Talk:Titanis/GA1

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Reviewer: PrimalMustelid (talk · contribs) 02:04, 18 May 2023 (UTC)[reply]

I can take this review session since I'm knowledgeable to Cenozoic paleontology to an extent. I'll start a full review of the article based on GA criteria within the next few days, so I'll let you know when I've started it. PrimalMustelid (talk) 02:04, 18 May 2023 (UTC)[reply]

Sounds good, thank you! AFH (talk) 10:51, 18 May 2023 (UTC)[reply]
Hi, I have made some additional edits to the page. AFH (talk) 13:27, 25 May 2023 (UTC)[reply]
Just checking in, are you still reviewing this article? AFH (talk) 01:50, 29 May 2023 (UTC)[reply]
Oh, sorry about the inactivity, I can get a review by this week. PrimalMustelid (talk) 13:06, 30 May 2023 (UTC)[reply]

Part 1:

Order of Sections:

  • Put Taxonomy-related sections such as "Discovery and Age" and "Classification" first before any other non-lead section. PrimalMustelid (talk) 01:01, 31 May 2023 (UTC)[reply]

Lead Section:

  • "The genus name references the Greek titans due to its large size and the specific name is after the collector Benjamin Waller."

Description:

  • "Titanis size has been estimated several times, with older guesses placing it at 2 to 2.5 meters (6.6 to 8.2 ft) tall, but more accurate scaling after the discovery of new material downsized it to 1.4 to 1.87 meters (4.6 to 6.1 ft) tall and 200 kilograms (440 lb) in weight."
    • Rephrase the beginning of the sentence to "The size of Titanis has been estimated...." PrimalMustelid (talk) 01:01, 31 May 2023 (UTC)[reply]
  • "Two quadratojugals are preserved, one of which has a more pronounced crest cranial to the articulation tubercular. This is the opposite in the smaller individual, which has a deep fossa anterocranial to the articulation tubercular."
    • The second sentence is slightly disconnected to the first sentence. I would make it clear that both sentences are referring to two different quadratojugals, one of which is smaller than the other. PrimalMustelid (talk) 01:01, 31 May 2023 (UTC)[reply]
  • "The pes was large and had three toes, the middle being the longest, with a large killing ungual on the third digit.[11] The spinal column is poorly known from Titanis, though several vertebrae have been collected from Florida."

Discovery and Age:

  • "The earliest discovery of Titanis fossils originates from the winter of 1961/1962, when amateur archaeologists named Benjamin Waller and Robert Allen were hunting for fossils through the use of scuba gear in the Santa Fe River on the border of Gilchrist and Columbia Counties in Florida, United States."
    • You don't really need "named" in the sentence, remove that word. PrimalMustelid (talk) 01:01, 31 May 2023 (UTC)[reply]
  • "The two collectors donated their discoveries to the Florida Museum of Natural History (UF) later along with bones of equids, proboscideans, and many other Floridan fossils."
  • "Ray also noted their stratigraphic origin, being found in a sedimentary layer containing the equid Nannippus and "bone-crushing" dog Borophagus, indicating that they originated from the upper part of the Blancan stage (2.2-1.8 million years old)."
  • "A new discovery of Titanis came in 1995, in which the description an isolated pedal phalanx that had been recovered from a sand and gravel pit near Odem along the Nueces River in San Patricio County, Texas."
  • "This was the first description of Titanis fossils that referred it to the genus from outside of Florida."
    • This is a bit of an awkward sentence, remove "that referred it to the genus." PrimalMustelid (talk) 01:01, 31 May 2023 (UTC)[reply]
  • "The pit was largely dissorganized, with fossils coming from the Early Pliocene and Late Pleistocene jumbled together inside the pit."

Classification:

  • "All of these genera went extinct by the middle Holocene during the Quaternary Extinction Event, in which the last phorusrhacids also died out during."
    • 10,000-12,000 years isn't exactly middle Holocene. It's more a boundary between late Pleistocene and early Holocene, though people more often say "late Pleistocene." PrimalMustelid (talk) 01:01, 31 May 2023 (UTC)[reply]
      • Also, Borophagus vanished by the early Pleistocene (~2 Ma) while Miracinonyx vanished probably before the end of the Last Glacial Maximum/Younger Dryas Event since the last known fossils date to 17,000-19,000 years ago. PrimalMustelid (talk) 01:01, 31 May 2023 (UTC)[reply]
    • Also, again, "Quaternary Extinction Event" isn't exactly an accurate name since it's a broad name and is shaky as a term, I'd just use "late Pleistocene extinctions" in the case of Smilodon. PrimalMustelid (talk) 01:01, 31 May 2023 (UTC)[reply]

More to come soon, looks like the article's good for GA other than minor issues. PrimalMustelid (talk) 01:01, 31 May 2023 (UTC)[reply]

Hi I made some additional edits AFH (talk) 17:59, 12 June 2023 (UTC)[reply]
Alrighty then, I'll be starting the 2nd half of the GA review. PrimalMustelid (talk) 22:10, 12 June 2023 (UTC)[reply]

Part 2:

Paleobiology:

  • Something I will note is that the section reviews the Phorusrhacidae in general more often than Titanis itself, which I feel several people might be dissatisfied with should they read it. Since this is likely to the relatively poor fossil record of Titanis, I think I can let this case slide, but the lack of complete fossil specimens or research around the paleoecology of Titanis in particular should be emphasized in several subsections. PrimalMustelid (talk) 15:45, 16 June 2023 (UTC)[reply]
  • "Phorusrhacids are thought to have been ground predators or scavengers, and have often been considered apex predators that dominated Cenozoic South America in the absence of placental mammalian predators, though they did co-exist with some large, carnivorous borhyaenid mammals."
  • "They were flightless, as evidenced by the proportional size of their wings and body mass, and wing-size was more reduced in larger members of the group."
    • Add "the" before "wing-size" and remove the colon as it seems unnecessary. PrimalMustelid (talk) 15:45, 16 June 2023 (UTC)[reply]
  • "They found these estimates unlikely due to the large body size of these birds, and instead suggested the strength could have been used to break the long-bones of medium-sized mammals, the size for example of a saiga or Thomson's gazelle."
    • Replace "the size for example of" with "typical sizes being equivalent to." PrimalMustelid (talk) 15:45, 16 June 2023 (UTC)[reply]
  • "Instead, they suggested that it either fed on smaller prey that could be killed and consumed more safely, by for example swallowing it whole, or that when targeting large prey, it used a series of well-targeted repetitive strikes with the beak, in a "attack-and-retreat" strategy."

Paleoenvironment:

  • "The Blancan age strata of Florida from sites Titanis has been unearthed from preserve over a hundred species and many different megafauna."
    • The phrasing is a bit awkward with "unearthed from preserve over." PrimalMustelid (talk) 15:45, 16 June 2023 (UTC)[reply]
    • Also in this case, since you're listing smaller mammals such as tayassuids or Capromeryx, I wouldn't use "megafauna" here, just use "mammalian faunas." PrimalMustelid (talk) 15:45, 16 June 2023 (UTC)[reply]
  • "The immigration after the full formation witnessed the movement of glyptodonts, capybaras, pampatheres, and marsupials to North America via the Central America route and a reverse migration of ungulates, proboscideans, felids, canids, and many other megafauna groups to South America."
    • Again, I wouldn't use "megafauna" in this as it's not just large animals that dispersed between the two landmasses, small animals participated too. PrimalMustelid (talk)

Extinction:

  • "Therefore, the extinction of Titanis and phrousrhacidae as a whole is a mystery."

The images as far as I'm aware should be good for usage, so it's just some of the remaining text-based minor errors and a potential concern for the paleobiology section that's left. Should you address all these, the article should be good for GA. PrimalMustelid (talk) 15:45, 16 June 2023 (UTC)[reply]

Alright I have put in your suggestions, thank you for the review! I’ll be nominating it for Featured Article after your promotion. AFH (talk) 18:55, 17 June 2023 (UTC)[reply]
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