Thanks for your comments on the California Condor article. I'm currently going back to track down those citations. About your comments on the fossils, Gymnogyps redirects to the California Condor page since it is now monotypic. Do you think that the fossil Gymnogyps should be A. moved down the page, B. put on a new, seperate Gymnogyps page, or C. put on the condor disambiguation page? Thanks again for your comments and corrections; they are very helpful. Rufous-crowned Sparrow23:51, 11 August 2007 (UTC)[reply]
He's a nice masked man. A friend and I got into e-conversation with him when I was at college and he was (to us) surprisingly happy to chat with a couple of students from the UK. Cheers for the confirmation. I really ought to re-join the mailing list (it's only been about a decade :-): what's the current gossip about the next book? --Phil | Talk 09:11, Mar 19, 2004 (UTC)
The potential concern is not over the informational content but over the precise form it takes. Which is why it's often kosher to summarize material you find on the web but not to copy and paste. ::shrug:: But usually these things don't became major issues anyway. -- कुक्कुरोवाच|Talk‽ 03:41, 8 Jul 2004 (UTC)
It's quite possible this photo to be a century plant. My father took this photo 25 years ago, obviously I don't remember how the plant looked like before this "flower" grew. And I am absolutely not a botanist. Yann 10:34, 29 Jul 2004 (UTC)
FYI this photo was taken in my grand mother's garden. Someone on fr: confirmed that it's not an aloe. He said that the photo should be fr:Agave_américaine which effectively looks like the plants I can see in her garden. The photo at Century plant is different. So feel free to move it where it belongs. Yann 08:30, 31 Jul 2004 (UTC)
I don't remember putting this image on, but from the page history iy must have been me (image has no history). I don't know now if it's a TV or not - please change if you have another pic. jimfbleak 04:37, 20 Aug 2004 (UTC)
Hi, a nice comment on the talk page for this species - falcons are always exciting. We has a single Feral Pigeon that comes to our garden for seeds, and yesterday I noticed it looking skywards - at first glance I saw only House Martins, but then I picked up the Hobby that the pigeon had seen -another super bird, like a giant swift. jimfbleak 05:25, 1 Sep 2004 (UTC)
Thanks Jerry, that could be timely. I've done all the articles now for List of Cyprus birds, and nearly finished list of French birds, so I thought I might do a few neotrops in preparation for next spring's holiday in T & T. jimfbleak
You read me like a book. We thought we would do Trinidad and Tobago to get to grips with all those new passerine families -antwrens, antshrikes, ant birds etc - before taking the plunge maybe to Ecuador in a feww years' time. Jim
Hi, I've started a drive to get users to multi-license all of their contributions that they've made to either (1) all U.S. state, county, and city articles or (2) all articles, using the Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike (CC-by-sa) v1.0 and v2.0 Licenses or into the public domain if they prefer. The CC-by-sa license is a true free documentation license that is similar to Wikipedia's license, the GFDL, but it allows other projects, such as WikiTravel, to use our articles. Since you are among the top 2000 Wikipedians by edits, I was wondering if you would be willing to multi-license all of your contributions or at minimum those on the geographic articles. Over 90% of people asked have agreed. For More Information:
To allow us to track those users who muli-license their contributions, many users copy and paste the "{{DualLicenseWithCC-BySA-Dual}}" template into their user page, but there are other options at Template messages/User namespace. The following examples could also copied and pasted into your user page:
Option 1
I agree to [[Wikipedia:Multi-licensing|multi-license]] all my contributions, with the exception of my user pages, as described below:
{{DualLicenseWithCC-BySA-Dual}}
OR
Option 2
I agree to [[Wikipedia:Multi-licensing|multi-license]] all my contributions to any [[U.S. state]], county, or city article as described below:
{{DualLicenseWithCC-BySA-Dual}}
Or if you wanted to place your work into the public domain, you could replace "{{DualLicenseWithCC-BySA-Dual}}" with "{{MultiLicensePD}}". If you only prefer using the GFDL, I would like to know that too. Please let me know what you think at my talk page. It's important to know either way so no one keeps asking. -- Ram-Man (comment| talk)
Have at it; I have no problem with your moving the Keres languages out of Kiowa-Tanoan languages. I recalled that I moved the whole lot as I found them in another article, but had also noticed that the Ethnologue classified them as a separate family, which is why I included that caveat in the article. I think the Ethnologue is as reliable source as any for moving the Keres languages to their own family; if anyone comes along with a more compelling reference authority, they can be moved back.
"Hi. I noticed that you changed back most of my edits to Scrub jay. To start with the name, I put in the hyphens because that's the AOU (http://www.aou.org/checklist/index.php3#corv)'s usage. Were you following some better authority?"
The Wiki birds project uses the Lynx Handbook of the Birds of the World list, so as to get uniform international coverage; the AOU is very much out on a limb in using the peculiar grammatic form of hyphens followed by capitals ("-J" in this case), no other bird listing group does so. Generally, either form 'Scrub Jay' or 'Scrub-jay' would be regarded as acceptable, but not 'Scrub-Jay'.
"I changed the " - " to "—" because that's Wikipedia policy (see the last bullet here). I also changed hyphens between numbers to en dashes for reasons given at the same page."
These things are an absolute pain in the @$$ when editing pages (as the codes for them are very 'brittle', the ampersand at the start of the code sticks to the previous word, and the semi-colon at the end sticks to the next word, thus disintegrating and leaving orphans behind unless edited very carefully); if you must use them, please put a space either side of them to avoid this problem.
"I changed the range in the first paragraph to include Central America instead of just Mexico because the article says the range of the Unicolored Jay extends to Nicaragua. There seems to be some disagreement about the range of this species—[5] (http://www.earthlife.net/birds/corvid-ch.html) says "Mexico and Honduras" while [6] (http://www.natureserve.org/infonatura/speciesIndex/Family_Corvidae_100196_1.htm) says "Guatemala, Honduras, Mexico, El Salvador". Maybe somebody who knows more than I do needs to straighten this out, but in any case, it looks like it's not just Mexico. (At [7] (http://www.travelwithmea.com/itin_wHonduras.htm) it's described as "commonly sighted" on their tours in western Honduras.)"
Agreed, it should include western Central America; I'll add it.
"I changed a sentence of the form "...the most commonly heard call is X, or Y". There can be only one most commonly heard call. What was the problem with my version "the most commonly heard calls are X and Y"? If necessary, it can be changed to something "the most commonly heard call is X and the next most common is Y" or "Common calls include X and Y; for each species, one or the other of these is the most commonly heard" or whatever would be correct."
Agreed; I guess the form "Common calls include X and Y" would be best.
"I'd like to make these changes, but I think we should settle it so there won't be a revert war. There's another sentence that we can argue about later. —JerryFriedman 18:59, 31 Jan 2005 (UTC)"
Hi Jerry - not quite so simple, as A. coerulescens (the taxon in the genus first described) is actually Florida Scrub Jay (not surprising, as it was discovered before the West was even explored at all!); Western Scrub Jay is A. californica. I'm in the middle of creating a page for Western Hemlock at the moment, but will hava a think about it when that's done in half an hour or so, and get back to you - MPF 22:10, 1 Feb 2005 (UTC)
PS my computer sometimes logs me out too without telling me, can be very annoying! MPF 22:10, 1 Feb 2005 (UTC)
Grrr . . . why does wikipedia crash so often!! Let me know if my addition is OK in clarifying, or expand it more if you like. I've also started a short stub for Unicolored Jay - MPF 02:01, 2 Feb 2005 (UTC)
Jerry, I added the picture while browsing through all wikicommons pictures of birds, mainly for the dutch wikipedia. On this particular Image:Hypotriorchis femoralis.jpg in commons:Falcon the title for this pictue is Falco femoralis (Aplomado Falcon). The full description of the image reads:
Hypotriorchis femoralis. From: Reports of Explorations and Surveys.... Volume X. 1859 of the U. S. Pacific railroad Explorations and Surveys 38th, 39th, 41st Parallels. Copied from NOAA Photo Library (http://www.photolib.noaa.gov/library/).
That is the reason why I added this picture. Feel free to remove this picture from Aplomado Falcon and/or comment commons:Falcon. HenkvD 19:19, 29 Mar 2005 (UTC)
Hola! si quieres, me ofrezco para revisar los artículos al español, sólo tenés que avisarme en mi página de usuario de Wikipedia en español. Soy Dianai Saludos! (aquí no firmo porque no tengo cuenta en inglés y sólo sería unos numeritos)
Soy un visitante de la Wikipedia en español. Te felicito por tu excelente nivel en este idioma, aunque he detectado alguna deficiencia en tu presentación que no he querido corregir en el original, pero que te señalo a continuación por si quieres hacerlo tú mismo:
"¡Hola! Nací en 1961 y soy profe de física y de matemáticas y estudiante de español (así denominamos este idioma aquí en Nuevo México). Escribo bastante en el Wikipedia inglés, pero espero VISITAROS AQUÍ [o VISITAR ÉSTE] de vez en cuando para traducir algo. Te agradezco mucho las correcciones en mis artículos, y aun más si me das algún consejo para mejorar mi dominio del idioma. Me puedes DEJAR un mensaje en mi página de discusión, pero es probable que lo VEA más pronto [mejor: ANTES] en mi página en inglés, donde son bienvenidos los mensajes en español. O mándame un correo a mailto:jerry_friedman@yahoo.com, que ya la conocen los "espamadores".
También me puedes pedir alguna traducción, aunque no garantizo nada. En inglés he ESCRITO más sobre la física, las matematicas, la literatura en inglés, especialmente la ciencia ficción, la botánica y la zoología, sobre todo DE aves. Estoy TRABAJANDO un poco en el Proyecto de traducción de artículos destacados.
Artículos traducidos (y corregidos por otr@s): cerezo, Cathartidae, aura común, unos párrafos de Isaac Asimov."
Good luck in Mexico, let us know how you get on; we want to do another neotropic, but haven't decided where yet.
Plains Wanderer used to be considered to be related to the buttonquail, and is listed in Pheasants, Partridges and Grouse of the World, which says that DNA analysis shows it is really a wader. Shorebirds, an older book, does not include this species, but obviouly it should be moved, which I've done, thanks jimfbleak16:35, 11 May 2005 (UTC)[reply]
Thanks for providing an explanation for that inclusion. However, upon reading the bit more carefully I have to conclude the current version is NPOV with respect to the opinions of philosophers commenting on the work of those who claim the Big Bang as proof of their own brand of creation story (ala William Lane Craig for example). It is important we mention that this is a common criticism of first cause and the like.
What seems to be to be off-subject is the statement that the Big Bang itself can be labeled a creation myth. Obviously, those who reject the Big Bang outright in Non-standard cosmology, for example, might be inclined to make such a characterization, but this isn't for philosophical reasons but rather for (pseudo)scientific reasons. We discuss them elsewhere in the article and there is no reason to point out their beliefs in this section which is solely about integrating the Big Bang with philosophies and religions. We point out that there are those that reject such an endeavor from religious standpoints (by means of rejecting the Big Bang theory altogether) and that there are those that reject it from non-religious standpoints, but to reject the Big Bang itself is an entirely different matter from what the section is trying to address.
Hi Jerry, the only species I've seen of those you listed was the Motmot, but we had relatives of some of the others, like Channel-billed Toucan in T&T. Little Tinamou, on T&T is never seen by anyone, but the parrots are easy, and the 3 trogons guaranteed with a guide to do the calls!
AOU Sibley - just laziness, basically the AOU is more radical than most European lists, and I didn't look carefully enough. Sorry, jimfbleak 29 June 2005 15:49 (UTC)
No big deal about changing 'inalienable' to 'unalienable'. I thought 'un' was a grammatical error, but I see that it's not. JJ14:15, 3 August 2005 (UTC)[reply]
funny about the waders, Pec and B-b aren't even official rarities here. Sabine's Gull so far inland must be a terrific record, it's not easy even in the UK with our long coastline, and inland birds are rare. Rarity of the week is a Green Heron in Ireland, but I saw Britain's second live bird a few years' back, so no sweat (I wouldn't twitch Ireland anyway). The SW US sounds pretty good. It's a possibility for us in 2007 or 2008. Jim
Thanks for the Sabine's info, and for the offer of help - still at wish list stage at present, one holiday at a time. English and AC isn't bad, but the main inspiration is somewhere that is safe(!), accessible, and doesn't overlap too much with the birds we have seen elsewhere. jimfbleak16:39, 17 October 2005 (UTC)[reply]
"Thinking of deleting it?" No, I'm thanking you for beating me to it when it came to recovering it. Steve Summit (talk) 20:28, 29 October 2005 (UTC) (a sometime alt.usage.english reader :-) )[reply]
Hi Jerry, thanks for positive comments and correcting made-up word Alcedininid!
The ratios don't look right, as you say, but Fry and Fry actually did the trapping, so you have to assume it's correct as stated
I thought of putting the species list in the ratio order, but there have been two divergences in this group, the first being the split between the rufous and white underparts, so taxonomically the list should be as is. Thanks, jimfbleak06:35, 3 December 2005 (UTC)[reply]
The citation is FRY, CH 1970.- Ecological distribution of birds in. North-Eastern Mato Grosso, Brazil. An. Acad. Brasil. Jim
Tiger Heron - I got back from Costa Rica today where I saw a few Bare-throated, and I'm certain your ID is correct. I'll look the robin soon - amazingly common in CR. jimfbleak15:09, 24 February 2006 (UTC)[reply]
CR was excellent - 250 species from only four sites with very limited professional guiding, nice people, interesting scenery, climate etc. I liked the mixed species article - we found this especially notable in Asian primary rainforest, such as Sinharaja, where you would see virtually nothing until one of the six or seven major flocks came through. I added only a couple of minor details to the Robin article. jimfbleak07:40, 25 February 2006 (UTC)[reply]
I've added a description to the feeding flock article. I think the phenomenon is more noticeable in Asia not only because of the larger flocks, but also the larger, noisier species involved, especially the babblers. I was surprised how easy Resplendent Quetzal was in its habitat, we found it easily ourselves. Similarly, when we stayed at Hotel Villa Lapas (lapas=macaw I think), we saw Scarlet Macaw on or over the hotel two or three times every day - so noisy its impossible to miss, and attracted attention even from the non-birding guests. jimfbleak07:40, 28 February 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Hi - thanks for the response. I am reading about this bird because I am working on improving some Guatemala-related articles. The interwiki German article is called Quetzal (Vogel), which means literally "Quetzal (bird)," so that's why I did not understand why the interwiki link did not belong there. Gilliamjf18:14, 27 February 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Please feel free to clear things up as you see appropriate. I'm afraid that I don't completely understand the differences between the two birds anyway. Thanks for fixing the German link. Gilliamjf18:33, 27 February 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Let's see. Some sources - [1], [2], [3]. Google pointed me to an issue of Biotropica in which an article contained the following sentence fragment - "Crane (1975) reported that baboons and chimps also follow the guiding calls of Indicator to...", but apparently it's subscriber-only.
"Honeyguide" vs "honeyguide bird" - I could have sworn I'd heard the latter elsewhere. shrug
As for whether other species than I.I. (and, my guess is, I. meliphilus as well) guide... I have no idea. I guess they're just referred to as honeyguides as a result of linguistic extrapolation.
For the record, I don't think I'm the one who described them as "dull-colored". As for whether they feed exclusively on the contents of hives - how about "primarily (though not exclusively)" instead?
Your work on the honeyguide articles looks fine. I do wonder about the phrasing (in your message, not in the article) that deliberately leaving comb for the bird "spoils" it, since I can see that having two distinct meanings - is it in the Shoemaker-Elf sense of "once you thank them for it, they will never do it again", or in the "spoiled brat" sense of "once you thank them for it, they will demand more and more"?
And given that bees are themselves incapacitated as a result of stinging vertebrate skin (see stinger), I suppose that the more bees who die as a result of attacks on the baboon, the fewer there are to harass the honeyguide (albeit this is not, of course, a deliberate plan on the part of the bird). DS14:30, 11 March 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Both Birds of the Gambia and the SASOL Birds of Southern Africa (my newest purchase) show the patch on the male and not the female, but the former source says it is not always visible, and neither guide mentions the yellow as a distinction between the sexes. Since there is no clear evidence that this feature really is a difference, I've removed it from the text. thanks, jimfbleak08:36, 23 March 2006 (UTC)[reply]
I caught your edit to Buck Owens; if I may explain why the comma should be there, rather than just go revert it:
The phrase "by onetime bandmate Merle Haggard" would not use a comma, as "bandmate" is an adjective accompanying the (proper) noun subject, "Merle Haggard". By inserting the article "his", however, the word "bandmate" becomes a noun and could signify the end of a sentence that would not be possible without the article ("by his onetime bandmate."). Once "bandmate" becomes the noun subject of the sentence, a further explanation thereof is a parenthetical phrase and is preceded by a comma (and would be thus followed if the sentence were to continue ["by his onetime bandmate, Merle Haggard, and..."]).
As a fellow pedant (grin), the concept of "necessary to the meaning" always threw me. A phrase like "so named by a onetime bandmate" (notice "a" rather than "his" and, of course, "his" would presume the one unless otherwise specified) is a stand-alone structure, and I had learned that the proper way to add the additional information to such a sentence was to drop the article ("so named by onetime bandmate Merle Haggard") and render "bandmate" an adjective. RadioKirktalk to me23:13, 5 April 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Your recent edit to Santa Fe Expedition was reverted by an automated bot that attempts to recognize and repair vandalism to Wikipedia articles. If the bot reverted a legitimate edit, please accept our apologies – if you bring it to the attention of the bot's owner, we may be able to improve its behavior. Click here for frequently asked questions about the bot and this warning. // Tawkerbot218:01, 7 April 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Hi there. My source for the Chaves contributions is the Twichell text, which has an entire section dedicated to Chaves, and details his interactions with the Texans pretty thoroughly (including his friendship with Cooke that resulted). The text states "Chaves and [Diego] Archuleta received the cross of honor from the Mexican Government on account of their services in this exploit." (p. 297) The Twichell book sets forth all its sources in the introduction, and there is no footnote to that bit about Chaves, but all in all it's a pretty reliable source. Do let me know if you have any questions. Murcielago20:09, 10 April 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Jerry, Hilty calls maximus Southern Grayish Saltator, which suggests there is a Northern G S, but the range he gives includes Mexico. He also says that some of the SAm subspecies are arguably splitable, but I'm not so bothered by that. Do you know anything about Northern/Southern Grayish Saltator?? jimfbleak07:04, 11 April 2006 (UTC)[reply]
thanks anyway - I couldn't find anything on the web, so I wasn't optimistic, Jim
I've sowed the seeds of confusion here. I was talking about Grayish, but the maximus crept in from Buff-throated somehow. Hilty calls coerulescens Southern Grayish Saltator, range nw Mexico to Uruguay and n Argentina, which suggests a Northern Grayish, but where? It's this "species" I couldn't track down. jimfbleak17:31, 13 April 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Thanks Jerry. I've mofified the article slightly but kept it vague since Hilty says that several (unspecified) SAm forms might be good species. jimfbleak05:16, 14 April 2006 (UTC)[reply]
The Fry ratios look a little flimsy the way you put it. I suppose that we could put in weasel words like "It has been suggested that...", but I don't mind if you just chop that bit. jimfbleak05:40, 21 April 2006 (UTC)[reply]
I started the article from a red-link on the Reies Lopez Tijerina article. That's pretty much the only reason. Quite honestly, I've never learned how to do re-directs (I should learn), but that's pretty much it. Thanks for the positive feedback, by the way.
On Rockero's talk page, I stated as follows:
I don't know that "order" is proper since I think an order needs some sort of confirmation from an authority, I called them a sect -- they're often referred to as a cult, but I think they're more a sect. The Catholic encyclopaedia link that Kshanks links is somewhat comprehensive, but was written in 1917, during the suppression and a little biased. A more apologist site is http://sangres.com/history/penitente01.htm. The most even-handed, comprehensive internet article I've found is at http://writing.lantenengo.com/009.php , but it gives no sources. There are a few photos out there which would be good for the article (of moradas, mostly)-- Charles Lummis had a good pic of a procession, which would have been great. A google of his name, though, reveals only his photo of a Crucifixion, which I think enforces the "barbarous" image rather than the fact that they were filling a spiritual void for the people. Re: Fray Angelico, he should probably be mentioned, along with other authors who have mentioned them, including Frank Waters ("People of the Valley") and Willa Cather ("Death Comes for the Archbishop), and Charles F. Lummis ("The Land of Poco Tiempo"). In fact, Chavez wrote a whole book called "My Penitente Land" which is a reflection on the spirituality of the Northern New Mexican People. I've read it and it's pretty good, although in Chavez fashion, he is light on primary sources, and long on his own musings. In the book, though, he questions the assertion that the Penitentes were descended lineally from the Spanish/Italian flagellants (as the Padre Martinez page asserts).
In the Big Bang article you edited at the Overwiev there is an incomplete sentence:
There is no compelling physical model for the first 10-33 seconds of the universe, before the phase transition called for ??????? by grand unification theory.
Hi Jerry, not to beat a dead horse off of your Chaves article, but I've been working a bit on the Padre Martinez article, and was wondering if you would take a look at it -- it's been primarily a two-editor piece, with the primary author contributing the overwhelming bulk of the article. I've tweaked it quite a bit, though, and if you could give your thoughts on it, I think it would be great. Thanks! Murcielago15:53, 13 June 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Gracias, amigo. I can't answer most of your questions, since I haven't read the sourcebooks that Kevin used, but I have ordered a couple of texts, and hope to improve the article using them. I think it's a really good "raw material" article, and could become a great article with a little work. Martinez really did play a huge role in 19th century NM. Murcielago00:34, 14 June 2006 (UTC)[reply]
I was wondering the exact same thing about Armijo. He is the great red link in the NM History pages. I am going to start taking notes from my varied sources. Murcielago01:26, 14 June 2006 (UTC)[reply]
The Twitchell and Salpointe books both have significant sections dedicated to Armijo, if you set up the template page, I will fill in in the coming days/weeks. Murcielago19:27, 20 June 2006 (UTC)[reply]
You get a daisy for starting the article. And due to your comprehensiveness, I didn't have to mercilessly edit and revise like I normally have to for articles on my to-do list. Gracias, --Rockero18:46, 21 June 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Jerry, I've added a couple of things to the article, though it's pretty comprehensive -- good job. I don't know how to do your "fancy" footnoting , though I like it. The details on the land grant come from the Broadhead text, could you fn those in for uniformity? Thanks, amigo. Murcielago17:46, 22 June 2006 (UTC)[reply]
According to Twitchell, "After the war Armijo was tried at the City of Mexico for cowardice and desertion in the face of the enemy; witnessses were summoned from New Mexico for the prosecution, but Armijo was acquitted of the charges against him." (p.240) As for deleting the "tried to have them killed," the reason behind it is two-fold, first, as you mentioned, the source of the assertion, and second, just readability -- if you like the statement, I'd say "recommended their execution." Either way, let's make sure we accord with all the linked pages (what does the TSFE page say?) Let me know if you have any questions.
I am also inclined to believe him, given all we know about Armijo's personality from all sources. I think we should actually bulk up TSFE (as well as discuss -- perhaps therein or perhaps in another article -- the Sniveley Expedition). I am out of town for the next two weeks, but when I get back I will dedicate some time to them. Cheers! -Murcielago14:45, 30 June 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Hi Jerry, I believe I have fixed the references and I have also been able to expand the article since new information is now available. I look forward to your thoughts. Thanks very much, Johntex\talk03:27, 18 July 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Thank you so much for your help with this article. Looking back on it, I realize that it was not GA material when you first reviewed it. Hopefully it is getting there now. Thanks for catching that copyvio paragraph. I think I must have copied it over into the edit window with the intention of rewriting it but then got distracted somehow. I have done a little more expansion of the article and I have now checked all 33 references to ensure they support the statement where they are used, but that none of the statements are copyvios. I have also tightened up the intro to better touch on the points that will be mentioned in the article, and I did some general copyeditting. I can't spot anything else at the moment that needs fixing. I'd appreciate it very much if you could look at it one more time. Thanks again, Johntex\talk15:29, 19 July 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Ok, thanks for the heads up. I'd help you with your article if I knew anything about it, but I don't. So I'll try to force myself to work on something else instead of compulsively hitting "refresh" to see if you have had a chance to come back to BGM yet. :-) Johntex\talk00:50, 20 July 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Sorry it took so long to answer the questions, but I hadn't seen your last post. Here's my reply:
I'm the guy who added the Hybrids section. To be quite honest I like the hybrids, however I have heard the criticism somewhere (I don't remember where). Anyway, it makes sense when you think about Macaw behaviour. As for the differences, I did't mean visual differences. More like behaviour differences. I fixed the color thing.
I was thinking that the article could use some fotos of hybrids and pure species as well. I have no idea how to obtain them (I'm not even sure if I can). I was wondering if you could do that, or ask someone for them or upload them yourself. Reply at the macaw talk page. - 22:57, 31 July 2006 (UTC)
Good question re: inline citations where all the rest is from one book. I would go to Wikipedia:Citing sources and ask how to handle that there. If you address the other things I'd pass it, since you're right, it's not mandatory, but just good practice. Especially if you want it to reach FA or A class. Also, it's harder for people later to go back and cite when, sometime in the future, it gets large enough for that... What parts came from Twitchell? plange19:17, 1 August 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Sounds good! I'm willing to pass it if you just take care of the lead and other portions (non-cite stuff). The expansion stuff too (on family) of course isn't needed for GA, it was just a nice-to-have suggestion for the article itself...plange22:47, 1 August 2006 (UTC)[reply]
It's alright, Jerry - I completely understand your mistake (after all, I've lost track of some pages now...=[ (guilty look) ). just wanted to congratulate you on your nice work with Maia (novel) and it is very much better now. If you haven't joined Wikiproject Novels, I suggest you do so. You'd be a great contributor. Go to my user page to find out more about Wikiproject NovelsLady Nimue of the Lake09:58, 22 September 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Hi Jerry you edited the Metatron article yonks back and removed some of the dodgy Greek "etymologies" that people put in. I've added a new section to the article called "Origin of the name" which summarises a bunch of etymologies I've found. Thought you might like to take a look as you seemed interested last time around! It probably needs a bit of cleanup and its no where near complete I dare say, but its a start. Best Regards -- Shimirel(Talk)02:18, 25 September 2006 (UTC)[reply]
A lot of the articles I edit usually have a high visit/edit rate (Uriel, Metatron, Enoch etc) so its often a headache adding new stuff. These days I save myself a lot of trouble by referencing everything in sight to save people adding cite tags and complaining on my talk page! The alternate names section was all my work as well, when I added it I didn't cite any of the names. Someone added a cite tag and then I spent weeks trying to remember where I got them from lol! -- Shimirel(Talk)13:03, 27 September 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Hi Jerry! Recently, I started a revision of the Crotalinae (pit viper) section and ran into an article that you created: Bothrops asper. The information you added looks very good, but I'm a stickler for references and am not sure where you got it all from. You did mention one: Schlesinger V. 2002. Animals and Plants of the Ancient Maya: A Guide. Was the only source you used -- did all of it come from this book and were you completely faithful to it? Cheers, --Jwinius16:52, 6 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]
(In reply to your reply on my talk page)
Great, thanks! I'll check the article against your source and add footnotes accordingly. I'll shortly be receiving some really authoritative that should include this species, so hopefully I'll then be able to check it properly and fill in any gaps to finish it.
On the synonymy, it's really important to me that every article in the Viperidae group uses the same taxonomy, and that includes the synonyms and their corresponding redirects, so they have to be accurate and complete. Whenever I begin writing/revising one of these articles, I start with McDiarmid's 1999 checklist, filling in the taxonomic and geographic data. I know working that way can sometimes be pretty tedious, especially with venerable species such as Vipera berus, but if you do it properly, you only have to do it once.
As for using more complete sentences, I actually started out that way, but it gets old after a while. For example, can you image what a longer article, like Daboia, would read like if every other sentence started out with "The Russell's viper this..." and "The Russell's viper that..." ? That's also rather redundant when you think of it, since the article isn't about anything else: it's a monograph after all. Besides, keeping it short cuts the crap and gets to the point. :-)
Do you still? Sorry to take so long. Anyway, I know what you're saying about "The Russell's viper this…" etc., and I'll admit to using such elegant variations as "This species…" And I'm strongly in favor of cutting the crap and getting to the point. My personal taste, though, is that repeating a non-standard form gets old even faster. —JerryFriedman02:22, 10 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Yup, and if we stay in touch and this page proves not to be too busy, I might leave it on my watchlist. :-) Otherwise I'll soon remove it. Anyway, IMO there's only so much elegant variation possible in articles like these. I use a number of general variations (i.e. species, taxon, form, snake, animal, specimen), but only if I can't avoid using them, and even then I have to watch out that the same ones don't show up too often, or too close together in the same article. I hate using any particular names, scientific or common, more than once in an article and try to limit them to the Common names and Taxonomy sections. --Jwinius18:50, 10 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Pronunciation of "mapepire balsain" (and other ma-pa-PEEs)
Hi. I was glad to see the pronunciation of "mapepire balsain" at Bothrops atrox, especially since I would never have guessed it. Would you mind adding which syllables are accented? You could capitalize them or say something like "with the accent on the last syllable in both words" (if that happens to be right). I'm lost at pronouncing the name without that. —JerryFriedman00:17, 7 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Hi Jerry. I was very pleased to get your note. I wasn't sure whether the Trinidadian names of snakes would be of any interest to readers - so it is good to hear from you. I have updated the articles on both the Fer de lance or Bothrops atrox and on the South American bushmaster Lachesis muta. I have added the stressed syllables in capitals as you suggested and provided an extra local name for the South American bushmaster (mapapire grande). I used to have to handle (and sometimes find and catch) both these species and remove and preserve parasites found on them when I worked for the Trinidad Regional Virus Laboratory in the 1950s - so I am well aware of the common names for them. Mendes, John. 1986. Cote ce Cote la: Trinidad & Tobago Dictionary, Arima, Trinidad, p. 95, gives some pronunciations but no indication of stress. I will also paste this dialog on both articles' Discussion Pages in case anyone wonders why I have bothered with such details or wonders how I am so sure of the local names and pronunciations. I hope you don't mind. Cheers, John Hill03:29, 7 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Is my proposition in Talk:Polymorphism (biology) correct? Or am I missunderstanding polymorphism? Or maybe I'm understanding it OK but the situation with blondes is more complex?
When you create stub articles such as Poshlost', please try to find the appropriate specific stub tag(s) on the page WP:STUBS. This saves other editors work in categorizing the page, and makes it easier for editors with experise in the subject to find pages that need work. Thanks, — Swpbtalkcontribs22:00, 31 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Hi. I think I disagree with you regarding both "amaturus esse" and "to get gradually rid" — arguments against split infinitives rest on the notion that the infinitive is somehow one whole indissoluble thing (almost a word which just happens to be written with a space in it) and so I don't see that it matters where in the middle of this putatively sacrosanct single "to-get-rid" word we insert the infinitive. Perhaps the page's definition is unnaturally precise -- nobody objects to following the word to with an adverb, they object to interrupting the infinitive.
Hm, I guess you could make a counterargument concerning "get gradually rid" NOT in an infinitive, e.g. "I will get gradually rid of my lice." Now I'd wager that anybody who objects to split infinitives would object to that too, disapproving of the split compound verb. So one might argue that "to get gradually rid" isn't a split infinitive, it's a split compound verb. But, see, I think an objection to a split infinitive is a specific kind of objection to split compound verbs.
OK, now I'm just meandering and I'm not sure where my comments are going; so I'll put it off for now and come back when fresh. Cheers, Doops | talk23:08, 16 January 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Well, and of course I can imagine the kind of prescriptivist who objects to split infinitives being hostile to such pragmatic concepts as regarding "set up" as a compound verb — I can just imagine them trying to convince us that 'up' is just a simple adverb, no more, no less! (And even diagramming it as such.) Doops | talk00:16, 17 January 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Hello, you were very helpful in getting Baby Gender Mentor improved to GA status. After more work, I think the article has improved to Featured Article status so I have proposed it as a Featured Article Candidate. The nomination is here if you would like to comment. I look forward to any and all suggestions you may have for improving the article. Best, Johntex\talk20:14, 22 January 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Hi Jerry, thanks for your reply. Yes, BGM did make it to FA and you definitely deserve part of the credit. Your suggestions during the GA phase were fantastically helpful in improving the article. Thank you very much, Johntex\talk16:39, 12 February 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Just wanted to say thanks for pointing me out to the article about the "super many time theory". It's a good understandable explanation. ... so ... thanks :) --Thomas00:41, 26 February 2007 (UTC)[reply]
I am preparing a mass nomination (for Europe, Africa, and South America) in a sandbox page. I will let you know when the nomination is posted. Dr. Submillimeter18:02, 4 March 2007 (UTC)[reply]
The "fauna of European country" categories were all deleted. Thank you for your assistance on these categories. I have made some clean-up nominations at Wikipedia:Categories for discussion/Log/2007 March 15; please go vote on the proposals.
I will probably push forward with nominations for Central American and South American animals next. I will let you know when the nominations are ready. Dr. Submillimeter14:04, 15 March 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Because of the discussion at Category talk:Biota by country, I am withdrawing from all work on these "fauna by country" categories. It is not worth my time to repeatedly answer KP Botany's questions when he/she will simply ignore me and then complain that his/her questions are not being answered. Dr. Submillimeter11:50, 18 March 2007 (UTC)[reply]
KP Botany left a response on my talk page after you left a response there. It demonstrates that the user still has not read anyone's responses to his/her questions on categories versus lists. In any case, I can provide what I have already prepared for discussion at WP:CFD (in my sandbox), but since I may attract accusations from KP Botany about attempting to overturn Wikipedia's policy by myself, I probably should not lead any efforts on these categories. Dr. Submillimeter08:10, 25 March 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Actually, I read your very first response, so did another user who pointed out that your WP:POINT argument had no basis. You ignored my second set of questions, only when I got to the third time around did anyone answer. Now, you continue to harangue me all over Wikipedia because YOU failed to offer up arguments and explain what you had already decided to do. If you want to change Wikipedia policy, simply explain your reasoning. If you have none, then don't keep spewing at those who want to understand what is going on. And, no, my questions were NOT answered, only one of them was answered after asking three times. KP Botany04:56, 29 March 2007 (UTC)[reply]
I can find "cosmopolitan" in all my ecology and biodiversity dictionaries and my botany text, but I can't find "widespread" listed in any of their glossaries or indexes. Can you give me a source for this usage? Thanks. KP Botany04:53, 29 March 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Well, I prefer to use the technically accurate term, but your point that there are widespread species without technically cosmopolitan distributions is well-taken, so we'll leave it as is. Thanks for the clarification. KP Botany01:10, 30 March 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Hi. I'm planning to spend a bit of time in the next couple of weeks or so trying to improve Slender-billed Curlew, with the aim of bringing it up to GA status. Any suggestions you have would be much appreciated at the article's talk page. Thanks SP-KP22:37, 4 April 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Just wanted to tell you that your article Lúpin has been proposed for deletion. I suggest you change the tone of the article a bit; I don't think it'll make it as it is. good wiking, --Mariano(t/c) 02:08, 3 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Thanks Jerry, sorry about the Britspell (not all mine incidentally), I have to think to write in American. One query The three island forms solitudinus, socorroensis, and fumosus, and the island populations of jamaicensis, do not overlap in range with any other subspecies. Doesn't this make four island subspecies, or does the nominate form occur on the mainland somewhere? Or am I missing the point of the change? Jimfbleak16:01, 12 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]
I'm sorry it took me so long to reply to your comments on Manuel Armijo. I have tried to stay away from making comments on Wikipedia because it could so easily become another addiction, like genealogy has become for me. I only registered in order to comment about my distant cousin Manuel. I have forgotten to log in, despite the fact that check out Wikipedia at least once a week. I left some comments, some sources and other information in response to yours. AND I'm amazed when my replies end up looking okay since I don't have a clue what I'm doing. Does regular html work in wikipedia? That I know. Cybergata04:12, 15 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]
sounds good to me, it never occurred to me that it was a summer destination, I tend to assume anywhere in the tropics is Nov-March. Kenya is on the wish list, bu some way of yet - northern Thailand is likely to be our next trip (complete with eastern Palaearctic migrants, but nothing is as bad as trying to sort out tyrant flycatchers). The pics look fine on my monitor. Jimfbleak05:35, 11 July 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Thanks for Gustav, Jerry. Cisticolas are dead easy in Europe (one) and not bad in the Cape Province, where they are fairly distinctive, but further north in Africa you really need to know the calls, which is especially difficult for a visting birder. Despite our trips to Goa and Sri Lanka, Thailand has lots of potential new stuff, if our trip goes ahead. Any thoughts on your next trip? Jimfbleak14:46, 11 July 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Yes, I'm sure now you are right. Although it looks too pale underneath, Its head shape, long pinkish(?) bill, and lack of an eyering are right for Wattled. I think you can even see the pale rump. I should have picked it up myself - I'll add wattled to the to-do list. Jimfbleak15:50, 11 July 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Hello, this is a message from an automated bot. A tag has been placed on Tropical Boubou, by TenPoundHammer (talk·contribs), another Wikipedia user, requesting that it be speedily deleted from Wikipedia. The tag claims that it should be speedily deleted because Tropical Boubou is very short providing little or no context to the reader. Please see Wikipedia:Stub for our minimum information standards for short articles.
To contest the tagging and request that administrators wait before possibly deleting Tropical Boubou, please affix the template {{hangon}} to the page, and put a note on its talk page. If the article has already been deleted, see the advice and instructions at WP:WMD. Feel free to contact the bot operator if you have any questions about this or any problems with this bot, bearing in mind that this bot is only informing you of the nomination for speedy deletion; it does not perform any nominations or deletions itself. --Android Mouse Bot 203:46, 23 July 2007 (UTC)[reply]
No, that was just for some info on parasites of these birds, to be incorporated when the articles are long enough to discuss such marginalities. Dysmorodrepanis02:58, 28 July 2007 (UTC)[reply]
I noticed you were looking for an image of self-parody. I can't think of a painting or sculpture at the moment (surely Andy Warhol would have done something like that?), but I do know that Alexander Pope wrote a parody of The Rape of the Lock called The Key to the Lock. I can get you an image of the title page, if you want. Awadewit | talk18:48, 12 August 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Hi. I'm curious about why you changed "summer" back to "summer months" in Margate, New Jersey. What's the advantage of "months"?
To give you the context, I came to this article when I was suggesting a policy against "summer months" and "winter months" at MOS talk. While citing examples of what I want to see deprecated, I felt that as a good citizen I should fix them. ("Fix" in my opinion, of course.) That's why I asked the question above. —JerryFriedman00:15, 13 August 2007 (UTC)[reply]
My bad. I had been testing out a bot of my own design that took pages and made changes that would then have to be pasted over the existing page. I thought I had checked for previous changes in all cases, but realized I had missed this one. I will change the admittedly redundant "summer months" back to "summer". Sorry for any confusion. Alansohn00:36, 13 August 2007 (UTC)[reply]
