Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Cetaceans/Archive 2

I actually set up the COTF on Wikipedia:WikiProject Sharks and that's where i have been for a while, setting up the project to get it off it's feet. I had been thinking of doing a cetaceans one as well. Fortnight or month would be best i think. Probably month. I can set that up if you want. Also what i was thinking about was assessment of articles, have a look at the sharks one and that was what i was thinking, it is the official kinda one. With assessment it doesnt really matter how long it takes so i think that one should work ok too.--chris_huh 21:59, 5 September 2006 (UTC)

The WikiProject Sharks collaboration project has an agreeable method. --

Gray Porpoise

01:50, 6 September 2006 (UTC)

There is another WikiProject called Wikipedia:WikiProject Sharks, which, surprisingly, is about sharks. I thought i would mention it here to see if anyone would be interested in helping out.--chris_huh 21:59, 5 September 2006 (UTC)

Dolphinarium has been nominated for Good Article status - It actually went up on 18 August, but i didn't notice chris_huh 13:58, 6 September 2006 (UTC)

I have made a draft of a welcome message we could use at

I like the idea of having the todo list template in there, it makes sense i guess. Although do you think the blue may make it stand out too much, a bit striking, wouldn't it look better just with a white background, but maybe a blue or grey border around it perhaps. chris_huh 01:12, 8 September 2006 (UTC)

I made an edit to your one, if you hadn't noticed. What do you think of that? chris_huh 23:56, 8 September 2006 (UTC)

I like that! The original was just a rough idea, awaiting a good designer. --

Gray Porpoise

00:59, 9 September 2006 (UTC)

Should I move it to a subpage of WikiProject Cetaceans, or leave it in my userspace? --

Gray Porpoise

16:29, 23 September 2006 (UTC)

Might as well move it to

Wikipedia:WikiProject Cetaceans/Welcome or something like that. chris_huh

17:06, 23 September 2006 (UTC)

I have made a few diagrams for particular cetaceans which compares the size of them against an average human as i thought these would be useful images. I have uploaded 11 to commons so far called things like Sperm_whale_size.png and Blue_whale_size.png etc. What do you think about these (they are quite basic), and where should they go on the pages. It would be handy if they could go in the taxobox, maybe in the image2 parameter, so that then they are all in the same place on all pages, rather than having some in strange places. chris_huh 01:10, 8 September 2006 (UTC)

That's a good idea. --

Gray Porpoise

01:29, 8 September 2006 (UTC)

I have added the images to most of the cetacean articles. I haven't made ones for the porpoises or river and oceanic dolphins. I will ge tround to that soon. Some of themi don't have informaiton for so i will have to find them somewhere else chris_huh 15:54, 9 September 2006 (UTC)

Very nice indeed. Every time I see one, I cant help but think the diver is about to get whacked! Istvan 22:41, 13 September 2006 (UTC)

I have set up a collaboration. This is essentially a copy of the one i made on Wikipedia:WikiProject Sharks although, of course this one is about cetaceans! It is also a collaboration of the MONTH as there aren't too many of use, nor are there a great deal of articles. I have added links to it from the main project page. Any one got any good ideas for what the first one could be? chris_huh 23:48, 8 September 2006 (UTC)

Gray Porpoise

01:19, 15 September 2006 (UTC)

Another idea of mine for a Cetaceans subproject: factual accuracy check. Members could sign up to read through articles and make sure, using outside sources, that there aren't inaccuracies. --

I have reworked the way the taxonomy can be sorted for

chris_huh 23:21, 27 September 2006 (UTC)

I'm not certain this is a good idea. While it is similar to what is done on Wikispecies, that site has a much lower traffic profile and so the compounding of templates has little effect on the site. Wikipedia has such a high traffic profile that the compounding of templates in this manner puts an undue strain on the servers. This is one of the reasons that the taxoboxes were changed to be a single template instead of multiple and sometimes nested templates. - UtherSRG (talk) 12:32, 28 September 2006 (UTC)

Moved from front page
Hi, I am enquiring about Indo Pacific Humpback Dolphins( Sousa Chinensis). Do you have any informantion or research on these estuarine dolphins. I am a Volunteer and a lay person in scientific terms, at the Dolphin Centre at Tin Can Bay, Qld ,Australia, where these Dolphins are found. I wish to put together an education programme for children, to teach them about Estuarine Dolphins & Dugongs in particular,as they relate to our area. Can you supply me with any sites or information . Thanks Norma Sanderson. —The preceding

Have you looked at humpback dolphin? - UtherSRG (talk) 11:43, 18 October 2006 (UTC)

You can see both the Dugong (Dugong dugong) and Indo-Pacific Humpback Dolphins (Sousa chinensis) at Underwater World Singapore (www.underwaterworld.com.sg). Jlmahon 02:36, 20 November 2006 (UTC)

Hello, I was just about to undertake some copyediting of the

I have contributed to many articles in the

You are correct about "Finback Whale", as it represents a species. For ranks above the species level, comon names should be in sentence case, such as "baleen whales". For details on the reasoning and logic, see the

Bird Wikiproject. - UtherSRG (talk)

22:37, 22 October 2006 (UTC)

Also, see

WP:MoS#Article titles --WhiteDragon (talk

) 17:03, 30 January 2008 (UTC)

The article has been promoted to featured article. Neil916 (Talk) 18:22, 11 November 2006 (UTC)

Great news. Neil - i don't know where you're getting the time to do all this but well done, it really paid off. Chris_huh^talk 18:24, 11 November 2006 (UTC)

The portal is also up for featured status, but, surprisingly, for featured portal. See its nomination, and help out if you can. Chris_huh^talk 18:37, 7 November 2006 (UTC)

I'm excited to see how this turns out. Please inform me if any work needs to be done on the portal. --

Porpoise^{cetaceans have large brains}

19:28, 11 November 2006 (UTC)

Excellent. Though it's in need of a few changes to be FA-worthy, I'm nominating it for good article status. --

Porpoise^{What have I done}

‽ 18:11, 11 November 2006 (UTC)

Yeah, i regard Start-Class as being maybe a paragraph or two. B Class should be a fair bit more than that - with some headings, because after B is GA, and that would be quite a bit higher than a few headings. Chris_huh^talk 14:15, 15 November 2006 (UTC)

There is currently a barnstar proposal at Wikipedia:Barnstar and award proposals/New Proposals#Wildlife Barnstar for a barnstar which would be available for use for this project. Please feel free to visit the page and make any comments you see fit. Badbilltucker 15:35, 15 November 2006 (UTC)

Beginning cross-post.

See

ROCKER★

03:37, 26 November 2006 (UTC)

End cross-post. Please do not comment more in this section.

There is now a proposed project at Wikipedia:WikiProject Council/Proposals#Veterinary Medicine to deal with matters of veterinary medicine, a subject which currently has disproportionately low content in wikipedia. Any wikipedia editors who have an interest in working on content related to the subject are encouraged to indicate as much there. Thank you for your attention. Badbilltucker 22:12, 6 December 2006 (UTC)

So the Baiji (Chinese River Dolphin) is no more ("functionally extinct"). I plan on putting up a lot of info on the Baiji in a few days as i was (ironically) working on it offline a few days before it was announced (typical, really). At the moment the page is at Chinese River Dolphin but should be moved soon to Baiji as that is the proper term for it.

Just thought i would say farewell to the Baiji. Chris_huh^talk 17:24, 16 December 2006 (UTC)

I'm so sad for the baiji. I just hope this will be a wake-up call for conserving other species.

We do good work here on Wikipedia. I tell myself it helps. Kla'quot 17:43, 16 December 2006 (UTC)

How unfortunate... I see that our coverage of this event has expanded somewhat significantly. --

Your wish is my command!

00:02, 23 December 2006 (UTC)

The articles on baleen whales are pretty close to being a

Please be aware of the proposed Species microformat, particularly in relation to taxoboxes. Comments welcome on the wiki at that link. Andy Mabbett 15:37, 28 January 2007 (UTC)

Hi everyone. I've been trying to figure out what to do with the very long section in the Orca article which discusses captive orcas. Most of it describes unfortunate incidents. I'd like to spin it out into a separate article that covers cetaceans in captivity, including the relevant purposes, history, current practices, effects on the animals involved, and ethical debate.

Right now we have the following similar articles which cover these issues to some degree:

• Dolphinarium
• Marine mammal park

Marine mammal park includes a list of marine mammal parks; we also have List of dolphinariums and List of marine parks with Orcas. There is also Oceanarium.

I propose that we:

• merge
  Cetaceans in captivity
  .
• summarize the Captivity section of
  Cetaceans in captivity
  .
• merge List of dolphinariums, List of marine parks with Orcas, and the list of marine mamal parks into a single article called List of marine parks with cetaceans

Does this make sense? I'll put requests at the Talk pages of these articles to come here and comment

Cheers, Kla'quot 11:03, 29 January 2007 (UTC)

On the surface I'd have to disagree since dophinairium and marine mammal park seem to be lengthy enough to stand alone. I also would expect people to find these (dolphinarium, marine mammal park, & oceanarium) by their names but not "Cataceans in captivity". I just don't see the need to merge. I might consider a new article

Cetaceans in captivity combining bits and pieces of other articles that overlap but not a merge. Please discuss more. Cburnett

14:03, 29 January 2007 (UTC)

Hmm, I disagree. I do see overlap though, with the same issue being brought up in various articles. So perhaps there could be an article like "Cetacean welfare in captivity", which these articles could link to for more information. BabyNuke 18:38, 29 January 2007 (UTC)

Just to be clear: do you disagree with the merge or with my comment (you're indention after my comment leads me to think so). Or both. :) Cburnett 20:52, 29 January 2007 (UTC)

I think an article called

Cetaceans in captivity would be a good topic for an article, as an article on exotic animal husbandry. I think the proposed Cetacean welfare in captivity is too POV. However, I would not support merging marine mammal park into such an article, because marine mammals kept in captivity include pinnipeds and sometimes others, not just cetaceans. I would support merging dolphinarium, or better yet, renaming it and then beginning to generalize it to other cetaceans. --Ginkgo100^talk

21:21, 29 January 2007 (UTC)

• Cetology
• Humpback whale - officially it's a Featured Article, but it needs a lot of work.

Kla'quot 05:22, 16 March 2007 (UTC)

Many whale articles list more than one species in the taxobox. These need to be split into their own articles. An example of one of these offending articles is Right whale.

Species should have their own articles, and list of species in genus articles should be put in the "subdivision" box (e.g. see how kangaroo's taxobox lists species, as done by just about every other genus article on Wikipedia). "Conservation status" does not belong on genus articles, nor on these Whale articles that try to cram 4 species into one taxobox. Likewise having four range maps is nasty. These should be at least overlaid and shown all in one map.

Also there's a bunch of articles where the conservation status is listed as "Not evaluated" (NE) where it should be "Data Deficient" (DD). This may be because of taxobox template changes.

I clicked through to all the cetacean species articles, and made this list of crammed cetacean articles:

• Right whale
• Minke Whale
• Bryde's Whale
• Pilot whale
• Common dolphin
• Right whale dolphin
• Humpback dolphin
• Tursiops aduncus
  -> Tursiops truncatus)
• Giant beaked whale
• Bottlenose whale

Maybe there could be an uncramming collaboration. Exciting idea, yeah? —Pengo 03:15, 17 March 2007 (UTC)

This is something that really needs to be done. Right whale in particular, shame its a FA and splitting it up could remove that. When it comes to right whale we could either just have four separate articles and then Right Whale either redirects to the most common or a disambiguation page. Or we have four separate articles plus another article on Right Whales (ie the group of whales) which could mean that a lot of the current text could be kept. The others might be easier to do as it would be a smaller job. I suppose that we could just have Right Whale as the COTM or something and focus mainly on working on splitting it. I dont know about merging Balaenidae straight into Right Whale as then it can confuse what it actually means, but i suppose if a Right Whales page is made it would deal with that. Chris_huh^talk 20:41, 19 March 2007 (UTC)

Having one article per species makes sense for some articles, but not all. I think we should decide on a case-by-case basis, depending on whether the result of splitting would be two substantially different articles or two very similar articles. Kla'quot 03:10, 20 March 2007 (UTC)

Let's start with the most obvious cases. Right whale is a good one, and I'd be in favour of it being the next COTM. Yeah, three or four range maps in one taxobox looks crazy. Kla'quot 06:41, 21 March 2007 (UTC)

FYI, I've nominated this picture at Wikipedia:Featured picture candidates/Killer whale mother and calf. Kla'quot 03:07, 20 March 2007 (UTC)

Good news everyone, after some hard work, Humpback whale is looking much better and has survived its Featured Article Review. Even better, the population of Humpback whales has increased by an order of magnitude ;) Kla'quot 05:14, 27 April 2007 (UTC)

In an attempt to uncram the Right whale article, I've started three new ones on right whales:

• Pacific Northern Right Whale
• Atlantic Northern Right Whale
• Southern Right Whale

All of which are stubs right now (hint hint). And if you're interested in editing these articles, you might want to look at the

Additonally, put yer on how to reorganize the RWs here cheers, Casliber (talk · contribs) 00:34, 16 June 2007 (UTC)

here. Tomer^talk 22:13, 12 June 2007 (UTC)

Category:Famous orcas is showing a lack of conventions. Most of them use the form "Name (whale)" but as orcas are dolphins, it's not really correct. Should it be "Name (orca)" instead, and if yes should orca be capitalized? Kla'quot (talk | contribs) 07:23, 26 June 2007 (UTC)

Ooh, good point (Orca != whale). Any followup/consensus on this, perhaps discussed elsewhere? I've been touching a lot of those pages today... I could have helped fix, if I'd known there was a need. - Ageekgal 04:56, 29 October 2007 (UTC)

Well, you're the first person to reply...I'm ready to move them all to either Name (orca) or Name (Orca), depending on how the capitalization discussion below goes. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Clayoquot (talk • contribs) 02:44, 11 November 2007 (UTC)

As there's been no discussion in months other than what's above, let's move them all to Name (Orca). Kla’quot (talk | contribs) 09:14, 19 November 2007 (UTC)

I have checked the reference and added more info from it. Also, I re-read the original paper where the first specimens were described. There is much data in it that isn't in the 2002 one. Does anyone have: Haley, D. (1978): Marine mammals of the eastern North Pacific and Arctic waters. Pacific Search Press, Seattle? Because the "M. carlhubbsi" on p.95 seems the only publicly accessible photo of the proposed perrini sightings, which would qualify it for fair use... :) Dysmorodrepanis 18:04, 22 July 2007 (UTC)

My local public library has a copy, and the second edition of the book as well. How can I help you? Kla’quot (talk | contribs) 18:34, 22 July 2007 (UTC)

A color scan (not too high DPI - just enough that the photo remains distinctive), uploading it on Wikipedia (not Commons - use "file upload wizard" in menu at left) under a "fair use" license. See

WP:NONFREE

for the points that must be covered - drop me a message when you're done and I'll add missing legal stuff.

Note that such use is not covered by the default Wikipedia fair-use templates. So you have to choose some other Fair Use license at uploading, and then edit the image page and replace the license bit with

{{Non-free fair use in|Perrin's Beaked Whale}}

{{Non-free historic image}}

And then you can add the image at the article, or I'll add it. Not in the traxobox though.

Thanks for your effort! Dysmorodrepanis 09:14, 23 July 2007 (UTC)

Hullo again. Sigh - my local public library workers are now on strike, and they'll be out for at least another week. Probably longer. Does anyone else have the book? Kla’quot (talk | contribs) 06:53, 31 July 2007 (UTC)

The library is back open (yay!) and I haven't forgotten about this. This particular edition is going to take me a bit more time to track down though (the second edition doesn't have the picture). Kla’quot (talk | contribs) 06:42, 11 December 2007 (UTC)

There is currently a debate underway at the main wikipedia manual of style regarding whether common names of animals should carry an initial capital letter (horse or Horse) when used in the body of the text. It is looking strongly like the rules are going to be changed in favour of no-caps (except for birds), and since this may impact you guys, please visit Wikipedia talk:Manual of Style#Common names of animals.Sabine's Sunbird talk 22:26, 5 August 2007 (UTC)

Archived, lives here, now. (Consensus was no change to MOS.) - Ageekgal 05:03, 29 October 2007 (UTC)

I think it's both a pity and somewhat illogical that we have no

• WikiProject Amphibians and Reptiles
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The above article has been prodded as not establishing notability. If anyone knows how to establish notability, or even find references for the article, that would be greatly appreciated. John Carter 20:55, 28 September 2007 (UTC)

OOps, I removed the notability header based on my perception that many living captive orcas, and some deceased ones, have pages (granted--poorly sourced, in most cases; I've been flagging many, today). Notability gleaned from being one of the relative few of their species in captivity--less common than, say, a camel or monkey or whatnot in captivity--and by virtue of being public performers during their lives. All of the captive orca, and some of the other captive cetacean, pages could use a workover and sourcing. Surely there are sources--research journal articles, etc. It's on my "to do" list to help these pages, if they can be helped (and I feel most of them can.) If I've significantly erred, feel free to add the header back (I know you didn't put it there, but if you feel it deserves to be there once added...) - Ageekgal 05:10, 29 October 2007 (UTC)

Some possible (print) sources for all the captive Orca pages -- http://members.aol.com/OrcaInfo/page12.htm - Ageekgal 12:43, 29 October 2007 (UTC)

Also, National Marine Fisheries Service Marine Mammal Inventory Reports, permit applications, and Erich Hoyt's Orca - the Whale Called Killer (3rd edition,1990.) (I'm scouring Orca-related sites and contacting the authors to ascertain what their sources reportedly were, since few cite them.) - Ageekgal 12:51, 29 October 2007 (UTC)

And The Performing Orca by Erich Hoyt -- http://web.mac.com/erich.hoyt/iWeb/www.erichhoyt.com/More%20Info.html - Ageekgal 13:23, 29 October 2007 (UTC)

Yes, I know Walruses are pinnipeds. However, those of us that work with the almost-but-not-quite-so-aquatically-adapted lack the exemplary Wiki-Project infrastructure of Club Cetacean. In light of this, perhaps some one might visit the Walrus page, which is currently on hold as a good article nominee, and provide some feedback or editing. This would be GREATLY appreciated, as the elevation of the article's status has been a largely solo affair to date. Thanks in advance, - Eliezg 17:03, 9 October 2007 (UTC)

Alerting...there is a [[Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/List of marine parks with Orcas |debate at AFD here]] on whether to delete List of marine parks with Orcas, if anyone has a strong opinion either way. cheers, Casliber (talk · contribs) 02:37, 1 November 2007 (UTC)

Thanks for the alert. Not heavily invested in the page, but do have a leaning so I appreciate it. - Ageekgal 03:09, 1 November 2007 (UTC)

Is there still consensus that the names of cetacean species should always be capitalized, e.g. "Orca" not "orca"? I know the arguments on both sides of the debate. I'm just wondering if our current practice of always capitalizing is what the community actually wants. Kla’quot (talk | contribs) 02:42, 11 November 2007 (UTC)

There are four of us that I'm aware of that prefer sentence case. I understand the reasoning for birds, but there is no confusion in the popular literature with whales, despite sentence case being almost universal. No one is going to think that a "killer whale" means a man-eating humpback, that only "fin whales" have fins, or that a "blue whale" is depressed. kwami (talk) 19:47, 21 May 2008 (UTC)

"I saw a blue whale yesterday." "Really? Was it a Blue Whale?" "No, it wasn't that big, but it was certianly blue in color." QED. - UtherSRG (talk) 20:08, 21 May 2008 (UTC)

We can all make up silly episodes like that, but it's simply not an issue in the real world. In your scenario, did you imagine yourself gesturing the capital letters in "Blue Whale"? Pray tell how your interlocutor was able to understand such a statement. Did you need to write it out for him? Context disambiguates here, just as it does in an article dedicated to the animal in question. The capitals are completely unnecessary, and go against common English usage. kwami (talk) 11:55, 23 May 2008 (UTC)