Talk:Petter's tufted-tailed rat

Petter's tufted-tailed rat has been listed as one of the Natural sciences good articles under the good article criteria. If you can improve it further, please do so. If it no longer meets these criteria, you can reassess it.

Article milestones
Date	Process	Result
May 24, 2011	Good article nominee	Listed

A fact from this article appeared on Wikipedia's Main Page in the "Did you know?" column on May 21, 2011.

The text of the entry was: Did you know ... that the Malagasy rodent Eliurus petteri is the only tufted-tailed rat with completely white underparts?

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GA Review

This review is transcluded from Talk:Eliurus petteri/GA1. The edit link for this section can be used to add comments to the review.

Reviewer: J Milburn (talk) 10:16, 24 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks for reviewing, J. Ucucha 10:33, 24 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Category:Animals described in 1994? Category:Rodents of Africa?
- Added.
"beyond the fact that it occurs in rainforest and is nocturnal and solitary" Clunky
- Reworded.
"gracile" is not the most accessible term
- Used "delicate" instead.
"Michael Carleton" brief description? "American biologist" or "zoologist from Oxford Univsersity" or something?
- Added.
pinna dablink
- Fixed.
"Most of the tail appears naked, but is covered with inconspicuous hairs." Doesn't read well
- Reworded.
"The weak incisors suggest its diet may differ from that of most other Eliurus.[16]" In what way?
- That's a difficult one. Carleton (1994:49) says "The length of the lower incisor alveolus and size of the capsular projection presumably reflect the degree of wear on the incisor tips and may correspond to the relatively indurate nature of seeds or insects consumed." It has a weak incisor, an indistinct capsular process (and therefore a shorter incisor), and nevertheless Carleton says the diet is more indurate (i.e., hard). I think he may have used the wrong word there, but am not sure, and I've therefore omitted this part of the discussion. Ucucha 10:49, 24 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]
  - Perhaps a direct quote? Or perhaps simply note that the difference in food is hypothesised specifically by Carleton? The sentence seems incomplete sitting there on its own. J Milburn (talk) 10:53, 24 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]
    - I've added a quote and in-text attribution. Ucucha 11:01, 24 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]
If I am reading the table correctly, it is based on two specimens of the species. The original description was from three, and more have since been found. Am I right?
- No measurements have been published for the later specimens. I suppose one of the three specimens published in 1994 didn't have its external measurements recorded. Carleton does give skull measurements for three specimens. Ucucha 10:49, 24 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]

The writing's generally good and the sources are obviously fine. We both know that this lacks detail, but, seeing as the prose even mentions how little is know about the species, this is acceptable. J Milburn (talk) 10:36, 24 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Nicely done. A very quick GAC, but I'm convinced that, though short, this article is at GA level. J Milburn (talk) 11:07, 24 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]