User talk:Plantdrew/Archive 10

Happy New Year, Plantdrew!

Happy New Year!

Plantdrew,
Have a prosperous, productive and enjoyable New Year, and thanks for your contributions to Wikipedia.
 SchreiberBike | ⌨  02:07, 1 January 2021 (UTC)

   Send New Year cheer by adding {{subst:Happy New Year fireworks}} to user talk pages.

Barleria prionitis

fyi, I have done as much as I could to the article, is the current page acceptable to you? Brunswicknic (talk) 07:25, 5 January 2021 (UTC)

White-tailed spider

White-tailed spider is an article about two species of spider in the genus Lampona.

• If it's left, I'm not sure whether it's possible to construct an automated taxobox. Any ideas?
• Ideally I would prefer it to be a disambiguation page with links to two species articles. Do you know of any articles set up the way it is now?

Peter coxhead (talk) 17:34, 7 January 2021 (UTC)

White-tailed spider
Adult
Scientific classification
Domain:	Eukaryota
Kingdom:	Animalia
Phylum:	Arthropoda
Subphylum:	Chelicerata
Class:	Arachnida
Order:	Araneae
Infraorder:	Araneomorphae
Family:	Lamponidae
Genus:	Lampona
Species
Lampona cylindrata L. Koch, 1866
Lampona murina L. Koch, 1873

Something like this? —  Jts1882 | talk  20:44, 7 January 2021 (UTC)

@Jts1882: well, if we have to have an article like this, your taxobox looks good! Peter coxhead (talk) 18:48, 8 January 2021 (UTC)

@Jts1882: after some thought, and also after working on Bolas spider, I decided that it was better to treat "white-tailed spiders" as an informal group, which meant that a normal Automatic taxobox could be used. I'd still prefer articles on each species, but given that it exists... Peter coxhead (talk) 08:10, 17 January 2021 (UTC)

Spider taxoboxes

I've spent some time converting the last few manual spider taxoboxes to automated ones. Using the search hastemplate:Taxobox "Order Araneae", right now I don't find any spider articles with manual taxoboxes. I'll be interested to see what you find when you update the table. Peter coxhead (talk) 09:25, 17 January 2021 (UTC)

Query

Hi, I wanted to present this for you. User:Starzoner/Eria andamanica. This worth publishing? Starzoner (talk) 22:33, 17 January 2021 (UTC)

@Starzoner: I would try to fix the genus redirect before publishing under the name that PoWO accepts, i.e. Dendrolirium andamanicum. Peter coxhead (talk) 10:53, 18 January 2021 (UTC)

Done. Starzoner (talk) 13:35, 18 January 2021 (UTC)

@Starzoner: but it's odd that the genus Dendrolirium redirects to a different genus. It needs to be converted to a genus article, as per PoWO. Peter coxhead (talk) 19:45, 18 January 2021 (UTC)

Thank you for your "thank" on Lamprodermataceae :-)

Hi Plantdrew, and thank you yet again for tidying up my enthusiastic but maybe not so well-informed edits to biology articles. Pete AU aka --Shirt58 (talk) 11:46, 20 January 2021 (UTC)

"Complete list of species in genus Persea" listed at Redirects for discussion

A discussion is taking place to address the redirect Complete list of species in genus Persea. The discussion will occur at Wikipedia:Redirects for discussion/Log/2021 January 24#Complete list of species in genus Persea until a consensus is reached, and anyone, including you, is welcome to contribute to the discussion. Elliot321 (talk | contribs) 12:07, 24 January 2021 (UTC)

Thanks

Hello plantdrew, thanks for the taxoboxes on the articles, I don't know how those work anyways — Preceding unsigned comment added by TheFirstVicar4 (talk • contribs) 16:01, 26 January 2021 (UTC)

Skeletal stub

I've been trying to build a skeleton of a stub on User:Plantdrew/Plant stub checklist but it is rather complex. Making it so it can be copy-and-pasted is the goal, but the layout is giving me trouble, and looking at it makes me wonder if it will be used properly. Maybe we could select a few stubs of real plants that we could get up to consensus between us, then put the link to their diffs on the taxon template page? Or we could ask at the Village Pump and have somebody build us a substitutable template that has the basic templates within it? The fields in the substitutable template could be the scientific name and the Wikidata item ID. Abductive (reasoning) 03:23, 31 January 2021 (UTC)

I can help with the template if you come up with the basic structure. I assume it would need parameters like |short=, |scientific_name=, |common_name=, |authority=, |image=, |synonyms=, |taxonbar=, |categories=, |subtaxa= (which can use {{Format species list}} for formatting lists from POWO, WFO, PlantList, etc), |subtaxa_ref=, and so on for other elements in the stub checklist. It should be straightforward in Lua. —  Jts1882 | talk  08:05, 31 January 2021 (UTC)

I'll take you up on that your talk page. Abductive (reasoning) 10:21, 31 January 2021 (UTC)

Automatic taxoboxes

I was about to create an article on Flabellia petiolata when I discovered it was a monotypic taxon, so I am now proposing to expand Flabellia, but that brings two problems; firstly, I don't know how to deal with the automatic taxobox, and secondly, according to Algaebase, the genus is now included in the family Halimedaceae rather than Udoteaceae. It would be helpful if you could make the required changes, or point me to instructions so that I could try to work it out myself. Cwmhiraeth (talk) 20:18, 3 February 2021 (UTC)

@Cwmhiraeth:, done. Plantdrew (talk) 21:16, 3 February 2021 (UTC)

Comment about Eria

Hi Plantdrew, I wanna have a small rant here about the species list. I had edited and created some pages, but the utter majority are synonyms of other species. Honestly, I feel like it should just be updated. Starzoner (talk) 20:32, 4 February 2021 (UTC)

@Starzoner:, the list was very badly out of date. I've added an updated list. Note that with {{Format species list}}, it is very easy to copy a list of species from POWO; the template takes care of formatting.

The old species list should be deleted, but before doing so, I want to make sure no articles are orphaned. That entails checking that any redirects from combinations in Eria to combinations are linked from the article (or species list) for that genus (and may require updating lists of species in other genera); also, links that aren't redirects, but aren't included in the current species list will need to have the article moved to the currently accepted name. The old list can be deleted piece-meal as portions of it are checked. Plantdrew (talk) 22:39, 5 February 2021 (UTC)

Eria

Thanks very much for cleaning this page, it was something I was going to do today. I like what you have done. I will check Cylindrolobus for up-to-date, &c. 07:12, 6 February 2021 (UTC)

please see Cylindrolobus, new page, is it ok?. Brunswicknic (talk) 03:07, 8 February 2021 (UTC)

Is it OK? I'd guess so, but I want to check [1], which I guess is the basis for POWO's treatment of Eria (with many species split into other genera. I'm not finding a full-text version that's not behind a paywall from my home, but I expect I can bypass the paywall when I go into the office on Tuesday. Plantdrew (talk) 05:49, 8 February 2021 (UTC)

Thanks

I just wanted to say thanks for checking my stubs and correcting my poor attempts at categorization. Abductive (reasoning) 00:45, 9 February 2021 (UTC)

Otholobium swartbergense

I just created Otholobium swartbergense. Perhaps I may ask you to rate the article within the wikiprojects Plants and South Africa. Thank you in advance. Dwergenpaartje (talk) 21:47, 14 February 2021 (UTC)

Tag on my Biography Page

Heya Plantrew, just a note I saw you tagged my Bio page. No probs just want you to know I generally try to avoid editing that page at all for NPOV reasons. I needed to fix the date of birth as it was causing an issue linking between pages on multiple wikis. However more or less everything else on that page was not done by me, except adding one paper that is going on Wikisource, again for link reasons. Cheers Scott Thomson (Faendalimas) ^talk 19:03, 19 February 2021 (UTC)

The tag is in your best interests. You make no secret of your identity and regular editors know that, but the potential conflict of interest should be noted. Unfortunately there are editors who are not so honest.—  Jts1882 | talk  20:54, 19 February 2021 (UTC)

Yes @Jts1882: I make no secret of it and thank you for your response. This issue first came up on Wikispecies where I am both an editor/ sysop and a taxon authority having named species. When someone created a page about me here I felt it was also in my best interest not to hide my identity, by my choice no one made those links for me. its why when I make changes to taxa I have published on I usually message a relevant notice page first as a polite heads up if nothing else. Unfortunately issues such as NPOV and WP:OR are not appreciated by everyone and I feel if people know upfront I cannot be accused of hiding it. I have no issue with the tag and realise its in my best interest, am glad its there. It was added just after I corrected my birthdate though so thought I should send a quick message about that. Cheers Scott Thomson (Faendalimas) ^talk 21:14, 19 February 2021 (UTC)

Acmispon categorization

Sorry, I should have fixed the categorization of the Acmispon articles when I moved some species recently. (The North American Loteae are a taxonomic nightmare, with constant moves among Acmispon, Hosackia, Syrmatium and Ottleya, not to speak of the original Lotus, and considerable differences between sources, partly, but not entirely, due to their differing dates.) Peter coxhead (talk) 10:19, 20 February 2021 (UTC)

Continued need for a "guidance stub".

A number of users are still creating sub-stubs lacking the most basic information and templates. If there was an example stub (or three) the project could agree on, it would make it easier to give these users guidance. Abductive (reasoning) 11:45, 21 February 2021 (UTC)

The |name= parameter

In many taxoboxes, I believe mostly butterfly species, I've founnd a name parameter with the common name, although the article is at the scientific name. How do you think I should handle that? Animal lover 666 (talk) 19:22, 21 February 2021 (UTC)

have

you explained anywhere what you are doing with the banksia talk page tagging? have been off focus and havent seen anything JarrahTree 23:48, 22 February 2021 (UTC)

you dont reply? JarrahTree 02:59, 24 February 2021 (UTC)

Help with a redirect issue?

Hi, please feel free to ignore/delete this, but I couldn't figure out how to use the [[Category: Plant articles needing attention]] and I've seen you as an editor on a lot of plant pages so I thought I'd ask you about an issue I'm having.

The issue is with a plant redirect. The problem seems to be that there are two versions of the Latin name Solanum glaucescens.

One is Solanum glaucescens Zucc. (called zarza in parts of Mexico) which is a valid and accepted name for which a Wikipedia page does not currently exist. The other is Solanum glaucescens Bacle ex Dunal which is a synonym of Solanum glaucophyllum Desf.

Currently, the page Solanum glaucescens redirects to Solanum glaucophyllum. I'm not sure how to go about fixing this issue and I was wondering if you had any input as I'm still not used to the redirect mechanisms and proper styles.

Tr3ndyBEAR (talk) 21:07, 24 February 2021 (UTC)

@Tr3ndyBEAR: Hello Tr3ndyBEAR. Plantdrew seems to be away from his desk at the moment. I'm happy to respond on your talk page. Gderrin (talk) 23:09, 24 February 2021 (UTC)

Speedy deletion nomination of Category:Symmoriida

A tag has been placed on Category:Symmoriida requesting that it be speedily deleted from Wikipedia. This has been done under section C1 of the criteria for speedy deletion, because the category has been empty for seven days or more and is not a disambiguation category, a category redirect, a featured topics category, under discussion at Categories for discussion, or a project category that by its nature may become empty on occasion.

If you think this page should not be deleted for this reason, you may contest the nomination by visiting the page and clicking the button labelled "Contest this speedy deletion". This will give you the opportunity to explain why you believe the page should not be deleted. However, be aware that once a page is tagged for speedy deletion, it may be deleted without delay. Please do not remove the speedy deletion tag from the page yourself, but do not hesitate to add information in line with Wikipedia's policies and guidelines. Liz ^{Read! Talk!} 21:30, 25 February 2021 (UTC)

Australian Rainforest Key

Hi Plantdrew. As you probably know the old RFK which was hosted at trin[dot]org[dot]au has been superseded. Yesterday I noticed that the domain is once again working but it brings up a rather sinister-looking page. There are probably many articles that still contain references and links to that old URL and I've started searching for them and replacing them with an updated link. I was wondering if there is a tool that can do this automatically? — Preceding unsigned comment added by Junglenut (talk • contribs) 03:57, 28 February 2021 (UTC)

@Junglenut: This search finds 569 pages linking the website, of which 244 pages use template {{RFK6.1}} and another 52 pages use {{AustTRFPK6.1}}. It might be possible to modify the template to edit the url, although that will depend on how the new version handles it (e.g. different url using same id). Can you give an example of an old and new url? This could provide a temporary fix. —  Jts1882 | talk  10:33, 28 February 2021 (UTC)

Test of sandboxed template (ignore the title which uses the page name):

• Using {{RFK6.1}}: Hyland, B. P. M.; Whiffin, T.; Zich, F. A.; et al. (Dec 2010). "Factsheet – Plantdrew/Archive 10". Australian Tropical Rainforest Plants (6.1, online version RFK 6.1 ed.). Cairns, Australia: Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organisation (CSIRO), through its Division of Plant Industry; the Centre for Australian National Biodiversity Research; the Australian Tropical Herbarium, James Cook University. Retrieved 20 March 2013.
• Using {{RFK6.1/sandbox}}: Hyland, B. P. M.; Whiffin, T.; Zich, F. A.; et al. (Dec 2010). "Factsheet – Plantdrew/Archive 10". Australian Tropical Rainforest Plants (6.1, online version RFK 6.1 ed.). Cairns, Australia: Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organisation (CSIRO), through its Division of Plant Industry; the Centre for Australian National Biodiversity Research; the Australian Tropical Herbarium, James Cook University. Retrieved 20 March 2013.

Would this help? —  Jts1882 | talk  10:52, 28 February 2021 (UTC)

@Jts1882: I was just writing a reply to you when I realised you'd added another comment. Yes that update to the template seems to work fine.

@Junglenut: It might be useful to create a new template for the new site and then redirect the old one. The advantage of a custom template wrapping {{cite web}} is that it makes future changes to the website easier to handle. Looking at the ATRP site, it doesn't seem to use the Hyland et al citation for edition 8. There also seem to be two variants of the page with a www.canbr.gov.au/cpbr link as well as the apps.lucidcentral.org I used for the template change. The former is used for ATRF identifier in the {{taxonbar}}. —  Jts1882 | talk  11:19, 28 February 2021 (UTC)

@Jts1882: I would be happy to create a new template but I don't know how to do it. Re the two different sites, the canbr.gov.au one is also outdated (it's v.7), and the lucidcentral one is the current v.8. (I keep forgetting to sign my messages, but not this time!) — Junglenut (talk) 11:35, 28 February 2021 (UTC)

genus auto taxoboxes with English names

Plantdrew, i hope I'm fixing auto taxoboxes the way you like them now. Lately I've noticed the auto taxoboxes link back to the specific name genus rather than the bold non linked page you view right off. If you look at the auto taxobox page itself, the pages are no longer linked to the English pages. See Pencil-tailed tree mouse. I think I fixed the page, but let me know if I should do something diFferent....Pvmoutside (talk) 17:06, 3 March 2021 (UTC)

@Pvmoutside: the taxobox at Pencil-tailed tree mouse is just as it should be. An important step, which regularly seems to be missed by some editors, is that when the article is not at the taxon name for whatever reason (English name, disamiguation, etc.) the link field in the taxonomy template must be set to the page name with the link text the scientific name, as is the case at template:Taxonomy/Chiropodomys. This ensures that the scientific name is shown correctly in bold in the taxobox.

My only comment about the article is that the first sentence should begin with the title, so I would swap the scientific and English names. Peter coxhead (talk) 19:39, 3 March 2021 (UTC)

Moonlight cactus or Selenicereus

I've been working on Selenicereus and Hylocereus, fixing the sinking of the latter into the former. I would, naturally, prefer the genus article to be at the scientific name and not at "Moonlight cactus", which remains ambiguous, not just because Hylocereus is still widely recognized. I notice that the move is on your list at User:Plantdrew/Moveprep. Do you have any more thoughts about this? Peter coxhead (talk) 13:55, 6 March 2021 (UTC)

@Peter coxhead:, it should be moved to the scientific name. I'm pretty sure last time I checked (several years ago), Google reported search results were in the low thousands for "moonlight cactus". Now that is up to 24k, but Google reports 400k results for "Selenicereus" (yes, I take WP:GOOGLETESTs with a large grain of salt). I see Britannica moved their article to "moonlight cactus" from "night-blooming cereus" in 2018, which is probably driving some increase. "Moonlight cactus" is not the most commonly used vernacular name for Selenicereus, and all of more common vernacular names (as well as moonlight cactus), appear to be ambiguous.

I believe everything in User:Plantdrew/Moveprep#Plant_moves should be moved. That section is a comprehensive list of the plants on Wikipedia I am aware of with vernacular name titles that are (in my opinion) completely unjustified (well, comprehensive barring a couple cases where I disagree with vernacular name titles that were arrived at via discussion through a formal RM). Most everything else on my Moveprep page should be moved as well, unless I've included a comment expressing some hesitancy. Plantdrew (talk) 02:45, 10 March 2021 (UTC)

Thanks. I also note that Google ngrams don't show "moonlight cactus" at all, and "Selenicereus" get more hits than the ambiguous "night blooming cereus". So I'll go ahead and make the move after leaving a justification on the talk page. Peter coxhead (talk) 08:44, 10 March 2021 (UTC)

Veronica jovellanoides

Hi Plantdrew, wondering if you would mind rating Veronica jovellanoides, I reckon it is above start class now. Thanks, Beeveria (talk) 05:50, 7 March 2021 (UTC)  Done Plantdrew (talk) 02:45, 10 March 2021 (UTC)

Generic popular names for plants

I'm trying to decide how detailed ShortDescBot should be when dealing with Angiospermae. This is such a huge and diverse group that I think we can be slightly more particular than "flowering plant", leaving that general term just to sweep up at the end everything that doesn't have any high-level popular name. At the moment I'm thinking of using these categories as popular terms, and wondered if you had any thoughts or suggestions for alternatives: grasses, orchids, cacti, [other] succulent plants. Unfortunately, many of the taxonomic groups such as Asteraceae don't map well to popular terms in the category tree. I'm also doing plants by habitat more generally: trees, shrubs, vines, eucalypus (in the mallees category), epiphytes; and acquatic plants. Of course I can't get too particular, or it will take forever, but generic terms that can be identified by Wikipedia category and that apply to more than, say, 1000 or so articles, would be OK. MichaelMaggs (talk) 12:32, 7 March 2021 (UTC)

@MichaelMaggs: There aren't a whole lot of categories that would work for 1000+ articles.

Family categories with a well known popular name (including some you've already mentioned)

• Category:Orchids (Orchidaceae) "orchid"
• Category:Legumes (Fabaceae) "legume"
• Category:Poaceae "grass"
• Category:Cyperaceae "sedge"
• Category:Araceae "aroid" (excluding Category:Lemnoideae, which can be called "duckweed")
• Category:Bromeliaceae "bromeliad"
• Category:Cacti (Cactaceae) "cactus"
• Category:Arecaceae "palm"

Other family category possibilities (maybe not so well known, or map less well to family)

• Category:Asteraceae "composite"
• Category:Euphorbiaceae "euphorb"
• Category:Melastomataceae "melastome"
• Category:Gesneriaceae "gesneriad"
• Category:Apiaceae "umbellifer"
• Category:Brassicaceae "crucifer"? or maybe "cruciferous plant" or "mustard"?
• Category:Solanaceae "nightshade"
• Category:Liliaceae "lily"? (may apply well to some other plants formerly included in Liliaceae)
• Category:Juncaceae "rush" (but bulrushes aren't rushes)
• Category:Cucurbitaceae "cucurbit"
• Category:Dipterocarpaceae "dipterocarp"
• Category:Ilex (only genus in Aquifoliaceae) "holly" (well known, maps well, but a small category)

If you drill too far down a family category you may end up with some taxa that aren't members of the family. Category:Pulse crop diseases needs to be excluded from legumes, and Category:Monocot diseases has subcategories that need to be excluded from Poaceae, Arecaceae and Orchidaceae.

Categories by habit are severely underpopulated. There are a lot of articles on trees that aren't in Category:Trees. Category:Succulent plants is missing lots of articles for succulent species not in the three entirely succulent families (Cactaceae, Crassulaceae, and Aizoaceae). You can certainly use the habit categories to generate short descriptions, but be aware they are far from complete.

Category:Carnivorous plants could be worthwhile

Instead of "mallee", you might consider "eucalypt" (using the genus categories for the genera listed there)

"Mistletoe" describes everything in Category:Loranthaceae as well as the genera listed at Viscaceae. Plantdrew (talk) 03:20, 10 March 2021 (UTC)

That's really helpful, thanks very much. MichaelMaggs (talk) 09:19, 10 March 2021 (UTC)

Unused taxonomy templates

I have Template:Taxonomy/= Leishmaniavirus on my watch list so I saw your edit. Is it fine to do that for any taxonomy template that is unused? There are some more virus ones for obsolete taxa or for strains that have since been redirected to the species they belong to and therefore do not have their own article anymore. Velayinosu (talk) 03:16, 19 March 2021 (UTC)

@Velayinosu: well, it's what I regularly do. If you feel very energetic, you can nominate all the entries in Category:Unnecessary taxonomy templates for deletion, but someone will get round to it eventually. Peter coxhead (talk) 11:04, 19 March 2021 (UTC)

"Template:Taxonomy/Leptochiton" listed at Redirects for discussion

A discussion is taking place to address the redirect Template:Taxonomy/Leptochiton. The discussion will occur at Wikipedia:Redirects for discussion/Log/2021 March 28#Template:Taxonomy/Leptochiton until a consensus is reached, and anyone, including you, is welcome to contribute to the discussion. Estopedist1 (talk) 19:17, 28 March 2021 (UTC)

Speedy deletion nomination of Category:Carex nothospecies

A tag has been placed on Category:Carex nothospecies requesting that it be speedily deleted from Wikipedia. This has been done under section C1 of the criteria for speedy deletion, because the category has been empty for seven days or more and is not a disambiguation category, a category redirect, a featured topics category, under discussion at Categories for discussion, or a project category that by its nature may become empty on occasion.

If you think this page should not be deleted for this reason, you may contest the nomination by visiting the page and clicking the button labelled "Contest this speedy deletion". This will give you the opportunity to explain why you believe the page should not be deleted. However, be aware that once a page is tagged for speedy deletion, it may be deleted without delay. Please do not remove the speedy deletion tag from the page yourself, but do not hesitate to add information in line with Wikipedia's policies and guidelines. UnitedStatesian (talk) 13:09, 14 April 2021 (UTC)

Ctenophorus cristatus

Hello Plantdrew, I'm a student updating the Ctenophorus cristatus page, and am struggling to format the referencing because it appears you have used a unique referencing style. Could you please show me how you have formatted the referencing in that article so that I can use the same style? Thank you. --WatsonKat (talk) 02:01, 13 April 2021 (UTC)

Advice on a large small problem

Hi. I'm curious as to your thoughts on something. There is a set of pages, all created by a single editor many years ago, each page listing all the species of robber flies whose genus names begin with a given letter of the alphabet. For instance, List of Asilidae species: A. I've only just now noticed, however, that when these pages were created, the editor who created them arbitrarily and erroneously put ALL of the author names in parentheses. That means that well over half of the entries - thousands of them - are wrong. Tracking down which subset of species names actually REQUIRE parentheses for their authorships would be an absolute nightmare of an editing task. On a few of these pages, subsequent editors have added new names, properly lacking parentheses when appropriate, but overall the scale of the issue is pretty overwhelming. The original source file from which these pages appear to have been downloaded (http://www.geller-grimm.de/catalog/species.htm) has the authorships properly formatted, and therefore mostly lacking parentheses. I honestly can't imagine how to fix this short of deleting the existing page scripts and replacing them entirely with a new version parsed from the source file, but I'm not proficient enough to know how to automate this, and doing it manually is not something I would expect any human to attempt, since there are 7194 names in the source file. If you know a good way to clean this up, that would be fantastic. Dyanega (talk) 23:34, 5 May 2021 (UTC)

@Dyanega:, rewikifying the source list is easy with the right tools. I have it done at User:Plantdrew/Asilid species. (I downloaded the source, opened it in a spreadsheet (it's a .csv, but values are separated by semicolons rather than commas), copied the spreadsheet column with the names and authorities and pasted that into Wikipedia, and then applied {{Format species list}} (the format template had a script time-out error when I tried to apply it to the entire list, but worked when I broke the list up into four batches).

My list doesn't have genus section headers like the existing lists do. There's been some haphazard attempts to link authority names to their biographies in the existing lists; I don't think that's worth the effort to preserve (if authorities are going to be linked it would be easier to start over by doing a search/replace my sandbox master list rather than try to reconcile links in 26 different lists). Links to newly described species not in Geller-Grimm's list are probably worth preserving. Geller-Grimm has just 16 species described form 2007-2009, and none from 2010 or later. Searching for recent publication dates should turn up most of the species that have been added to existing lists that aren't in Geller-Grimm.

I don't intend to place a burden on you to fix the current asilid lists, but if you are inclined to do so, I hope my sandbox list makes it easier (and you are welcome to make edits to User:Plantdrew/Asilid species). I'm not inclined to work on the asilid lists myself right now. I'd rather not work on correcting authority parentheses errors at all, but I guess I'll tackle the 300 odd spider species created between May 2 and May 4 by a novice editor that ALL have an authority in parenthesis.

There is a big problem on Wikipedia with authority parentheses. It's mostly an ICZN taxa problem (with ICNafp taxa, the problem is more omitting a combining authority that should follow a parenthetical authority). Many articles have been created by editors who don't understand the significance of parentheses. Taxon articles may have parentheses that shouldn't be there, or omit parentheses that should be present. I am not inclined to trust that Wikipedia has applied parentheses correctly. However, I don't routinely check parentheses in my Wikipedia edits, and I don't think any active taxonomy editors pay a very close eye to parentheses in articles they haven't created. Sometimes I'll notice a problem with parentheses. If it's a small problem, I'll fix it; if it's a large problem (e.g. 7000+ species), I may not. Maybe I'll notice a non-parenthetical species that predates the description of its genus; maybe I'll notice species described in the last ~10 years with parenthesis. In a list of species, parentheses for ALL/NONE of the species is a red flag for me, if I notice. Parentheses problems are more apparent in genus articles with species lists than in species articles. I'd bet that there are some asilid species articles with incorrectly parenthesized authorities copied from the existing lists, but there isn't an efficient way to check for that.

It's not just necessarily Wikipedia either. My first Wikimedia edits were on Wikispecies for a few weeks in early 2008. I started editing Wikipedia several years later. While I was active on Wikispecies, an admin!!!, queried "When do we use the brackets around the author? This puzzles me a lot but I never asked.". I explained it, but it didn't leave me with much confidence in the state of Wikispecies at that time. Plantdrew (talk) 03:54, 6 May 2021 (UTC)

Thanks. With the proverbial "leg up" on this, I might chop away at it, one page at a time. It definitely is a problem when people edit taxonomy articles who know next to nothing about the nuts and bolts. I *do* generally notice when articles I'm editing contain a discrepancy, and then I check the entire article. I haven't made many edits to species names on those asilid pages, however, so that escaped me. Appreciate the support. Dyanega (talk) 16:29, 6 May 2021 (UTC)

@Plantdrew and Dyanega: just noticed this thread. I monitor new spider articles, and had seen the parentheses problem. I left a note on QatarStarsLeague's talk page, and am working my way through them. Sigh... Peter coxhead (talk) 05:52, 7 May 2021 (UTC)

Plantdrew, see the work list at Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Spiders#New spider articles that need checking if you want to work on some of them. Peter coxhead (talk) 17:04, 7 May 2021 (UTC)

Double small font

Just to note that when fixing incorrect uses of {{Species list}}, as here, it's easy to end up with double small font; better is to convert to use {{Linked species list}}, removing all the formatting, or convert to a plain list with *. Please see Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Spiders#Use of Specieslist template for some general comments and a question. Peter coxhead (talk) 14:08, 10 May 2021 (UTC)

Tilletia horrida

Hi. Hate to bug you, but need your expertise. Can you take a look at this new article? It had been a redirect to Tilletia barclayana, where it is listed as a synonym. Can it be both a synonym and its own species? Thanks. Onel5969 ^{TT me} 13:09, 11 May 2021 (UTC)

(talk page stalker) @Onel5969: While I'm not as well versed, this article mentions on pages 125-126 that the two were synonymised after "questionable results of a study in which seedlings of two species of Pennisetum L.C. Rich. were artificially infected with the rice pathogen". If you can't access the article I can provide a screenshot of the relevant extract. Take from this what you wish. Anarchyte (talk • work) 14:22, 11 May 2021 (UTC)

@Onel5969:, the short answer is no, it can't be both synonym and it's own species at the same time. A longer answer is that taxonomists can disagree and one person might regard something as a distinct species that another regards as a synonym. Wikipedia can't really accommodate multiple taxonomic points of view (it would be WP:SYNTHESIS, and would be inherently inconsistent), so we usually follow the a particular database that follows the general consensus taxonomic point of view for a particular group of organisms. We shouldn't have an article on a species that is listed as a synonym in a different article; the articles should either be merged, or the name should be removed from the synonym list (in the case of T. horrida, keeping separate articles and updating the synonym list at T. barclayana appears to be the right way to go). Plantdrew (talk) 00:27, 12 May 2021 (UTC)

Excellent. Thanks to both you and Anarchyte for your detailed explanations. I see that the editor who created the new horrida article has already removed the synonym from the barclayana article. I had already marked the horrida as reviewed, since I had an inkling that this would be your response. On a different tack, have you ever thought of doing NPP patrol, concentrating on taxonomy articles? Onel5969 ^{TT me} 00:34, 12 May 2021 (UTC)

display of extinction symbols

Excuse my laziness, it is easier to ask. I seem to recall there was a way to suppress extinction symbols in taxoboxes, or perhaps there was general agreement not to bother. In the simple listings I remove the redundant marks from the 'child' parts, just seems sensible. ~ cygnis insignis 19:00, 18 May 2021 (UTC)

I don't think there has ever been a consensus to do this. Indeed, given that automated taxoboxes generate the symbol from the taxonomy templates, at levels of genus and above, a missing lower ranked extinct marker would correspond to a taxonomy template error that would get corrected – the system checks that all ranks below an extinct rank are also marked as extinct. Peter coxhead (talk) 19:45, 18 May 2021 (UTC)

I later realised I know how to do it, I'm rusty, whether I should stop doing what I had been is the question. Do either of you think it preferable to mark each one, or inconsequential, and would you have that in the article lists as well? ~ cygnis insignis 20:29, 18 May 2021 (UTC)

@Cygnis insignis:, my inclination is include extinction symbols for lists of child taxa in the taxobox of an extinct parent taxon. However, I don't feel very strongly about it, and in practice I don't regularly add extinction symbols when they are absent (but I definitely don't remove them when present). I don't think I've ever added extinction symbols to a list of species in the body of an article about an extinct genus; but then again most fossil genera don't have species presented in a list format in the body of the article (there will be a list in the taxobox, but individual species are usually mentioned in running text in the body of the article). I think it would be good to add extinction symbols to (article body) species lists when a genus has both extant and extinct species, but again, this isn't something I routinely check. Plantdrew (talk) 20:51, 18 May 2021 (UTC)

This seems good advice to me, i.e. always put them in taxoboxes, don't put them in running text, always put them in lists which mix extant and extinct taxa, it doesn't matter either way in something like a list of the species of an extinct genus. Peter coxhead (talk) 20:59, 18 May 2021 (UTC)

Thank you both, I think that is pretty much what I had resolved to do. I have possibly removed in a mix, but only where I added a screed to make it explicit when, eg. fossil or once known as extant. I should probably add subfossil, which might indicate known to people once upon a time. I should probably expand them into sentences … ~ cygnis insignis 21:30, 18 May 2021 (UTC)

Nepenthes latiffiana

Hi, I just accepted Nepenthes latiffiana submit to AfC, then noticed the submitter had previous for copy vios so I did some more checking and realised the first para of "Plant characteristics" is a direct copy of diagnosis from this source page 7. I'm not sure my knowledge of the terminology is good enough to reword, so I thought I'd ask if you could have a look as I know you jump on many/most plant AfC submissions. If not I'll remove and request a CV revdel. Cheers KylieTastic (talk) 13:39, 27 May 2021 (UTC)

@KylieTastic:, I'm not sure who you're referring to as having previous copy vios. The person who created this article hasn't edited any other articles. The paper with the diagnosis has a copyright notice stating it is "distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License". Isn't it OK to copy CC-BY content to Wikipedia? If not, just remove it. A diagnosis is required when describing a new species, but it's not really encyclopedic content (the "description" section following the diagnosis in the linked paper would be appropriate for an encyclopedia). A diagnosis summarizes the differences between any similar known species and a new species; it's not useful to somebody who isn't already intimately familiar with the known species, or at least somebody who has access to specimens of the known species. The description is useful for a more general audience (although it requires knowledge of jargon as written). 01:24, 28 May 2021 (UTC)

They have a rejection for submitting Draft:Nepenthes domei as a copy vio so as it was deleted it does not show up as edits - it was submitted and deleted 14 April 2021. DOH - yes I completely missed the "Creative Commons Attribution" I looked for the logo/standalone text - which is of the launch page. I agree that using the diagnosis rather than the following description did appear odd to me, however as the description was so long and detailed it seams that a direct copy would not be appropriate either. Many thanks KylieTastic (talk) 09:33, 28 May 2021 (UTC)

Request for peer review

Hi Plantdrew. I hope you are safe and staying hydrated during these times! Sorry to bother you and for the random request. I have been working on an Australian cycad stub article, Macrozamia miquelii, and I'm trying my best to get the article to a C class. I know that you peer reviewed another cycad species in 2017 (Macrozamia spiralis) and that is why I am requesting a peer review from you. I would love it if you could review my work on the Macrozamia miquelii and leave a comment on what I can do to improve my edits. I hope this is okay and it is completely fine and understandable if you are busy.

Hope to hear from you soon! Thank you for your time! :) --Yames76 (talk) 12:13, 1 June 2021 (UTC)

A barnstar for you!

	The Barnstar of Diligence
	For keeping Taxoboxes tidy and error-free, I award you this barnstar! — hike395 (talk) 00:12, 6 June 2021 (UTC)

Plant names in other languages

Hi Plantdrew, I picked your name randomly, but fully cognisant of the fact that you contribute a lot on taxonomic matters, so I thought you might b the right person to address. Do we have policy guidance on the inclusion of names in other languages such as here (example for mere illustrative purposes, does not fully reflect common practices)? Where such sections exist in articles, the different names are added ad hoc by whoever come across the article and add the name in a language that they speak. In some cases there are interwiki links to most of the languages cited, which make such inclusion superfluous. In other cases, it is almost always the names in European languages that are added, so such sections fail in terms of WP:WORLDVIEW. Would like to hear your take. Regards, Rui ''Gabriel'' Correia (talk) 12:38, 10 June 2021 (UTC)

@Rui Gabriel Correia: see WP:WikiProject Plants#Common names – guidance widely ignored, but sound in my view. Peter coxhead (talk) 20:57, 10 June 2021 (UTC)

Blobfish photo

Hi, I noticed that there is a 'well known photograph' of (a) blobfish, but no link. This is the edit where you added it. 2A02:C7F:861D:6A00:F1D1:47C3:879F:FB9E (talk) 17:21, 13 June 2021 (UTC)

Edit Warring

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Goodsprings,_Nevada
You currently appear to be engaged in an edit war. This means that you are repeatedly changing content back to how you think it should be although other editors disagree. Users are expected to collaborate with others, to avoid editing disruptively, and to try to reach a consensus, rather than repeatedly undoing other users' edits once it is known that there is a disagreement.

Points to note:

1. Edit warring is disruptive regardless of how many reverts you have made;
2. Do not edit war even if you believe you are right.

If you find yourself in an editing dispute, use the article's talk page to discuss controversial changes and work towards a version that represents consensus among editors. You can post a request for help at an appropriate noticeboard or seek dispute resolution. In some cases, it may be appropriate to request temporary page protection. If you engage in an edit war, you may be blocked from editing. 98.26.118.255 (talk) 01:16, 14 June 2021 (UTC)

23 more WikiProject tags

In case you're interested, I just went through all transclusions of {{Category described in year}} and found these 23 category talks which don't exist yet ~

23 cat talks

1. Category talk:Butterflies described in 2012
2. Category talk:Crustaceans described in 1925
3. Category talk:Fossil parataxa described in 1860
4. Category talk:Fossil parataxa described in 2020
5. Category talk:Fossil parataxa described in the 19th century
6. Category talk:Fossil taxa described in 1792
7. Category talk:Fossil taxa described in 2021
8. Category talk:Insects described in 2020
9. Category talk:Insects described in 2021
10. Category talk:Molluscs described in 2020
11. Category talk:Molluscs described in 2021
12. Category talk:Moths described in 2020
13. Category talk:Nematodes described in 1799
14. Category talk:Nematodes described in 1856
15. Category talk:Nematodes described in 2020
16. Category talk:Plants described in 1757
17. Category talk:Plants described in 1769
18. Category talk:Plants described in 2020
19. Category talk:Plants described in 2021
20. Category talk:Reptiles described in 2020
21. Category talk:Spiders described in 1862
22. Category talk:Spiders described in 2020
23. Category talk:Taxa described in 2021

Cheers  ~ Tom.Reding (talk ⋅dgaf)  02:50, 15 June 2021 (UTC)

@Tom.Reding:, now done and thanks for pointing these out. I have not been consistently adding {{WikiProject Years}} in my previous edits, but I did for this batch. Plantdrew (talk)

thanks for looking at my P. melanderi page

Greetings,

thank you for your comment on my P. melanderi page. It was my first one from scratch. I also worked on the Chrysomela aeneicollis page and the Parasyrphus nigritarsus page. The C. aeneicollis page was a stub and I made an article about it, and the P. nigritarsus one was brief and jargony so I added a lot to it. If you have a chance, could you look at my other pages? I would appreciate it a lot. I am trying to document assertions with good sources, and it is amazing what's out there nowadays but if you have comments about those I would appreciate it too. NCalBeetleGuy (talk) 16:53, 19 June 2021 (UTC)

Astroloba pentagona

Could you do me a favor and check this new article. Since I can't access the sources, would like someone with more knowledge to take a look. Thanks. Onel5969 ^{TT me} 12:56, 22 June 2021 (UTC)

Thanks for rating my Symmorphus cristatus page

Greetings,

I appreciate your comments on that page a lot. I hope that it ends of up interest to potential readers. I wonder what I should do to get the ratings of the Chrysomela aeneicollis page (currently stub) and the Parasyrphus nigritarsus page (currently rated only for Diptera before I edited it substantially) re-rated. Any suggestions you might have would be appreciated.

Pinjalo (fish)

Thanks for looking at this. How do I get rid of the italics in the title? Quetzal1964 (talk) 08:03, 29 June 2021 (UTC)

The taxobox takes care of italicisation and recognises the title as a genus. To override this use |italic_title = no in {{speciesbox}}. I've made the change. —  Jts1882 | talk  12:02, 29 June 2021 (UTC)

An interesting case, where the ambiguity between the genus name and the English name of the species forces a less standard disambiguation. Peter coxhead (talk) 15:27, 29 June 2021 (UTC)

It's similar case to asparagus. I think the (genus) disambiguator for the genus article is appropriate here (as with Asparagus (genus). I think the species should probably be at the binomial (with Pinjalo (fish) redirected to the disambiguation page at Pinjalo). The species doesn't appear to be very well known. Going through the first several pages of search engine results for pinjalo, I'm seeing mostly taxonomic databases, a resort in the Phillipines, and a couple sites that are basically encyclopedias of fishes (and these sites include "pinjalo snapper" as a name for the species). Plantdrew (talk) 15:48, 29 June 2021 (UTC)

I agree with the move to the binomial. Even if "pinjalo" were more common, "pinjalo (fish)" doesn't satisfy WP:PRECISION because of the ambiguity between the genus and the species. Peter coxhead (talk) 07:24, 30 June 2021 (UTC)

Thank you for all your comments, it has now been moved to the binomial.Quetzal1964 (talk) 09:19, 30 June 2021 (UTC)

A barnstar for you!

	The Original Barnstar
	You're doing great. Keep up the good work! V. E. (talk) 20:09, 5 July 2021 (UTC)

Common Sage

Thoughts on this? I'm thinking the plant is the primary topic, and should be a redirect, with the band having a dab.

Note that Common sage (lower case s) does redirect to Salvia officinalis. I think for the distinction between capitalized and non-capitalized version, the hatnote may be just fine. --Elmidae (talk · contribs) 14:32, 13 July 2021 (UTC)

@Onel5969:, the band isn't very well known, but I think it is unlikely that somebody would capitalize "Sage" when searching for the plant. There aren't any incorrect incoming links to "Common Sage". A hatnote should suffice.Plantdrew (talk) 16:03, 13 July 2021 (UTC)

Thanks to both of you. I wasn't sure, so went to the experts! Onel5969 ^{TT me} 17:12, 13 July 2021 (UTC)

Incident involving you

There is currently a discussion at Wikipedia:Administrators' noticeboard/Incidents regarding an issue with which you may have been involved. Thank you. Sietecolores (talk) 16:21, 13 July 2021 (UTC)

Ezov & Origanum syriacum

I am a relatively inexperienced editor, so please excuse any misunderstandings. I strongly believe that Ezov should be merged with Origanum syriacum, as the academic consensus (not currently represented on the Wikipedia page) is that the Ezov mentioned in the Bible is O. syriacum. My combination included significant improvements to several aspects of the article, but obviously needed some improvement. Nevertheless, I think restoring my merger and adding to the article to reflect the consensus is more appropriate then separating the pages.

Bugulina

I have created the automatic taxobox for the bryozoan Bugulina but I don't know how to deal with the fact that there is an existing article which redirects to a town in Russia. Please could you help. Cwmhiraeth (talk) 06:27, 23 July 2021 (UTC)

@Cwmhiraeth: see Template:Taxonomy/Bugulina. The article on the bryozoan genus will then be at Bugulina (bryozoan). Peter coxhead (talk) 07:42, 23 July 2021 (UTC)

Gaylussacia bigeloviana Edit conflict please help a newbie recover all my stuff??

Hello I'm sorry if I'm not using this feature correctly but I need help I was working on the Gaylussacia bigeloviana page when you edited my edit and now I have a edit conflict but it's not showing ANY of my literal hours of work it just says "no differences" and Idk if it's confused because I added several sections or what but I am on the verge of tears and do you maybe have any advice for me to recover my last several hours of work because you appear to know what you're doing and I am just paralysed on the editing page now basically afraid to touch anything because I only know how to use this site in visual editor & I don't think it's compatible at all. Kelly of Carolina (talk) 03:21, 6 August 2021 (UTC)

@Kelly of Carolina:, oh no. I'm very sorry. There's nothing I can do on my end. You may be able to recover it, depending on what you've done with your browser. If you just tried to save the page and got a notice of an edit conflict, the notification will include the text you were adding (among quite a bit of other stuff; scroll to find it), and you can copy paste it back into the article and then save again (don't worry about trying to preserve my edit). If you are no longer at the point where the edit conflict notification was displayed, you might be able to find your text with the back button on your browser. I really hope you can get it back, I'm sorry to have conflicted with your edit. Plantdrew (talk) 03:38, 6 August 2021 (UTC)

@Plantdrew: I don't know if I'm on the right page or not. It looks like the page from the Edit conflict home page (it says Latest revision // Your text at the top) but then it says "no difference" and only has one text box. Basically since I hit save the first time I have not seen my own text again. Like it did not show it to me in the notification and I feel like that's not what was meant to happen?? Kelly of Carolina (talk) 03:46, 6 August 2021 (UTC)

@Kelly of Carolina: Try hitting back and see if you can get to a point where your browser has the Wikipedia page in edit mode with your text present? The initial edit conflict notice should have included your text, but you may have clicked on another link from the initial notice that led to Wikipedia ignoring your changes. Plantdrew (talk) 04:15, 6 August 2021 (UTC)

@Plantdrew: So if I hit back it just gives me a notice about leaving without saving (because I'm still on that first page after the "do you want to resolve conflicts by hand?" pop up) I didn't see any page inbetween the two and wiki seams to think it still has all my work even though it's evidently chucked it all. I found and went into the help live chat and it appears to be a pretty unique error. 100% no one's fault but I don't know if I'm ever going to re-do all that work it took me a few hours. Kelly of Carolina (talk) 04:22, 6 August 2021 (UTC)

@Kelly of Carolina:, very sorry to hear your work is gone. Please don't let that discourage you from editing Wikipedia. If it would help you feel encouraged, I'd like to work on expanding the article for Gaylussacia bigeloviana. However, I'm going to have little internet access until August 8th. Plantdrew (talk) 04:38, 6 August 2021 (UTC)

Hello again :@Plantdrew:! I wanted to let you know after I chilled out a while and took some deep breaths I decided I probably am going to re-do my work for that page that I lost. I've got it in my sandbox this time like a responsible person though because I need to try do work for my job until the weekend! I wanted to thank you for being so kind in trying to help me figure out what went wrong. It was not at all your fault and I appreciate you trying to console me anyway! I did have another question about the Speciesbox I'd been trying to work out on my own and since that was what you fixed, I thought you might know. I had tried to look around for more information about the "Conservation status system" element and I was wondering if there is a list of accepted systems and how they should be written anywhere? The coding is a bit over my head but if I wanted to add the US national listing or ranking do you know how I'd go about that? Thanks so much again for your help and kindness! Kelly of Carolina (talk) 18:38, 9 August 2021 (UTC)

@Kelly of Carolina:, see Wikipedia:Conservation status. You can add a second conservation status with the parameters |status2=, |status2_system= and |status2_ref=. However, TNC/NatureServe's national and subnational ratings are not supported. By "not supported", I mean that the code underlying taxoboxes doesn't know to do anything special with them (e.g. by displaying a graphic), but it will display any text for status parameters as entered. Taxobox support for different status systems does need some updating and expansion. Plantdrew (talk) 02:07, 10 August 2021 (UTC)

The conservation status is handled by {{Taxobox/species}}, which has a description of supported systems.

I did make a start on a module to update template. I've used it to make a few recent additions, but not for the main systems (although they do work). It would be relatively simple to add the national ratings for NatureServe, and the graphics could be made by modifying the existing SVG files (i,e, changing the G or T to N). However, my understanding is that national ratings should only be used for endemic species, so I wonder how useful it would be. If it is considered a useful addition, I can look into making an update. The same goes for any other additional systems. —  Jts1882 | talk  16:04, 10 August 2021 (UTC)

Emus (beetle)

Hi, I was wondering why you decided to move the page Emus (genus) to Emus (beetle) even though there had just been a discussion on its talk page which resulted in a decision to retain the status quo. I am not necessarily opposed to your move but wonder if it is better to have consensus on the talk page before performing the move. Sincerely, Nikolaih^☎️📖 22:59, 22 August 2021 (UTC)

@Nikolaih:, I wasn't aware of the move discussion, but I see it was primarily about whether to disambiguate or use the base title for the beetle genus, with some discussion about which disambiguation to use if it remained disambiguated. (beetle) is the disambiguator used for almost all beetle genera that are disambiguated. (genus) often is ambiguous between plant and animal genera and there is consensus among editors who work on taxonomy articles to deprecate (genus) as a disambiguator. Plantdrew (talk) 23:31, 22 August 2021 (UTC)

I see, thanks for the clarification. Nikolaih^☎️📖 23:33, 22 August 2021 (UTC)

Rutaceae manual taxoboxes

I thought I would look at the manual taxoboxes in Rutaceae – excluding Citrus, which is a mess – as there are a manageable number. Some of our articles have subfamily and lower ranks, but there is no agreement whenever sources have been given. Consider Erythrochiton.

• The taxobox has Rutoideae.
• GRIN has Toddalioideae, but seems to be based on a 1992 ref, so can be discounted.
• APweb has Zanthoxyloideae here.

APweb says its classification is based on doi:10.1002/tax.12543, a 2021 paper, which concludes "It is hoped that future phylogenomic studies, currently underway, will resolve the remaining phylogenetic uncertainties so that a revised classification at the tribal level will become feasible." So I'm tempted to go with APweb, which has a full list of genera by subfamily, and remove any ranks below that level.

Any views before I start on this? Peter coxhead (talk) 09:20, 7 September 2021 (UTC)

@Peter coxhead: following Applehans/APweb for subfamilies (and no tribes) sounds good to me. I hadn't looked at APweb's Rutaceae treatment recently; if I had done so, I'd already be working on this. Plantdrew (talk) 19:02, 7 September 2021 (UTC)

Ok, thanks; I'll work on Rutaceae minus Citrus. The Citrus articles seem to be a taxonomic mess. Peter coxhead (talk) 20:52, 7 September 2021 (UTC)

Citrus is a nightmare. I'd be very happy if somebody published Tanaka's species as cultivar groups. Plantdrew (talk) 03:20, 8 September 2021 (UTC)

I created a spreadsheet of the genera, relating our articles to PoWO and the APweb list of genera, assuming that APweb matched the Appelhans article, and did some work on List of Rutaceae genera. However, I've since discovered that actually the APweb list doesn't match the Appelhans article, and it has other issues (e.g. genus names in italics rather than bold which are said to mark synonyms but which lack an accepted name). There's a working list of genera that are problematic in some way at User:Peter coxhead/Work page#Rutaceae genera issues if you're interested. The "Has article but not accepted in PoWO or in Appelhans paper" ones seem to me to be in clear need of being moved. The others may need more investigation. Peter coxhead (talk) 11:20, 9 September 2021 (UTC)

@Peter coxhead:, I'll look into the problematic genera. APweb is a wonderful resource, but it is the work of a single person, and isn't reviewed by an editor; it does have occasional inconsistencies and errors (not that editorial review necessarily ensures that a work is error free). Plantdrew (talk) 16:48, 10 September 2021 (UTC)

Some of the problematic genera show up at the 'extra' list at the stub I've just created Zanthoxyloideae, particularly those with articles at the accepted name and at a synonym. Peter coxhead (talk) 09:28, 11 September 2021 (UTC)

That's a good way of handling it. It's totally clear where the lists came from. The Appelhans paper is a very useful one as it combines a phylogenetic study with a clear and conservative taxonomic proposal. The subfamily divisions are clear cut and they avoided the temptation to add tribes even though there are some obvious ones. I don't know if you've seen it, but the Rutaceae Phylogeny Poster (Cole & Groppo, 2020) includes a few genera not in Appelhans and notes a few synonyms.

It's odd that POWO still recognise Clymenia. It clusters with Eremocitus and Microcitrus in phylogenetic studies (Garcia-Lor et al, 2015, as well as Appelhans), so you'd expect all three to be synonymised with Citrus, the three merged into one genus, or all kept separate. I wonder if this an oversight or reflecting reluctance to depart from some older tradition? —  Jts1882 | talk  15:22, 11 September 2021 (UTC)

@Jts1882: no, I hadn't seen the poster – useful, thanks.

It's a good question about Clymenia. If anything, PoWO seems to lump. I expect more questions about Rutaceae and PoWO to emerge, so I'll wait before asking Govaerts. Peter coxhead (talk) 16:18, 11 September 2021 (UTC)

Another thing I find strange with POWO is the species listed under Citrus. As far as I can tell it is now accepted that the four ancestral species for most commercial citrus fruit are C. maxima, C. medica, C. reticulata, and C. micrantha. Yet POWO only recognises the first two of them as species. Citrus micrantha is considered a synonym of Citrus hystrix and Citrus reticulata (as Citrus × reticulata) a synonym of Citrus × aurantium. The latter is particularly odd as it seems well established that C. × aurantium is a hybrid between C. reticulata and C. maxima. This means the parent is considered a synonym of the hybrid. Adding to the confusion the IPNI entry is for Citrus reticulata rather than Citrus × reticulata using the same ID. —  Jts1882 | talk  07:54, 18 September 2021 (UTC)

@Jts1882: I haven't researched it extensively, but no source for the taxonomy of Citrus that I've seen makes sense to me; PoWO is far from the worst. As noted several times, I'm not touching this genus! Peter coxhead (talk) 17:44, 18 September 2021 (UTC)

@Peter coxhead: Have you looked at The Citrus Taxonomy by Ollitrault et at (2020). This has what seems a reasonable taxonomy consistent with recent phylogenetic studies (Curk et al, 2015; Wu et al, 2018) and a clear proposal (Table 4.1) for handling hybrids and varieties. —  Jts1882 | talk  06:29, 20 September 2021 (UTC)

@Jts1882: I'm very happy to leave Citrus to another editor! Peter coxhead (talk) 16:31, 20 September 2021 (UTC)

As far as I can tell, I've converted all the manual taxoboxes for Rutaceae articles, except:

• Citrus, which I'm not touching
• Some of the 'problem cases' listed at User:Peter coxhead/Work page#Rutaceae genera issues, which may need some more researching.

I want to expand the subfamily articles a bit, based on Appelhans et al. Peter coxhead (talk) 16:16, 15 September 2021 (UTC)

@Peter coxhead:, very nice work. I found a couple cases where a monotypic genus wasn't displaying a subfamily because |display_parents= wasn't included; I assumed that was unintentional and displayed the subfamily. Empleuridium was described in Rutaceae but [placed in Celastraceae in https://www.jstor.org/stable/2399174 1985]. Tropicos has it in Rutaceae which probably explains it's inclusion on APWeb's Rutaceae genus list. Pachycaulos has an automatic taxobox that erroneously places it in Rutaceae; it should be Gesneriaceae, which I think you have gone over fairly recently, so I'm inclined to leave it up to you what parent (subfamily or tribe?) it should have. Plantdrew (talk) 02:57, 16 September 2021 (UTC)

Well, you've managed to correct a number of my errors and omissions, so thanks.

• Empleuridium: ah, I hadn't found any reason why APweb had it in Rutaceae; it just seems to be a straightforward error. Are you able to tell Tropicos?
• Pachycaulos (an Estopedist1 article) could hardly have been more wrong, at least while still treated as an angiosperm: it's a monotypic genus within Gesnerioideae. Sigh.

Peter coxhead (talk) 06:20, 17 September 2021 (UTC)

@Peter coxhead:, Empleuridium is now in Celastraceae on Tropicos. I can edit Tropicos, but wanted to make sure herbarium specimens were refiled in Celastraceae along with making the edit. It won't automatically propagate to APWeb though. IPNI also has it in Rutaceae (all the other taxonbar sources have it in Celastraceae). Plantdrew (talk) 18:57, 17 September 2021 (UTC)

Excellent! Although it claims otherwise, I think that IPNI usually just repeats the family in the protologue, which is here and, as you noted above, has "Rutaceae?". What I find odd is that IPNI gives this as the origin of the genus name as well as the species name Empleuridium juniperinum, but the wording of the second paragraph on p. 50 implies to me that the authors regard the genus as already described. Peter coxhead (talk) 19:30, 17 September 2021 (UTC)

Goldblatt notes discrepancies in authorship for the genus and species in the article I linked above. Plantdrew (talk) 20:02, 17 September 2021 (UTC)

Um, but although he suggests assigning the genus name only to Sonder and the species name to Sonder & Harvey, the earliest citations given for both on p. 182 of his article are to Thesaurus Capensis. The reality seems to me to be that the genus is actually described in Flora Capensis (here) which is dated a year later. If both names are based on the Thesaurus Capensis text, then the authorship of both should be the same. If Flora Capensis is used, then it declares different authorships. I guess some subtle points in the ICNafp about priority are involved. Peter coxhead (talk) 18:08, 18 September 2021 (UTC)

Update: I've decided to go with Goldblatt et al. for the authorities at Empleuridium rather than IPNI/PoWO. Peter coxhead (talk) 08:17, 19 September 2021 (UTC)

Remaining issues

@Jts1882:, @Agricolae:, @Plantdrew: I believe I've done all I can for now on Rutaceae, bearing in mind that, as noted repeatedly, I am not going to do anything on Citrus and its species articles. There are a few remaining issues, which are caused by multiple sources accepting a genus as distinct, but there apparently being no names in that genus for many or most of the species.

• Bergera – very good evidence for removing from synonymy with Murraya, but there don't seem to be names in Bergera for most species, which is probably why PoWO still synonymizes
• Afraurantium – there are good sources putting the genus in Citrus but I can't find a name in Citrus for the only species Afraurantium senegalense
• Bouzetia – probably in Citrus, but I can't find a name in Citrus for the only species Bouzetia maritima

Peter coxhead (talk) 07:52, 23 September 2021 (UTC)

@Peter coxhead:. What sources place Afraurantium and Bouzetia in or near Citrus? There seems very little information on these genera. APweb places them both in Zanthoxyloideae (in the Rutaceae genus list) and doesn't mention them on the page describing Rutaceae. —  Jts1882 | talk  09:09, 24 September 2021 (UTC)

@Jts1882: firstly note that in the Rutaceae genus list, both are in italics, meaning they are synonyms, although it's not said what of. For Afraurantium, see the list of genera at the end of this poster and the GBIF entry, based on GRIN. Bouzetia is accepted in the poster, and by PoWO, which says the only species Bouzetia maritima is extinct, so will be problematic for molecular phylogenetic studies. On reflection, Citrus for the synonym is too speculative on my part, so I guess we leave Bouzetia as it is. Peter coxhead (talk) 09:58, 24 September 2021 (UTC)

Participation in a signpost interview for WikiProject Redirect

Hi Plantdrew, hope that you're well. I was wondering if you'd be able to participate in a Signpost interview in your capacity as a contributor to WikiProject Redirect? I am enthusiastic about these interviews because they help remind other Wikipedians about the passionate and diverse group of volunteers that edit Wikipedia, and into the many discussions and editors that inhabit our space, nooks and crannies. If you had time to even answer a few questions here (User:Tom (LT)/sandbox/WikiProject redirects interview draft) I'd be very grateful :). Tom (LT) (talk) 04:45, 9 September 2021 (UTC)

Ropica (genus)--apparently, we're working at the same time

I looked just now at the category page for the genus Ropica. I saw that it was sorted part way through the letter P by species name (ideal), and the rest of the way by genus name. I supposed it had been one of my interminable category sorting projects, that I had somehow forgotten. So I started doing a few of them.

And I noticed that a few others were getting done at the same time. I looked in the history, and saw that you are right now doing--something.

I don't want to get in your way, and mix you up as far as what you have done and haven't done. So I leave off, right here. And I'll also tell you that I did the ones with species names beginning with R; I did all of them, and I did no others. Uporządnicki (talk) 16:38, 11 September 2021 (UTC)

@AzseicsoK:, thanks for letting me know. I'm primarily converting manual taxoboxes to speciesboxes, but there are some other things I do in the course of those edits, such as adding sortkeys. I've been slowly working my way through Ropica over the last few days. I hadn't realized anybody was currently working on refining beetle categorization. Keep up the good work! Plantdrew (talk) 18:23, 11 September 2021 (UTC)

And thank you for making my new category, Oncideres, all kosher and official. It'll have about 120 items in it when I finish--likely today or tomorrow. Actually, I'm working on--been working since before I set up an account in 2012 on--everything categorization.

The subfamily Lamiinae, to which the Oncideres genus belongs, has a category; that category has 4400 articles. It also has 52 subcategories--generally tribes. And as a rule, the tribe categories list a lot of genera--and the species belonging to those genera are listed in the Lamiinae category. The particular genus Oncideres was a particularly confused one. A few of the species were in the category for the tribe, Onciderini. The rest were in Lamiinae. Uporządnicki (talk) 18:43, 11 September 2021 (UTC)

User:Plantdrew/common.js in Category:Pages with templates in the wrong namespace

Hello Plantdrew, your user script page User:Plantdrew/common.js is categorized into maintenance Category:Pages with templates in the wrong namespace because your script mentions {{R from scientific name}} and {{R to alternative scientific name}}. To fix this issue, you can wrap your whole script page in <nowiki>...</nowiki> in JavaScript comments:

// <nowiki> first line of [[User:Plantdrew/common.js]]
... your code ...
// </nowiki> last line of [[User:Plantdrew/common.js]]

—⁠andrybak (talk) 14:13, 12 September 2021 (UTC)

@Andrybak:, done. Plantdrew (talk) 01:57, 16 September 2021 (UTC)

Eugenia dysenterica - "from gems"

The article on Eugenia dysenterica says they can be reproduced "from gems". What does that mean?

Thanks! 2600:1702:4020:78A0:9976:4E20:47CF:517A (talk) 15:44, 17 September 2021 (UTC)

Barnstar for you

		The Science Barnstar
		This is for helping me on my species articles.CycoMa (talk) 03:45, 20 September 2021 (UTC)

Myrtaceae manual taxoboxes

I looked at User:Plantdrew/Plant automatic taxobox progress for another smallish family to perhaps work on, now that I've gone as far as I can (or want to in the case of Citrus) in Rutaceae. I picked Myrtaceae. Maybe all the families with manual taxoboxes are problematic, but there are certainly issues in Myrtaceae. See User:Peter coxhead/Work page#Myrtaceae genera issues. I've only looked at PoWO and APweb so far.

• There are about a dozen genera with articles where both APweb and PoWO agree they are synonyms, so they should be merged or moved.
• There are seven where APweb disagrees with PoWO, but we are using the PoWO genera, so the articles are probably ok at their current title.
• There are seven where PoWO disagrees with APweb, but we are using the APweb genera.
• There are subfamilies and tribes in APweb which could be used, at least where sources agree on genera.

Any thoughts? Peter coxhead (talk) 17:04, 26 September 2021 (UTC)

@Peter coxhead:, Myrtaceae isn't a smallish family (but there aren't many manual taxoboxes left). I think it may have been the first family I worked on that had an infrafamily classification with multiple ranks (subfamily and tribes). If it wasn't the first, it was still one of the earlier ones, and back when I had lower standards for verification and adding references. I don't remember the details, but at a glance it looks like APweb, GRIN and NCBI are in accord and are all following Wilson 2011's infrafamily classification.

The tables on your work page are missing several (synonymous) genera that account for many of the remaining manual taxoboxes; e.g. Mozartia, Pseudoeugenia Piliocalyx, and species in Gomadesia and Krokia

It's certainly worth adding references and bringing genus synonymy up to date.

I think Myrtaceae is pretty representative of the issues with manual taxoboxes in smallish (by number of manual taxoboxes) families. Mostly it's going to be a couple of genera that should be turned into redirects as a synonyms, dealing with species in these genera (via moves), and lumping/redirecting a handful of species that aren't accepted by e.g. POWO (these will mostly be Polbot creations for species that are accepted by IUCN but not other databases). Plantdrew (talk) 22:20, 26 September 2021 (UTC)

Sorry, by "smallish family to perhaps work on" I meant smallish in number of manual taxoboxes, as you wrote in your last paragraph.

I hadn't checked Category:Myrtaceae genera for WP genus articles, only the genera listed at Myrtaceae, so hadn't picked up those you listed, i.e. Mozartia, Pseudoeugenia, etc. I'll check and add them to my table.

The issue for me is that I'm not really happy now just to convert manual taxoboxes as I used to do, without considering whether the overall taxonomy of the family is correct. Adding in the genera in the Myrtaceae genera category, there are a lot of synonymous genera that need to be dealt with – at least two dozen if the PoWO genera are taken as correct rather than APweb – but I haven't found anything like the Appelhans et al. paper, and a 2011 infrafamily classification is rather old by molecular phylogenetic standards. So I'm not sure whether or how to proceed. Peter coxhead (talk) 06:19, 27 September 2021 (UTC)

There is a 2017 paper on the tribe Myrteae (Vasconcelos et al, 2017). It confirms the tribe is monophyletic with 46 of 51 genera placed in it (genera numbers cite Wilson et al 2011 and WCSP). It defines a number of groups that could be the basis for a further subtribe division but they don't make any proposals. This seems to provide good evidence for placement in a tribe for nearly half the genera in Myrtaceae.

Vasconcelos et al, 2017 also confirmed the polyphyly of Blepharocalyx and suggested resurrecting genus Temu for Blepharocalyx cruckshanksii. As this is the treatment used by POWO, I've moved Blepharocalyx cruckshanksii to Temu cruckshanksii. I put the article at the species names even though its a monotypic genus as Temu (plant) is used for something else.

With this change the automated taxonomy system now has 55 genera in Myrteae. These are the 51 genera belonging to the tribe as stated in Vasconcelos et al, 2017, Temu (added by me today), and three others: Calycorectes, Feijoa, and Hexachlamys. According to your table, Hexachlamys is synonymised with Eugenia by both POWO and APweb, Feijoa recognised by POWO but synonymised with Acca in APweb, and Calycorectes accepted by both POWO and APweb. Vasconcelos et al, 2017 includes Feijoa sellowiana as Acca sellowiana, consistent with WCSP —  Jts1882 | talk  10:26, 29 September 2021 (UTC)

Based on Mazine et al 2014 (phylogeny) and Mazine et al 2016 (taxonomy) Calycorectes and Hexachlamys are sections within Eugenia. Other synonymised genera in Eugenia are also discussed. —  Jts1882 | talk  14:06, 29 September 2021 (UTC)

@Jts1882: see also my comment at User talk:Gderrin#Myrtaceae genera. I think I've done most of what I feel able to at present. Peter coxhead (talk) 15:51, 29 September 2021 (UTC)

Ok, so I updated the table at User:Peter coxhead/Work page#Not accepted by PoWO or APweb. There are 13 genera not accepted by PoWO or APweb where they agree on the accepted name. So should they be fixed, regardless of the kind of taxobox? Peter coxhead (talk) 06:45, 27 September 2021 (UTC)

Further update: I've fixed all the manual taxoboxes for Myrtaceae, as far as I know, moving/redirecting pages with manual taxoboxes as per PoWO and APweb. I haven't done anything about the remaining problematic genera with automatic taxoboxes. Peter coxhead (talk) 15:50, 28 September 2021 (UTC)

Correcting/updating the overall taxonomy of families is something that should be done. But I don't think it is a task that should necessarily be coupled with implementing automatic taxoboxes. I intend to go back and verify genus lists and add references for infrafamilial classification of the families I worked on early on when my standards were lower. I've wanted to wait until there was a big announcement that World Flora Online was ready to use (and then compare WFO/POWO treatments). But WFO still isn't in great shape and I'm not sure an announcement is coming any time soon (I guess this publication is the closest thing we'll get to an announcement that WFO was completed by their 2020 deadline).

I estimate about 20-25% of plant genus articles were created this year by Estopedist1; none of them have references in the taxonomy templates, nor do they have parents below family rank. So even in families I worked on when my standards were high, it will be necessary to revisit them to add references and infrafamily parents for Estopedist1 created genus articles.

You should definitely work on problematic Myrtaceae genera with automatic taxoboxes. If POWO, APWeb (and Williams 2011?) agree that a genus is a synonym, Wikipedia shouldn't have an article for it.

I'm inclined to treat verifying and updating family taxonomy as a separate process from implementing automatic taxoboxes; both can and should be done simultaneously in dealing with remaining manual taxoboxes, but we should track progress on verifying/updating separately as many families have automatic taxoboxes fully implemented but haven't been verified and updated (and updating species lists in genus articles is another big task). Plantdrew (talk) 16:56, 28 September 2021 (UTC)

Yes, sadly WFO is a disappointment so far. Much of it amounts to no more than a flashier–looking version of The Plant List. In particular, at least when I've looked at particular groups, TPL's error in importing Tropicos names as if Tropicos accepted them has not been fixed.

Ok, thanks for your comments and I'll work at least on the genera on which PoWO and APweb agree that the WP articles are synonyms.

I noted some comments you've made about:

• not adding {{R with history}} to redirected Polbot articles; I'm now only adding the template if there appear to be significant other edits. One issue that made me hesitate was when there were only other bot edits, but if these were recorded on the talk page, I felt that history should perhaps be noted.
• not automatically copying the status when moving a Polbot article. I've sometimes removed it from the taxobox and added something like "Under the synonym ..., the species was regarded as ..." followed by the old status ref. I think a good marker of the status being doubtful is when the species under the now accepted name has a markedly wider distribution.

Thanks again for your input, which I value as I'm only an amateur botanist. Peter coxhead (talk) 17:58, 28 September 2021 (UTC)

Herbstia

Thanks for all your edits on Herbstia. 2 things / questions !! You added 'Category:Plants described in 1849' - POWO have only 1976 publ. 1977 for the genera, Herbstia and for the taxon, Herbstia brasiliana. Also am attempting to write Hewittia malabarica and its genera Hewittia, is it better to label the article as the taxon or the genera?? I am always unsure in these monotypic genera - where it is easier or more understandable to have one article that covers both genera and single taxon. DavidAnstiss (talk) 23:29, 28 September 2021 (UTC)

@DavidAnstiss:, a monotypic genus and it's only species should be covered in a single article, and the genus name should usually be the article title. The exception is when the name of a monotypic genus requires disambiguation; in that case the binomial should be the title (see Wikipedia:Naming_conventions_(flora)#Monotypic_taxa).

Herbstia brasiliana was first described as Banalia brasiliana, and that name was published in 1849. Description in year categories should be the year a species was first described, not the year in which it was given it's current name; see Wikipedia:WikiProject_Plants/Description_in_year_categories.

I hope that helps. Let me know if you have any other questions. Plantdrew (talk) 01:31, 29 September 2021 (UTC)

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You Moved Roundheaded pine beetle to Dendroctonus adjunctus

Hello @Plantdrew:! I saw you moved roundheaded pine beetle to its scientific name, with the justification that the scientific name is more common than the common name. In this case, not so. If you look up the scientific name, you'll see only taxonomic records. Looking up the common name, however, yields a wealth of pest control literature and entomologist records, indicating the common name is more commonly used. You've moved many of my articles from scientific names to common names, and I reviewed all your previous moves and found you were correct. On this article, however, I think the move is unjustified, and I ask you to undo it. Thanks! Gug01 (talk) 04:47, 28 November 2021 (UTC)

About the Rubia argyi {{taxobox}} - over to you

"Rubia argyi (H.Lév. & Vaniot) H.Hara ex Lauener" - thank you for all your previous help - and I would seek your opinion about this - Pete AU aka --Shirt58 (talk) 12:08, 2 December 2021 (UTC)

 Done Basic {{speciesbox}} added. —  Jts1882 | talk  13:15, 2 December 2021 (UTC)

A very sticky taxobox

At Logania (fish), when converted to Automatic taxobox, it shows up the plant one. Can you fix it?Leomk0403 (Don't shout here, Shout here!) 09:17, 3 December 2021 (UTC)

@Leomk0403:, when there are multiple taxa with the same name on Wikipedia, the taxonomy templates will need to be disambiguated. See Logania (butterfly) and Template:Taxonomy/Logania (butterfly) for an example of how this is accomplished; take note of how |link= is formatted in the template.

It is OK for there to be a plant/fungus genus and an animal genus with the same. It isn't OK for there to be two animal (or plant/fungus) genera with the same name. When there are two animal genera with the same name, the more recently described one needs to be renamed (sometimes the renaming hasn't happened, in which case, Wikipedia just follows the existing literature). The butterfly was named in 1884, the fish was named in 1962. Loganella was published as a replacement name for the fish in 1986 (see here). So the fish should be moved. However, it's a little more complicated than that, as apparently, Loganella was already in use for another animal, and the name of the fish had to be replaced again, as Loganellia (see here). I want to investigate the situation a little further to be sure I've figured out the correct name for the fish before taking any other actions. Plantdrew (talk) 22:55, 3 December 2021 (UTC)

Speedy deletion nomination of Template:Taxonomy/Edwardsiella (bacteria)

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Speedy deletion nomination of Template:Taxonomy/Jacksonia

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A tag has been placed on Template:Taxonomy/Jacksonia, requesting that it be speedily deleted from Wikipedia. This has been done under section G1 of the criteria for speedy deletion, because the page appears to have no meaningful content or history, and the text is unsalvageably incoherent. If the page you created was a test, please use the sandbox for any other experiments you would like to do.

If you think this page should not be deleted for this reason, you may contest the nomination by visiting the page and clicking the button labelled "Contest this speedy deletion". This will give you the opportunity to explain why you believe the page should not be deleted. However, be aware that once a page is tagged for speedy deletion, it may be deleted without delay. Please do not remove the speedy deletion tag from the page yourself, but do not hesitate to add information in line with Wikipedia's policies and guidelines. Leomk0403 (Don't shout here, Shout here!) 01:30, 21 December 2021 (UTC)

Merry Christmas

Merry Christmas, Plantdrew! Or Season's Greetings or Happy Winter Solstice! As the year winds to a close, I would like to take a moment to recognize your hard work and offer heartfelt gratitude for all you do for Wikipedia. May this Holiday Season bring you nothing but joy, health and prosperity. Onel5969 TT me 22:53, 21 December 2021 (UTC)

About Calendula suffruticosa - "Symb. Bot. (Vahl) 2: 94 (1791)"?

Hi Plantdrew,

It would appear to me that Martin Vahl is the binomial authority for this plant.

IPNI tells me "Calendula suffruticosa Vahl, Symb. Bot. (Vahl) 2: 94 (1791)"

"Symb. Bot." would appear to be a "learned journal".

Could you possibly look into this?

Pete AU aka --Shirt58 (talk) 11:26, 24 December 2021 (UTC)

@Shirt58:, looks like this has been sorted out now? But yeah, per IPNI, Martin Vahl is the authority and it was published in a work abbreviated Symb. Bot. IPNI notes the work as being a "folio" (there weren't very many learned journals in 1791, and a lot of taxonomic work from that era was essentially self-published). Plantdrew (talk) 23:55, 25 December 2021 (UTC)

Article assessments

Hey, Plantdrew, when I create or significantly update a species article, I usually create the talk page (if article is new) and add the WikiProject Plants template to the talk page. I always assume low priority and can generally tell the difference between the classes. I feel like setting stub, start, and C classes are fine, but I don't and won't do B or above (obviously). Do we have a rule or guideline for what should be in an plant or botanist article for it to be at a certain class? As always, feel free to correct me and let me know. – Elizabeth (Eewilson) (tag or ping me) (talk) 08:26, 30 December 2021 (UTC)

@Eewilson:. I operate mostly like you do; assume low priority and don't do B class or higher. There are guidelines at Wikipedia:WikiProject_Plants/Assessment#Quality_scale. The table is ancient boilerplate; most of the organismal WikiProjects with assessment guidelines have the same text (I don't know where it was first copied from). There's a more recent (2018) section below the table with more specific guidelines for what a taxon article should have to qualify for various classes. None of that should be taken as gospel or assumed to have broad consensus. The examples in the table should probably be re-evaluated; many of them date from 2007, and I wouldn't consider the 2007 version of broccoli to be B-class (I'm not even sure I'd call the current version of broccoli B-class; it has at least added a history section since 2007, which I think is crucial for a domesticated vegetable, but it still doesn't mention how long it takes to grow (which is basic information on any seed packet)).

My take on B-class is that it should follow the checklist given in the table. Stub/start/C assessments can be done in seconds, based on the length of the article, and checking that certain information is present (morphology, distribution, etc.). B-class assessment should at least involve reading the entire article and making sure it is well-referenced.

There are article creators who apply stub templates to their work that I would consider start class. If the creator hasn't added a talk page template themselves, I add one with the class set as stub (going with the template on the article rather than using my own judgement). Assessment is subjective and some assessor are more conservative than others. The criteria in the boilerplate table don't really reflect how Wikipedia works in 2021 (it doesn't assume that references are essential). Plantdrew (talk) 17:33, 30 December 2021 (UTC)

Thanks. That helps. This brings me to a follow-up topic, and that is if the assessment guidelines need to be re-evaluated, how does that happen and by whom? We are a large group of plant lovers with what appears to be a small group of people interested in the maintenance or updating of the project page, other than statistics. This is not a criticism as much as an observation, although it may be an inaccurate observation. I've been around the project for perhaps about 15 months, mostly creating articles or enhancing them, related as you know to Symphyotrichum. Page histories show that the people who got it going some years ago are not doing much now or possibly have left Wikipedia. Am I being alarmist over things that are not a big deal? Newcomers, like me, and others I've seen come since me, look to what is on the project pages for guidance and act accordingly (or try to, hopefully). I'd like to see us all be presented with up-to-date guidelines. But if others don't care too much about the overseeing of the project pages (e.g., changes that may need to be made to the pages), then should I? Are there project administrators? Is that an official thing in this project? Thanks. I value your thoughtful input and advice. Feel free to answer me here, on my talk page, or in an email. – Elizabeth (Eewilson) (tag or ping me) (talk) 23:52, 30 December 2021 (UTC)