energy is limited - I wish you could both write a section you agree on - even though there might not be a final conclusion and you have to agree to disagree, and then move on to use that energy for article writing.DrChrissy (talk) 16:27, 25 May 2015 (UTC)
- We've all done a lot of research on stuff, that gives us a working expertise, perhaps, but absent credentials, we'd have a hard time convincing anyone of our "expert" status. And even then, on WP, as they say On the Internet, nobody knows you're a dog. (There's a credentialed "expert" that I run into sometimes on the Montana articles who might have a PhD but is also a POV-pushing ideologue, a credential and expertise still doesn't prevent someone from being full of s--t). That said, and I say this with respect, I think @DrChrissy: does have a PhD, which makes him an expert in something... ;-) but not Mustangs - all of which is why we do more research and keep working on improved sources. Montanabw(talk) 16:03, 25 May 2015 (UTC)
- Actually it was Hope Ryden that started making the argument, in 1970, that horses should be considered native species. Her argument centers around the idea that early man wiped out horses in the New World and that the idea "is the only one that has any significant number of adherents in the scientific community" so when the Spanish brought horses back, it was a reintroduced native species. I'm not sure if she was correct that, in 1970, there were few if any adherents to the idea that it was climate change that wiped out the horses, but presently that idea has many proponents. Dr. Kirkpatrick's essay 33 years later tried to make a more scientific approach to the issue, but it was never peer-reviewed, and even an amateur like me could see a lot of problems with it. Lynn (SLW) (talk) 15:10, 25 May 2015 (UTC)
- It's fair to acknowledge that the hypothesis exists, who promotes it and such. Ryden is generally respected as a promoter of wild horse preservation, so she's a RS that the position exists (if not its validity); Kirkpatrick's essay all depends on where it was published, and not being submitted for peer review does make it fair game - but it cannot be OUR analysis, it has to be that of others. (I know, you hate the caps, but WP:SYNTH is our reality) I happen to agree with you that it is important to present the scientific view that is supported by the BLM and other groups, and that evidence. The question of "climate change versus newly-arrived hunters" is probably not going to be resolved one way or the other based on current science, but much of what I have read suggests that both were factors. Would horses have died out anyway if humans had not appeared on the scene? Hard to say. Montanabw(talk) 16:03, 25 May 2015 (UTC)
- I dunno. What do you consider "an expert"? Someone who's done a lot of research, which I have? Not trying to impress anyone, just trying to give some background into the debate. Dr. Kirkpatrick's essay is used as a source in this article (see Note 28, which goes to a dead link). My point is, not that what I put on facebook could be used as an RS, but that essay itself has issues and appears to no longer even be promoted by the author-which weakens the argument for considering horses to be wildlife. Lynn (SLW) (talk) 14:17, 25 May 2015 (UTC)
Proposal - I don't have a problem with any information that is accurately stated and supported by the RS cited. I would like to modify the lead to accurately define in a nutshell that Columbus reintroduced the horse to the New World in 1493 and that anecdotal evidence generally credits the Spanish conquistador Hernando Cortez as being the first to bring horses to North America. In 1543, the horses that escaped from Francisco Vasquez de Coronado's expedition as they headed north from Mexico are the horses that became the foundation of the first feral horse population in North America that, over the centuries, evolved into the wild free roaming horses known today as “mustangs”. The etymology section will explain the origin and use of the word "mustang" as originating from the Spanish word “mesteño,” meaning “wild.” The lead should also include a brief definition of "true wild" per the same article by the American Museum of Natural History. [34]. If we can all agree on that summary I will add it to the lead and etymology section. Agreed? Disagree? Atsme📞📧 16:43, 25 May 2015 (UTC)
- SLOW DOWN: Please don't mess with the lead - the lead has to reflect the content that is already in the article - in any article improvement drive, standard procedure is to fix the article, then clean up the lede, otherwise you wind up rewriting the lead a dozen times. I'm OK with improving the etymology bit on the history of the word but - I wonder if you've actually read it and looked at the citations there - what's there is more precise ("strayed animal") than what you have proposed here. I like your additional AMNH source, which you could use to augment the OTHER AMNH source that is already in the etymology and usage section. There is actually insufficient evidence to support the Coronado theory - that was actually debunked decades ago in favor of the theory that a horse-trading center in the vicinity of Santa Fe may have been how horses were introduced to the southwest from Mexico. [35] Montanabw(talk) 17:16, 25 May 2015 (UTC)
- Part of the problem with what you suggest, Atsme, is that, for the most part, today's mustangs do not descend from the horses brought over by the Spanish. They descend from the horses brought to the desert regions by American settlers, much later than when the Spanish horses came. Lynn (SLW) (talk) 18:01, 25 May 2015 (UTC)
- Read what I wrote - it's science, it's cited, and it clarifies. Atsme📞📧 20:33, 25 May 2015 (UTC)
- No it doesn't, Atsme, and could you please listen to what we are saying? The issue is far, far more complex than you are making it out to be. I just told you that the lead isn't the place to put a bunch of generalizations. Lynn and I have been disputing for about two months over how to handle the history section and much as we disagree with each other, I don't think either one of us feel you have a proper understanding of the issue. Verifiability≠truth, OK? Montanabw(talk) 21:56, 25 May 2015 (UTC)
- Your OWN behavior and condescension toward me and other editors is WP:BATTLEGROUND and I ask that you please stop. This article is about an animal which should focus primarily on its evolutionary history, phylogeny, behavioral characteristics, uses, and maybe a small paragraph about legal issues but being careful to not give it UNDUE. WP is not a political soapbox. The concern over legal issues, BLM and government rangeland is beginning to raise my concerns over where this article is headed. I am trying to AGF but I tend to agree with DrChrissy who said, What I have been trying to inject here is a neutral, biological approach to the use of terms that are biological, but seem to have been hijacked (not by you two) for political motives. Perhaps you can enlighten me regarding your motivations for reverting RS biological material from the lead which speaks to the phylogeny and evolutionary history of the animal while you are busy focusing on the BLM controversy and lawsuits. Atsme📞📧 22:22, 25 May 2015 (UTC)
This statement reveals your lack of knowledge - the Mustang is not a subspecies of horse, it's a type or a breed or a landrace, but it's definitely NOT a subspecies, so, just for starters, adding e. ferus caballus is unnecessary. This is not an article about a species. That's pretty much the beginning and the end of the matter. We could as well be debating if the Beagle is a species of dog. You are in fact, promoting precisely the WP:FRINGE views that Lynn and I happen to both agree on - and when the two of us agree on something, that says a lot. Your suggestion to add the material about the Przewalski's horse (Takhi) was well-taken and was added - just not in the lead. Now calm down and learn about the topic before you go putting in inaccurate materials. Montanabw(talk) 22:43, 25 May 2015 (UTC)
- I agree with Montana here - this isn't a species. It's not even a subspecies. It's a type/breed/landrace of horses, we treat it like we'd treat the domestic shorthair article for cats.Ealdgyth - Talk 03:13, 26 May 2015 (UTC)
- As a general rule, if information isn't in the body of the article, it doens't belong in the lead. Generalizing here, but when folks fight to get something into the lead which isn't in the body of the article, it usually means they are trying to push a point of view, rather than actually develop articles. The huge emphasis on the Spanish explorers and their missing horses in the lead is way undue weight. Ignore the lead and work on the body of the article, then when that's complete, the lead will easily write itself because the body will be balanced and easy to summarize. Ealdgyth - Talk 23:02, 25 May 2015 (UTC)
- Well, as a general rule we don't accuse other editors of pushing POV because its uncivil and in this instance, pretty far-fetched considering we're discussing the evolutionary history of a horse. The accusation made visions of Rod Serling flash before me. Since you appear to be having trouble finding lead coverage in the article, may I suggest reading the section History? Oh, and passages in the lead need only to be "covered" in the article not written verbatim. The claims of "huge emphasis" and "way undue weight" are actually huge exaggerations and way unwarranted as demonstrated by the following:
- The article currently reads, Horses first returned with the conquistadors, beginning with Columbus, who imported horses from Spain to the West Indies on his second voyage in 1493. Domesticated horses came to the mainland with the arrival of Cortés in 1519. The only extant true wild horse is the Przewalski's horse, native to Mongolia. (50 words) Sorry, but....
- Columbus was principally a seagoing entrepreneur not a conquistador, and
- the short one sentence passages are neither lucid nor fluid rather they read more like an out of breath orator. Prose should flow like a natural conversation. The section also falls short of meeting the minimum requirements for providing general knowledge about the mustang's history.
- The proposed lead reads, ...Christopher Columbus reintroduced the horse to the New World in 1493. Spanish conquistador Hernán Cortés was credited as being the first to bring horses to land in North America. However, it wasn't until 1543 when the expedition led by Francisco Vasquez de Coronado was headed north from Mexico that several of their horses escaped captivity, and became the foundation of the first feral horse population in North America. It was from that ancestry that various herds of feral horses evolved and became known as wild mustangs. (86 words) The lead is properly cited, the conquistadors are covered in the body of the article, as is everything else I wrote. The coverage is there, the details aren't and should be. In fact, the article coverage needs to be vastly improved so that the prose is lucid and flows more like the lead. As for the claim of WP:UNDUE, it appears there's a serious misunderstanding of what constitutes UNDUE. Read the 3rd paragraph which contains 147 words about the political controversy - more words than the other two paragraphs combined. Now what was that you were saying about POV? Atsme📞📧 02:32, 26 May 2015 (UTC)
- Please read what I said - I said it's undue weight in the lead, since it is larger than the section in the body it's purporting to summarize. BUt, even after explaining this several times, you continue to insist on it being in the lead. It may well be wonderful in the body - but we do not put information in the lead that is not in the body of the article. That's basic wiki editing. I wouldn't have an issue with this information in the body of the article. I'm not sure why that's so hard to grasp ... that it doesn't belong in the lead. And no, I did not accuse you of POV pushing - see that "Generalizing here" ... I'm saying that the continual insistance on this information in the lead is going to come across wrong. Put it in the body, develop the body more, and then when the body is polished up, worry about the lead. Ealdgyth - Talk 03:13, 26 May 2015 (UTC)
- Atsme, my greatest wish would be to just write a straightforward, objective article. But, unless all of these issues are addressed in a way where all sides can feel like their views are fairly represented, this article will never be stable because there will always be people challenging it. That's why we're treading carefully through the political minefield. It was you that brought up the wild vs feral debate, and all this is basically providing the background for the controversy over the terms. I know it's frustrating Dr. Chrissy also, who I don't think realizes what a hot button topic this is. And it's so convoluted. Horses evolved here, then died out here, then were reintroduced here, went feral here, and now the question is: are those "wild" horses native-in their natural habitat and thus meet the definition of wild or an invasive species and are simply feral? We're not going to settle that question here, but just want to write a balanced discussion on the controversy, so that people who come here to learn about the issue can form their own opinion. Your input is most welcome. Lynn (SLW) (talk) 23:32, 25 May 2015 (UTC)
- Lynn, I understand. The problem here is that Mustang is supposed to be an article about the animal complete with a taxobox and maybe even a clade diagram. What it has become is a political battlefield which is UNDUE, SOAPBOX and does not belong in this article. Those issues belong somewhere else, perhaps even a new article BLM Mustangs or as a section in the BLM article.
- Montanabw, I have asked you to please stop edit warring and to stop the PAs and battleground behavior. Your argument for reverting the 1st paragraph I wrote for the lead lacks relevance to what I wrote. The only "consensus" anyone gets at this article is what you decide and that is hardly what I consider consensus - that demonstrates WP:OWN. You cannot prevent other editors from making GF edits to improve or expand this article. You know full well that is not how collaboration works. If you want to criticize my edits bring it to the TP before you revert and provide the diffs or quote what you claim is an incorrect passage. Every sentence I wrote is supported by cited RS. If community consensus is what is being proposed, then it is time for the community of involved editors to participate which currently includes DrChrissy, myself, and LynnWysong. What I actually wrote follows:
(A)The mustang (Equus fetus caballus) is a wild, free-roaming horse of the American west. Unlike the takhi which is the only extant true wild horse, the mustang first descended from domesticated European horses brought to the Americas by the Spanish in the early 16th century. The indigenous American horse was extinct by the end of the Pleistocene epoch (approximately 12,000 years ago), long before Christopher Columbus reintroduced the horse to the New World in 1493. Spanish conquistador Hernán Cortés was credited as being the first to bring horses to land in North America. However, it wasn't until 1543 when the expedition led by Francisco Vasquez de Coronado was headed north from Mexico that several of their horses escaped captivity, and became the foundation of the first feral horse population in North America. It was from that ancestry that various herds of feral horses evolved and became known as wild mustangs.
What the article reads now follows:
(B) The mustang is a free-roaming horse of the American west that first descended from horses brought to the Americas by the Spanish. Mustangs are often referred to as wild horses, but there is debate over terminology. Because they are descended from once-domesticated horses, they can be classified as feral horses.
Furthermore, the 3rd para in the lead regarding BLM and the controversy is WP:UNDUE. A brief mention of what government agency manages the horses is fine, but the political controversy needs to be brief and included in the body of the article. WP is not a political battlefield or SOAPBOX for editors to express the pros and cons for why the mustang should stay or be removed. The article is supposed to be about the biology of the mustang as an animal. Atsme📞📧 00:08, 26 May 2015 (UTC)
Please state KEEP (A) or KEEP (B) with your comments below.
- DrChrissy - KEEP B primarily for one reason - this article is about the animal not the history of the animal. If B is kept, it should include the taxonomic name and the date when the Spanish brought the horse to the US. Version A is very informative and with a few tweaks could perhaps be the 3rd or 4th para in the lead, but it is a little "detail-dense" for the opening paragraph (these are the comments of a generalist biologist). Unfortunately, at the moment, the entire lead reads as if the mustang exists only to be a political hot potato; where are the general facts about the animal? How big is it? Does it have recognised colours or markings? How is it different from other horses? What is its social organisation? Can they be tamed? Some of these might seem obvious to you guys, but they won't be to the average reader. I really feel average readers want to know these sorts of facts before understanding the (detailed) political aspects of the history of the animal.DrChrissy (talk) 11:17, 26 May 2015 (UTC)
Comment Well I tried - I actually think that B with the couple of additions I suggested make it very informative for the average reader. I tend to think of an adult reading to a child - would the child learn something? Would he adult learn something? I think an ammended B ticks both boxes. It has already been suggested that the main article should be organised first and the lede written later to summarise. I agree with this. Most/many articles have a "Description" or "Characteristics" section. One of these shoould be written and summarised as the 2nd or 3rd para in the lead section.DrChrissy (talk) 13:11, 26 May 2015 (UTC)
- Lynn - In the spirit of collaboration, I would be willing to KEEP (A) for now, with the caveat that it is adequately supported as the body of the article is developed. I also see your point about there may be too much discussion of the controversy here. Lynn (SLW) (talk) 02:13, 26 May 2015 (UTC)
- Montanabw - I guess Keep B for now, with the caveat that the lead could change later if content is changed. But please see WP:NOTDEMOCRACY, while this poll is interesting, a "consensus" that is wrong is still not going to go into the article. Point by point:
- The lead should not change until we get the rest of the article tuned up. Ealdgyth (who has written dozens of featured articles - more than me- and knows what she's talking about) is correct on this. Montanabw(talk) 18:11, 26 May 2015 (UTC)
- We do not place the species name in the lead of ANY of the breed/type articles - it's in the infobox. Unnecessary beyond that. This is not an article about a species, it's about a breed/landrace/type.
- History is inseparable from the animal. We already have other articles about the other feral horses in the United States (and worldwide). To have something like "BLM Mustangs" is a WP:CONTENTFORK.
- "Unlike the takhi which is the only extant true wild horse..." I just added a variant of that to the "usage and etymology" section before the article was locked down, so it's something worth adding and has been added. It may still not need to be in the lead, though.
- "extinct by the end of the Pleistocene epoch..." Again, it's already touched upon in the history section, and a over-generalization like this is actually inappropriate... the extinction issue is addressed in more detail at evolution of the horse and so here a summary and a link is all that's needed per WP:UNDUE
- @DrChrissy: much of the info on behavior and such is covered at horse and horse behavior, so again no need to do a species article here when we are discussing a bred/type. There is tremendous range in look of mustangs, though a bit on characteristics could be discussed - the problem with the whole "breed/type/landrace" question is that there are a lot of different groups lumped under the heading "Mustang." This is one area where the article needs to be expanded; for example, the Pryor Mustang is different from the Kiger Mustang and the Spanish Mustang is different yet. Montanabw(talk) 18:11, 26 May 2015 (UTC)
- The "Spanish conquistador" stuff is, some of it, already in the article. The stuff on Coronado, however, is discredited and inaccurate.
- The BLM material is not at all undue... most Mustangs today are under the jurisdiction of the BLM (or are descended from horses adopted from the BLM) and you cannot separate the federal legislation and political stuff from the history and development of the animal. There may, eventually, be a need for a spinoff article, but it isn't there yet.
So That's my 25 cents... which no one is going to pay the least amount of attention to, but there you have it. Montanabw(talk) 18:11, 26 May 2015 (UTC)
- Atsme - KEEP (A) for the reasons I mentioned above about the article focusing on the animal, its evolution, historic range, biology, morphology, reproduction, behavioral characteristics, etc.
- comment - (B) does not work for multiple reasons. (1) It is poorly written; (2) it tells us little to nothing about the mustang; (3) the first sentence creates confusion - not all free-roaming horses are mustangs and not all populations that are free-roaming today were descended from those brought by the Spanish as the lead implies; (4) The second sentence immediately introduces "debate" when the lead paragraph should be providing encyclopedic information, not tabloid controversy; (5) the entire lead is UNDUE and there is no BALANCE as I already demonstrated above. (A) belongs in the lead, possibly condensed somewhat and definitely belongs in the body. Atsme📞📧 12:25, 26 May 2015 (UTC)
- Ealdgyth - Put the proposed text in the body of the article. Solves the problem. Ealdgyth - Talk 03:13, 26 May 2015 (UTC)
End comments
Not a RfC
I have to say that I am rather disappointed there has not been a better uptake of my suggestion to have more information on the animal rather than arguing about the history of the animal. I am not suggesting there should not be discussion about the history, but it appears that people are at such loggerheads about this that the whole article is now tangential to the subject matter. I think we need more heads on this. Calling for an RfC would, I think, be a disaster - hence the title of the thread. I was wondering whether I should contact some other generalist biology editors and ask for their opinions. I propose to make it as easy as possible for them to give feedback, so perhaps we could develop a template asking a range of questions such as "would you like to see more detail in the XXX section - strong yes, yes, no, strong no". Any comments?DrChrissy (talk) 19:22, 26 May 2015 (UTC)
- I certainly would not oppose. You could post for input on the project page. Atsme📞📧 20:35, 26 May 2015 (UTC)
- Which project page were you thinking of? I was thinking of talking to non-horse editors who can give general comments.DrChrissy (talk) 20:57, 26 May 2015 (UTC)
- The TP for Wikipedia:Project biology. Atsme📞📧 21:27, 26 May 2015 (UTC)
- OK, I can do that. But, I would like to hear from Montanabw and Lynn before I do this.DrChrissy (talk) 22:12, 26 May 2015 (UTC)
- I totally agree - that's what collaboration is all about. --Atsme📞📧 22:33, 26 May 2015 (UTC)
- OK, I can do that. But, I would like to hear from Montanabw and Lynn before I do this.DrChrissy (talk) 22:12, 26 May 2015 (UTC)
- The TP for Wikipedia:Project biology. Atsme📞📧 21:27, 26 May 2015 (UTC)
- Which project page were you thinking of? I was thinking of talking to non-horse editors who can give general comments.DrChrissy (talk) 20:57, 26 May 2015 (UTC)
- I apologize for my part in everyone's frustration. My concern was with the accuracy of the information existing on the page, and I now I realize maybe the problem wasn't with the accuracy, but whether or not it should be there at all. Lynn (SLW) (talk) 23:23, 26 May 2015 (UTC)
- So Lynn, do you agree this is a way forward?DrChrissy (talk) 23:29, 26 May 2015 (UTC)
- I apologize for my part in everyone's frustration. My concern was with the accuracy of the information existing on the page, and I now I realize maybe the problem wasn't with the accuracy, but whether or not it should be there at all. Lynn (SLW) (talk) 23:23, 26 May 2015 (UTC)
- Hell no, but of course I can't stop you, Atsme; you will do whatever you want anyway and just keep the drama going. Of course, what would an RfC be about? DrChrissy is right that an RfC would be a disaster - this article has had 2 or 3 in the last six months already and not one of the commenters on the other RfCs has stayed around to work on the article itself - RfC is just a drama magnet. This article is not getting worked on at all because of continued drama, and now this POV-pushing to include inaccurate material out of lack of knowledge. This is not your ordinary horse breed article, it is extremely complex. The history and political status of the Mustang is a critical component of the article; there was movement forward by myself and {[u|LynnWysong}} (and we really disagree on some things, so that progress was a really good thing to see...until someone else comes along with their own drama). If someone wants to post on the animals, mammals, or whatever wikiprojects and invite eyes that way, no one is stopping you, but really, not an RfC! This is just about people who don't "get it" about this particular horse. Montanabw(talk) 03:28, 27 May 2015 (UTC)
- OK. I have tried, but I have run out of energy to try to help here. With comments made here and also on my Talk page, I am now unwilling to approach other editors for comments. I struggle to believe the lack of basic biological information in ths article and I really wish all 3 of you would take a voluntary 2-week ban on making comments of a political nature and divert your attention to writing about the animal. I wish you all the best on this article.DrChrissy (talk) 10:42, 27 May 2015 (UTC)
- @DrChrissy: can we just try to move forward with your idea? I would like to get some input by neutral editors with a good background in biology on the concept of "breed". I think if we all stand firm and ignore the uncivil behavior, we can push past it. Lynn (SLW) (talk) 11:34, 29 May 2015 (UTC)
- Lynn, you seem to be missing the point. The entire article has now become POV vs POV vs POV. I wanted to get biologists to look at the entire article, not simply the esoteric political points of breed/type/landrace/wild. Until people let go of the POV pushing, I will not have my name associated with bringing outside people to an article which has been dysfunctional for months. Of course you could always approach the project yourself.DrChrissy (talk) 11:46, 29 May 2015 (UTC)
- @DrChrissy: can we just try to move forward with your idea? I would like to get some input by neutral editors with a good background in biology on the concept of "breed". I think if we all stand firm and ignore the uncivil behavior, we can push past it. Lynn (SLW) (talk) 11:34, 29 May 2015 (UTC)
- Okay. We'll just trudge forward then. Lynn (SLW) (talk) 11:59, 29 May 2015 (UTC)
A way forward
Having slept on it a bit, I think I can address some of DrChrissy's concerns and maybe - indirectly - touch on what Atsme is upset about, which may offer everyone a way forward: What this article lacks is a "breed characteristics" section, which is standard on most other horse breed articles. The reason it doesn't have one now is because (as they say on facebook) "it's complicated," requires research, and I have just been too worn out by all the other dramas to work on it. The tricky part is, as LynnWyong and I have been going in circles about, the multiple sources and types out there. But, that said, there ARE some common characteristics - all modern Mustangs tend to be on the small side, hardy, tough, sound, good feet, good bone, etc. Many have Colonial Spanish Horse traits, and we have solid RS (Sponenberg and that other guy from Texas A&M) on that subgroup. We have the BLM to describe the horses in some of the other HMAs. Even the breed encyclopedias are OK (absent anything better) for some characteristics. We can probably pull together a summary and then either a chart or multiple subsections on the various types. If anyone wants to see where my brain is going, I offer two examples: #1: Finnhorse - which has four distinct subtypes with a complex history. #2: Appaloosa, which has a cool chart of the different color patterns - some sort of chart like that (with our without pics) could be used to describe the different types of Mustangs - a similar chart is used at Rainbow trout to describe the different varieties of that fish (and I worked on both charts, so I think I can hack the syntax... or ping someone who can). To that end, I will refer you all to the talk archives here and to User:Montanabw/Spanish horses sandbox where I have stored various old conversations and some good source material. Does this work? Montanabw(talk) 18:41, 27 May 2015 (UTC)
- I just can't see calling "the" mustang a breed. "Mustang" is simply a term used for feral or wild horses in the western U.S. Mustang blood HAS been incorporated in some bona fide breeds, such as the Spanish Mustang (which was comprised from a variety of sources, not all mustang) and some people consider the horses from some HMAs as breeds upon themselves, but I think that's as far as you can go with it. I know there are some breed encyclopedias out there that call the mustangs overall a breed, but I think a lot of that is due to ignorance and the idea that they all descend from the horses brought over by the Spanish. The common characteristics they all share today is probably due to natural selection-since they aren't under human care and protection, those that aren't "hardy, tough, sound" and without "good feet and good bone" will quickly succumb to the elements and not pass on their genes. "Small", may be due to two things: natural selection because small horses do better in the harsh desert environment, or simply stunted due to lack of ideal feed. That being said, I've seen some pretty big mustangs; many of the herds in Nevada descend from draft horses used to work on the ranches. Lynn (SLW) (talk) 19:40, 27 May 2015 (UTC)
- I agree with Wysong - with the exception of the few "registries" that were established and maintained as a specific breed arising from certain mustang populations. The use of the term mustang is not unlike the use of the term pony. It describes a horse derived from mixed breeding with certain morphological characteristics. If they can't be established as a breed with DNA testing that traces them back to a specific identified and recorded foundation breeding stock that verifies its true blood, it is not a breed in the true sense of the word. Generally speaking, one analogy is the mongrel dog which is not a breed and neither are mustangs. We know the ancestry of some populations but others are just feral horses with a hodgepodge of genetic traits, none of which represent consistency as a "true blood" or "pure bred" exept as mentioned earlier in the discussion. --Atsme📞📧 13:11, 29 May 2015 (UTC)
- These are not grade horses - they have clear landrace traits, and as Sponenberg has stated, landraces are a step in breed formation. Clearly different groups with different ancestors, but like the draft horse or gaited horse or sport horse types, there are clear, consistent traits. Montanabw(talk) 21:05, 29 May 2015 (UTC)
- Who suggested they are grade horses? Tthe free roaming mustangs who have lived a wild existence don't even come close to that designation. Grade horses are the result of domestic breeding. Free roaming mustangs are feral horses with an ancestry that dates back to the European horses brought over by the Spaniards. The only consistent traits of the later mustangs are primarily the same traits that are consistent in all horses. Our speculation doesn't matter anyway. Passages that go into the article need to be cited using RS. --Atsme📞📧 03:56, 30 May 2015 (UTC)
- I believe you did, with the mongrel dog comment. And we actually agree about the RS thing. Just remember WP:VNT. Montanabw(talk) 23:06, 30 May 2015 (UTC)
- Who suggested they are grade horses? Tthe free roaming mustangs who have lived a wild existence don't even come close to that designation. Grade horses are the result of domestic breeding. Free roaming mustangs are feral horses with an ancestry that dates back to the European horses brought over by the Spaniards. The only consistent traits of the later mustangs are primarily the same traits that are consistent in all horses. Our speculation doesn't matter anyway. Passages that go into the article need to be cited using RS. --Atsme📞📧 03:56, 30 May 2015 (UTC)
- These are not grade horses - they have clear landrace traits, and as Sponenberg has stated, landraces are a step in breed formation. Clearly different groups with different ancestors, but like the draft horse or gaited horse or sport horse types, there are clear, consistent traits. Montanabw(talk) 21:05, 29 May 2015 (UTC)
- I agree with Wysong - with the exception of the few "registries" that were established and maintained as a specific breed arising from certain mustang populations. The use of the term mustang is not unlike the use of the term pony. It describes a horse derived from mixed breeding with certain morphological characteristics. If they can't be established as a breed with DNA testing that traces them back to a specific identified and recorded foundation breeding stock that verifies its true blood, it is not a breed in the true sense of the word. Generally speaking, one analogy is the mongrel dog which is not a breed and neither are mustangs. We know the ancestry of some populations but others are just feral horses with a hodgepodge of genetic traits, none of which represent consistency as a "true blood" or "pure bred" exept as mentioned earlier in the discussion. --Atsme📞📧 13:11, 29 May 2015 (UTC)
- I suggested above that we model this article more on the domestic shorthair cat article - which is probably the closest analog I can think of. Mustangs are a bit more specific in their area, but while the subject includes some breeds (Pryor/Spanish/etc), it also includes a lot of non-breed-specific animals also. Probably this article needs a section on history, a section on where they currently reside, a section on traits (even if it just says that because of their diverse genetic background, there aren't any single defining traits), some on the various management controversies, a line or two mentioning the fringe theory of horses not having died out (with refutation), etc. The trait section may need to be broken down into subsections describing any sub populations, but that would depend on the sources. Since our article isn't that big, it might help to look at other encyclopedias to see what they cover for anything I'm not getting. And the best method would be to see what sources are available - Hendricks INternational Encyclopedia of Horse Breeds has a section on Mustangs ... which is moderately useful. Find other general purpose horse books and see what they say... that's going to be the least POV sources and probably the ones having the most general information that will be useful. Ealdgyth - Talk 13:37, 29 May 2015 (UTC)
- Many of the populations would have been impacted as well by the old ranch practice of turning the bulk of their horse herds loose in the winter and conducting a roundup in the spring when they needed remounts for their riders. These weren't draft horses, mind, but more of a general mix of smaller riding animals traditionally called "cow ponies." Bit of a diversion perhaps, but it may weigh into the historical discussion. Intothatdarkness 14:20, 29 May 2015 (UTC)
- ITD and Ealdgyth have an understanding of the issue and may be coming up with some good ideas. I would also note that some ranchers turned loose Thoroughbred and Arabian stallions to "improve" these herds as well- I think even post-Act efforts by the BLM allowed this. I would say that the domestic shorthair cat article is a useful place to get ideas, it's more of a mongrel than the Mustang and that we already have grade horse for the truly mutt horses, (and no, Mustangs are not like ponies- that's far too broad) the concept of "breed" is pretty loose with Mustangs, though they are clearly a distinct type of horse (with multiple variations and bloodline strains) They have more experience here than the drive-by folks who think that no one has been working on this article for years. @Ealdgyth: and @Intothatdarkness:, the article is locked down (again) due to edit-warring, so we have to sandbox a new section, shall a sandbox be created off this article talk for now? Montanabw(talk) 21:01, 29 May 2015 (UTC)
Protected edit request
 | This edit request has been answered. Set the |answered= or |ans= parameter to no to reactivate your request. |
I would like to seek consensus to add a new subsection as written at Talk:Mustang/Sandbox#BLM_Mustangs immediately following the introductory paragraph at Mustang#Mustangs_today. (Only the BLM Mustangs subsection, not anything else in the sandbox at present, most of the rest is rough draft) There may be a need to also edit other sections, but this edit request stands on its own merits if this chart and content can gain consensus, it can serve as a base for other edits to other sections. Montanabw(talk) 18:54, 1 June 2015 (UTC)
- Support as nom, willing to make additional sandbox edits that will improve the subsection. (Yes, I know protection is scheduled to go off tomorrow, no I don't anticipate that the edit-warring will end when it does.) Montanabw(talk) 18:54, 1 June 2015 (UTC)
- Support, only if entire page is unprotected. This is a blatant attempt by the nominator to insert only the material she wants to put in, while restricting editing of all other sections by other editors. There is no consensus on the new subsection. Since the page protection only lasts for less than 24 more hours anyway, the entire page should be unprotected, or the nominee should have to wait like the rest of us. If she wishes to resume reverting others edits and causing edit wars, it might as well start today. It is apparent from her statement "no I don't anticipate that the edit-warring will end" that she plans to put in her content, then have the page locked down again. Lynn (SLW) (talk) 19:01, 1 June 2015 (UTC)
- I have indicated that your Great Basin material has potential, at least with full citations so we know it is properly verified and not merely "extrapolated." Montanabw(talk) 03:54, 2 June 2015 (UTC)
- Oppose - a short, succinct overview describing BLM's management of the land would be appropriate but what is being proposed looks more like promotional material for BLM. What this article needs is mustang history, biology, behavior, morphology, utilization, etc. --Atsme📞📧 19:11, 1 June 2015 (UTC)
- @Atseme: If you'd like to propose your "short, succinct overview" language in the sandbox, it's something to consider. And see what's going on at the sandbox, where there is an attempt to describe characteristics, though no consensus yet. Montanabw(talk) 03:53, 2 June 2015 (UTC)
Not done for now: It looks like a little more time needs to be left before a consensus emerges here. After there is a consensus, please reactivate the edit request template. — Mr. Stradivarius ♪ talk ♪ 01:58, 2 June 2015 (UTC)- I believe that this shows the character of the dispute on this page. No one else has bothered to make a protected edit request. I opened a sandbox and no one seems to be collaborating, everyone is in their own little corner. Montanabw(talk) 03:53, 2 June 2015 (UTC)
- Support – I find it mind-boggling that Montanabw is receiving so much resistance for wanting to improve an article. Lynn and Atseme, you are holding this article back by delaying its overhaul so I suggest you stop, accept it and grow up. CassiantoTalk 04:51, 2 June 2015 (UTC)
- Thanks for the suggestion. Lynn (SLW) (talk) 08:38, 2 June 2015 (UTC)
- This talk page is open to the community so I won't "stay out of it" as you suggest in your edit summary. And "participate" in what exactly? CassiantoTalk|
- "Participating" is, when you make a support statement, you give rationale for why the content is an improvement, rather than just criticize opposing editors. Meaning, you are actually engaged in the discussion, rather than just blindly supporting a crony half a hour after after she came on to your talk page claiming she's the victim here. Lynn (SLW) (talk) 10:26, 2 June 2015 (UTC)
- This talk page is open to the community so I won't "stay out of it" as you suggest in your edit summary. And "participate" in what exactly? CassiantoTalk|
- Thanks for the suggestion. Lynn (SLW) (talk) 08:38, 2 June 2015 (UTC)
- LynnWysong, I choose to come to articles off my own back and not as a result of being asked. Nowhere did Montanabw ask for me to come over and wave a flag of support. It is you who is turning this atmosphere toxic and I would ask you to get a grip. Are you deliberately trying to be a troll? CassiantoTalk|
- Please confine this article's TP discussion to article content and take other matters to the respective user pages. Thank you kindly. --Atsme📞📧 12:52, 2 June 2015 (UTC)
- Tell that to your pal LynnWysong then. CassiantoTalk 13:07, 2 June 2015 (UTC)
Sandbox up
I went ahead and took Ealdgyth's advice to look at Hendricks. Along with another source, I whipped together a start here: Talk:Mustang/Sandbox anyone who wants to actually create content instead of drama is welcome to trot over and contribute. Montanabw(talk) 21:32, 29 May 2015 (UTC)
- Discussions regarding article content belong on the article talk page. I see no reason for a separate Sandbox. --Atsme📞📧 04:07, 30 May 2015 (UTC)
- Look at it. It contains actual content. Better to work on content there than here at talk where the archiving and threaded discussions make it impossible to keep straight what's going on. The sandbox can go once the content is agreed upon and can be added into the article. We may also have sandboxes off our own talk pages (as I do with my Spanish horses on), but they are more for personal drafting and such. Here we have an article locked down and so a sandbox in article space is appropriate (they do this with articles having copyvio problems also). I am certainly not going to argue with you over an article improvement sandbox. Be part of the solution or keep on being part of the problem. Montanabw(talk) 22:59, 30 May 2015 (UTC)
- How about restraining yourself from making snarky, uncivilized comments like: "Be part of the solution or keep on being part of the problem." It is those kinds of comments here that are the biggest part of the problem. Lynn (SLW) (talk) 13:27, 31 May 2015 (UTC)
- No, the biggest problem are people who prefer drama to editing. I've got a GAN up, am working on a featured list, will be putting up another GAN in a week or so, just finished a FAC last month, had a featured article on the main page earlier this month, all while dealing with this nonsense drama. What have you done lately other than drama on your own talk page? Montanabw(talk) 05:34, 1 June 2015 (UTC)
- Responded to on my talk page Lynn (SLW) (talk) 11:47, 1 June 2015 (UTC)
- I personally find it ironic that someone who was insisting on moving comments from this talk page to their own talk page in order to sequester a discussion is now complaining about having a discussion at a different location. Perhaps it's a matter of control. Intothatdarkness 14:00, 1 June 2015 (UTC)
- LOL, ITD. Well, I'm off to the sandbox. Once again have been reminded why this article doesn't get worked on even absent talk page drama - 270 HMAs, all with different origins for population. It's a bear to get a handle on! Montanabw(talk) 16:39, 1 June 2015 (UTC)
While your work is commendable, your chest-beating, condescension and arrogance overshadows it as does your WP:OWN behavior regarding this article. You aren't the only editor on WP who has created articles, helped promote GAs and/or FAs, prepped DYKs, or reviewed articles. Perhaps you should take a step back and analyze the true cause of the disruption here which in this case happens to be you. As soon as my laptop is back operational, I will be writing prose and uploading photographs. You are free to do whatever you feel you need to do. In the interim, stop trying to impose your will on others. --Atsme📞📧 17:13, 1 June 2015 (UTC)
- Write good stuff, it won't be reverted. I have 73,000 edits to wikipedia and dozens of collaborations on many, many articles. Please take my advice and get over yourself. And grow up. You don't like what I do, ANI is thataway. Montanabw(talk) 03:49, 2 June 2015 (UTC)
- Avoiding incivility: "Avoid condescension. No matter how frustrated you are, do not tell people to 'grow up'..."
- Linking to random essays and policies does not make one civil, no matter how hard one might wish that it did. That is one of the greatest myths in Wikipedia, but unfortunately one of the hardest to combat. Intothatdarkness 13:45, 2 June 2015 (UTC)
- Please restrict your discussions on this article's TP to article content and there will not be an civility issues. --Atsme📞📧 14:04, 2 June 2015 (UTC)
- Another Wikipedia fallacy, I'm afraid. There have been plenty of civility issues in any number of articles based on article content discussions. Intothatdarkness 14:10, 2 June 2015 (UTC)
- I find it hilarious that you preach to us about civility Atsme and then choose to ignore your friend LynnWysong who calls another editor "a crony". Which essay will you link to for that I wonder? CassiantoTalk 18:03, 2 June 2015 (UTC)
- Another Wikipedia fallacy, I'm afraid. There have been plenty of civility issues in any number of articles based on article content discussions. Intothatdarkness 14:10, 2 June 2015 (UTC)
Move this discussion to new Section
Sorry but I don't see any benefit to the sandbox for discussing content when it can be done right here on the article's TP. Archive what is no longer relevant and hat what is not relevant to content. I have repeatedly covered the key points related to content but I'm happy to provide them again. See my numbered list below. When I get my laptop back, I will gladly join a collaborative effort but to be quite frank, I am weary of the OWN behavior, the chest pounding and bullying that has been directed to both Wysong and I. The request for PP was unwarranted and I imagine if the admin who granted the request knew the circumstances, the request would not have been granted but that's neither here nor there - bygones. My ability to do any online research is handicapped on this iPad original (running OS v5.1.1 with only a 1Ghz processor and 256 MB RAM). It already crashed once while I was writing this text. Hopefully it will alllow me to finish listing the key points:
- The article is about the mustang, not BLM. BLM has its own article and the wild horses and donkeys are covered there. The lead now contains more info about BLM and politics than it does the mustang. UNDUE and very SOAPBOXY.
- A short overview of BLM's management of the mustang populations on the land they manage can be included in the section under Distribution possibly with subsections for Historic, Present, and Future. My best work writing prose comes when I'm allowed to edit freely without the threat of unwarranted reverts hanging over my head.
- A taxobox needs to be added
- There needs to be more history and biology which requires RS. I found several but they are on my laptop.
- I may very well come up with other ideas to improve the article, add more images and remain optimistic that this can/will be a productive collaboration.
- Hopefully my laptop will be repaired by this evening. If it is, I will be more than happy to join the collaboration and write prose. There is no deadline. --Atsme📞📧 12:36, 2 June 2015 (UTC)
- Yes, I agree, most of what was written in the Sandbox belongs either here or here. Lynn (SLW) (talk) 13:02, 2 June 2015 (UTC)
- Coments on the above related to content only:
- We have infobox horse here on the article already, it is used for breeds and landraces. A taxobox is inappropriate because Mustangs are not a separate species or subspecies. While there is heated debate even if the real world over whether Mustangs are a breed, a type, a landrace or a "whatever", they clearly are NOT a species or subspecies separate from e. ferus caballus. So no, a taxobox is not appropriate. Montanabw(talk) 04:24, 3 June 2015 (UTC)
- In the sandbox, I created a "Characteristics" section. I would be glad to add it, except that the two editors on the opposite side deem it inadequate because it focuses on the Spanish type, but add nothing in the alternative for such a section. Montanabw(talk) 04:24, 3 June 2015 (UTC)
- Not so. You were so determined on focusing on the Spanish section, you blew off attempts to develop an alternative. Lynn (SLW) (talk) 11:01, 3 June 2015 (UTC)
- Do not attribute motives, I added more material to the section and if we didn't have all this drama, OR and POV-pushing, maybe I could get something more done; as it sits, I did create a chart article, List_of_BLM_Herd_Management_Areas in part to figure out precisely which areas have which types of horses (quite a few of which ARE Spanish) while in the meantime you have done...? You are bound and determined to paint all mustangs as crap, and your comments about draft horse breeding will take time to parse out - so far I have only found two HMAs that state there was draft breeding in the existing horses. Montanabw(talk) 23:56, 3 June 2015 (UTC)
- Not so. You were so determined on focusing on the Spanish section, you blew off attempts to develop an alternative. Lynn (SLW) (talk) 11:01, 3 June 2015 (UTC)
- Do not attribute motives. I wrote about the transition from Spanish descent mustangs to those descended from American settler's horses. Sorry you don't like that history, but it is what it is. Lynn (SLW) (talk) 00:07, 4 June 2015 (UTC)
- Some are, some aren't. This is why this article hasn't gone up to GAN yet - it's actually VERY VERY complex. Some belonged to Native people, some were remounts, some were ranch herds that had Thoroughbreds kicked out to run with them, a few were draft-cross horses. If you wanted to help with the chart at the BLM article, you found several HMAs with ranch horse breeding, with 270 HMAs to do, it would be cool to have collaboration. Montanabw(talk) 01:16, 4 June 2015 (UTC)
- I have moved some of the charts to the List_of_BLM_Herd_Management_Areas. But that said, one cannot discount the roughly 70,000 Mustangs under the management of the BLM (about 30K± in the wild another 40K+ in holding facilities, not counting all the ones that have been adopted into private ownership) as if they are irrelevant; the BLM's role is significant and relevant to this article. Montanabw(talk) 04:24, 3 June 2015 (UTC)
Most of that could be put in a separate articleSorry, I didn't read carefully enough, I seen you've done this. I would suggest renaming that article to something like "BLM Wild Horse and Burro Management" and just put a short section about BLM Management in this one. Lynn (SLW) (talk) 11:01, 3 June 2015 (UTC)- That article is not about BLM management, it is intented to be a list that charts all 270 HMAs with a brief summary. You cannot discuss the American mustang without discussing the BLM because that's where the bulk of the free-roaming horses today are living. Montanabw(talk) 23:56, 3 June 2015 (UTC)
Here's another BLM webpage, (I think it's an old one they don't maintain, or link to, but haven't taken offline, and it popped up with a google search) that has useful information for that article. If you want help with the HMA article, let's have some discussion about making it more about the BLM management. Lynn (SLW) (talk) 10:39, 4 June 2015 (UTC)
- When I see "My best work writing prose comes when I'm allowed to edit freely..." I can only say that every edit window contains the disclaimer, "Work submitted to Wikipedia can be edited...by anyone..." So there you have it. Montanabw(talk) 04:24, 3 June 2015 (UTC)
- True, but summarily reverting someone's edits while they are finalizing them can only be considered disruptive editing. Unless it's a huge problem, wouldn't it be a lot more civil to tag it, and if it's not fixed promptly then revert it? Lynn (SLW) (talk) 11:01, 3 June 2015 (UTC)
- No. That's why every user can make a sandbox. The rule is WP:BURDEN and WP:BRD. The person adding has the responsibility to do it right. Montanabw(talk) 23:56, 3 June 2015 (UTC)
- True, but summarily reverting someone's edits while they are finalizing them can only be considered disruptive editing. Unless it's a huge problem, wouldn't it be a lot more civil to tag it, and if it's not fixed promptly then revert it? Lynn (SLW) (talk) 11:01, 3 June 2015 (UTC)
- As for the rest, I have many good sources already accumulated in User:Montanabw/Spanish_horses_sandbox that anyone is welcome to use to kickstart their research efforts. Wysong/Lynn/SLW (or however she's signing this week) and I also put up a bunch of sources earlier on this talk page that are probably now in the archives. Montanabw(talk) 04:24, 3 June 2015 (UTC)
- Congratulations on finding a way to sign off your responses with a snarky comment. But, I did start a new Source Section. I'll reformat and add to them as I can. Lynn (SLW) (talk) 11:01, 3 June 2015 (UTC)
- Thank you. Montanabw(talk) 23:56, 3 June 2015 (UTC)
- Congratulations on finding a way to sign off your responses with a snarky comment. But, I did start a new Source Section. I'll reformat and add to them as I can. Lynn (SLW) (talk) 11:01, 3 June 2015 (UTC)