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Template:Did you know nominations/Cumberland Island horse

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The following is an archived discussion of the DYK nomination of the article below. Please do not modify this page. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as this nomination's talk page, the article's talk page or Wikipedia talk:Did you know), unless there is consensus to re-open the discussion at this page. No further edits should be made to this page.

The result was: promoted by Yoninah (talk) 21:18, 5 June 2014 (UTC)

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Cumberland Island horse edit

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Cumberland Island horses on the beach

  • Comment: Any alternative hooks are welcome

Improved to Good Article status by Dana boomer (talk). Nominated by Matty.007 (talk) at 11:10, 10 May 2014 (UTC).

  • The following has been checked in this review by Maile
  • No QPQ necessary, not a self-nom
  • Article achieved GA status on May 10, 2014, and has 10495 characters (0 words) "readable prose size"
  • Every paragraph sourced, both online and offline
  • No bare URLs, and no external links used as inline sources
  • Hook is sourced
  • Image is used in the article is sourced on Commons
  • Duplication Detector check of online sourcing found no copyvio
  • Disambig links tool found no issues
  • External links tool found no issues
  • The article's very nice indeed, but the FN1 source puts the introduction of the horses as "mid-1700s", and its use of "mid" and "late" and "early" makes it clear that "mid" means the middle of the century, i.e., the years surrounding 1750, not 1700–09. So 1750 and 2014 are nowhere near 300 years apart, and the hook doesn't fit the facts from the article and sources. ALT hook is needed. BlueMoonset (talk) 23:39, 16 May 2014 (UTC)
  • Alt 1: ... that the Cumberland Island horses (pictured) have span approximately half that of domesticated horses? This is from the article, but I'm not sure if the word "forbearers" is referring to this or to previous generations of horse on the island. Thanks, Matty.007 07:39, 17 May 2014 (UTC)
  • Matty.007, I think "forebears" in the source does refer back to its "Descendants" second sentence. The problem is that it's talking about "late 19th- and 20th-century" beasts, and the article says the herd started from the mid-1700s. If you want one involving life span, how about this:
  • I like that one! Thanks, Matty.007 17:13, 17 May 2014 (UTC)
  • Review of ALT2 needed. Maile, might you be able to do the honors? Many thanks. BlueMoonset (talk) 21:45, 17 May 2014 (UTC)
BlueMoonset, here's what the source says: Because they are susceptible to parasites and subtropical diseases, their life span is about half that of their forebears. The large quantities of sand they ingest while grazing blocks their intestines, distending their bellies. Just reading the source, I don't see that the sand is necessarily the cause of their shortened lifespan, but some of the horses in the photos either have distended bellies or they're pregnant. And while the article says "domesticated horses", is that the same thing as "forebears"? — Maile (talk) 22:10, 17 May 2014 (UTC)
  • Maile, I think you're on to something here. I just followed the article's logic in connecting of the two, not truly thinking about whether the sand issue was a further health issue that affected longevity or something that affected the horse but not necessarily mortality. Under the circumstances, this looks like an issue that either needs another source to shore up sand as a contributor to shortened life span (if one even exists) or where we need another hook altogether, in which case this needs to go back to Matty.007 for a new hook altogether. Something could probably be done with a hook that's based off the source's claim that they eat a lot of sand, but that fact would need to be added to the article first (it just says they eat it, not that they eat "large quantities" of it). BlueMoonset (talk) 01:20, 18 May 2014 (UTC)
BlueMoonset, you get a pat on the back for being a second set of eyes on this. I'm sure Matty.007 will take care of this in due time. — Maile (talk) 14:46, 18 May 2014 (UTC)
Attempted fix of the two things (don't eat sand and life span of ancestors as opposed to domestic horses). Alt 3: ... that the stomachs of Cumberland Island horses (pictured) can be stretched by consuming sand? Thanks, Matty.007 14:52, 18 May 2014 (UTC)

— Maile (talk) 18:16, 18 May 2014 (UTC)

  • I'm sorry, but I thought the article changes were problematic, and the hook is just weird. I'll try to get a fix for both done shortly, but I don't want to risk it being promoted before I can. BlueMoonset (talk) 04:02, 19 May 2014 (UTC)
I think this has the advantage of being short and snappy. I've adjusted the article as well, though Danaboomer and Montanabw got there before me; still, as I don't believe the source allows the claim that the sand ingestion increases mortality, as logical as it might be, I divided the mortality and sand issues into separate sentences. I also struck ALT3. BlueMoonset (talk) 04:30, 19 May 2014 (UTC)
  • BlueMoonset, I see your article changes and hook change. I have no objection to either. I would like this nomination to have no room for doubts when it makes it on the front page. In light of my involvement in the review process already, I would like an uninvolved reviewer to green tick your hook. — Maile (talk) 16:09, 19 May 2014 (UTC)
  • Thank you very much to both of you for your help. Best, Matty.007 16:45, 19 May 2014 (UTC)
  • That hook is not accurate either, it is ingestion of relatively small amounts of sand that leads to sand colic. The issue is kind of an obscure veterinary issue for the horses - they don't eat sand on purpose, they pick it up as they graze the grasses on the island, and I would prefer to see a historic or other unique fact about these animals. May I suggest, the following, which is currently the last line of the article, cited to footnote #5 Montanabw(talk) 17:31, 19 May 2014 (UTC)
  • Montanabw, I have no objection to ALT5, and no particular need for ALT4 to run, but if you're saying that ALT4 is inaccurate, then you're casting doubt on the accuracy of the entire Travel and Leisure article it's based on, since it says: The large quantities of sand they ingest while grazing blocks their intestines, distending their bellies. If the horses don't ingest large quantities, then the article is wrong about that, and therefore cannot be trusted as a source for any other facts. (It is, after all, a travel magazine, and scientific knowledge probably isn't their strong suit.) If another source cannot be found, I'd recommend deleting the two sentences that came from that T&L article. BlueMoonset (talk) 21:42, 19 May 2014 (UTC)
  • (big sigh) No, the horses DO "ingest" (a fancy word for eating) sand, and it causes a type of impaction horse colic. "Distends their bellies" is a symptom of gas colic, a mild form, and if the sand actually blocks their intestines, they die. So the source isn't incorrect, it's just trying to explain a veterinary medical condition in layman's terms without all the gory details, so it's kind of oddly-worded, but not precisely "wrong." But my point for proposing ALT5 is that sand colic or sand impaction will happen to ANY horse that grazes on grass growing out of sandy soil anywhere; it's nothing unique to Cumberland Island or this horse breed. (Lots of sand colic in the sandhills area of Nebraska, for example) It's kind of like saying "horses grow a long mane and tail," yes, true, but not unique. Does that help clarify things? Montanabw(talk) 16:52, 20 May 2014 (UTC)

for ALT5. Not as exciting as a sand-eating horse but supported by the citation. Belle (talk) 12:16, 4 June 2014 (UTC)

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