Talk:Robert C. Stebbins/GA1

GA Review

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Reviewer: Stigmatella aurantiaca (talk · contribs) 13:04, 19 September 2015 (UTC)

Beginning review. I will be adding my comments over the next several days. Stigmatella aurantiaca (talk) 13:04, 19 September 2015 (UTC)

Possible copyvio

The first 26,624 byte version of this article appeared on 17 June 2015 and closely matches the biographical entry on Bigmaybe.com. I do not see any note on Bigmaybe crediting Wikipedia as the source, so unless a satisfactory explanation can be provided, I cannot proceed with the GA evaluation. Stigmatella aurantiaca (talk) 15:13, 19 September 2015 (UTC)

@Stigmatella aurantiaca: Thanks for starting the review. BigMaybe.com is a known mirror of Wikipedia that neglects to attribute according to license: see Wikipedia:Mirrors_and_forks/Abc#BigMaybe. Thus, any content on Wikipedia, even recently created or Featured articles (e.g. Michael Jackson or Stigmatella aurantiaca ), will show up there. --Animalparty! (talk) 17:08, 19 September 2015 (UTC)

Thanks for the clarification! I could see that you had a very good history as a contributor, so the seeming copyvio made no sense to me. Stigmatella aurantiaca (talk) 01:59, 20 September 2015 (UTC)

First impression

Very good writing overall. You are going to leave me with little to do except to make minor copyedit suggestions. . I will refrain from pointing out more than a handful of the Misuse of Commas that I see (mostly a tendency towards overuse), and will try to confine myself to more substantive recommendations.

Lede

• "Stebbins is commemorated in the scientific names of three species (Batrachoseps stebbinsi, the Tehachapi slender salamander; Anniella stebbinsi, a legless lizard; and Ambystoma tigrinum stebbinsi, the endangered Sonora tiger salamander)." (Rather than enclosing the list in parentheses, it may be better set off by a colon.)

Early life

• "where his father worked on agricultural curriculum for children, and taught at the University of California, Berkeley." (If verbs applying to the same subject are used in multiple locations in a sentence, they should not be separated by a comma. This is the Separating verbs rule.)

INCORRECT: She jogged for 30 minutes, and walked for 20 minutes.

CORRECT: She jogged for 30 minutes and walked for 20 minutes.

• "His early work consisted of cartoons: he drew illustrations on classmates' clothing, some of his cartoons appeared in youth magazines, and his art won several awards." (The list after the colon lacks parallel structure and reads rather awkwardly. Perhaps instead of a list, you could try something like "he drew illustrations on classmates' clothing and contributed cartoons to youth magazines, winning several awards.")

University and early career (1933–1945)

• "He switched his major to zoology, and graduated in 1940 with highest honors." (Remove superfluous comma.)
• "After graduating, Stebbins split his time between a summer job as a naturalist at Lassen Volcanic National Park, and pursuing graduate school at UCLA." (This is the last time that I invoke this same rule about commas. Please fix the remaining incidents by yourself.)
• "the biology of fringe-toed lizards (genus Uma), a group sand-dwelling lizards of the American Southwest." ("a group of")
• "he also published on behavior of the sidewinder rattlesnake" ("the behavior")
• "and produced two field guides to birds with his father, with Robert providing illustrations to his father's text." (Reads a bit awkwardly. Perhaps "and, with his father, produced two field guides to birds, providing illustrations to his father's text" or some other such wording.) Stigmatella aurantiaca (talk) 10:09, 20 September 2015 (UTC)

@Stigmatella aurantiaca: Thank you for your suggestions. I've fixed the comma issues highlighted here and some others but may have missed some (feel free to identify or delete an extraneous comma if more are found), and used your suggestions for improved phrasing. --Animalparty! (talk) 19:34, 21 September 2015 (UTC)

Career (1945–1978)

• "He was also the first faculty member to teach herpetology at Berkeley and wrote new lab manuals, created the herpetology teaching collection, and co-taught a popular course on vertebrate natural history." (Sentence covers too many separate activities. Split into two: "Berkeley. He wrote...")
  • How about "The first faculty member to teach herpetology at Berkeley, he wrote new lab manuals, created the herpetology teaching collection, and co-taught a popular course on vertebrate natural history"?

Ring species in salamanders

• "Stebbins soon became interested in Ensatina salamanders, which occur from British Columbia to Baja California and are present in both the Sierra Nevada and Coast Ranges of California but absent in the Central Valley." (Borderline case. It might be better split into two sentences, possibly not.)
  • I'll leave it as is for now.
• "...he proposed that the color varieties–many previously regarded as distinct species–were actually various races..." (Should be em dashes.)
  • YDone.
• "This phenomenon is known as a ring species..." (ring speciation)
  • YDone.

Reptilian parietal eye

• "also called the "third eye"; a tiny light-sensitive organ on the forehead" (use comma rather than semicolon)
  • YDone.
• "Further studies over the next few decades involved the parietal eye of the tuatara, the pineal gland's effects on lizard reproductive behavior, and parietal skull openings in fossil "mammal-like reptiles" such as Lystrosaurus, investigating the transition to warm-bloodedness." (Parallel structure defective. Instead of "involved", try "focused on" or similar wording)
  • Y done, and simplified complex sentence.
• " began investigating the pineal gland in mammals, and especially the effect of the hormone melatonin on activity cycles." (Instead of "and especially", try alternative wording such as "with emphasis on" or similar wording.)
  • Y done.

Other research, conservation, and field guides

• "and chaired a U.C. elementary school science project which recommended science be taught to children as early as six." ("that science be taught")
  • YDone.
• "...desert ecosystems of southern California–witnessing environmental degradation in some of the same places he had studied during graduate school–and became actively involved..." (Use em dashes)
  • YDone.
• ""the Tehachapi slender salamander (Batrachoseps stebbinsi) and Sonora tiger salamander (Ambystoma tigrinum stebbinsi). ("and the Sonora tiger salamander")
  • YDone.

Stigmatella aurantiaca (talk) 04:13, 23 September 2015 (UTC)

Retirement years (1978–2013)

(no comments)

The "Stebbins"

• "Samuel Sweet of U.C. Santa Barbara, stated"

Use a pair of commas to set off non-essential clauses, phrases, and words. On the other hand, do not use commas to set off essential elements of the sentence.

1. If you leave out the clause, phrase, or word, does the sentence still make sense?
2. Does the clause, phrase, or word interrupt the flow of words in the original sentence?
3. Can the element be moved to a different position in the sentence and still make sense?

Depending on whether the phrase is considered essential or non-essential, it would appear that one should either leave out the commas entirely, or enclose "of U.C. Santa Barbara" with a pair of commas. A single comma after the phrase, however, is unacceptable.

YI fixed this by using UC Santa Barbara, as the period-free abbreviation seems to be preferred. The errant comma was a leftover from the expanded form "...University of California, Santa Barbara,...

• "Biologist David Wake, then of the University of Chicago but later to work with Stebbins at Berkeley, considered the only "serious defect" to be absence of any coverage of snake-bite first aid and noted the geographic area covered left a gap ranging from 75 miles to over 400 miles wide when paired with the earlier Peterson Guide to eastern reptiles and amphibians by Roger Conant."

1. Complex sentence would probably benefit from breaking up into two.
2. "and noted the geographic area" => "and noted that the geographic area"

Y split into two sentences and added "that"

Stigmatella aurantiaca (talk) 09:18, 23 September 2015 (UTC)

• "A new painting of a gila monster took around 40 hours to complete, but Stebbins considered keeping up-to-date with current scientific literature the most daunting task." The source reads:

He continues painting today (age 91), and he notes that his hand still remains steady and allows the accurate detail he puts into his work. He can still highlight each scale as he did for the Gila Monster painted for the third editon of his Peterson's Field Guide to Western Reptiles and Amphibians (Stebbins, 2003). That painting took about 40 hours to complete. Bob finds the library research a more daunting task. When he first began working on the field guides it was not too difficult to keep up on the appropriate literature....When preparing the third edition of the Field Guide, given the large volume of recent publications in the field, he worried about missing important references.

Correct the sentence to more accurately convey the meaning intended in the source.

Stigmatella aurantiaca (talk) 04:40, 23 September 2015 (UTC)

• • I'll get to this shortly.Y (simplified). Much thanks for your careful review and suggestions. --Animalparty! (talk) 01:17, 24 September 2015 (UTC)
    • I believe I've addressed all the points above. Please let me know if anything else needs clarification or revision. Cheers, --Animalparty! (talk) 23:28, 28 September 2015 (UTC)