Wikipedia:WikiProject Animals/Draft capitalization guidelines
Appearance
This Wikipedia page has been superseded by Wikipedia:Manual of Style#Animals, plants, and other organisms and is retained primarily for historical reference. |
Please feel free to modify anything on this page
Purpose of this draft proposal:
- To clarify and confirm existing uncontroversial guidelines and conventions, and present them in a "quick-reference" table format, for inclusion into the guidelines for the capitalization of common names of species in order to:
- a) help prevent multiple page moves of existing articles;
- b) help ensure new articles are properly named when created
- To possibly agree upon new conventions currently unresolved.
Proposed additions/clarifications to guidelines:
- Common names of animal species are written either in title case or sentence case depending upon the taxonomic group (shown below).
- In title case, the first letter of every important word is capitalized (e.g., Grey Currawong, Duke of Burgundy), except for words that follow a hyphen (e.g., Brown-headed Spider Monkey).
- In sentence case, no capital letters are used (e.g., brown bear, ray-finned shark), except for proper names (e.g., North American beaver, Roosevelt's elk).
- Names of higher categories of animals are always written in sentence case (e.g., kangaroo rat, river martin).
- Individual articles should be consistent in using either title or sentence case for common names. If an article on an animal species uses title-case title, all species mentioned in the text should have their name in title case.
WikiProject examples
[edit]Animal type | Case to use | Example article title | Usage in prose | Current status of non-group articles |
Capitalisation of groups[1] |
Group use in prose | Remarks/exceptions | |
---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
Mammals | Sentence | Polar bear | The polar bear is a bear. | Mixed | Sentence | Per naming conventions as WP Mammals doesn't have project specific guidelines. | ||
Primates | Sentence | Ring-tailed lemur | The ring-tailed lemur is a primate. | Mixed – converting to lower | Sentence | ruffed lemur | ||
Cetaceans | Sentence | Pygmy blue whale | The pygmy blue whale is a whale. | Mainly sentence | Sentence | blue whale | ||
Rodents | Sentence | Guinea pig | The guinea pig is a species of rodent. | Mixed | Sentence | mouse | ||
Birds | Upper | Bald Eagle | A Bald Eagle is a bird. | Actively upper | Sentence | thick-billed parrot bluebird |
Lower case should be used in contexts outside of ornithology | |
Upper | Palawan Peacock-Pheasant | A Palawan Peacock-Pheasant is a bird. | Sentence | see Talk:Palawan Peacock-Pheasant | ||||
Insects | Sentence | Red imported fire ant | The red imported fire ant (Solenopsis invicta) is one of over 280 species ... | 100% sentence | Sentence | rove beetle | Lepidoptera and Odonata species may be capitalised | |
Butterflies and moths | Mixed | Gypsy moth | The gypsy moth is a moth. | More upper | Sentence | skipper | Ditto | |
Fishes | Sentence | Ocean sunfish | The ocean sunfish is a fish. | Mainly sentence | Sentence | catfish | Project guideline | |
Sharks | Sentence | Oceanic whitetip shark | The oceanic whitetip shark is a shark. | 100% sentence | Sentence | bullhead shark | ||
Amphibians and reptiles | Sentence | Komodo dragon | The Komodo dragon is a reptile. | Mixed | Sentence | poison dart frog | ||
Turtles | Sentence | Loggerhead sea turtle | The loggerhead sea turtle[2] is a turtle. | 100% sentence | Sentence | sea turtle | ||
Arthropods | Sentence | American lobster | American lobsters are usually bluish green to brown. | 100% sentence | Sentence | lobster | Few common name articles | |
Spiders | Sentence | Katipo | A bite from the katipo produces a toxic syndrome. | 100% sentence | Sentence | orb-weaver spider | ||
Cephalopods | ||||||||
Gastropods | Sentence | Lightning whelk | The lightning whelk is a large edible sea snail. | Mostly sentence | Sentence | door snail |
Addendum - breeds
[edit]Animal type | Case to use | Example article title | Usage in prose | Current status of non-group articles |
Capitalisation of groups |
Group use in prose | Remarks/exceptions | |
---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
Dogs | Upper | Beagle | A Beagle is a dog. | Actively upper | - | - | Guidelines not followed | |
Equine | Upper | American Quarter Horse | The American Quarter Horse is a breed of horse. | Actively upper | - | - | Distinction between breed and type often must be determined on a case-by-case basis |
See also
[edit]References
[edit]- ^ * according to WP:Fauna name "The common name of a group of species, or an individual creature of indeterminate species, is not capitalised."
- ^ prose use in New York Times