Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Arthropods/Archive 7

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Archive 7

Hexanauplia is unaccepted by WoRMS

Given the title, I think that articles need to be altered. Many species still display Hexanauplia as their class. Is there semi-automated method of updating infoboxes, or is it all done manually? Pabsoluterince (talk) 06:13, 4 November 2022 (UTC)

Yes, changing the templates that revise the parent taxa in the infoboxes (taxoboxes) is quite easy and with only one edit each, I have already changed the parent class for the Copepoda and Tantulocarida taxoboxes, which will automatically carry through to any subordinate taxa that already have an automatic taxoboxe or speciesbox present in their articles.

However, the time consuming part is not in making the change to the taxonomy template used in the taxobox, but in checking for and revising the text for each of the affected articles, ensuring that each is at the correct title, and to convert any remaining manual taxoboxes that may still be in use in the (now superseded) Hexanauplia tree. It will also be necessary to revise the text of the parent taxa pages (Crustacea and Multicrustacea). Along the way, other fixes (taxonomic updates, page title moves, etc) may further extend the time needed to finish this review. I can help with this once I have finished my current project of revising the family name for Strabomantid frogs, which is nearing completion (only 33 out of 784 left to go). Loopy30 (talk) 12:14, 4 November 2022 (UTC)

As I now turn my attention to bring the taxonomy of the crustaceans into conformity with that on WoRMS, it is apparent that some major review and revision will be necessary at the higher level articles as well.

• Crustacea - As the hexapods are now recognised as being classified within the crustaceans, the evolution section of the article needs to be brought up to date from the 2009-2013 studies used as a primary source.
• Pancrustacea - Is this article still required? Or would it be best to just redirect and merge to Crustacea now?
• Arthropod - Would also need updating and revision to reflect the both the classification of Hexapoda within Crustacea, and the use of either just Crustacea or a traditional Crustacea within a Pancrustacea framework.

I will focus down to family/genus level for now, but at some point the higher articles will have to be updated as well. Does anyone feel like taking this on? Loopy30 (talk) 00:05, 10 December 2022 (UTC)

I'll have go at the top level taxonomy articles. The changes for the crustacean taxonomy templates look simple enough, but I won't do it until I have time to check the articles as well. I think it is well established that WoRMs is the good source for Crustaceans, like Molluscs, so that shouldn't be controversial

However, what about insects? Changing the subphylum Hexapoda to class would require a change for Insecta from class to subclass and that will have an affect on the current insect subclasses (eg. Pterygta) and infraclasses (e.g. Neoptera). WoRMs is not a good source for Hexapods or Insects, as it omits many taxa, so we'd need a good insect taxonomy source to justify any changes. An alternative taxonomy template hierarchy (like the skip templates) may be necessary.

I think it would be premature to merge Pancrustacea and Crustacea. The evolution of Arthopods review by Gribet and Edgecombe (2019) and their 2020 book, The Invertebrate Tree of Life both use the Pancrustacea framework. —  Jts1882 | talk  15:40, 10 December 2022 (UTC)

A couple things I've been aware of: Maxillopoda isn't recognized by WoRMS. Antennopoda and Tactopoda represent competing hypotheses about the relationship between arthropods, tardigrades and onychophorans. I haven't looked into which is better supported in recent literature, but Tactopoda is the the parent of Arthropoda in the taxonomy templates. Several years ago, high use taxonomy templates were protected en masse. Shortly before the mass protection happened, an editor who disagreed with the Tactopoda hypothesis had changed a taxonomy template (I don't remember which one) so that insects were shows as being in phylum Euarthropoda; due to the templates becoming protected, that stayed in place for several months. If there isn't some really solid evidence now, I'd suggest just omitting Tactopoda/Antennopoda as the parent of any other taxonomy templates. I suspect there are some other cases across the Tree of Life where taxonomy templates are enshrining one of the two possible phylogenetic relationships between three taxa when there is some evidence for the other relationship. Plantdrew (talk) 17:14, 10 December 2022 (UTC)

Yes, I think the relationship between tardigrades, onychophorans and arthropods is still not decided, although Onychophora seems more common. Giribet and Edgecombe place Onychophora as sister in their consensus tree in The Invertebrate Tree of Life, which is otherwise conservative on relationships. I'd agree with using Panarthropoda for the parent of all three in the taxoboxes.

I'm making progress on removing Hexanauplia and Maxillopoda. {{Taxonomy/Hexanauplia}} is now empty and {{Taxonomy/Maxillopoda}} only contains Copepodoida for Skara, which is unclear. Most of the higher level taxonomy templates now follow the current WoRMs structure, but some of the listings in articles still need updating.

@Plantdrew: What is the search to get crustacean manual taxoboxes? —  Jts1882 | talk  09:37, 14 December 2022 (UTC)

@Jts1882:, THE search? I'd start with this PetScan search; articles with {{Taxobox}} and in Category:Crustaceans (depth 6). That returns 1505 results, but there are probably a few articles that aren't in the category. Another approach is this Wikipedia search; articles with taxobox and regex "subphylum[ ]+=[ ]\[\[Crustacea". That returns 1444 results; I suspect most of the difference between 1505 and 1444 is articles that just don't include the subphylum in the taxobox (but there may be some articles that omit spacing around the = sign as well). If I was going to make an effort right now to find crustacean articles to convert to automatic taxoboxes, I'd go with Petscan searches with categories for lower ranks (classes/orders/families) and work through those rather than searching for Crustacea as a whole. Plantdrew (talk) 16:56, 14 December 2022 (UTC)

That's a lot of articles. I started at the top of the list and soon got bogged down with an extinct genus with uncertain taxonomy.

Given the subject of this talk section, it might be best to clear out Hexanauplia. I found 107 results with this search: hastemplate:taxobox insource:/\| *classis *= *\[\[Hexanauplia\]\]/. I'll try and get these converted. —  Jts1882 | talk  12:58, 15 December 2022 (UTC)

Incidentally, I've noticed quite a few family articles with the {{Expand section}} template in the genera section, where only three genera are shown (these articles were created by Estopedist1). I've modified {{format species list}} to generate a formatted genus list with a copy of the list at WoRMS:

{{subst:format species list |option=WoRMS |mode=genus| ... }}

Example at Aetideidae. —  Jts1882 | talk  15:07, 15 December 2022 (UTC)

I have reviewed the articles within Oligostraca and have (subject to final petscan search) completed Ichthyostraca (Branchiura and Pentastomida) and Mystacocarida. My progress has now stalled as the primary reference for the ostracods (WoRMS/World Ostracod Database (WOD)) has not populated hundreds (possibly more than a thousand) of ostracod species in their databases. Many of the genera in their database are without any subordinate taxa at all. In the mean time, I can use Martens & Savatenalinton, 2011 to fill in much of the gaps but I am also dealing directly with the WOD editors to help them complete their database. This is an activity that will likely take several months to complete. Loopy30 (talk) 01:31, 15 December 2022 (UTC)

I have PRODed the article, but feel free to get rid of this. I was not aware of this discussion. Will let you people figure out what you want to do. For my part, I think a merge with Multicrustacea wouldn't be beyond the realms of reasonableness. YorkshireExpat (talk) 19:19, 20 December 2022 (UTC)

Elmidae has dePRODed the article with the comment I'll have to disagree with this one. There is sufficient related literature to show that this hypothesis was a going concern for a while (and the article makes it clear that it is not to be regarded as current valid classification). Possibly merge to an article on larger arthropod phylogeny though.

I agree with this. A more general arthropod phylogeny article is a good idea. The Maxillopoda is another older hypothesis that should be covered. I presume the Mandibular and alternative hypotheses are discussed somewhere in other articles. —  Jts1882 | talk  17:20, 21 December 2022 (UTC)

Crustacean Taxobox updates

I've being working on Decapoda taxoboxes and taxonomy, organising the taxonomy templates to follow the WoRMS taxonomy and converting taxoboxes on the way.

• All family level taxonomy templates now have the appropriate superfamily as parent, superfamilies and higher also have the correct parent according to the WoRMs taxonomy with exception of Podotremata, which I don't think we should follow (but thats another topic).
• All family level and higher taxa articles now have automatic taxoboxes.
• However, that still leaves 741 manual taxoboxes with Decapoda as order: hastemplate:taxobox insource:/\| *ordo *=[ \[]*Decapoda/ (741 results). This is down from over 900 when I started, which is a bit disappointing as it felt like I'd done more.
• Of these, two are Crayfish and Furry lobster, which aren't formal taxa. The crayfish seem to form a monophyletic group, but I can't find a formal taxon name. The remainder are genus and species level articles:
  • 306 are genus level articles: hastemplate:taxobox insource:/\| *ordo *=[ \[]*Decapoda/ -insource:/\| *species *=/] (308 results; but this includes crayfish and furry lobster)
  • 433 species are species level articles: hastemplate:taxobox insource:/\| *ordo *=[ \[]*Decapoda/ insource:/\| *species *=/ (433 results)
• The bad news is that means that converting these will need over 300 new taxonomy templates. There are not many genera with many species that use the same template. —  Jts1882 | talk  16:09, 26 December 2022 (UTC)

More taxobox numbers

The Petscan search now returns 1276 results for crustacean manual taxoboxes. The Wikipedia search for subphylum Crustacea now returns 1219 results.

• Over half are species as there are 545 results excluding species.
• Excluding both genus and species returns 73 results, which I'll take a measure of family and higher taxa.
• There are only results when families are excluded as well. These are the next target.

—  Jts1882 | talk  16:50, 26 December 2022 (UTC)

Cormocephalus brachyceras L.E.Koch, 1983

Can anyone help with the correct spelling of the specific name of this Australian centipede? Most sources have a terminal 'as', though some have 'us', including the Australian Faunal Directory as well as, apparently, the original descriptive paper in the Australian Journal of Zoology (v.31, p.806) (at least in the abstract). Thanks. Maias (talk) 06:08, 17 February 2023 (UTC)

I would go with brachyceras as that is used by most current databases, notably the Chilobase entry for Cormocephalus brachyceras L.E. Koch, 1983 (the source used by CoL for centipedes). However the abstract for the original description has bruchycerus, but unfortunately I can't access the full text. I can't find any other use of "bruchycerus" on the web. The abstract also has "west- angelusensis" instead of Cormocephalus westangelasensis L.E. Koch, 1983. Perhaps there were OCR errors when putting the paper online, which might also explain the ending. —  Jts1882 | talk  09:07, 17 February 2023 (UTC)

Thanks for that. I guess I will leave it as it is for the time being. Maias (talk) 11:46, 17 February 2023 (UTC)

Usage of names Uropygi and Thelyphonida

Thunderhawk256 pointed out problems with our articles at Talk:Schizomida#Classification Self-Contradiction. Some research shows that the usage of these two names varies in a confusing way. The table below summarizes two systems in use, with examples of sources that use each of them (although usually without my added and clarifying s.s. and s.l., and without the top level in the table).

Alternative classifications

English names	System 1	System 2	Recent families
whip scorpions short-tailed whip scorpions	Thelyphonida s.l. (if used) Uropygi s.s. Schizomida	Uropygi s.l. (if used) Thelyphonida s.s. Schizomida	Thelyphonidae Hubbardiidae, Protoschizomidae
	doi:10.1111/jbi.13076 M.S. Harvey (2003), Catalogue of the smaller arachnid orders of the world: Amblypygi, Uropygi, Schizomida, Palpigradi, Ricinulei and Solifugae World Arachnida Catalog Fossilworks CoL GBIF IRMNG ITIS Uropygi + Schizomida in NCBI	doi:10.7717/peerj.641 doi:10.1101/2021.10.05.463216 Biolib

We are currently using Thelyphonida in the sense of my System 2, although with some confusing text there and at Schizomida. The great majority of taxonomic databases seem to use System 1, with the result that the links in the taxonbar at Thelyphonida almost all go to a taxon with the name Uropygi.

I suggest moving Thelyphonida to Uropygi if we use the scientific names, and having a clear explanation of the two uses of these names. Comments please. Peter coxhead (talk) 12:28, 7 March 2023 (UTC)

I think there are two questions, which to use when treated as synonyms and whether to use the other for both together. Both CoL and doi:10.7717/peerj.641 use them as synonyms, differing in which to choose. The use of Thelyphonida over Uropygi is also supported by doi:10.11646/zootaxa.3703.1.6 (Animal Diversity) and doi:10.1111/pala.12105 (Edgecombe & Legg (2014), while doi:10.1111/j.1096-3642.2007.00284.x (Schultz et al (2007)] used Thelyphonida s.s. and Uropygi s.l. There are some other sources at the Sciencedirect Uropygi page, mostly leaning towards Uropygi. My understanding is that Uropygi is the older name and included the short-tailed whipscorpions, while Thelyphonida is a newer family-based name created when they decided to separate them. This is based on my recollection rather than a source I can present now.

In short there doesn't seem to be a strongly favoured choice. I think the best solution is to treat them as synonyms and to make a choice for the article title and taxobox, as always presenting different opinions in the text. We should avoid using the other name for the broader group in the taxobox heirarchy as that will lead to confusion. —  Jts1882 | talk  14:08, 7 March 2023 (UTC)

@Jts1882: I assume you mean treating Uropygi s.s. and Thelyphonida s.s. as synonyms, which is fine as they have the same circumscription, and ignoring the s.l. versions in taxoboxes. I think there is a favoured choice, as per my response to Dyanega below. Peter coxhead (talk) 17:17, 7 March 2023 (UTC)

Yes, although I'm undecided which to use. —  Jts1882 | talk  18:09, 7 March 2023 (UTC)

As an aside, the ICZN does not regulate names above the rank of superfamily, so this case is not - technically speaking - affected by the seniority of one name or the other, as it would be if these were superfamilies. I will also point out that Mark Harvey (one of the sources cited) is a fellow ICZN Commissioner, so if you consider that to give any stronger weight to his opinion about which names mean what, there is that to toss out there. Dyanega (talk) 15:57, 7 March 2023 (UTC)

I added the link to Harvey (2003) deliberately; I'm definitely inclined to give stronger weight to his usage, which is anyway that followed by the majority of taxonomic databases. Peter coxhead (talk) 17:17, 7 March 2023 (UTC)

As no-one has objected, I'm going to move Thelyphonida to Uropygi. Peter coxhead (talk) 07:25, 10 March 2023 (UTC)

I've now made the move, and tried to explain the confusing names at Uropygi#Taxonomy. Do feel free to improve it! Peter coxhead (talk) 10:38, 10 March 2023 (UTC)

Project-independent quality assessments

Quality assessments are used by Wikipedia editors to rate the quality of articles in terms of completeness, organization, prose quality, sourcing, etc. Most wikiprojects follow the general guidelines at Wikipedia:Content assessment, but some have specialized assessment guidelines. A recent Village pump proposal was approved and has been implemented to add a |class= parameter to {{WikiProject banner shell}}, which can display a general quality assessment for an article, and to let project banner templates "inherit" this assessment.

No action is required if your wikiproject follows the standard assessment approach. Over time, quality assessments will be migrated up to {{WikiProject banner shell}}, and your project banner will automatically "inherit" any changes to the general assessments for the purpose of assigning categories.

However, if your project decides to "opt out" and follow a non-standard quality assessment approach, all you have to do is modify your wikiproject banner template to pass {{WPBannerMeta}} a new |QUALITY_CRITERIA=custom parameter. If this is done, changes to the general quality assessment will be ignored, and your project-level assessment will be displayed and used to create categories, as at present. Aymatth2 (talk) 14:13, 9 April 2023 (UTC)

Phalangiotarbi/Phalangiotarbida

Would it be correct to say that Phalangiotarbi should use the title Phalangiotarbida? Most if not all sources or resources online I can find call the extinct arachnid order "Phalangiotarbida": e.g. Arthropoda Species File, the latest version of the A summary list of fossil spiders and their relatives, and the majority of published articles on the subject since 2000 (according to Google Scholar, at least). Yet apparently since the Wikipedia article's creation in 2006, it has been claiming the emendation of Phalangiotarbi to Phalangiotarbida was "unnecessary and unwarranted" according to the ICZN. Offhand I don't think it's true that the ICZN doesn't allow emendations of names for orders (I think that's only for family-group and below??), but maybe Dyanega can clarify this? Monster Iestyn (talk) 19:02, 31 May 2023 (UTC)

Article 1.2.2 lists the Articles that apply to names above the family-group. Article 19 covers emendations, and is not listed in 1.2.2. But Dyanega would know for sure. Plantdrew (talk) 20:36, 31 May 2023 (UTC)

Shouldn't Wikipedia use the most commonly used name even if it was wrong under the code? [Disclaimer: I didn't make the rules] A google search excluding Wikipedia finds few reliable uses of Phalangiotarbi (e.g. Field Museum and [https://www.biolib.cz/en/taxonsubtaxa/id1241219/ BioLib.cz), whereas Phalangiotarbida is used more widely and in the scientific literature. Wikispecies also uses Phalangiotarbida. The influence of the English Wikipedia can be seen in the google search which has Phalangiotarbi as the top item even when searching for Phalangiotarbida. —  Jts1882 | talk  08:07, 1 June 2023 (UTC)

Certainly there's no uniformity in the formation of names of arachnid orders (just look at the list of orders in the taxobox of Arachnida), and my understanding is that there's no priority above the family group, so there's nothing to prevent the replacement of the original "Phalangiotarbi" by Petrunkevitch's "Phalangiotarbida". A Google ngram suggests the change-over took hold in the mid-1980s.

As another example, "Palpigradida" instead of "Palpigradi" (or "Palpigrada"), formed on the same basis, is also used, but doesn't seem to have caught on in the same way according to the Google ngram. Peter coxhead (talk) 09:01, 1 June 2023 (UTC)

Hi, all. As mentioned, the ICZN Code only extends as "high" as superfamily (except as noted in 1.2.2). Anything above that is unregulated, meaning no rules at all apply. Not priority, not grammar, not spelling; it's a messy free-for-all. Given Wikipedia's general rule about minority viewpoints not taking precedence over majority views, it sounds like this case is fairly clear-cut in favor of Phalangiotarbida, regardless of what an individual editor might want to claim - especially since the ICZN is irrelevant here. Dyanega (talk) 20:41, 1 June 2023 (UTC)

In that case I'll rename the article to Phalangiotarbida right now and remove the unsourced (and now proven incorrect) claim citing the ICZN. Monster Iestyn (talk) 23:17, 1 June 2023 (UTC)

@Dyanega: I have a question on the suprafamiliar names being unregulated. I've seen it argued that as family group names are regulated (Article 29), then properly typified family group names cannot be used for orders and higher ranks. The case in point is the use of names that look like superfamily names for insect superorders, e.g. Neuropteroidea and Panorpoidea. The argument is that Panorpoidea is invalid because the family group name is based on Panorpa, but Neuropteroidea is valid as it is not a typified family group name (see comment sections at Neuropteroidea and Mecopteriformia). Your comment above suggests that this is an overinterpretation of Article 29. The examples section says a genus name like Ranoidea is allowable. —  Jts1882 | talk  10:38, 10 June 2023 (UTC)

I'm not sure that there have ever been actual conflicts between higher ordinal names and superfamily names that are spelled the same, but I don't think there's any clause in the Code that would literally invalidate them. That would just be a matter of "saner heads prevailing" to avoid that sort of issue. I can raise this question with the other Commissioners, but I don't expect a different result. Dyanega (talk) 18:29, 11 June 2023 (UTC)

I've consulted with other Commissioners. This particular case is a fairly unique example, but there are a large number of examples where a supra-ordinal name is identical to a genus name. These are not homonyms, as homonymy only applies within a rank (the Code recognizes family-rank, genus-rank, and species-rank, only), not across ranks, and also does not apply to any names above superfamily. One of the links you provided stated that "Panorpoidea" as used by Handlirsch was "invalid". The Code has a very different and precise meaning for the term "invalid", and it does not apply here. Supra-ordinal names are neither valid nor invalid - they are unregulated, and taxonomists can pick and choose which one to use, for whatever arbitrary reasons they might choose. Avoiding confusion is a pretty good reason for not using a name, but there is nothing inherent in Handlirsch's "Panorpoidea" that means that people can't use it if they really want to. All that being said, I do note that there is no article for Panorpoidea, even though it is displayed in a number of taxoboxes, and is part of the taxonomic heirarchy - as a superfamily. At some point that is going to need to be given an article rather than being red-linked, and whoever writes that article is going to need to address the alternative historical usage of "Panorpoidea" for a supra-ordinal group. Dyanega (talk) 22:03, 11 June 2023 (UTC)

Merger discussion for Arthrorhabdus

An article which may be of interest to members of this project—Arthrorhabdus—has been proposed for merging with another article. If you are interested, please follow the (Discuss) link at the top of the article to participate in the merger discussion. Thank you. Edward-Woodrow :) _[talk] 20:32, 12 June 2023 (UTC)

It's been proposed since 4 May but I forgot to ping anyone. Edward-Woodrow :) _[talk] Edward-Woodrow :) _[talk] 20:32, 12 June 2023 (UTC)

Disambiguation for harvestmen

Hi all,

I'm new to using wiki, but i'm editing some taxa on iNaturalist. I wished to link some to their wikipages - especially to fix cases with alternatives of the same name, so select the correct one. E.g. both plants and animals that use same genus name, or other 'things' such as the mythological figures that scientific names are often derived from. Hence i was looking at fixing-up some such 'disambiguations'. I'm also keen to build a few more pages for Opiliones - aka "Harvestmen".

But, whilst starting, i fear i've mis-stepped: i newly created "Ampheres_(harvestmen)". I was unsure what to specify within brackets so i used plural "(harvestmen)". Later I found there's a category list for other genera under Category:Harvestman genera where at least 11 others created prior to mine used the alternative singular spelling as "(harvestman)" [rather than plural "(harvestmen)" as per my new usage]

I could argue that plural 'harvestmen' [per my usage] is better for all, but at end of day i don't think matters, just that my recent one is now inconsistent. What's a good strategy to get these consistent? [is even my deleting my own "Ampheres_(harvestmen)" an option?, then remaking] Sjl197 (talk) 13:56, 18 July 2023 (UTC)

@Sjl197:, Wikipedia article title are normally singular, so the disambiguatory terms should also be singular. I've moved the article to Ampheres (harvestman), but you should be able to move articles yourself once you've made a few edits and have had an account for a few days (I think it's 10 edits/5 days). The "harvestmen" one doesn't need to be deleted. Do add a hatnote for the disambiguated article to any article that occupies the base (undisambiguated) title; I've done so at Ampheres.

As long as there's no ambiguity with another genus, the taxonomy template doesn't need to include a disambiguatory term; I've moved the template to Template:Taxonomy/Ampheres. However, if there is ambiguity with any other subject, the link in the template needs to include the disambiguation. I've set the link to "Ampheres (harvestman)|Ampheres" (otherwise it would link to the Greek mythology article).

If you are creating articles for species via the prefilled page for creating a Wikipedia article on iNaturalist, you should know that the "parent" parameter is unnecessary and should usually be omitted (it is only supposed to be used when the parent is a subgenus or section). I'd brought this up on the iNaturalist forums, but it was never removed from the default prefilled template (I hope I'm not making this more confusing, but "parent" is needed in Wikipedia's taxonomy templates, but not Wikipedia's articles, and it shouldn't be in iNaturalist's prefilled thing). Plantdrew (talk) 01:46, 19 July 2023 (UTC)

Many thanks! Awesome that you made the fixes to my 'mis-steps' so i can see how you've implemented those alongside your explanation. I'll aim to remember (from my notes!) that ones needing disambiguations should go in singular, even if i fundamentally object to a genus being singular; i'll go for consistency and conventions.

Thanks for explaining and demonstration also on the taxonomy template - my revised understanding is that IF another taxon already exists with a taxobox (i.e. a plant genus of same name when creating for an identically named animal genus) then add in 'term' (e.g. (harvestman)) into the new latter taxonomy template, but if the other 'thing' isn't a taxon then can omit that term and fix the disambiguation issue in the modified link as show for Ampheres.

RE: the iNaturalist templates, yes indeed the pre-filled "parent" line, also for the genus it reads "|rank=genus" when now seems that also becomes redundant when specified in the taxobox - both leading to highlighted conflict errors that can be confusing to a new wiki user. The pre-filled page from iNaturalist also seems to often present the taxa in a non-aphabetical order (not sure why yet - date/time added there perhaps) and puts a superfluous **ref name="inaturalist-Antonae"** after every one instead of perhaps helpfully making a place format for the authority and date! Anyway - those issues for the ears of iNaturalist themselves, to go on their long list of things i often hear "they're considering to implement" Sjl197 (talk) 12:40, 19 July 2023 (UTC)

You write "i fundamentally object to a genus being singular" - however, under the ICZN Code, they MUST be singular, no exceptions allowed: Article 11.8 states "A genus-group name (see also Article 10.3) must be a word of two or more letters and must be, or be treated as, a noun in the nominative singular." Treating genus names as plurals is a direct violation of this rule. Accordingly, you can say (e.g.) "Bombus is a genus of bumblebees", but a phrase like "Bombus are commonly called bumblebees" should instead be written (or grammatically interpreted) as "Members of the genus Bombus are commonly called bumblebees". Dyanega (talk) 15:10, 19 July 2023 (UTC)

This is interesting. What about species? "Examplus examplarii is a species of insect" is clearly correct, but what about "It has a three-year life cycle"? Should that be changed to "They have a three-year life cycle", since the article is there discussing the habits of individuals, not as a taxonomic unit. Edward-Woodrow :) _[talk] 15:16, 19 July 2023 (UTC)

Species epithets are also treated in the nominative singular, though sometimes genitive, though they can be adjectives/participles as well as nouns. Again, the names should be used as singular though certain phrasing can imply that the members of that species are being referred to. You wouldn't ever say "Felis tigris are in the family Felidae" but instead "Felis tigris is in the family Felidae", though you could get away with "Felis tigris are large cats" instead of "Members of the species Felis tigris are large cats", which is a lot more cumbersome. It's mostly a matter of there being certain phrasings that just aren't right, otherwise there is some slack afforded through the implication of referring to a group. Dyanega (talk) 16:50, 19 July 2023 (UTC)

That makes sense, thanks. Edward-Woodrow :) _[talk] 16:55, 19 July 2023 (UTC)

Well, i'm regretting letting my mind wander freely on an open wiki, but even if any genus is technically nominative singular, [Members of] the genus Ampheres are harvestmen. But i'll go for the singular there, so -> Ampheres_(harvestman) Sjl197 (talk) 21:49, 19 July 2023 (UTC)

Antwiki

Is there some established notion about the reliability of Antwiki? Based on the setup, it appears to be more of a Sanger-style "written by experts" affair [1] than a WP free-for-all, but it is crowdsourced nonetheless. It certainly gets linked often enough [2] but then most of these appear to be image links.

I'm asking because there are a few new ant articles cropping up that have Antwiki as the main or only source (e.g., Polyrhachis mucronata). Kosher? --Elmidae (talk · contribs) 16:23, 26 July 2023 (UTC)

I'm less concerned about that than the creation of articles which are outside the established norms for article formats that are already commonly in use. For example, instead of an article titled "List of Polyrhachis species", this user has created an article titled "Taxonomy of Polyrhachis". The article isn't about taxonomy, really, since all it contains is a list of species. Communicating with this user and seeing if they would consider following established practice would be a higher priority, I think, than worrying about their sourcing. Dyanega (talk) 18:34, 26 July 2023 (UTC)

It really seems to be a 3 person effort; David Lubertazzi, Gary Alpert and Steve Shattuck are listed on the governance page, and browsing recent edits, and the page history for P. mucronata show few edits by anybody other than these three people. All three are also listed as curators on AntWeb. AntCat is another taxonomic resource for ants. Both AntWeb and AntCat provide links from their species pages to AntWiki. Based on the links, Antwiki seems to be a respected part of the ecosystem of ant-related information on the internet. It seems that everything there should be sourced to other publications, so it might be unnecessary to cite Antwiki directly (although some of the sources cited by Antwiki may not be available on-line or held by most libraries). Plantdrew (talk) 18:48, 26 July 2023 (UTC)

Of those 853 links, 506 are links to pdfs of published papers, which are placed in their image directory. These are obviously helpful. AntWiki does seem to be written by experts so I think it is a reasonable source, although perhaps it shouldn't be the only source. Together with Barry Bolton's AntCat that should be reliable support for a species or other taxon. There does seem to be considerable cross-linking between these different ant resources so that provides support for their credibility. Another interesting site is https://antmaps.org, which has an interactive map of the distributions of subfamilies, genera and species. —  Jts1882 | talk  14:52, 27 July 2023 (UTC)

Lithodidae (king crabs)

Hello! I am making a push this fall to have an article for every species in the family Lithodidae, the king crabs. All of the genera except for Lithodes and Paralomis already have an article, although any improvement or expansion of extant articles would be great as well. Additionally, many of the articles are missing images, and if one can be found that's suitably licensed for upload to Wikimedia Commons, that would be a massive help. I'm mostly hoping to round this out because I already finished Neolithodes and Cryptolithodes, and it'll be a lot easier to make contributions to this subject in the future once all the articles have already been created. At the time of writing, there are 79 articles left to be created – 20 in Lithodes and 59 in Paralithodes. All the best, TheTechnician27 (Talk page) 20:52, 4 September 2023 (UTC)