Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Birds/Archive 72

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The 2020 WikiCup is on!

2020 WikiCup

Do you want a fun and exciting Wiki challenge? An opportunity to get involved in some of the most important editing on Wikipedia? A giant shiny cup to display on your userpage? Well then you should join the WikiCup challenge! Folks of all experience levels are welcome to join. It's a good way for veteran editors to test their mettle, and for new users to learn the ropes. The competition revolves around content creation, such as good and featured articles, DYK's, reviewing such content, and more. See Wikipedia:WikiCup/Scoring for full details. Over the course of the year, users compete to create the most and best content in a round based format. The top performers in each round will advance to the next, until just 8 remain in the final round. Out of those, one Wikipedian will walk away with the coveted silver Wikicup. Could that user be you? Find out by signing up! Signups are open until January 31, 2020. May the editing be ever in your favor! Captain Eek ^{Edits Ho Cap'n!}⚓ 21:57, 2 January 2020 (UTC)

IOC Version 10.1

An FYI, the newest version of the IOC update was released yesterday with a number of updates....Pvmoutside (talk) 12:44, 25 January 2020 (UTC)

Crimson-backed flameback vs Red-backed flameback

Would anyone be able to confirm if they are the same please? Thanks in advance! Rehman 03:42, 13 January 2020 (UTC)

based on this and this (avibase), they're different species, not even in the same genus. hope that is helpful! Audrey.m.horn (talk) 06:29, 13 January 2020 (UTC)

Thanks for the links Audrey.m.horn! Strangely, the first link contains pictures of more than one bird type - one of the images has a yellow-ish bird, and the rest are with red/crimson colouring... I cannot seem to figure out how to differentiate the two types. :( Rehman 08:39, 13 January 2020 (UTC)

Oh, it seems like those pages cite Wikipedia as its source. Rehman 08:40, 13 January 2020 (UTC)

I don't see where it says Wikipedia is the source... lower down on the page it lists all the databases that have both of these species in them (Avibase, eBird, Birdlife, IOC, and lots more). I'm not sure how to visually tell the difference, so I'm afraid I can't help much there but according to many databases they are separate species! Audrey.m.horn (talk) 16:27, 13 January 2020 (UTC)

Wikipedia is not the source of any taxonomic material on Avibase. It is only being used as a source for the descriptive introductory sentence at the top of the article. Loopy30 (talk) 19:00, 13 January 2020 (UTC)

Loopy30, yes you might most probably be right. The "Source: Wikipedia" is stated at the end of the introductory sentence. Rehman 02:54, 14 January 2020 (UTC)

• Not the same. Scientific names trump common vernacular. May be worthwhile discussing renaming to Greater Sri Lanka Flameback (Chrysocolaptes stricklandi) and Lesser Sri Lanka Flameback (Dinopium psarodes) as listed on HBW, which is much less confusing. Eostrix (talk) 08:56, 14 January 2020 (UTC)

Thanks for the feedback, I will work on those renames. After much searching, I've figured out the visual differences of the two birds. See Red-backed vs Crimson-backed (note the head patterns on both males/females). The images we have on Commons are all actually that of the red-backed bird, despite being in two categories. Hence I had gone ahead and fixed that. Another important point to note is that Avibase's images of the birds are incorrect (i.e. they are mixed, along with further other species). Rehman 08:56, 19 January 2020 (UTC)

When two animals have two different scientific names they belong to two different species by definition, unless for subsequent genetic discoveries. In fact they have two different pages also in breton, catalan, dutch and swedish. Albert the 1st (talk) 18:49, 25 January 2020 (UTC)

Merger proposal:Breed standard

An article of interest to the project—Breed standard—has been proposed for merging with Breed type. Project members are invited to participate at the merger discussion. Cavalryman (talk) 02:44, 27 January 2020 (UTC).

Taxonomy of conures needs to be updated?

Look at conure. AFAIK, the taxonomy of the species has changed a lot since this article was written. New genera, species moved around...

I know ornithologists don't like conures, but I don't know enough to update it myself. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 146.200.126.162 (talk) 08:22, 12 February 2020 (UTC)

Diving adaptations in birds

I am working on expanding Physiology of underwater diving#Adaptation in other animals. I have a fair amount on mammals, but lack good sources to expand Physiology of underwater diving#Diving birds. I would welcome anyone with an interest in this subtopic who wants either to expand the section or who can link me to some good sources on the internet, as I do not have access to suitable libraries. Please reply at Talk:Physiology of underwater diving. Cheers, · · · Peter Southwood ^(talk): 16:18, 17 February 2020 (UTC)

White-browed tit-warbler source request

Howdy hello folks! I'm looking for someone who has a HBW subscription to help me with the White-browed tit-warbler and [1]. If someone would email me the page, that'd be top. I'd have gotten to it myself, but since HBW is on the way out, I don't have a subscription rn, and its impossible to get new subscriptions. Anyone else who has sourcing suggestions would also be appreciated. Its a real cute lil bird, and some (edited) photos of it have been going around on social media, so its super popular right now. Afraid I've been unable to find many sources however :( Any help appreciated! CaptainEek ^{Edits Ho Cap'n!}⚓ 04:07, 4 March 2020 (UTC)

Sent - Aa77zz (talk) 09:17, 4 March 2020 (UTC)

Hiya Eek. Here's the original description, pg. 135 (this site has improved immensely btw, now you can read online, no more скача́тьing of .djvu files -15 years ago I used to get these books as torrents via ru.tracker). My Russian stinks, but it's better than no Russian, I can translate bits. I see nothing about the purported etymology, for example. If you search for the original publications in Cyrillic you can also find the descriptions of the subspecies. There is also an important 1905 article in the Bulletin of the St. Petersburg Science Academy about this species: synonyms and such. Also check out the great picture in Russian Wikipedia. Cheers, Leo Breman (talk) 02:39, 8 March 2020 (UTC)

Taxonomy trouble, or missing page?

Howdy hello folks! I recently came across this cool but clickbaity article that mentioned Ceyx mindanensis, the South Philippine Dwarf-kingfisher. HBW has an entry on it [2], but we don't have a page for it. We do however have Philippine dwarf kingfisher. My question here: are we missing a page, or is this a taxonomic issue. For whit, see this paper in The Auk, which might seem to place it as a subspecies of Ceyx melanurus, though it doesn't say explicitly. The IOC bird list has Ceyx melanurus mindanensis, but its also unclear whether that refers to Ceyx mindanensis, or simply reflects the fact that a heck ton of Phillipine birds have mindanensis in the name because of the island of Mindanao. Guidance appreciated. CaptainEek ^{Edits Ho Cap'n!}⚓ 08:56, 17 March 2020 (UTC)

This is a case where HBW has split a species and promoted a subspecies to species status. There are several hundred such cases. The IOC is more reluctant to split and waits until there is a strong journal article that argues for a split. Wikipedia follows the IOC. In the article for the Philippine dwarf kingfisher (Ceyx melanurus) I would list the subspecies (there are 3) and add a note that C. m. mindanensis Steere, 1890 is sometimes treated as a separate species, the South Philippine dwarf-kingfisher and cite the HBW. Note that Birdlife International and thus the IUCN follow the HBW - they are not independent sources. - Aa77zz (talk) 09:29, 17 March 2020 (UTC)

I've now added some taxonomy to the Philippine dwarf kingfisher article and cited the HBW for the split. Surprisingly, I cannot find a scan of Kaup's original description online. It is unusual for BHL not to have such an article. - Aa77zz (talk) 12:04, 17 March 2020 (UTC)

Aa77zz, Thanks for taking a look, sometimes I can't make heads nor tails of taxonomy! CaptainEek ^{Edits Ho Cap'n!}⚓ 16:31, 17 March 2020 (UTC)

HBW merging into Cornell Lab

The HBW is being merged into the Cornell Lab of Ornithology’s "Birds of the World". The HBW website is still working but I don't know for how much longer. The merge is likely to break the large number of wikipedia links to the HBW. I've also sometimes linked to James Jobling's "Key" on the HBW site (it is open access) but this is also likely to end. - Aa77zz (talk) 09:45, 17 March 2020 (UTC)

Maybe the links could be saved with the Wayback Machine? Could a bot do it? FunkMonk (talk) 09:48, 17 March 2020 (UTC)

You mean like IABot? --awkwafaba (📥) 13:44, 17 March 2020 (UTC)

Possibly, can't say I know much about the bots, but I have seen some that automatically add archives to links. FunkMonk (talk) 13:59, 17 March 2020 (UTC)

We may wish to raise this on VPT, as someone there may have a better solution than we do. We might need to coordinate with a bot owner to run a script through all the bird pages. CaptainEek ^{Edits Ho Cap'n!}⚓ 16:33, 17 March 2020 (UTC)

I found 2112 pages that link to hbw.com. I sicked IABot on them. I then found 1510 pages using https and ran that job. If there are archives at Internet Archive of any of the links on those pages, then they will be added. Hopefully this will cut down the work a little. Perhaps someone more knowledgeable of the situation can also contact the Internet Archive about this, so they can archive all the pages at HBW. --awkwafaba (📥) 20:42, 17 March 2020 (UTC)

Move of Secretarybird

User User:Robongio has cut-and-pasted the article Secretarybird into the redirect Secretary bird. There was no discussion of the move on the talk page (now of the redirect). The IOC list (which we follow) treats the name as one word (as does HBW, but Borrow & Demey in their Birds of West Africa hyphenate the name and Stevenson & Fanshawe in their Birds of East Africa have two words). I'm not sure whether I can undo this change myself so I am asking here for someone to revert this change. Many thanks - Aa77zz (talk) 20:49, 24 March 2020 (UTC)

Now undone. Thanks to User: Apokryltaros (perhaps I could have done this myself). - Aa77zz (talk) 22:06, 24 March 2020 (UTC)

Identify birds based on line art (pandemic edition!)

As before, here's line art of various birds, of which all I know is the first letter of their species name. Can you help?

• An M-bird
  An M-bird
• Another M-bird
  Another M-bird
• 
  N-bird
• 
  Another N-bird
• 
  Still another N-bird
• 
  And lastly, a T-bird.

Thanks. DS (talk) 20:22, 25 March 2020 (UTC)

One of the two pigeons may be a mourning dove? Actually, if you look at the source image it has been cropped from, you can see the names of each hand-written on the scanned pages:[3] Seems to be the case for some of the others as well. FunkMonk (talk) 21:11, 25 March 2020 (UTC)

Goodness, I hadn't noticed that - too faint to see at regular size. Good work; those M birds are indeed both mourning doves - one marked "Rice" and one "Snyder". (Anyone know what those names mean?) DS (talk) 02:22, 26 March 2020 (UTC)

Fifth image is a nightjar of some kind, beyond that, who knows. Lesser nighthawk , Common poorwill could both be possible, but all the nightjars look very similar. CaptainEek ^{Edits Ho Cap'n!}⚓ 22:24, 25 March 2020 (UTC)

Common nighthawk perhaps? CaptainEek ^{Edits Ho Cap'n!}⚓ 22:25, 25 March 2020 (UTC)

"N" for (Brown-headed) Nuthatch and T" for thrush? Loopy30 (talk) 00:55, 26 March 2020 (UTC)

Which one is the Nuthatch? DS (talk) 05:36, 28 March 2020 (UTC)

1. Mourning Dove

2. Mourning Dove

3. Nuthatch

4. Nightingale

5. Nightjar/Nighthawk

6. Thrush Loopy30 (talk) 12:23, 28 March 2020 (UTC)

Make WikiProject Poultry a task force

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 feel that WikiProject Poultry, to get more people to join, should become a task force of this project (move Wikipedia:WikiProject Poultry to Wikipedia:WikiProject Birds/Poultry task force). I love chickens and am determined to help Wikipedia have a better coverage of them! Thanks so much, 🐔Chicdat ^ChickenDatabase 11:19, 6 April 2020 (UTC)

Speaking as the author of what I believe is Wikipedia's only poultry FA, I strongly support subsuming the poultry project into the birds project. Yes, there are differences between the two topics—a poultry article is much more about social and economic history and less about technical detail than a pure species article—but the crossover is obvious. Realistically the poultry project is never going to have enough members to be viable on its own. ‑ Iridescent 11:58, 6 April 2020 (UTC)

So, should this project merging happen? I think so. 🐔Chicdat ^ChickenDatabase 12:37, 6 April 2020 (UTC)

The proposal is a sensible one and I would support it. However, I think the choice should be for members of the poultry project as that is the project that will be going. I see no reason to object to a poultry task force within the bird project. —  Jts1882 | talk  12:47, 6 April 2020 (UTC)

What about Wikipedia:WikiProject Agriculture? The poultry eggs appear to fall in both WP baskets.--Eostrix (talk) 13:26, 6 April 2020 (UTC)

I'm not a lumper, but I think WP Poultry would do better if it were under the wing of another project. There is not much effective difference between a TF and a WP. It can be a child project or a task force. Either way, WP Poultry could be added to the WP Birds and WP Ag talk page templates, similar to how articles relating to the Pterosaurs task force can be added through {{WikiProject Palaeontology}} and {{WikiProject Amphibians and Reptiles}}. --awkwafaba (📥) 00:47, 10 April 2020 (UTC)

Okay, I am a member of WikiProject Poultry, and I see by looking at the page that it really reached its peak in participants back in 2014. About half of the pages once in WikiProject Poultry have been adopted by this one. The remaining half are out-of-date and some are in disrepair. WikiProject Poultry's primary purpose, like most others, was to improve Wikipedia's coverage of something (in this case, poultry). Judging from the high quantity of stubs and other low-quality articles in it, if it ever did fulfill its purpose, whatever it accomplished has mostly been reversed. M e r g e. 🐔Chicdat ^ChickenDatabase 13:32, 10 April 2020 (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.

What species of bird is this?

I stumbled upon File:Share-6D2E9EF9-D848-4071-8844-C6EB8A69AEDB.jpg, and the description doesn't specify what bird this is. Google Images says it's a Budgerigar, but I want to make sure by asking here. Thanks, Pandakekok9 (talk) 02:36, 21 April 2020 (UTC)

Pandakekok9, Given that its being held by a human, I would tend to agree that its a Budgie, AKA Melopsittacus undulatus, as they are one of the more common pet birds, and it matches the description well. CaptainEek ^{Edits Ho Cap'n!}⚓ 02:45, 21 April 2020 (UTC)

Thanks, I will be requesting a rename on Commons. Pandakekok9 (talk) 02:47, 21 April 2020 (UTC)

Azores wood pigeon

I was trawling through the "Expert needed" tags and came across Azores wood pigeon, which is a subspecies of the Common wood pigeon. Not sure why the subspecies has its own page...? Its basically unsourced, I would opt to just merge it into the main species page. Any thoughts? CaptainEek ^{Edits Ho Cap'n!}⚓ 03:47, 21 April 2020 (UTC)

Yeah, subspecies articles should generally be merged (unless a substantial article with little duplication can be written, I think), subspecies stubs definitely should be. Do we have a guideline on this? Should we maybe write one to have something to point to in the future? FunkMonk (talk) 06:42, 21 April 2020 (UTC)

I'd keep it. There is sufficient sourced local information about its place in a unique ecosystem and it does have an ESA conservation status. This makes it notable, IMO. I wouldn't advocate creating subspecies articles in general, but there is no need to delete an article which is above stub level. In mammals there are articles on populations within subspecies. —  Jts1882 | talk  07:52, 21 April 2020 (UTC)

But the info shouldn't be deleted, of course, just merged. The parent article isn't that big itself. FunkMonk (talk) 08:04, 21 April 2020 (UTC)

Birds on isolated islands have a habit of jumping between species and sub-species status, though it seems this one is a recent arrival.[4] It is however a very well studied sub-species, e.g.: [5],[6],[7],[8],[9]. This particular sub-species should probably be separate.--Eostrix (talk) 06:52, 22 April 2020 (UTC)

Mass notifications (limited to 50 though)

Notifying all members of WikiProject Birds (more info · opt out): (User:Hjemt, User:좀비 브렌다, User:Jimfbleak, User:Casliber, User:4444hhhh, User:MeegsC, User:Ashyprinai, User:Pvmoutside, User:Innotata, User:RileyBugz, User:Sabine's Sunbird, User:Elmidae, User:Loopy30, User:Richard001, User:Shyamal, User:Aa77zz, User:Jts1882, User:Atsme, User:Vihaking277, User:MandyMB, User:Xenoriole, User:Evvoltura, User:Interaccoonale, User:Probably not a pigeon, User:Loft-ind, User:Grungaloo, User:RedKnight7146, User:vkacey) - I just noticed this feature for mass notifications that allows one to use a markup like {{ping project|WikiProject Birds}} or {{mass notification|group name}} Your message. ~~~~ to notify project members listed in that module (I have just put in a sample of members - feel free to add or remove yourself - for a little test. Seems like a useful feature. Shyamal (talk) 09:27, 16 May 2020 (UTC)

Looks good Jimfbleak - talk to me? 11:00, 16 May 2020 (UTC)

Looks good to me too! MeegsC (talk) 11:47, 16 May 2020 (UTC)

Agreed Cas Liber (talk · contribs) 12:19, 16 May 2020 (UTC)

HBW Alive closing

The HBW Alive website will be closing on 11 May 2020. This is part of the takeover by Cornell Labs, which is launching a new website called Birds of the World, which is supposedly incorporating the HBW Alive material. It looks to me that more of the material will require a subscription.

This change also means that at least 1000 citations will go dead. —  Jts1882 | talk  14:21, 7 May 2020 (UTC)

I've gotten a subscription to the Birds of the World site already, and I gotta say, I quite like it. Its still a bit in its infancy, they're clearly still working on expanding articles, especially non-North American species. But it has already merged with most of the HBW material as far as I can tell. With regards to the old HBW sources, they could get ported into Birds of the World sources? Or they could be sourced to the paper copy of HBW? CaptainEek ^{Edits Ho Cap'n!}⚓ 19:39, 7 May 2020 (UTC)

The new site is apparently free to view for today - https://birdsoftheworld.org Shyamal (talk) 04:23, 8 May 2020 (UTC)

I think the free preview is today and yesterday.

From what I can see the information in the species accounts on HBW Alive has been copied to the species accounts in the new website, just with slightly different organisation. The only things that seem to be missing are the taxonomic authorites and interactive etymologies. There is some mismatch of the taxonomies used. For instance, in Eurasian magpie, some of the text discusses the nine subspecies in HBW Alive, but the subspecies listing only has six arranged in the ebird groups. So the text discusses identification of P. p. anderssoni, with an interactive photo, and its systematic history, but doesn't list it in the subspecies section. However, for an early version of the website some teething pains are to be expected and overall it looks very nice.

As for references, I don't think we can do anything. There are going to be differences in content (notably the taxonomy) and we can't assume the the point being referenced will be included in the printed HBW book or at the new site. —  Jts1882 | talk  09:39, 8 May 2020 (UTC)

Updating the wiki references will involve a lot of work. Some wiki articles, including some FAs, rely heavily on the HBW Alive pages. From a quick look it appears that where Cornell already had an article (for birds occurring in the US), the HBW content has not been copied across. The different taxonomies will certainly cause headaches. - Aa77zz (talk) 10:40, 8 May 2020 (UTC)

Jts1882: James Jobling has indicated that information on the etymologies (his Key) will eventually be moved to the new site (and be free to view) - see his post to BirdForum on 4 May 2020 at 17:06 here. - Aa77zz (talk) 10:40, 8 May 2020 (UTC)

How much of the site are they going to put behind a paywall?TheLordOfWikis (talk) 12:30, 8 May 2020 (UTC)

@TheLordOfWikis: According to people on the BirdForum it will be more for subscribers only than HBW Alive, which had most of the taxonomy public.

Now the free preview is over I can say pretty much all of it is subscribers only. The public content consists of the taxonomy page, a checklist with links to species accounts, which are each restricted to a photo, common and scientific name, conservation status and number of subspecies (but not what they are). The family pages provide a list of genera with species number. Basically all the text is behind the paywall, apart from a few example species. —  Jts1882 | talk  07:16, 9 May 2020 (UTC)

@Aa77zz: My unscientific survey was largely informed by looking out of my window (hence the magpie example). Reading a bit more on the new site, it will integrate content from four sources: Birds of North America, Neotropical Birds (both Cornell publications), HBW Alive, and Bird Families of the World. So they may be using their publications as primary content for New World species and HBW will cover the Old World species. The family accounts seem to be based on Bird Families of the World.

However, they do explain how the move to the Cornell taxonomy complicates the merger (see Understanding Birds of the World Taxonomy) and leaves inconsistencies like I found for the magpie. Hopefully this will be cleared up in the near future. —  Jts1882 | talk  13:33, 8 May 2020 (UTC)

Now that the HBW Alive site has closed I notice that the wikipedia links to the HBW species articles get redirected to the corresponding species article on the Cornell Birds of the World website - eg http://www.hbw.com/node/467455 links to the Cornell article. HBW Alive introduced many splits that haven't been recognised by other authorities. Cornell use their own taxonomy and have lumped the species again. When this is the case the separate HBW links redirect to the lumped Cornell species article.- Aa77zz (talk) 10:19, 15 May 2020 (UTC)

FYI anyone (or a lot of people) who's contributed at least 1000 bird checklists to eBird during the past year got a free subscription, and that includes me. That is intended to be continued for another year; I'll probably pay after that. So hopefully we'll have a decent number of people with access. (Yeah I'm still around, will respond to user talk page messages and pings, and have bird projects here to get to some time.) —innotata 00:28, 17 May 2020 (UTC)

Articles

Do you guys think that a little bit of copyediting that Sandhillcrane massively expanded articles and wasn't promoted yet can be GA?, look at how huge are the Long-eared owl Ural owl Ornate hawk-eagle White-tailed eagle Eastern imperial eagle Barred owl Kori bustard Cooper's hawk Verreaux's eagle-owl Cinereous vulture Southern ground hornbill Verreaux's eagle Harpy eagle Crowned eagle Bonelli's eagle Changeable hawk-eagle Northern goshawk Mountain hawk-eagle and more, just can't see their contribution on mid 2019 to early contributions. seeing on his/her talk page when FunkMonk talked to him, I think he/she doesn't know the rules of GA yet, their work is amazing. 77.106.107.160 (talk) 11:07, 17 May 2020 (UTC)

Yeah, isn't Sandhillcrane active anymore? FunkMonk (talk) 20:15, 17 May 2020 (UTC)

FunkMonk. I am still active and love researching and editing these bird pages extensively. I may be showing my age, but I am of limited knowledge regarding editorial terminology on wikipedia. I am not sure what GA means nor why my edits to pages pre-2019 are not viewable to others. Could you inform me about the rules of GA? Thank you!. Sandhillcrane (talk) 04:02, 20 May 2020 (UTC)

hi Sandhillcrane, if you feel the article is in good shape, you can nomimate it as GA on the article's talkpage like this edit [10], just copy-paste it and you'll just replace the date and time to current time and the name into your name you've placed/edited it on talkpage. After nominating, you need to wait for reviewer to review your article, if the reviewer reviews the article, they will notify you on your talkpage. The review is like this [11] on other article. You need to address each reviewer request, mostly every article needs to be copyedited/written properly so it will have a higher chance to be GA. 77.106.107.160 (talk) 06:04, 20 May 2020 (UTC)

If anyone has these sources feel free to add information about them to the article.

• HBW and BirdLife International Illustrated Checklist of the Birds of the World, volume 1 (esp. on taxonomic change)

• The population estimate from here based on Brooke (2004), presumably Albatrosses and Petrels across the World (Bird Families of the World) First Edition (ISBN 978-0198501251)

• Jahnckea, Jamie (1994). "Biología y conser vación de la golondrina de tempestad negra Oceanodroma markhami (Salvin 1883) en la península de Paracas, Perú". Informe Técnico (in Spanish). APECO. The source is offline so any help here would be great.

• If you took a photo of a Markham's storm petrel and want to upload it follow the steps here at the Commons: Release

Thank you! Therapyisgood (talk) 22:49, 6 June 2020 (UTC)

Distribution maps

This article Biologia Futura: rapid diversification and behavioural adaptation of birds in response to Oligocene–Miocene climatic conditions has a series of distribution maps for bird families. My reading of the copyright status is that they are available under {{Cc-by-4.0}} and suitable for Wikipedia use, but I'm not that familiar with these copyright issues. Can anyone confirm that we can use the maps? —  Jts1882 | talk  06:56, 7 June 2020 (UTC)

Diversity map of Accipitriformes (258 species). The colour gradient (from light to dark) indicates species richness

I think it is OK so I've uploaded one map to Commons. We'll see if there is a problem there. —  Jts1882 | talk  08:26, 7 June 2020 (UTC)

Misidentification at File:Long-billed Thrasher, Toxostoma longirostre; South TX on cactus 01.jpg?

The file says that it's a long-billed thrasher (Toxostoma longirostre), but an IP at the file's talk page says it's a curve-billed thrasher (Toxostoma curvirostre). Which one is it really? Thanks, Pandakekok9 (talk) 12:52, 19 May 2020 (UTC)

Seems like the IP is right. But lets wait for another opinion. Rehman 12:54, 19 May 2020 (UTC)

I also agree with the IP. The overall colour certainly appears grey and not brown. The iris colour and the bill shape supports either species and is not conclusive.The markings visible on the small amount of breast showing do not appear to be dark streaks and are instead more likely the faintly spotted breast of a curve-billed. However, there are small white tail-spots are visible at the tip, a feature that only the curve-billed has. Finally, the lack of solid grey in the cheek and the missing black border at the lower border/throat also supports an identification of curve-billed thrasher. 'Cheers, Loopy30 (talk) 18:23, 19 May 2020 (UTC)

Also note that a second image was uploaded to File:Long-billed_Thrasher,_Toxostoma_longirostre;_South_TX_on_cactus_02.JPG. Loopy30 (talk) 18:31, 19 May 2020 (UTC)

Thanks for your opinions. I also added a notification at the long-billed thrasher's discussion page, so that all editors of that article could participate if they want to. I think I will wait for now, as the image is used as a lead image of the said article, so it might be too early for me or Rehman (who is an admin at Commons) to rename the file now. Pandakekok9 (talk) 02:08, 20 May 2020 (UTC)

These pictures are of a curve-billed thrasher, not a long-billed. Long-billed thrashers don't have pale tail tips (their tail is all rufous) and are very rufous on the back — like a brown thrasher. There's a distinct difference between the color of the face, and the color of the crown and back. Long-billed also has a bold black moustachial stripe, which isn't as strong on the curve-billed (like in this picture). MeegsC (talk) 09:14, 31 May 2020 (UTC)

I've replaced the misidentified picture with one from further down in the article. It's a bit pointless to leave a misidentified photo up! MeegsC (talk) 09:22, 31 May 2020 (UTC)

@Pandakekok9: The file name has now been corrected, but the file description is still wrong. Can you please fix that too? Thanks! MeegsC (talk) 12:41, 8 June 2020 (UTC)

I've corrected the file captions, descriptions and categories for both image files on Wikimedia Commons and have also removed the image from the articles on both French and Hungarian Wikipedias. Loopy30 (talk) 13:16, 8 June 2020 (UTC)

Whoops, forgot about that. Thanks! Pandakekok9 (talk) 13:39, 8 June 2020 (UTC)

HBW and BirdLife International Illustrated Checklist of the Birds of the World

If anyone has a copy of HBW and BirdLife International Illustrated Checklist of the Birds of the World and can add taxological information to Markham's storm petrel about why their classification from Oceanodroma markhami to Hydrobates markhami changed that would be appreciated. I do have a access to Handbook of the Birds of the World, vol. 1 (1992) with family information. Therapyisgood (talk) 02:31, 2 June 2020 (UTC)

I don't have access to the book, but I think I can answer the question. The IOC list, which still recognised Oceanodroma as a separate genus, notes that Oceanodroma is paraphyletic with inclusion of Hydrobates, which would have priority for these species if confirmed (Robertson et al. 2011, H&M4). The phylogenetic analysis in Robertson et al (2011) shows Hydrobates pellagicus nested within Oceanodroma.. A more recent study finds the same result with all 14 species (Wallace et al, 2016). Strangely the change isn't included in the draft of the upcoming IOC list 10.2, at least yet. —  Jts1882 | talk  09:11, 2 June 2020 (UTC)

The Committee on Classification and Nomenclature of North and Middle American Birds (NACC) voted to merge the storm-petrel genus Oceanodroma into Hydrobates last year - proposal 2019-B-7. The change was published last August in the Sixtieth supplement to the American Ornithological Society's Check-list of North American Birds (open access). The South American Classification Committee of the AOS (SACC) voted on the same proposal - the decision was announced on 8 June 2020 (yesterday) - see Proposal (829) to South American Classification Committee. Surprisingly, in neither case was the voting unanimous. Pamela C. Rasmussen is one of the editors of the IOC list and is also a member of the NACC so will be aware of the change. I expect that the IOC list will eventually follow suit. - Aa77zz (talk) 09:20, 9 June 2020 (UTC)

An interesting discussion at the SACC which reflects the conflicting desires for monophyletic groups and taxonomic stability. They all agree change is needed and nearly all that more than one genus is required. But as the data is not quite good enough for the division they are torn between waiting until a better decision can be made and making the only clear change now, knowing a further change will probably be needed. I think I now understand why the IOC has being holding off on making what seems an obvious and long overdue change. There is nothing in the 10.2 draft suggesting it will be in the July revision. —  Jts1882 | talk  11:31, 9 June 2020 (UTC)

References

Eclectus species split?

I read today that the eclectus parrot has been split into 4 species.

This was decided in 2019, by Birdlife, apparently. Does this need to be changed on here too?

It's Moluccan, Tanimbar, Sumba and Papuan Eclecti now. I'm writing this on my kindle atm, so I can't paste the link.

The Vos Eclectus (the common pet one), or Eclectus Vos or however you write it is still a subspecies, or a breed? Idk.

146.200.127.203 (talk) 23:49, 15 June 2020 (UTC)

Here's the link: Archived 2019 topic: Eclectus Parrot (Eclectus roratus) is being split: assessment of newly recognised taxa

The IOC still have one species. They have a new update (version 10.2) due in a few weeks, but I don't see the split on the species update page.

As the IOC is the default reference for the project, is there a compelling reason to use a different authority and make the split?. What other authorities make the split? Are there IUCN assessments for the new species? —  Jts1882 | talk  09:25, 16 June 2020 (UTC)

To answer the last question, the IUCN have assessments for the new species:

1. Sumba Eclectus (Eclectus cornelia) EN
2. Papuan Eclectus (Eclectus polychloros) LC
3. Tanimbar Eclectus (Eclectus riedeli) VU
4. Moluccan Eclectus (Eclectus roratus) LC

—  Jts1882 | talk  09:41, 16 June 2020 (UTC)

It will happen sometime. I keep an eye on the proposed splits page as well. I give it 9 months....Cas Liber (talk · contribs) 10:11, 16 June 2020 (UTC)

It does seem like just a matter of time. The IUCN already have individual assessments for the species and the Clements checklist has four subspecies groups corresponding to the new species. If the IOC don't follow in July (they're still adding splits), then January becomes likely. Best to be patient until the split is uncontroversial. —  Jts1882 | talk  16:59, 16 June 2020 (UTC)

Seems there'll be quite a hassle identifying and categorising all the photos on Commons[12] which are now only labelled E. roratus... FunkMonk (talk) 17:15, 16 June 2020 (UTC)

References

Utilising New Audubon Guide?

So apparently Audubon has released a new guide for North American birds that contains information on almost 800 species of American birds. It does look quite useful, having information on the feeding habits, diet, breeding, calls, distribution, and appearance. So my question is, would Audubon be considered a reliable enough source to use for updating bird articles? Because although North American birds are some of the best written about birds here, the information in the guide would certainly beef up a lots of articles, especially where nesting, calls, and diet are concerned.TheLordOfWikis (talk) 05:13, 23 June 2020 (UTC)

Image addition guidelines

I have made an addition to the project page of some guidelines for image addition, please feel free to improve or discuss the guidelines. There are some articles where there are frequent changes of the taxobox and a lot of argumentation - some common species also have the problem of drive-by add-my-photo-too additions that can be irritating to deal with repeatedly. Shyamal (talk) 05:33, 26 June 2020 (UTC)

Nice, I think I asked for such guidelines once. I think we could add that different growth stages of a bird could also be shown, as well as seasonal plumage? FunkMonk (talk) 07:37, 26 June 2020 (UTC)

Additions look good! It seems some of the section formatting was screwed up, though? FunkMonk (talk) 10:45, 26 June 2020 (UTC)

Hopefully fixed now. Shyamal (talk) 11:01, 26 June 2020 (UTC)

Yep! I wonder if the guideline of facing into/towards the text should be expanded to include all images when possible, not just in the taxobox? And also note perhaps that it's not always possible with the available images... FunkMonk (talk) 11:04, 26 June 2020 (UTC)

Assessment tab, Statistics section-updated

Greetings, On Assessments page, I added wikilinks to "Popular pages" (runs monthly), and "Quality operations" log. JoeNMLC (talk) 15:39, 11 July 2020 (UTC)

Species confirmation (or otherwise!) requested

File:West Hylebos Wetlands Park - ducks on Brook Lake 01.webm and File:West Hylebos Wetlands Park - ducks on Brook Lake 02.webm: I'm sure they are Anas but am less certain of platyrhynchos; could someone who knows more than I do have a look and confirm or disconfirm? Thanks in advance! - Jmabel | Talk 19:05, 15 July 2020 (UTC)

Central Park birdwatching incident

Hi all! Just a note to say the Central Park birdwatching incident page is now live, so should no longer be listed under Articles for Creation. But it looks like that list is being generated by a macro or something, and I don't know how to edit it.

Style for bird vocalizations

Is there a standard for how to write bird vocalizations? Most commonly I've seen them in italics, but also single quotes, double quotes and with varying capitalization. Thanks, SchreiberBike | ⌨  03:05, 23 July 2020 (UTC)

Some editors have been going about protecting these with {{Not a typo}} to keep automated spell-checkers away, which seems to be a good idea regardless of the other formatting. Shyamal (talk) 03:14, 23 July 2020 (UTC)

Draft:Triton cockatoo

Should this draft be accepted? I'm not sure what makes a subspecies notable and/or whether these should be redirected to the species article. Thanks, Calliopejen1 (talk) 02:26, 30 July 2020 (UTC)

It's all up to you, Calliopejen1. Regards. Vihaking277 (talk) 08:09, 30 July 2020 (UTC)

Actually, it's better to add it because the other three subspecies have their own article.Vihaking277 (talk) 08:32, 30 July 2020 (UTC)

We usually merge subspecies to the species level unless a page is too long, and these are so short that they could be easily covered at the species articles. No need to split subspecies articles for the sake of it. FunkMonk (talk) 09:22, 30 July 2020 (UTC)

Generally subspecies articles are only created or kept if there is so much material that it warrants a separate article. That does not seem to be the case here. - On that note, Greater sulphur-crested cockatoo also should be merged. Eleonora cockatoo at first glance looks like it might sustain its own article, but actually the sourcing is somewhat shite, and much of the material is already at the species article. I'll be having a look at merging those two. --Elmidae (talk · contribs) 14:31, 30 July 2020 (UTC)

IOC list to be eventually superseded by the IOU Global Checklist

IOC notice here - "The IOU Working Group on Avian Checklists (WGAC) has chosen to adopt the IOC World Bird List as the template for the building of its consolidated Global Checklist. ... Meanwhile the IOC World Bird List will continue to be actively updated on a semiannual basis, including changes recommended by the IOU Global Checklist. It is expected that the IOU Global Checklist will eventually supersede the IOC World Bird List." - Aa77zz (talk) 20:58, 2 August 2020 (UTC)

List of birds of North America

The North American list could use a bit of scrubbing which I plan on jumping on soon.....also, it is the only list that has separate articles on each family. All the others are consolidated. Anyone out there feel strongly it should be kept that wat? Otherwise I plan on consolidating them.....Pvmoutside (talk) 8:24, 4 August 2020 (UTC)

• Support I fully agree with the consolidation to one page. It will contain 2158 species, a little fewer than List of birds of Africa and two-thirds as many as List of birds of South America. Craigthebirder (talk) 14:05, 4 August 2020 (UTC)
• Support. If you do the legwork merging them in like the African list it would be beneficial.--Eostrix  (^{🦉 hoot} _hoot🦉) 05:53, 6 August 2020 (UTC)

Is the IOC considered the supreme authority on Wikipedia for bird taxonomy?

Hi, while I normally edit a lot of taxonomy articles, I generally don't edit living birds. As I understand the IOC is one of many ornitholigcal authorities, although it is one of the big ones. I am currently concerned about the Gallirallus / Hypotaenidia dispute. Apparently the IOC and IUCN recognises the core of what is usually considered Gallirallus (including the Buff-banded rail and close allies) to comprise the separate genus Hypotaenidia, leaving Gallirallus only to consist of the Weka, Calayan rail and New Caledonian Rail (apparently the IUCN considers the extinct Chatham rail to belong to the separate genus Cabalus despite being sister species to the New Caledonian rail according to molecular results). However this assembelage has been found to be paraphyletic w.r.t Hypotaenidia according to the most comprehensive molecular phylogeny of rails, and other authorities like eBird stil consider that all the species belong to Gallirallus. The literature also seems split on the Gallirallus/Hypotaenidia distinction, with most papers preferring Gallirallus from Google scholar results. Pvmoutside has changed all of the articles to the IOC taxonomy without concensus to do so, and without mentioning that other authorities consider the species to be part of Gallirallus, which is likely to be confusing to people unfamiliar with the issue. Hemiauchenia (talk) 16:41, 7 August 2020 (UTC)

• To answer your title question, yes. From https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:WikiProject_Birds/References: "Wikipedia's taxonomy for bird species, subspecies, genus, family and order pages follows that of the IOC, unless consensus determines there's a reason not to. The IOC World Bird List is now updated twice a year. The IOC is also the de facto standard for English bird names. This decision does not affect country, state or other regional lists that use a different, named, taxonomy, or other articles that discuss bird biodiversity or birds in general. Exceptions may be made in particular cases for either taxonomy or names. Where disagreement exists between the major taxonomic authorities, articles should note this." Craigthebirder (talk) 16:50, 7 August 2020 (UTC)

Fair enough, the usage in the literature is split enough that it needs to be noted in the text of the articles to avoid confusion. Hemiauchenia (talk) 17:04, 7 August 2020 (UTC)

Hemiauchenia, Ebird follows Clements which isn't doing an update until 2021.... Clements hasn't updated this year......Pvmoutside (talk) 17:24, 7 August 2020 (UTC)

The split follows the 2014 edition of the Handbook of the Birds of the World, I think if Clements/eBird were going to have followed the IOC on this they would have done so in previous editions. Hemiauchenia (talk) 18:17, 7 August 2020 (UTC)

not necessarily so, particularly if the IOC just changed and the Handbook/Clements are from 2014. As an FYI, all the bird taxonomy groups are talking to each other, and it sounds like there will be more conformity next year.....Pvmoutside (talk) 18:24, 7 August 2020 (UTC)

per WP:CRYSTAL Wikipedia should reflect the split as it is currently, the articles can be modified if/when the proposed changes happen. Hemiauchenia (talk) 19:49, 7 August 2020 (UTC)

Updated version of IOC bird list released

Version 10.2 of IOC list of world birds has just been released here. This release includes a large number of changes - splits but also changes to the genera. These are marked in red in the Excel spreadsheet "Life List+ (v10.2 red, Excel File XLSX, 4.6Mb)" here.

This release includes some/all of the changes introduced by the AOU in their 61st supplement

I notice that the IOC refrained from making a unilateral change to South American birds and instead Pamela Rasmussen put forward a proposal - see here.

Normally the Clements list is updated once a year in July. A notice on the Clements website here states that the list won't be updated in 2020 - with the explanation "This delay is driven by technical considerations." I suspect that they are still working on merging the HBW database with their own. They'll have a lot of catching up to do next year.

Some of the changes in the new IOC list had already been adopted in the HBW list. It seems likely that Cornell will eventual split some of the species in the HBW list that they have recently lumped. - Aa77zz (talk) 08:22, 19 July 2020 (UTC)

I've just checked the IOC site and it seems that the update is still in progress - the spreadsheets have been updated but not the home page. - Aa77zz (talk) 08:35, 19 July 2020 (UTC)

The IOC hasn't yet updated the family/genus roster pages yet either. Maybe by the 25th?....Pvmoutside (talk) 18:24, 19 July 2020 (UTC)

Cornell won't be updating the Clements checklist this year. Apparently they are making a technical update to the "Lab’s database management systems", but I'm not sure if this is associated with their takeover of HBW Alive and an attempt to reconcile their lists. Perhaps they will use the opportunity reconcile with IOC where possible. —  Jts1882 | talk  09:25, 19 July 2020 (UTC)

It looks to be a two way street. The IOC is also making changes to match some of Clements taxonomy....Pvmoutside (talk) 8:24, 21 July 2020 (UTC)

Yes, I didn't mean to imply one was favoured or dominant. All four checklists came to agreement about trying to get closer together a couple of years ago (I forget where I read this). Quite a few of the IOC changes had already been made by Birdllife International/IUCN and already followed here on Wikipedia. Most of the differences come down to timing and how conservative or progressive they want to be. —  Jts1882 | talk  13:49, 21 July 2020 (UTC)

A bit more on the plan for one checklist to rule them all: Working Group Avian Checklists. —  Jts1882 | talk  10:55, 31 July 2020 (UTC)

• While working on the Réunion swamphen (Porphyrio caerulescens) article, I noticed the IUCN calls it "Reunion Gallinule".[13] Based on Birdlife I assume:[14] I checked the IOC list to figure out what to do, but it doesn't seem to be covered there. Is there something I'm overlooking, or should the title be changed? Was it perhaps once on their list under the current name but then removed? FunkMonk (talk) 15:09, 31 July 2020 (UTC)

Likewise, the Lord Howe swamphen seems to be called White Swamphen at IOC[15] and IUCN[16] now. Anyone know when these changes occurred, and what we should follow? FunkMonk (talk) 15:15, 31 July 2020 (UTC)

The names of the hoopoe starling[17], Spotted green pigeon[18], and Newton's parakeet[19] also seem to have been changed from what they are now called on Wikipedia. FunkMonk (talk) 16:04, 31 July 2020 (UTC)

Avibase here lists who used what when. Birdlife International (and hence IUCN) changed from White Gallinule to White Swamphen in 2014. HBW uses/used White Swamphen. H&M changed from Lord Howe Swamphen to White Swamphen with the 4th edition (2014). IOC has used White Swamphen, at least since 2013. Clements appears to be the only list that uses Lord Howe Swamphen. (although Avibase has "Lord Howe Swamphen or White Gallinule") We generally follow the IOC and there doesn't appear to be a particularly strong reason not to in this case. - Aa77zz (talk) 16:15, 31 July 2020 (UTC)

Interesting, the examples above are just from articles I've personally expanded, so there should be many more. I thought such changes/disrepancies were quickly detected here in the past, but I guess we need to do some mass moves if we want to comply with the IOC? FunkMonk (talk) 16:28, 31 July 2020 (UTC)

I've come across very few species articles with a common name that differs from that used by the IOC so I doubt that there are many to change (at least in percentage terms). In contrast I've come across many articles in which a bird is placed in the wrong genus. It is an easy mistake to make - handbooks are frequently out of date and many editors don't realise that the taxonomy is in a state of flux. - Aa77zz (talk) 17:21, 31 July 2020 (UTC)

It seems to be somewhat common for obscure, recently extinct species for some reason. Of just the ones I've worked on, add Mascarene grey parakeet[20], Mauritius blue pigeon[21] (with a hyphen at IUCN, indicating this might apply to all blue pigeons), Mauritius sheldgoose[22], and Lyall's wren[23] to the list above, which makes nine extinct birds with different names here just from an arbitrary selection (six of them are FAs). FunkMonk (talk) 18:10, 31 July 2020 (UTC)

Seems like a philosophy shift - from Frank Gill to Pamela Rasmussen! Shyamal (talk) 10:11, 1 August 2020 (UTC)

This is not a difference between Gill and Rasmussen - none of 9 species have had their names changed since Rasmussen has been involved with the IOC list. In fact the IOC and the wikipedia articles have the same common names for 7 of the 9 species mentioned here. The Réunion swamphen is not included in the IOC list and the IOC has White Swamphen rather than Lord Howe swamphen.

Here is a table listing the common names of the 9 species (using Avibase not the original lists). Note that the IUCN uses the Birdlife and eBird uses Clements.

Wiki	IOC	HBW/BirdLife	Clements 2019	H&M4
Réunion swamphen	not listed	Reunion Gallinule
Lord Howe swamphen	White Swamphen	White Swamphen	Lord Howe Swamphen	White Swamphen
Hoopoe starling	Hoopoe starling	Reunion Starling	Reunion Starling	Réunion Starling
Spotted green pigeon	Spotted Green Pigeon	Liverpool Pigeon	Spotted Green Pigeon
Newton's parakeet	Newton's Parakeet	Rodrigues Parakeet	Newton's Parakeet	Rodrigues Parakeet
Mascarene grey parakeet	Mascarene Grey Parakeet	Mauritius Grey Parrot	Mauritius Gray Parrot
Mauritius blue pigeon	Mauritius Blue Pigeon	Mauritius Blue-pigeon	Mauritius Blue-pigeon	Mauritius Blue Pigeon
Mauritius sheldgoose	Mauritius Sheldgoose	Mauritius Shelduck	Mauritius Shelduck
Lyall's wren	Lyall's Wren	Stephens Island Rockwren	Stephens Island Wren	Lyall's Rockwren

- Aa77zz (talk) 12:04, 1 August 2020 (UTC)

Wow, four separate names for the last one! I guess we just move those that diverge to the IOC name? And while the Réunion swamphen is not listed by the IOC, should we then go by HBW instead, or use the current title? FunkMonk (talk) 12:12, 1 August 2020 (UTC)

I have now made a formal move request for Lord Howe swamphen to be moved to white swamphen, following the above. But I'm still unsure what to do about Réunion swamphen, as it is not covered by IOC... FunkMonk (talk) 12:05, 10 August 2020 (UTC)

New Phylogeny

A new phylogenetic analysis of birds covering nearly all families is out (at least a preprint is). Rather than end the long running confusion of conflicting topologies it adds a few wrinkles of its own, with a new first branch in Neoaves, breaking of two of the magnificent seven clades (a cuckoo in the nest), yet another position for the hoatzin, and a new broad "basal landbird clade". Below is a summary and the alternatives from the Neoaves article.

Jarvis et al. (2014)

Columbea Mirandornithes (flamingos, grebes) Columbimorphae (pigeons, mesites, sandgrouse) Passerea Otidae Otidimorphae (cuckoos, bustards, turacos) Strisores (hummingbirds, swifts, nightbirds) Gruae Opisthocomiformes (hoatzin) Gruimorphae Gruiformes (cranes, rails) Charadriiformes (shorebirds) Phaethoquornithes Eurypgimorphae (sunbittern, kagu, tropicbirds) Aequornithes (core waterbirds) Telluraves Afroaves Australaves (core landbirds)

Prum et al. (2015)

Strisores (hummingbirds, swifts, nightbirds) Columbaves Columbimorphae (pigeons, mesites, sandgrouse) Otidimorphae (cuckoos, bustards, turacos) Gruiformes (cranes, rails) Aequorlitornithes Mirandornithes (flamingoes, grebes) Charadriiformes (shorebirds) Phaethoquornithes Eurypgimorphae (sunbittern, kagu, tropicbirds) Aequornithes (core waterbirds) (waterbirds) Inopinaves Opisthocomiformes (hoatzin) Telluraves (core landbirds)

Suh (2016) — a hard polytomy
Mirandornithes (flamingoes, grebes) Columbimorphae (pigeons, mesites, sandgrouse) Otidimorphae (cuckoos, bustards, turacos) Strisores (hummingbirds, swifts, nightbirds) Opisthocomiformes (hoatzin) Gruiformes (cranes, rails) Charadriiformes (shorebirds) Phaethoquornithes Eurypgimorphae (sunbittern, kagu, tropicbirds) Aequornithes (core waterbirds) Telluraves Afroaves Australaves (core landbirds)

Reddy et al. (2017)
Columbea Mirandornithes (flamingos, grebes) Columbimorphae (pigeons, mesites, sandgrouse) Passerea Otidimorphae (cuckoos, bustards) Musophagiformes (turacos) Gruiformes (cranes, rails) Aequornithes (core waterbirds) Charadriiformes (shorebirds) Opisthocomiformes (hoatzin) Strisores (hummingbirds, swifts, nightbirds) Eurypygimorphae (sunbittern, kagu, tropicbirds) Telluraves (core landbirds)

Houde et al. (2019) —polytomy in Passerea
Columbea Mirandornithes (flamingos, grebes) Columbimorphae (pigeons, mesites, sandgrouse) Passerea Otidimorphae (cuckoos, bustards, turacos) Strisores (hummingbirds, swifts, nightbirds) Opisthocomiformes (hoatzin) Charadriiformes (shorebirds) Gruiformes (cranes, rails) Phaethoquornithes Eurypygimorphae (sunbittern, kagu, tropicbirds) Aequornithes (core waterbirds) Telluraves (core landbirds)

Kuhl et al. (2021)

Mirandornithes (flamingos, grebes) Columbaves Columbimorphae Pteroclimesites (sandgrouse, mesites) Columbiformes (pigeons) Cuculiformes (cuckoos) Musophagotides (turacos, bustards) Strisores (hummingbirds, swifts, nightbirds) Opisthocomiformes (hoatzin) Gruimorphae Gruiformes (cranes, rails) Charadriiformes (shorebirds) Phaethoquornithes Eurypygimorphae (sunbittern, kagu, tropicbirds) Aequornithes (core waterbirds) Telluraves (core landbirds)

Braun & Kimball (2021) — soft polytomies at the base of Neoaves and in Passerea

Mirandornithes (flamingos, grebes) Columbimorphae (pigeons, sandgrouse, mesites) Passerea Otidimorphae (bustards and cuckoos without turacos) Musophagiformes (turacos) Strisores (hummingbirds, swifts, nightbirds) Opisthocomiformes (hoatzin) Gruiformes (cranes, rails) Charadriiformes (shorebirds) Phaethoquornithes Eurypygimorphae (sunbittern, kagu, tropicbirds) Aequornithes (core waterbirds) Telluraves (core landbirds)

Wu et al. (2024)

Aquaterraves Columbaves Columbimorphae (pigeons, sandgrouse, mesites) Otidimorphae (bustards, turacos, cuckoos) Litusilvanae Strisores (hummingbirds, swifts, nightbirds) Gruimorphae Gruiformes (cranes, rails) Charadriiformes (shorebirds) (Cursorimorphae) Aequorlitornithes Mirandornithes (flamingos, grebes) Opisthocomiformes (hoatzin) Phaethoquornithes Eurypygimorphae (sunbittern, kagu, tropicbirds) Aequornithes (core waterbirds) Telluraves (core landbirds)

Stiller et al (2024)

Mirandornithes (flamingos, grebes) Columbaves Columbimorphae (pigeons, sandgrouse, mesites) Otidimorphae (bustards, turacos, cuckoos) Elementaves Gruae Opisthocomiformes (hoatzin) Gruimorphae Gruiformes (cranes, rails) Charadriiformes (shorebirds) (Cursorimorphae) Strisores (hummingbirds, swifts, nightbirds) Phaethoquornithes Eurypygimorphae (sunbittern, kagu, tropicbirds) Aequornithes (core waterbirds) Telluraves (core landbirds)

Kuhl et al. (2020)

Neoaves Mirandornithes (flamingoes, grebes) "Basal Landbirds" Gruiformes (cranes, rails) Charadriiformes (shorebirds) Caprimulgiformes/Strisores (hummingbirds, swifts, nightbirds) Opisthocomiformes (hoatzin) Otidimorphae (bustards, turacos; without cuckoos) Columbimorphae (pigeons, mesites, sandgrouse; plus cuckoos) "Aquatic and Semiaquatic Birds" Aequornithes (core waterbirds) Eurypgimorphae (sunbittern, kagu, tropicbirds) (Ardeae) Telluraves "Higher Landbird Clade" (=Afroaves) Australaves

I think it too early to add anything to the articles, but I thought it would be of interest. —  Jts1882 | talk  15:08, 13 August 2020 (UTC)

I'm impressed by the colouring (I didn't realise it was possible) Kuhl et al claim that their phylogeny of passerines is similar to that obtained by Oliveros et al in 2019 - but I haven't checked how similar. It will be interesting to see how well Kuhl et al. is received by other ornithologists. - Aa77zz (talk) 16:07, 13 August 2020 (UTC)

I don't think their conclusion that they have solved the higher order arrangement of major bird clades will get wide acceptance. It will be taken as more evidence that the topology obtained is method dependent.

On the other hand, I think they've underplayed the result for the passerine tree. The match with the Oliveros et al (2019) tree is remarkable. While Oliveros et al cover more families, Kuhl et al (2020) cover some additional families. Together they go a long way towards solving the passerine family tree. All the major clades match very well and within them there is good agreement on family relationships.

• Tyranni. The family topologies are in complete accordance for the families studis [11 families in Kuhl et al (2020), 24 families in Oliveros et al (2019)]
• Basal Passeri (i.e. not Corvida or Passerida). Again in complete accordance for families studied [9, 11]
• Corvida [24, 30]. There is complete agreement in the basal taxa [3,4] and Malaconotoidea [6*,8], while only disagreement on the positions of Psophodidae within Orioloidea [6,8] and Dicruridae in Corvoidea [9,10].
• Passerida. Agreement on topology of basal families studies [5,8*] and the three major clades: OHC9/Sylviida, OHC10A/Muscicapida and OHC10B/Passerida
  • OHC9/Sylviida [28,26*]. Supports breakup of Paroidea and the large Sylvioidea, and recognition of three superfamilies (Locustelloidea [5,4* (total 6*)], Aegithaloidea [6,6*], Sylvoidea [8*,6]). There is almost complete agreement on the topology of the studies families apart from the position of Pnoepygidae and Cisticolidae, which are both in Locustelloidea rather than outside the superfamilies [9,11]. Fig S6 also shows the babblers in agreement with a recent study by Cai et al (2019) and the new families recently recognised by the IOC.
  • OHC10A/Muscicapida [15,20]. Differ on the position of Regulidae relative to the three superfamilies. The topologies in Certhioidea [=Sittoidea] are in agreement for the families studied [5,6], while only the position of Cinclidae differs in Muscicapoidea [6,7], but the topologies in Bombycilloidea differ, presumably due to different family sampling [3,6].
  • OHC10B/Passerida [22*,30*]. There is complete agreement on the topology for the families studied.

I've wondered what to do with the Oliveros et al (2019) study as it was quite different from earlier studies. Now, with confirmation in this new study, I think it can be used to add phylogenies to articles on the silvioids and muscicapoids that are in need some updating. —  Jts1882 | talk  10:31, 15 August 2020 (UTC)

Passerines

Example of selectively transclude superfamily

Sylvioidea Pycnonotidae (bulbuls) Paradoxornithidae (parrotbills, fulvettas) Sylviidae (typical warblers, sylviid babblers) Zosteropidae (white-eyes) Timaliidae (babblers, tit-babblers, scimitar bablers) Leiothrichidae (laughingthrushes) Pellorneidae (fulvettas, ground babblers)

Above is a draft version of an interactive cladogram of the Oliveros tree. It's also possible to use parts selectively (see right). —  Jts1882 | talk  16:00, 15 August 2020 (UTC)

—  Jts1882 | talk  16:00, 15 August 2020 (UTC)

References

Looking for category suggestion

What could be a category for people who worked on the periphery of ornithology, as field assistants, native informants etc.? For use at Jali Makawa, Ian Saem Majnep, Ali Wallace, ... Shyamal (talk) 03:57, 21 August 2020 (UTC)

this article

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mountain_kingfisher — Preceding unsigned comment added by Clone commando sev (talk • contribs) 23:39, 26 August 2020 (UTC)

List of birds of North America

I've merged all the individual family pages into the main article for the List of birds of North America. The family pages look like they haven't been updated in a while, so I also did that for the main article, so new family pages have been added, as well as any genus/species changes. I'd like to propose all the family lists be deleted. They have not been updated anticipating this change.....Pvmoutside (talk) 8:24, 5 September 2020

SUPPORT With the advent of the up-to-date one-page full list, the individual family pages are superfluous in addition to being out of date. Craigthebirder (talk) 22:45, 5 September 2020 (UTC)

Gambel's Quail page -- relationship with humans section

The Gambel's Quail page has a section titled "Relationship with Humans" which I thought was somewhat odd and unnecessary, and I went ahead and deleted it. The creator of the section has reverted it. I'd love some expert bird and Wikipedia folks to take a look and weigh in. Should it stay? Should it go? Should it be changed? Thanks! --Chrisspurgeon (talk) 20:59, 23 September 2020 (UTC)

Such sections are common in animal articles, but they are usually more about culture and captivity. This one seems a bit odd in some of the wording and subject, but the presence of such a section isn't unusual in itself. FunkMonk (talk) 21:12, 23 September 2020 (UTC)

Not very encyclopedic in style and it's essentially unsourced. Ref #6 mere says "Quail also must fear humans, since these birds are a favorite target of many hunters". That hardly justifies the section. Most wild animals avoid humans. Ref #7 gives the two definitions but gives no indication that there is a link, while Ref #8 is about friendly birds and doesn't mention quails. The section could be justified if it dealt with hunting, but not in the current form. —  Jts1882 | talk  08:09, 24 September 2020 (UTC)

That's what I thought too. (And also, why did the author put this with Gambel's Quail, as opposed to any of the dozens of other quail species?) I deleted it a few weeks ago, but the author reverted it with an accompanying snippy comment. I wanted to just get a sanity check here. Thanks! Chrisspurgeon (talk) 20:09, 25 September 2020 (UTC)

Parrot and advanced flight tricks

I'll ask this here too.

Is it possible to teach the goffin how to loop and barrel roll in flight, as well as fly upside down or backwards? Have been looking for info on the internet but can't find anything useful. She can already fly skilfully with speed and chase crow and small seagulls for fun. 146.200.128.134 (talk) 04:34, 17 September 2020 (UTC)

Goffin's are very agile in the air. However, I doubt if one could fly backwards.

If your parrot is flying out of doors, then I hope it's not chased by a hawk flying skilfully with speed.

When I take her out I supervise her. She's on a parrot harness with a long leash most of the time. If a hawk is nearby it would have to deal with me too. 146.200.128.134 (talk) 06:44, 30 September 2020 (UTC)

I was surprised to see a Goffin doing a vertical take off. From standing on the ground, the Goffin flu upwards and continued flying upwards for about four feet before it gained horizontal speed. 2A00:23C4:210A:BF01:306E:49C1:76EB:241C (talk) 07:11, 3 October 2020 (UTC)

Category:Loriculus is considered for merging

🦜 You are invited to join the discussion at Wikipedia:Categories for discussion/Log/2020 October 4 § Category:Loriculus. —⁠andrybak (talk) 10:16, 4 October 2020 (UTC)

new skeletal elements of early Eocene of Europe , stem group of parrots found

The new Vastanavis skeletal elements and bones that were found in westtern India resemble the skeletal elements of the late Eocene QuercySittidae. (Rana RS, 2013). It is essential to understand the natural history of the newly discovered fossils, because it can provide us with valuable information about the evolutionary process of different parrot species not only of the western India region, but to the avian species that are morphologically related. The study of the newly found specimens of the early Eocene bird Vastanavis further described a “morphologically distinctive distal humerus of a small bird resembling the stem group nyctibiid Paraprefica,”(G.Mayr, 2013) which was discovered in the Vastan Lignite Mine during a recent excavation. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Malnat2 (talk • contribs) 22:50, 16 October 2020 (UTC)

Feral chickens and flight

See the most recent edit on feral chicken. It removed the claim that they fly into trees to roost. But they do roost in trees, and can fly well enough to get up there? 146.200.128.134 (talk) 12:13, 19 October 2020 (UTC)

Taxobox source

Is there a page explaining the source of category names placed into taxoboxes? Example: Family taxon found in taxobox of Zonotrichia is Passerellidae. Where is the word ‘Passerellidae’ picked from? Wikidata item of Zonotrichia says parent taxon is Emberizidae, so Wikidata is obviously not the source. --Roarjo (talk) 07:00, 24 October 2020 (UTC)

The favoured source for taxoboxes is the IOC (see Family index and Passerellidae). This should be written up in the project pages somewhere. While Wikipedia articles should discuss alternative, for taxoboxes we have to make a choice and try and be consistent. In recent years a lot of new families have been carved out of the traditional Emberizidae. The split between American sparrows and Old World buntings was relatively recent but I think it is accepted by all the major checklists. I've added the reference to the article and taxonomy template. —  Jts1882 | talk  08:49, 24 October 2020 (UTC)

Thanks, also for updating wikidata:Q914721. But where are the taxonomy data items stored, from where the template system is grabbing the parent categories in the moment Wikipedia pages are displayed and template system is processing? Wikipedia:Automated_taxobox_system/technical#Algorithm tells “the database”. Is this "database" a table in a page maintained within English Wikipedia, or is there a real-time lookup into worldbirdnames.org? --Roarjo (talk) 10:13, 24 October 2020 (UTC)

The structure for the automated taxoboxes is in a collection of templates of form {{Taxonomy/TAXON_NAME}}, in this case {{Taxonomy/Zonotrichia}}. Each template includes basic information about the taxon including the taxon rank and parent. The taxonomy in the taxobox is formed by following the hierarchy (from the parents) in the templates. You can see this by clicking the red pencil to the right of the Scientific Classification header in the taxobox. This shows the hierarchy and has links to the templates to facilitate editing. The system takes a bit of learning but is quite simple once you grasp the basics and people are always willing to help on the taxobox or project talk pages. —  Jts1882 | talk  12:23, 24 October 2020 (UTC)

Note that the taxonomy templates have a parameter for a reference. This should be filled in, but often isn't (very few bird taxonomy templates currently have a reference). If a reference is given, it should show that the taxon is accepted, and confirm the parent taxon and rank shown in the taxonomy template. Some other language Wikipedias (e.g. Catalan) use Wikidata to generate the taxonomic hierarchy in a taxobox; there are so unavoidable bugs with this approach, but it may be a worthwhile trade-off for a Wikipedia language edition with a very small editor base that is unable to keep up with taxonomic updates. Plantdrew (talk) 17:05, 24 October 2020 (UTC)

Moving American sparrow to New World sparrow

Please could someone with the necessary privileges move American sparrow to New World sparrow. I attempted to do this myself and received the message: "The page could not be moved: a page of that name already exists, or the name you have chosen is not valid."

The page "New World sparrow" is currently a redirect.

"New World sparrows" appears to be the usual name for the family Passerellidae. I've added a note on the talk page listing the reliable sources that I've checked see here.

Many thanks

-Aa77zz (talk) 11:00, 24 October 2020 (UTC)

I've requested the page move at Wikipedia:Requested_moves/Technical_requests#Uncontroversial_technical_requests.—  Jts1882 | talk  12:14, 24 October 2020 (UTC)

Many thanks for that. The page has now been moved - Aa77zz (talk) 17:45, 24 October 2020 (UTC)

Psittacula split into six genera?

I just noticed this 2019 study[24] that proposes splitting Psittacula into six genera, since various genetic studies have found it to be paraphyletic. Some subspecies are also split into species. This would have pretty big ramifications here, but I guess we shouldn't act on this (other than just mentioning it in articles), until other authorities apply it. Do we know if any plan to do so? FunkMonk (talk) 03:44, 2 November 2020 (UTC)

The IOC have this note: Psittacula may be paraphyletic relative to Tanygnathus and Psittinus. See Braun et al. (2016) for a phylogeny of Psittacula and allies. Braun et al. (2019) is the full paper follow-up for Braun et al. (2016) so I'd expect the IOC to make the change, although there is currently no mention in the diary and updates. As you say, we should probably wait until they do. BOW/Cornell also still have them in the one geneus. —  Jts1882 | talk  09:49, 2 November 2020 (UTC)

Ouch, so Braun named one of the new genera after his wife, not exactly after himself, but close enough... Anyway, yeah, I guess we can start preparing mentally for the splits then... FunkMonk (talk) 10:04, 2 November 2020 (UTC)

The IOC often does not implement the exact changes proposed in an article. Bird taxonomy is still changing significantly - in version 10.2 the generic boundaries of the tanagers (Thraupidae) were revised. This involved resurrecting 11 genera, creating 6 new genera and the loss of 7. - Aa77zz (talk) 10:17, 2 November 2020 (UTC)

Oh wonderful. The Alexandrine parrot isn't in Alexandrinus. That's gonna cause confusion. 146.200.128.134 (talk) 19:29, 2 November 2020 (UTC)

Split discussion

Some in this group might wish to comment on this split proposal. MeegsC (talk) 13:31, 3 November 2020 (UTC)

Green-headed hillstar plagiarism(?)

There have been edits recently to the Green-headed hillstar stub and while it is now a much more informative article, there is a significant level of 'no in-text attribution' plagiarism ('Inserting a text—copied word-for-word, or closely paraphrased with very few changes from a copyrighted source—then citing the source in an inline citation after the passage that was copied, without naming the source in the text'). I have tried to get in contact with the editor, but their User Page is a red link? I had been working on this article myself in my Sandbox for the past 2 months and am able to recognise there is a lot of text that has been copy-pasted. Grammarly plagiarism checker confirms this, Copyvio not so much, but I believe this is because most of the sources are printed text available through access-only databases or require a monetary subscription for access. I am not sure myself how to go about rectifying this, as I am new to Wikipedia and my work on the 'Green-headed hillstar' stub is for an educational assignment. None of my work has been added to the stub thus far. Any help here would be appreciated or if an admin could check the stub. Thankyou! Gabygsp (talk) 01:54, 3 November 2020 (UTC)

Hi Gabygsp: You can leave a message for the other editor by clicking on the user's TALK tab (even if it's red) and then typing your message. Let me know if this isn't clear! MeegsC (talk) 13:36, 3 November 2020 (UTC)

Page move suggestion

Hi All: I'd like to propose that we move Birds of Torres Strait Islands to List of birds of Torres Strait Islands to bring its name in line with all of our other country/geographical area lists. Any comments? If so, please do so here. Thanks! MeegsC (talk) 16:28, 10 November 2020 (UTC)

Update to peer review page

Hi all, I've boldly updated your project's peer review page (Wikipedia:WikiProject Birds/Peer review) by updating the instructions and archiving old reviews.

The new instructions use Wikipedia's general peer review process (WP:PR) to list peer reviews. Your project's reviews are still able to be listed on your local page too.

The benefits of this change is that review requests will get seen by a wider audience and are likely to be attended to in a more timely way (many WikiProject peer reviews remain unanswered after years). The Wikipedia peer review process is also more maintained than most WikiProjects, and this may help save time for your active members.

I've done this boldly as it seems your peer review page is pretty inactive and I am working through around 90 such similar peer review pages. Please feel free to discuss below - please ping me ({{u|Tom (LT)}}) in your response.

Cheers and hope you are well, Tom (LT) (talk) 23:51, 12 November 2020 (UTC)

I've submitted black-cowled oriole there, if anybody wants to have a look at the new process. MeegsC (talk) 14:45, 16 November 2020 (UTC)

I only see it at the general peer review, not the bird-specific one? FunkMonk (talk) 14:47, 16 November 2020 (UTC)

Yeah, I can't figure out how to add it to the WP:BIRDS review page. I just get a red link when I try. MeegsC (talk) 14:48, 16 November 2020 (UTC)

Got it sorted now. I don't like how it lists articles for review though; I've already given Tom my two pence. MeegsC (talk) 15:10, 16 November 2020 (UTC)

Tom (LT) has taken suggestions on board, and the review list looks a lot better now. Let him know what you think. MeegsC (talk) 19:23, 17 November 2020 (UTC)

Move discussion at Brant (goose)

Please see here: Talk:Brant_(goose)#Requested_move_18_November_2020 and comment if interested. Somatochlora (talk) 14:25, 23 November 2020 (UTC)

Elfin woods warbler

Hi gang: I've been asked to review elfin woods warbler (currently one of our FA articles), which was elevated to that status back in 2006. I've found a few issues, which I've listed here. If anybody feels like helping out, we might keep this one from falling into the FA review process if we can get it sorted quickly enough. MeegsC (talk) 14:59, 24 November 2020 (UTC)

Mini-macaw/maracanã

Just a quick question. In Brazil, does maracanã refer specifically to the red-shouldered macaw, or is it all mini-macaws? Just found a small contradiction in the two pages that bugged me. They all have "maracanã" in their Portuguese names. 146.200.127.140 (talk) 01:37, 29 November 2020 (UTC)

I can't answer your question, but where are the contradictions?

The Mini-macaw article mentions that small macaws are "maracanã" in Portuguese (unsourced). The red-shouldered macaw article doesn't mention the term. The Blue-winged Macaw is Primolius maracana but I see no mention of maracana in the English names of any macaws on the IOC and BOW websites. —  Jts1882 | talk  08:48, 29 November 2020 (UTC)

The maracanã page. I added a link to mini-macaw article there the other day, but the defintion of red-shouldered macaw was already there. 146.200.127.140 (talk) 13:03, 29 November 2020 (UTC)

I've asked a Brazilian bird guide for comment, and will let you know what he says. MeegsC (talk) 13:19, 29 November 2020 (UTC)

The Portuguese article for maracanã lists all the same mini-macaws with this in their common name, FWIW. The large macaws are "arara"? 146.200.127.140 (talk) 21:35, 29 November 2020 (UTC)

For what its worth, my Brazilian friend says all mini-macaws are maracanãs. However, I have no source (other than my reliable friend) to point you to. MeegsC (talk) 21:45, 29 November 2020 (UTC)

Thank you. While I'm here, can I point out that the hybrid macaw article needs work? Doesn't mention anything about the downsides or the controversies of breeding hybrids. Interested in this because an internet friend had pair of blue and golds that laid an egg. He also had a pet scarlet. He was very surprised to see that the baby macaw was orange when she started feathering up. 146.200.127.140 (talk) 22:02, 30 November 2020 (UTC)

Thanks. Most of us in this project are interested in wild birds (rather than pets/caged birds), so I doubt anybody will get to that one soon. But give it a tag – that might encourage someone to make the improvements. MeegsC (talk) 12:58, 2 December 2020 (UTC)

A potential merge

There's been a suggestion to merge Stewart shag with Otago shag. Comments can be made here. It's a bit convoluted, but it looks like the original article is the Otago shag one; it's been in existence since 2005, and has gone through a number of name changes. The Stewart shag article was created with the same scientific name in 2016. The editor who created it is now calling for the two articles to be merged. Please weigh in! MeegsC (talk) 11:05, 25 November 2020 (UTC)

This has now been sorted. There's a "disambiguation" article at Stewart Island shag which points readers to the two species that resulted from the split. Thanks to all who commented. MeegsC (talk) 13:21, 29 November 2020 (UTC)

What happened to the discussion? It seems to have got lost in the moves. —  Jts1882 | talk  13:25, 30 November 2020 (UTC)

Yeah, I'm not sure what to do about that. I could leave it at the redirect, rather than pointing that talk page to the new target. But I can't just cut and paste it onto the target talk page without losing the attributions (a no-no in Wikipedia), and (per Jimfbleak), admins are discouraged now from merging article histories. So it's disappeared. Any suggestions? MeegsC (talk) 22:55, 2 December 2020 (UTC)

I didn't know about the new directive on merging histories.

It seems to me that in hindsight the Talk:Stewart shag page should have been moved to the disambiguation page Talk:Stewart Island shag, but that was added after the merge. I'm not sure if this can be done now. —  Jts1882 | talk  09:27, 3 December 2020 (UTC)

Jimfbleak, can we remove the current Talk:Stewart Island shag page (which only has two wikiproject banners, which I added the other day) and instead MOVE the former Talk:Stewart shag page (i.e. the iteration before I made it a redirect) there instead? Or is it too late to do that? MeegsC (talk) 11:06, 3 December 2020 (UTC)

MeegsC, I've deleted the banner page, moved the Stewart shag page there, and reverted to the discussion, please check Jimfbleak - talk to me? 11:18, 3 December 2020 (UTC)

Thanks Jimfbleak. That's just what I was hoping for. Does it look okay to you Jts1882? MeegsC (talk) 13:32, 3 December 2020 (UTC)

Yes, that's what I was thinking of. —  Jts1882 | talk  16:06, 3 December 2020 (UTC)

Another potential merge

Okay — now that we've got the cormorant move sorted, there's been another potential merge languishing out there for months. Klbrain suggested that the Norfolk and Lord Howe starling articles be merged into the Tasman starling article. The first two articles are about the two subspecies of the latter. The proposer's comment is that "the two (extinct) subspecies share much in common, and hence are best discussed in one place where their similarities and differences can be discussed. There is enough content for one reasonable article, but not three." Anybody wishing to comment can do so here. MeegsC (talk) 18:24, 3 December 2020 (UTC)

Higher-order relationships

I've found the classification of passerine birds above the family level to be confusing. The IOC list is no help. I wanted to know which families were in the superfamily Passeroidea - but this superfamily isn't included in the H&M4 classification (Dickinson, E.C.; Christidis, L., eds. (2014). The Howard & Moore Complete Checklist of the Birds of the World. Vol. Volume 2: Passerines (4th ed.). Eastbourne, UK: Aves Press. ISBN 978-0-9568611-2-2. {{cite book}}: |volume= has extra text (help)) nor in my "go to" article on passeriform relationships: Oliveros, C.H.; et al. (2019). "Earth history and the passerine superradiation". Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States. 116 (16): 7916–7925. doi:10.1073/pnas.1813206116..

I've now discovered what happened to Passeroidea. Joel Cracraft has a chapter "Avian higher-level relationships and classification: passeriformes" in H&M4 vol 2 and on p. xxiv:

Yet, classification above family level has not kept pace. As a consequence, widely used group names like "Corvida" and "Passerida" and within the latter, the use of three broad family superfamilies (Sylvioidea, Muscicapoidea and Passeroidea), are no longer capable of easily accommodating the increasing phylogenetic complexity. Therefore, the following classification departs from the conventional approaches. The changes are relatively minor in that they elevate these familiar superfamilies (with the suffix -ida) and at the same time increase the number of superfamilies within them, thereby capturing more phylogenetic structure on the passeriform Tree of Life.

Thus in H&M4 and in Oliveros et al 2019

• superfamily Passeroidea becomes parvorder Passerida
• parvorder Passerida becomes infraorder Passerides

So Passerida previously contained 87 families and now contains just 31 families.

I don't know whether the change in definition has been generally adopted by ornithologists. A search using Google scholar for "Passeroidea" since 2019 gets more hits than "Passerides". -Aa77zz (talk) 20:10, 2 December 2020 (UTC)

It's a shame none of the main checklists bother with maintaining a higher level taxonomy and that the Cracraft taxonomy is only available to those with the book (is the listing available online anywhere?). One is left with trying to get current usage from research papers that are not consistent (e.g. Oliveros et al, 2020). Passeroidea continues to be used, even by Cracraft (e.g. in Claramunt & Cracraft, 2015). It seems that Emberizoidea (which incidentally is not equivalent to nine-primaried oscines) is consistently used by people specializing on those birds, while others continue to use the older term. I suppose it is helpful that Passeroidea hasn't been redefined and that we know it refers to the older traditional grouping, unlike Sylvioidea which is used much more variably.

I think from our perspective the articles should reflect this and cover new and old circumscriptions. Perhaps the best way is to describe the newer more restricted circumscriptions and briefly discuss the history of the term with the broader circumscriptions. I know some people object to articles on disused taxa but Passeroidea is so traditional I think it should have a page. It could describe its origin, the Sibley definition with 6 families, the expansion to 30 plus families, and then the reranking proposed by Cracraft. —  Jts1882 | talk  09:17, 3 December 2020 (UTC)

Those familiar with the phylogeny posters following the Angiosperm Phylogeny Group classification, along with similar ones for brophytes and tracheophytes, may be interested in a new Bird Phylogeny Poster from the same main author.

WINK M, COLE TCH, FERNANDES AM (2020) TREE OF BIRDS – AVIAN PHYLOGENY POSTER (Neornithes, Aves), Systematics, Classification, Features

There's nothing new in the phylogeny (it follows Prum et al, 2015) but it does associate morphological features to the main branches, which might be useful. —  Jts1882 | talk  08:48, 15 December 2020 (UTC)

Questions about "list of birds" articles

@SchreiberBike:@MeegsC:@Sabine's Sunbird:@Pvmoutside: I have pinged you several Wikipedians who know birds and/or Wikipedia policies in an attempt to reach a concensus on including (or not) material in lists of birds.

@Ddum5347: has repeatedly deleted or changed entries that I believe contain true and useful information. He has a pattern of replacing information taken from the principal source with information from IUCN's pages. I have several times asked him without success to not delete documented items when he has found something which contradicts them but to add the differing information with its citation. Some recent specific examples follow.

In List of birds of the United States (The Ex tag means extirpated.):

• For greater prairie-chicken, I want to include this because the species is tagged as endemic to the lower 48: "(Ex from its former Canadian range)". Ddum5347 says the statement only belongs in List of birds of Canada. Ironically, he today deleted (Ex) from the species' entry on that page.

• For California condor, I want to include this: "(Ex, reintroduction in progress but not yet established per the California Bird Records Committee; "not self-sustaining" per Cornell Lab of Ornithology)". Ddum5347 wants only "(reintroduced)".

In List of birds of Haiti:

• I want to include this species, which is on the page's cited source list, and its extirpation is stated in BoW. Most bird lists include extirpated species if documented. (The E-Hisp tag means endemic to Hispaniola.) Ddum5347 has deleted it twice.

• • Ridgway's hawk, Buteo ridgwayi (E-Hisp) (extirpated from Haiti)

In List of birds of Canada:

• In the introduction, he has deleted the clause "the extinct Labrador duck was also a breeding endemic" and its citation with the edit summary "It also bred in the U.S.".

• For greater prairie-chicken, I want to include the (Ex) tag with the BoW citation. Ddum5347 has deleted it twice despite have said (when editing the US list) that it belongs here.

• For mountain quail and California quail, he has deleted the (Ex) and (I) (=introduced) tags respectively which come from the cited source, and added citations to the species's IUCN articles which say differently, without saying why they differ.

In List of birds of Texas:

• For green parakeet, he has replaced the (u) (=uncertain origin) that the principal source uses with the species' IUCN citation.

In List of birds of New York (state):

• For Carolina parakeet, he has replaced the (H) (=hypothetical) tag used by the principal source with (B) (=bred) and an IUCN citation while leaving the citation for the (H) tag.

References

If you examine the history of Ddum5347's talk page you will see that I am not the only editor who has been troubled by his actions. You have to read the history because he frequently blanks the talk page.

I am asking your opinions on (first) whether the specific items I want to include should be included, with Ddum5347's added as counterpoints, and (second) more generally, under what circumstances it is proper or not to remove documented material. Naturally, the documentation must be from reliable sources, which I believe that those I have used here are.

All information that I have changed on these articles is because it is contradictory to what other sources (mainly the IUCN) state. The primary source used for these lists should not be the only ones used. Thank you. Ddum5347 (talk) 21:31, 27 December 2020 (UTC)

You are contradicting yourself, here[25][26] you removed various extinction categories based on your own personal preferences, whereas the IUCN clearly[27][28] states these birds are extinct (doesn't matter whether they are confirmed to have existed or not, that's irrelevant to what the IUCN says). Please self-revert. FunkMonk (talk) 21:59, 27 December 2020 (UTC)

That has nothing to do with this issue. If you want to discuss this further, take it to the articles' talk pages. Ddum5347 (talk) 22:07, 27 December 2020 (UTC)

It has everything to do with this issue, if you say we should follow the IUCN, your category removal spree is contradictory to that. FunkMonk (talk) 22:15, 27 December 2020 (UTC)

There is much false or misleading info on IUCN, and in most if not all of these cases the original source was correct, which is quite apparent on a cursory Google Search. @Ddum5347 I would suggest caution when using this source if it conflicts with others. Somatochlora (talk) 22:02, 27 December 2020 (UTC)

I understand your concern, but the IUCN pages in the instances above only contradicted the Avibase lists, and not other sources. Ddum5347 (talk) 22:07, 27 December 2020 (UTC)

Ddum5347 We don't remove referenced information because it is "contradictory to what other sources" say. We indicate that there is a lack of consensus and present both points of view, with sources. You are not the arbitrator of which is correct — particularly in this case, where various experts disagree on wording. These aren't fringe theories we're talking about here. MeegsC (talk) 22:40, 27 December 2020 (UTC)

I will point out that Avibase is the principal source for only the Haiti and Canada lists, not the other three. And contradiction is not a basis for removing a properly documented entry. Craigthebirder (talk) 22:33, 27 December 2020 (UTC)

I mis-spoke. For the US list, the American Ornithological Society is the principal source for the 50 states, DC, Puerto Rico, and the US Virgin Islands. Avibase is the principal source for the Pacific Ocean territories. Craigthebirder (talk) 23:02, 27 December 2020 (UTC)

I will concur with the OP that we are to "not delete documented items [in favor of] something which contradicts them but to add the differing information with its citation". Agreed with comments above that we should give WP:DUE weight, e.g. list first the more authoritative and recent sources for particular areas. It is not WP's job to try to determine WP:TRUTH; if reliable source conflict, we report the specifics of the conflict. If doing so would produce details a bit long for a list entry, use a footnote; the most expedient and code-clean method is to use {{efn}} and {{notelist}}. PS: I also agree with "There is much false or misleading info on IUCN['s site and lists]"; WP in many places has given far too much (WP:UNDUE) weight to material from a single advocacy organization.  — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼  16:22, 28 December 2020 (UTC)

I just signed up for an account and made my first edit - is this okay?

Was editing as IP before (I'm the person who asked about mini-macaws further up). I added info to Snowball (cockatoo).

https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Snowball_(cockatoo)&diff=994626089&oldid=930144303

Is my edit okay? Thanks. --Iloveparrots (talk) 18:20, 16 December 2020 (UTC)

I've done some more stuff, like these edits to the page about Eclecti.

https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Eclectus_parrot&type=revision&diff=994791680&oldid=983618868

Am I on the right track? I don't wanna break anything. --Iloveparrots (talk) 20:08, 17 December 2020 (UTC)

@Iloveparrots: It's the right approach in its basics. However, in the first one, "It is believed" is MOS:WEASELWORDING; given that specific context, it should read "Patel believes", "The paper concludes that", or something else more specific. Also, it is not desirable to just paste in URLs as citations. While this is better than nothing, it is lazy and just creates busywork for other editors to do. You can fill in the key components of {{cite web}} manually (copy-paste stuff from the site open in your other browser tab), or see the "Preferences" menu up top for some citation assistance tools you can install (in the Gadgets and Beta Features sections). I think WP:CITE lists some additional tools. There are lots of third-party scripts and stuff, too. What people prefer to use depends on what they get most familiar with. In the second one, you've cited globally-threatened-bird-forums.birdlife.org which is a web forum, and is thus not generally a reliable source (WP:UGC). One might have argued that the forum post in question is an "official" one by a member of BI, which also runs that forum, and thus might qualify as a usable primary source. But it would be better to find a version of this that isn't forum material. It's from 2019, so it seems recent enough to care about (if it were from 2014 or so, I would say it is material that is too old to rely on, especially in forum form, for a proposed split; whether the split had been accepted by now would be determinable from other, better sources).  — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼  16:45, 28 December 2020 (UTC)

Thanks for the reply. I've made the changes you suggested. I know how to use the cite templates now (I think).

As for the Eclectus stuff, there was a thread here about it a while back (that was me started it, editing as IP) - Wikipedia_talk:WikiProject_Birds/Archive_72#Eclectus_species_split?. Seems that the four split species have now been added to the IUCN red list. --Iloveparrots (talk) 17:25, 28 December 2020 (UTC)

Preening

I've been working for several months on buffing up the preening (bird) article that we started as a project collaboration a number of years ago. Any comments/suggestions/improvements would be appreciated before I put it up for GA consideration. The peer review page is here if you care to comment. MeegsC (talk) 17:13, 28 December 2020 (UTC)

Thinking about Preening_(bird)#Allopreening. What about adding something about humans preening the heads of pet parrots, cracking the keratin sheaths off the pinfeathers, etc.? Article specifically mentions "interspecific allopreening". Example of this sort of thing with an Alexandrine parrot here. --Iloveparrots (talk) 18:49, 28 December 2020 (UTC)

Do we really preen though? Or just scratch? We're not picking off tiny ectoparasites or rezipping feather barbs or spreading preen oil. No doubt our scritches feel great to the bird — I've had plenty of parrots incline their heads to my scratching fingers — but I'm not sure it really qualifies as preening. MeegsC (talk) 22:31, 28 December 2020 (UTC)

I'd say that something like this is 'preening' by pretty much any sensible definition you'd want to use. --Iloveparrots (talk) 23:51, 28 December 2020 (UTC)

Can you provide me a reference? It sounds like you might have lots of parrot books. Surely one of them must say something about it. YouTube won't work as a source, I'm afraid! MeegsC (talk) 11:14, 29 December 2020 (UTC)

Don't have any of my books handy at the moment, and I don't recall reading any that specifically discuss it in terms of allopreening - but would this, from Irene Pepperberg (one of the world's foremost parrot experts) be useful? — Preceding unsigned comment added by Iloveparrots (talk • contribs) 11:22, 29 December 2020 (UTC)

Yep, that could work! I'll put it in, and hopefully those reviewing the article will agree it's a reliable source. Thanks! MeegsC (talk) 11:53, 29 December 2020 (UTC)

Complete list of bird species articles in Wikipedia

Is there a way to generate a complete list of bird species articles in Wikipedia? I'm trying to turn List of birds by common name into something useful, but it's short by about 2,000 species. I don't know how to generate a full list to find out what's missing. Thank you. SchreiberBike | ⌨  20:20, 16 December 2020 (UTC)

The 204 families is also out of date (H&M 236, HBW 243 (possibly changed recently), Clements/BOW 249, IOC 252). I can't think of anything apart from categories. There is a slight possiblity that something can be got from the automated taxobox system. —  Jts1882 | talk  20:35, 16 December 2020 (UTC)

I can think of a few methods, each with it's own potential pitfalls.

1. Wikidata query. I'm not familiar with Wikidata queries, but this could work very well. Pitfall is that wikilinks might be on the wrong item (e.g., a synonym); there are people who update wikilinks on Wikidata to go with the latest IOC classification, but at any given time, Wikidata may not be up-to-date.
2. Petscan search for pages with {{WikiProject Birds}} (on talk page) and {{Speciesbox}}. Pitfall; will pick up some organisms that parasitize birds and fossil birds; may miss species with manual taxoboxes (there shouldn't be any IOC accepted species with manual taxoboxes, but I came across a few cases recently where somebody who didn't understand automatic taxoboxes had reverted to a manual taxobox). Search could probably be refined to exclude parasites and fossils. If the search produces more than 10,000 results, not all will be displayed. Also, Petscan has been down today.
3. Download a complete list of species (e.g. from IOC). Open in a spreadsheet (or word processor), remove higher taxa and subspecies. Do a search and replace to add wikilink markup to each common name and/or scientific name. Copy onto a Wikipedia sandbox page and look for red-links. Pitfalls; won't catch Wikipedia articles on species no longer recognized by IOC; a handful of Wikipedia articles don't use IOC names (mostly gray/grey spelling variants), but there should be at least a redirect from the IOC name (you probably should set your preferences to turn redirect links green). Plantdrew (talk) 23:03, 16 December 2020 (UTC)

Creating the list from the IOC spreadsheet is a good idea. if List of birds by common name follows the IOC it can be accurately sources and easily updated. It won't list all birds with an article on Wikipedia, but it will show discrepancies between the IOC list and Wikipedia. I've created a list at User:Jts1882/sandbox/IOC102. I didn't correct for capitalisation, where Wiki-style is different from the IOC style, but most have redirects. —  Jts1882 | talk  09:58, 17 December 2020 (UTC)

I'm working on it through method 3 using MS Excel. I think that will work, but I'm not there yet. Thanks for the advice. SchreiberBike | ⌨  01:19, 18 December 2020 (UTC)

Check it out (List of birds by common name), it's 10,968 species long and takes up 272 kb, but it's something meaningful.

I made more than a few judgment calls in combining what the IOC has with what we have in Wikipedia. If anyone disagrees with those, please feel free to make changes and I'll discuss if I feel strongly.

It's odd to me that we have some bird names which use the accent like Galápagos dove and others like Galapagos crake which don't, but I'm trying to become more comfortable with inconsistency.

Thanks again. SchreiberBike | ⌨  20:36, 21 December 2020 (UTC)

Well done! Now it is complete and meaningful, and is a list by common names instead of a list of them. Craigthebirder (talk) 22:18, 21 December 2020 (UTC)

Excellent job, especially dealing with all the accented characters. I ran a comparison with my IOC list and added one article (Myrtle warbler). The list reveals some inconsistencies (e.g. article titles using native accented letters and others not). It also shows where some splits haven't been handled consistently and where there are IOC recognised species without articles. I'll try and put together a summary in the next few days. —  Jts1882 | talk  20:31, 22 December 2020 (UTC)

Sketches from Sudan

Abel Chapman's Sudan sketchbooks

The sketches in this 1919 notebook, by Abel Chapman, may be of interest. Andy Mabbett (Pigsonthewing); Talk to Andy; Andy's edits 20:59, 16 December 2020 (UTC)

Caption for range map doesn't appear.

See my recent edit at Burrowing parrot. I added a range map with caption (following the instructions on the template page), but the caption doesn't appear. What did I do wrong? Any ideas? --Iloveparrots (talk) 18:41, 22 December 2020 (UTC)

Parameter names are case-sensitive. I have changed it to all lower case "range_map_caption". William Avery (talk) 19:18, 22 December 2020 (UTC)

Ah, thanks very much. Why is it capitalized in the documentation here then? - Template:Speciesbox#Template_Data? --Iloveparrots (talk) 19:46, 22 December 2020 (UTC)

The first column in that table should be a friendly name used by the Visual Editor, and the second column is the parameter name to be used in source code. There is a better example at Template:Infobox_cricketer#TemplateData See Wikipedia:TemplateData for further details. William Avery (talk) 21:26, 22 December 2020 (UTC)

This is the second time this has come up in the past two months (other time was on the talk page for Speciesbox). I've just learned that TemplateData shows the capitalized parameter when "label (en)" isn't filled in. I've added labels for Speciesbox and will do their other templates in the taxobox family shortly. The cricketer infobox has labels, which are capitalized; I'm not sure what the advantage of that is (I suppose it looks neater, but could cause editor confusion as happened here). Plantdrew (talk) 22:28, 22 December 2020 (UTC)

Cool. Thanks very much for fixing. I don't really understand all that stuff. --Iloveparrots (talk) 23:00, 22 December 2020 (UTC)

Thanks @Plantdrew: I'm afraid I 'turned off' once I found out this feature relates to Visual Editor. It's unfortunate the default behaviour produces documentation that has a tendency to confuse. William Avery (talk) 10:28, 24 December 2020 (UTC)

Is eBird a reliable source?

I've been questioned for using eBird data in List of birds of the Dominican Republic, with WP:RS (third-party source) cited as the reason. See the page history for details. I maintain that eBird is reliable, because though it could be considered self-published, entries are peer-reviewed and erroneous ones are not available for public view. eBird data are widely used by scientists, as noted in its Wikipedia article. I have used eBird data to supplement primary sources in more than 70 lists of birds of countries, US states, and US national parks, and this is the first time anyone has questioned its reliability. Disclosure: I am an eBird reviewer for the state of Ohio. Craigthebirder (talk) 22:06, 23 December 2020 (UTC)

I would argue that eBird data may be considerably less reliable for countries outside North America. Costa Rica, for example, has a single reviewer; there's no way he can vet every record given the vast number submitted. And given the number of old records that have been accepted by rarities records committees but aren't accepted by the single-person reviewer for some countries (i.e. where there is an on-the-ground records committee versus a Cornell U grad student who's the sole reviewer), there can be problems on that side too. Personally, I don't think we should be adding things to country/state lists on the basis of an eBird report. If it's presented to an appropriate review committee with appropriate documentation, it will get added to the country/state's official list at some point. MeegsC (talk) 23:04, 23 December 2020 (UTC)

I half-way agree, but see List of birds of Ohio and List of birds of Sweden for examples of how I've used eBird data. Appropriate or not? And is it opening another can of worms to ask if Xeno-canto should be treated the same way as eBird? It too is crowd-sourced. Craigthebirder (talk) 23:38, 23 December 2020 (UTC)

The website is too user-based for it to be a reliable source, in the same way Wikipedia articles cannot be used as citations for other articles. I agree with MeegsC. Ddum5347 (talk) 23:42, 23 December 2020 (UTC)

I concur. Sabine's Sunbird talk 02:13, 24 December 2020 (UTC)

What about a new (to the area) species whose eBird posts have undeniably correct photos taken since the date of a published state or national list which is several years old? Still not reliable? Craigthebirder (talk) 02:45, 24 December 2020 (UTC)

I don't think exceptions should be made, no matter how useful they might be in describing that species' range. I think you should stick to WP:RS and play it safe. Ddum5347 (talk) 08:04, 24 December 2020 (UTC)

Well WP:IAR would disagree, but even if you could successfully make an argument that the citation didn't violate the rules on reliability, it's also a primary source and those are discouraged too. Sabine's Sunbird talk 09:16, 24 December 2020 (UTC)

Given this weight of opinion, I will remove eBird entries. Be patient though; it'll take a while to do the 70+ pages. Craigthebirder (talk) 13:50, 24 December 2020 (UTC)

But I now repeat my earlier buried question: What about Xeno-canto? I see that it's used in this project's article in the example of how to include bird vocalizations, and in many species' articles. It's a crowd-sourced primary and I don't know what if any vetting its entries get. Craigthebirder (talk) 13:50, 24 December 2020 (UTC)

I've never cited Xeno-canto in an article but I have sometimes added a link in the External links section. I stopped doing this when I noticed that Xeno-canto is included in the "Taxon identifiers" block at the bottom of an article. Xeno-canto follows the IOC classification and they have good up-to-date range maps (I'm not suggesting we should cite them). - Aa77zz (talk) 14:06, 24 December 2020 (UTC)

Comment Ddum5347 (talk), please assume good faith and pay a little bit more respect to other editors. Please don't revert other people's good-faith contributions without giving a proper reason. Please don't ask for references for every sentence other people wrote. Sometimes, those additional information can be easily cross-referenced via the internal and external links. If you believe the original unsourced information is correct, please add some reliable sources yourself to improve the article instead of edit warring. I noticed that you have problem following the rules set by the Wikipedia community and has already been banned several times. Please refrain from making further disruptive edits to articles which you have limited knowledge. Thank you. 120.16.155.104 (talk) 07:25, 25 December 2020 (UTC)

Good faith edits do not belong on articles. All edits need sources, which you have not added as of yet. If you have a problem with my edits, bring it to my talk page. Ddum5347 (talk) 07:23, 26 December 2020 (UTC)

And absolutely nothing Ddum5347 has said here has any "bad-faith assumption" implications of any kind. Ddum5347 is accurately and calmly telling you how things are done here. And is correct about that, and has been quite polite.  — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼  16:48, 28 December 2020 (UTC)

Concur with Ddum5347, et al. This is WP:UGC material, not WP:RS.  — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼  16:48, 28 December 2020 (UTC)

• I have completed deleting eBird data from those "List of birds of XXX" pages that I had earlier added them to. Craigthebirder (talk) 18:25, 29 December 2020 (UTC)

Thanks, Craig. In answer to your earlier question, I see xeno-canto links as being different than eBird. For one thing, we're not using them as source material; we're simply linking to an external site. For another, multiple people can and do review and comment on xeno-canto recordings. Only a single reviewer ever does so with an eBird listing. MeegsC (talk) 22:35, 30 December 2020 (UTC)

WikiSpecies and WikiCommons project boxes

Over the last two weeks, WikiSpecies and WikiCommons project boxes have been added to several hundred bird articles. As links to these entries are already present on the left-hand column under the "In other projects" header and sometimes additionally in the taxonbar at the bottom of the page, I consider these project boxes to be redundant and an un-necessary cluttering of the page.

Has the addition of these project boxes to article space already been discussed on these pages? I have reverted one pair of edits on Rudd's lark to alert the editor, but would like to point to a wider consensus before engaging on a larger scale of reversions. Loopy30 (talk)

Addition of these boxes to bird articles is not a new phenomenon - but I completely agree that they are unnecessary and just add clutter. - Aa77zz (talk) 18:12, 26 December 2020 (UTC)

It's a Wikipedia-wide phenomenon, not restricted to bird articles. Whether its a good idea, I can't say. But it means the wider issue needs to be addressed somewhere, and we can't just remove it from bird articles alone without a general consensus on Wikipedia. FunkMonk (talk) 12:39, 27 December 2020 (UTC)

Transferred discussion to WP:TOL to invite a wider audience. Loopy30 (talk) 14:34, 28 December 2020 (UTC)

I'll repeat here what I posted there: I would argue that most readers, particularly casual ones, probably have no idea what the taxon bar is. And the links in the left hand column aren't particularly obvious either. A couple of little boxes down at the bottom of the reference section doesn't strike me as "clutter", personally. And I'll bet readers are far more likely to click on that than on the taxon bar. MeegsC (talk) 22:42, 30 December 2020 (UTC)

Should the species names of Amazon parrots be capitalized?

See Amazon parrot. According to the article here, they were named after The Amazon jungle.

So it should be like "yellow-headed Amazon", or whatever? Yes? No? --Iloveparrots (talk) 13:45, 27 December 2020 (UTC)

BOTW and others: Yellow-headed Amazon, Wikipedia: yellow-headed amazon --Melly42 (talk) 17:00, 27 December 2020 (UTC)

IDK if "yellow" should be capitalized by default, but "Amazon" is a place name, so it should be, I think? --Iloveparrots (talk) 18:30, 27 December 2020 (UTC)

It's a tricky one, but if "Amazon" is used as the head noun, e.g. in "yellow-headed amazon", I would say not, because it doesn't then mean the geographical feature. If it is used to qualify another noun, as in "blue Amazon parrot", I would say yes. However, I would always pose such questions to SMcCandlish. Stanton is the "style guru" for capitalization issues. Peter coxhead (talk) 18:37, 27 December 2020 (UTC)

I think last time this was brought up, the consensus was that the species common names come from the genus name Amazona, so it would be lower case. For example, the Puerto Rican amazon is named after the genus rather than the river. SchreiberBike | ⌨  20:31, 27 December 2020 (UTC)

Yeah, but the genus is named after the Amazon area though? --Iloveparrots (talk) 22:11, 27 December 2020 (UTC)

That's not a question.  — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼  16:17, 28 December 2020 (UTC)

Yeesh. Way too many Wikipedians' brains will melt if you try to get them, en masse, to understand linguistic distinctions like head noun versus noun repurposed as a modifier. And this isn't a distinction broadly recognized when it comes to English-language orthography ("I left half my groceries in the Ford" retains a capital F even though here it's a shorthand for "Ford [vehicle type/model goes here]"). And MOS:ARTCON would have us be consistent; it will be confusing to readers for us to use "yellow-headed Amazon parrot" in one sentence then down-case it to "yellow-headed amazon" in another. Given that English usually capitalizes "proper modifiers" – proper names turned into adjectives (Canada goose) or modified as adjectives (Italian cuisine), or even turned into fused prefixes in adjectives and adverbs (Mormonism, Trumpishly) – I think Amazon here would remain capitalized in all such usage.

I wouldn't argue for an exception unless the long-form name were not yellow-headed Amazon parrot, but literally and entirely yellow-headed Amazon, and even that would be iffy. But I can't think, anyway, of any animals right off-hand whose vernacular name is (or is clearly derived from) a proper name but which doesn't have some kind of "life-form-type identification" qualifier following it ("wren", "rose", "bear", etc.). There are a zillion cases that do have such a postfixed qualifier, and we retain the capitalization on the proper-name component of the vernacular name when that qualifier is contextually dropped. E.g., in writing "The Jefferson salamander reproduces sexually, but in cold conditions may undergo a form of natural cloning called gynogenesis: triploid Jeffersons, which are all female, can use males' spermatophores to stimulate egg development as if fertilized, without actually using any male genetic material", we wouldn't down-case that to "jeffersons" in the second half. That appears to be exactly the same linguistic/usage scenario as "yellow-headed Amazon parrot" → "yellow-headed Amazon". It's also the same in animal breeds: "27 Holstein cattle" → "27 Holsteins". And pretty much everything: "the Italian people" (as a general class) or "the 27 Italian individuals in the organization" (a much more specific class) → "the Italians".

I think what's happened here is that someone doing the de-capitalization that resulted from the WP:BIRDCON RfC took it too far and applied lower-case to a few proper names inside species' common names; "Amazon" might not be the only case to look for. Maybe see who made that change here, then look for similar changes at other articles in the same timeframe.

PS: Even if they had not been named after the forest, Amazon parrots would still have a proper name in their name, since the mythological Amazons are also a proper name. There is no common noun "amazon", and even if there were, it would not be the namesake of the parrots. We might have a complication arise with something that's both a word and a name, e.g. [G|g]r[a|e]y; we'd have to research whether it was named after someone or named after the typical coloration. PPS: There are cases where eponyms become lower-cased, but it's only (in regular writing) when the subject has lost all meaningful connection to the namesake, thus platonic relationship versus Platonic idealism. That doesn't appear to be the case here.
 — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼  16:17, 28 December 2020 (UTC)

But I can't think, anyway, of any animals right off-hand whose vernacular name is (or is clearly derived from) a proper name but which doesn't have some kind of "life-form-type identification" qualifier following it - how about robins or phoebes (sound and name). This old article I stumbled upon when looking at bird common names does lowercase "amazons".[29] From that: "The canary came from the Canary Islands. Bantam, with reference to a breed of small chicken, refers to a province in Java, while pheasant comes from the Greek name of a river. An amazon is a type of parrot, named after the large South American river." A few more modern sources lowercasing it after a quick search:[30][31][32][33][34] —Hyperik ⌜talk⌟ 01:21, 29 December 2020 (UTC)

"List of birds" articles redux

@Ddum5347: has again deleted documented text because he doesn't think it's relevant. See the histories of List of birds of Canada (California quail), List of birds of Texas (green parakeet), and List of birds of the United States (California condor). I'm again bringing the issue here rather than to multiple talk pages because of its broad scope. @SchreiberBike:@MeegsC:@Sabine's Sunbird:@Pvmoutside: Craigthebirder (talk) 20:08, 31 December 2020 (UTC)

Ddum5347, you need to stop the edit warring. This is getting pretty ridiculous now. If you have issues, discuss them on the article's talk page and indicate here that you have concerns. That allows multiple editors and readers to comment. Putting your gripes in the article history (which seems to be your MO) is not acceptable. Removing things that you feel are "unnecessary" without discussion is not acceptable. You need to start playing by Wikipedia rules, or you may find yourself blocked again! MeegsC (talk) 21:08, 31 December 2020 (UTC)

I am not edit warring. I have told Craigthebirder many times why his additions to the articles are not relevant to the article, and are not using the tags that are used by the article (accidental, extinct, introduced, extirpated, etc.) In this instance, I did not remove the valid sources he linked, nor did I completely remove his edits. I am simply adding links to the IUCN, which contradicts many things said on Avibase, the "only" source for all these "Lists of birds" pages (which I find to be very counter-intuitive, but that is best left for a different post). Ddum5347 (talk) 21:18, 31 December 2020 (UTC)

The Texas list's source is the state bird records committee. The source for the mainland part of the US list is AOS. The source for the Canada list is Avibase. (All are stated in the articles' text.) He has left sources, yes, but they are the sources of the material he deleted. Craigthebirder (talk) 22:25, 31 December 2020 (UTC)

Ddum5347, why is providing more detailed information "not relevant"? And you certainly have been removing things that you feel are "unnecessary". Examples include here, here, here and here. MeegsC (talk) 22:27, 31 December 2020 (UTC)

I'll second MeegsC's questions....Pvmoutside

I have restored some material to List of birds of the United States and List of birds of Canada with details of my reasons in their respective Talk pages. Craigthebirder (talk) 18:31, 1 January 2021 (UTC)

Looking for good picture of parrot sitting on eggs

Can't find anything useful on Commons with the search function. Maybe I suck at search. Was looking for something I could use to illustrate chronic egg laying. Anyone know of any good pics? --Iloveparrots (talk) 01:30, 1 January 2021 (UTC)

I didn't find anything either, after looking through all of the parrot pictures at Commons. I also took a look at Flickr without success. The best I could find were clutches of captive parrot eggs, clearly in a nest box. I'm assuming anybody with a parrot having chronic egg-laying issues wouldn't be providing a nest box!! Maybe one of our vet-birders or parrot owners can help. MeegsC (talk) 17:36, 1 January 2021 (UTC)

Yeah, I didn't want to put a generic 'eggs in nest' imagine on there, as that's not the subject of the article. I did find File:BudgieProlapse.png (warning, graphic), showing a budgie with a prolapsed cloaca(?) as a result of egg binding. Egg binding can be caused by chronic egg-laying. Not sure if I should be dropping an unexpected disturbing image into the article though. I know it's *allowed*, but should I choose to do that? --Iloveparrots (talk) 18:30, 1 January 2021 (UTC)

It's not a very good picture either — grainy and out of focus. I've added a "needs photo" category to the talk page. That will get the request in front of more eyes, as there are photo buffs that go through those requests regularly. MeegsC (talk) 18:48, 1 January 2021 (UTC)

When to remove a Stub indicator

Hi. I've just started making some edits of bird pages that are marked as stubs. Is there any guideline on how much information is required for a page to be "de-stubified" - i.e for the stub marker to be removed? As an example Rainbow-bearded Thornbill was a one-liner. I have added some information on Taxonomy, a description and some details on habitat. Is this enough to warrant removing the stub marker? Adaptivity77 (talk) 22:34, 1 January 2021 (UTC)

Nice start! However, as it only has 1112 characters of "readable prose", it probably still qualifies as a stub. The DYK minimum is 1500 characters; that's the cutoff for "stub" as far as that process is concerned, and it's probably a reasonable measure. You could probably expand it to 1500 just by making what you've written into complete sentences; good, readable prose is infinitely preferable to choppy sentence fragments. Here's a link to our project assessment page, in case that's of any assistance. MeegsC (talk) 23:42, 1 January 2021 (UTC)

Thanks! Adaptivity77 (talk) 00:31, 2 January 2021 (UTC)