User talk:Jwinius

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[edit] Scientific names vs. Common names

In the time that I've been busy at Wikipedia, I managed to get myself into many arguments on the issue of whether scientific or common names should be used for article titles. Wikipedia's official policy is to use common names for this purpose whenever available -- preferably the "most popular" common name -- purely for reasons of presentation. However, in my opinion there are too many problems with this approach:

  • Articles names at Wikipedia have to be unique anyway, so why not use the only ones that are always unambiguous?
  • Scientific names avoid conflicts, since many common names often apply to different species. In such cases, one article gets the "good" name and the others have to be, um, different. How is this good for presentation?
  • Choosing between two or more more common names only on the basis of which one shows up more often in Google is arbitrary and unscientific.
  • Selecting one common name for a species over all the others gives people the impression that it's more importance or more official than the others, even though that's not the case. An exception might be the AOU where they've tried to make certain common names for birds "official", but that's only for American species and even Wikipedia aren't following their lead.
  • Using scientific names avoids petty conflicts between editors: no more fights about Siberian Tiger vs. Amur Tiger or Puma vs. Cougar.
  • Common name tiles make category overviews pretty useless: just compare Category:True vipers with Category:Sharks and you'll see what I mean.
  • Using scientific names for article titles can teach readers more about how organisms are related: "These names are weird, but look how the first names are all the same... maybe they're all related!"
  • Scientific names are universal while common names are not; people in one (English speaking) country may not be familiar with the common names in another.
  • Using scientific names for article titles promotes better continuity when linking with other articles inside and outside of Wikipedia.

Of, not everyone is familiar with these names, but that doesn't mean an article has to be inaccessible to the uninitiated. For example, in Vipera berus, the common names for this species are listed just below the title and there are redirects for all of them. I put a lot of thought into the format. Within the article itself, I try to use the title name as little as possible and prefer to use more general terms instead. All of the articles that I've worked on are written this way. Take a look around and let me know what you think. Category:True vipers or Viperinae are good places to start.

[edit] Authority parentheses

You'll have to explain to me what exactly the difference is with some authorities being in parentheses and some are without? I always figured it was just various authors information being compiled together, and didn't think it had any real significance? -Dawson 16:15, 26 July 2006 (UTC)

Apparently, they are significant. I didn't notice at first, but it's now obvious to me that it has to do with the name that was originally used to describe an animal, as opposed to the name for it that is currently considered valid. If those names are still the same, then no parentheses are used for the authority. Example, Bitis parviocula, Böhme, 1977, since Böhme described the animal with this same name in his 1977 publication.
On the other hand, if the name has changed since the animal was first described, then parentheses are used for the authority. Example, Bitis inornata, (Smith, 1838), since Smith first described this animal as Echidna inornata in his 1838 publication -- not as Bitis inornata.
This also means that if, for instance, the views of Lenk et al. (2001) are eventually accepted by ITIS (in other words, by Dr. Roy McDiarmid of the Smithsonian Institution) and Bitis is subsequently split into four different genera, we'll be changing the above reference to Calechidna parviocula, (Böhme, 1977).
I have to say that this concept is probably not very obvious unless you regularly browse through checklists (or have more knowledge of systematic zoology). An on-line example is the EMBL database, but if you want something really complete, get yourself a copy of Snake Species of the World: A Taxonomic and Geographic Reference, vol. 1, by McDiarmid et al. (1999). One of the ITIS administrators, David Nicolson, suggested it to me (thanks, David!). It looked pretty boring at first, but it's what the snake information in ITIS is based on and I now consider it an invaluable resource (I can hardly wait for vol. 2 to be published!). Actually, for snakes it's been described as the most significant reference work since Boulenger's 1896 Catalogue of Snakes of the British Museum. Never leave home without a checklist! --Jwinius 17:38, 26 July 2006 (UTC)
I guess it makes sense now that I think about it, but it sure isn't very intuitive to anyone who may not have studied taxonomy. :) -Dawson 17:45, 26 July 2006 (UTC)
True, but do you want to do things right, or what? This is a learning experience for me too, you know. Actually, do you remember that news item last month about Jimmy Wales saying that he receives some 10 emails a day from people who had quoted Wikipedia only to find that the information was inaccurate? Well, that really woke me up. No more assumptions for me -- no more bullshit! That's when I wrote Vipera ammodytes and I decided that I would not write any more articles for Wikipedia unless they are referenced so that other people can check up on what I write. I either do things right, or I don't at all. That way, people won't ever be able blame Wikipedia (or me) for factual errors, since they can make their own minds up about whether to trust the source I mentioned or not. Personally, I'd like nothing more than to hear a professional herpetologist, or at least a knowledgable amateur, mention some day that the snake articles in Wikipedia are well-written. We still have a long way to go, though. --Jwinius 18:32, 26 July 2006 (UTC)
That is the whole reason I started writing on Wikipedia, because the reptile articles were so poorly written, and had so few good photos. I received Klauber's rattlesnakes two-volume set for my birthday. I'm working on mustering up the energy to start delving into those articles. :) -Dawson 18:38, 26 July 2006 (UTC)

Yup, writing articles for Wikipedia makes me feel like I'm doing something significant. Plus, I'm teaching myself how to write articles in a scientific manner -- just by not assuming anything, quoting without plagiarizing, rigorously citing my references and getting the taxonomy right. It's fun! And the more I do it, the easier it gets.

That Klauber set sounds like a gold mine of information to me! I'm tempted to buy a copy myself: $150.00 at Amazon for 1580 pages! But, there are so many other books I'd like. It reminds me of my copy of Handbook of Snakes by Wright & Wright (1957, 1985), 1105 pp; I used it last for distribution info for Sistrurus, but unfortunately it's not much good for viperines. I can well image, however, the depth of information in the Klauber set: most of it will not be interesting for Wikipedia at this point in time, so it's up to you to figure out what to pick out and what to ignore. Personally, what I find daunting is the biochemical information in books like True Vipers by Mallow et al. (2003): it's currently simply beyond my capabilities to accurately interpret and summarize that stuff. My sister (a veterinarian) says I'll have to bone up on cell biology first. She's got this huge book on the subject that she says I'm welcome to borrow... --Jwinius 19:49, 26 July 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Daboia common names

Hi Jwinius. A late response to your message on my talk page. I saw the page today and think that the alternate scientific names need to be reduced to just those that people are likely to bump into. Most modern reptile lists use Vipera russelii and now the reinstated genus name based on priority to Daboia russelii. Historically numerous authors may have used different names in their works and may have introduced errors (Lapsus calami) or amendations in their works and it may not be useful to list them all. However it is very important to add links to the pages from the valid names. I just added a redirect from Vipera russelii. Also I feel that the common names list should go after the lead paragraph which gives the context of the article. cheers Shyamal 08:05, 27 July 2006 (UTC)

Synonyms list -- Who's "most people"? I don't think we should decide what "most people" are interested in. Rather, we should strive to educate and to be complete and accurate. Like most people here, I started out by just adding a few older scientific names that I knew of to this list, but I was always worried that my list was incomplete and that I didn't really know what a synonyms list was supposed to be. There are lists of synonyms on the EMBL as well, but what did they represent?
Then I took somebody's advice and bought a copy of Snake Species of the World: A Taxonomic and Geographic Reference, vol. 1. by McDiarmid et al. (1999) and it all became clear. A synonyms list is a history of who said what and when about a certain species. It shows not only when the animal was first described, but how its classification has evolved over time. The names and dates that follow each synonym represent publications of books and papers that apparently all have something significant to say about the matter; these are essential to include, since the synonyms by themselves are almost meaningless.
By the way, McDiarmid's 1999 checklist is what ITIS uses for its classification of snakes. It's also been described as the most significant reference work since Boulenger's 1896 Catalogue of Snakes of the British Museum. It's about as authoritative as you can get these days -- certainly more so than the EMBL -- and it's perfect to use together with the ITIS database.
The list of synonyms included for Daboia (from McDiarmid) is longer than most, I'll admit, but it is exceptional. However, just because this particular list is longer than most does not give us the right to abbreviate it; the story it tells would otherwise be incomplete. Besides, you don't have to read it if you're not interested.
Vipera russelii redirect -- Oops! Guess I missed that one. A pretty important one, too. Thank's for adding it!
Common names list -- This one has been a bit of a headache for me. As I'm sure you know by now, I'm one of those dissenters who would rather use scientific names over common names for article titles. However, this approach does tend to emphasize a problem that the proponents of the current official policy would apparently rather ignore: what to do with animals that have more than one, perhaps many, common names. You can use a style like in Sistrurus catenatus, but this seems to give more import to one, while the others are buried elsewhere in the text. Then there's Agkistrodon taylori, but that's way too much bold type face for me, plus it's still like you're saying one common name is more important than the others when you use phrases like "also called." Finally, if you use only a separate common names section, but place it further on down in the article, people not familiar with the scientific name in the title may have to spend too much effort looking for it -- they might even have to scroll down before the common names section comes into view!
Therefore, unfortunate as it may seem, I decided to break with tradition and try something new. Well, actually I nicked the idea from one of my favorite reference books, True Vipers (Mallow et al., 2003), although this book is certainly not the first to use this format. Examples are indeed Daboia, but also Adenorhinos as an example of what I did when there are too many common names to fit on a single line (I'm still undecided as to whether the latter is a good idea or not).
I thought a lot about this. It certainly was not my intention to draw unnecessary criticism by resisting any more of the established style policies, but I can't escape the feeling that there is a logic and a certain efficiency -- even elegance -- to this solution. It solves all of the problems I mentioned: 1.) All of the common names now have the best chance of being found almost immediately by everyone -- especially those not familiar with the scientific name in the title. 2.) Even though this still places the common names in a certain order, it does so in a way that least emphasizes the first over the others. 3.) This format allows you to add additional common names without having to modify the flow of the existing text below. So, yes it's different, but it works well, so it's a step forwards in my view, whether you're a proponent of using scientific names for article tiles or not. --Jwinius 14:24, 27 July 2006 (UTC)

I am ok with most things except the common names being at the beginning. I have more names including Mandaladha haavu in Kannada. In most of the biodiversity articles, the scientific names and the most popular common name for the wikipedia language, in this case English. Common names for snakes are rather non-standard especially for the more widespread species and here and for instance in most of the invertebrates I am for use of scientific names for the article pages. Common names and their actual meanings and origins in their native regions would preferably come later in the article and include other cultural references. Overall the article looks much better than it was. cheers Shyamal 03:50, 28 July 2006 (UTC)

I must say that I've always had a problem with Wikipedia's concept of the most popular common name. In many cases if not most, it's incredibly vague. If it wasn't for search engines like Google, it would be almost meaningless. As a matter of fact, it's for this very reason that biological nomenclature was invented.
There are exceptions, of course. "Russell's viper" is a very well established common name and the only true English one that I know of, despite the fact that this species is so widespread. I included the Hindi(?), Sinhala and Tamil names for it because these are often mentioned in English literature. This is to be expected on the Indian subcontinent, where several hundred million people speak English as a second language; such common names for this species (and others) were always bound to be introduced there. I don't think we should ignore that.
A species does not have to be so widespread to have many common names, however. Adenorhinos is a fine example: it's as if every other herpetologist to have described this animal came up with their own common name for it! And then there's Vipera ammodytes, which is much more widespread in and does indeed have many common names. So what do we do in these cases? Select one of them over the others just because Google said so? You know there's no real connection between that and the frequency with which any particular common name occurrs in literature. It also plays too much into the hands of the common name proponents for my taste. Therefore, I'd rather not give any one of these common names any more precedence over the others than I possibly can. Listing them in this manner is the best way that I can think of to achieve this. In addition, for people accessing these articles who are not familiar with the scientific names, it makes for a less "jarring" experience (as one common name proponent put it) if the common names (all of them) are this easy to find. --Jwinius 14:01, 28 July 2006 (UTC)


[edit] Snake scales

Please see User:AshLin/Snake scales. Also please see my rewrite with images of Amphiesma stolata. I also think we are going to need a WikiProject Serpentes sooner rather than later. AshLin 04:07, 5 August 2006 (UTC)

Version 0.4 up with more material, additional image and footnoting. Comments please. AshLin 22:54, 11 August 2006 (UTC)

Dear Jaap, I have uploaded the article as Snake scales. It is now open for cped. Thanks for the encouragement. AshLin 12:26, 14 August 2006 (UTC)

Dear Jaap, Have amended Ocular (scale) to reflect both ocular scale and the circumorbitals. Thanks, I really dont have a modern work and have to derive much of my stuff from arbitrary references, as you can see. Regards, AshLin 18:11, 21 August 2006 (UTC).

Hi Jaap, Yes, also added some more articles, raw, need improvement, just stubs. Please see Temporal (scale), Internasal (scale) and Prefrontal (scale). Also corrected some wikilinks. Regards, AshLin 22:22, 3 October 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Old material

Hi Jwinius. Feel free to remove material you feel is outdated or incorrect. It is just that I don't have any newer reference. Unfortunately for the Indian region there are lots of species that have never been seen since. Let me know what particular entry you found that lacks reference and I can help you. In all probability it would be either Gunther's Reptiles and amphibians or Boulenger's work. cheers Shyamal 08:29, 5 August 2006 (UTC)

Incidentally both works are available online, links are in their bio pages. Shyamal 08:42, 5 August 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Thanks for your comments

I read your comments on Amphiesma stola...um..whatever. I agree with your view regarding annotation though I lament it because in my opinion it adds 'noise' for the vast majority who may not want such accuracy. Could you please point me to guidelines on creating those footnote markings. May I request comments on the snake scale article presently on my user page. Regards. AshLin 14:54, 5 August 2006 (UTC)

Your point about accuracy is absolutely correct, but I do feel that articles need to be well organised, written well and should feel good to read. This is a 'soft' issue which I feel is as important as accuracy. Incremental addition of info sometimes leads to cluttered up articles. Then I have the fun of reorganising and rewriting it.
BTW, I have met many young people in India who use the internet for communicating but do not have any brand recognition of wikipedia at all! I also know people who visited Wikipedia but were dissatisfied due to its lack of information on what they needed. Most of these were young budding naturalists so this is my impetus to spending time and effort here.
I do wish someone would come up with wikiproject Serpentes, but I am already unable to cope with Lepidoptera and the others. Thanks for the footnote links. Regards, AshLin 05:01, 6 August 2006 (UTC)

Please see version 0.2 of the article. Grateful for comments. Am slowly proceeding in the general direction you indicated. AshLin 16:43, 9 August 2006 (UTC)

Am upto version 0.5 of User:AshLin/Snake scales. Have incorporated material from govt websites (what I consider public domain). Have footnoted them too. Comments please on the talk pages of this effort of mine. Regards, AshLin 08:57, 13 August 2006 (UTC)

[edit] References

Easy. The first set of stub articles for all the Indian snakes were added from the EMBL reptile database, so if you see descriptive notes in the first versions, they came from there. The external link to the EMBL database was added to all those. They do not have specific book references, if that is what you need. cheers Shyamal 02:07, 6 August 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Bitis gabonica

Hello. Thanks for clarifying the issue. I am not a biologist and have no scientific reference of Bitis gabonica living in Ethiopia but I have seen very interesting documentary about group of folks rafting down the Omo River in Ethiopia. They have met that snake, actually one guy was even biten by Bitis gabonica. If you can recognise that snake, I can take a screenshot and upload it. What do you think ? I respect scientific reports but Omo River was rafted down the full length only two times. Also Bitis gabonica appears in countries neighboring Ethiopia. - Darwinek 23:35, 6 August 2006 (UTC)

Hello. I have uploaded them at http://home.tiscali.cz/zadara/snake/ . It's not high quality cause it's done in motion. One of guys see the snake so he pick it up and snake bites him. He then say it's a baby Bitis gabonica. For a few hours he have been quite torpid and soulless but then he was OK again. Let me know when you'll see the pics. - Darwinek 08:09, 7 August 2006 (UTC)
Thanks for identifying that snake. Do you plan to start some new articles about snakes? I think most Bothrops species are only red links. My favorite is Bothrops insularis :). Also I would like to know if you think categorization "Fauna of xy" is useful. - Darwinek 10:54, 7 August 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Fauna of xy

Hi, thanks for your comments about my adding fauna of xy to things. I didn't realize that those two were not species. However, I think that in other cases it would be useful for now to add them. The classification system you suggested would be useful at some point, but there isn't really enough information to know which categories would be appropriate. What is your opinion on adding fauna of ___ to individual species? Aelfthrytha 22:25, 9 August 2006 (UTC)

I strongly disagree with you because the majority of those things which I tagged don't have such a distribution. If the categories for Fauna of Central Asian countries become too big, they can be split at a later date. Also, I would appreciate a little bit if you would soften your tone; I'm not sure if it's your intent, but you seem rather harsh. Aelfthrytha 23:35, 9 August 2006 (UTC)
Thousands and thousands of articles doesn't sound so alarming to me; I've been resposnsible (sometimes solely) for stub-category splits along those lines. Check my history if you like. The basic problem I have with your response is this: my goal is to create somewhere where information about wildlife (as well as any other aspect) of Central Asian countries can be accessed from a central point linking the articles all together. My focus is the information about those countries rather than animals. Because of this, my knowledge of animals (or whatever) is probably not sufficient. However, I feel like your alternative which you describe really isn't an alternative because my knowledge (and stage in the project) won't allow me to use that plan. Would you be willing to use what you know to help me implement such a system? Otherwise I don't see how I can take your advice and accomplish anything related to my goal. You've already (almost entirely) convinced me; it's just a matter of practicality. Aelfthrytha 00:33, 10 August 2006 (UTC)

Hi guys, I saw this conversation and thought I might throw in my two cents. The way I have been categorising things has been to split up the categories, but leave a central, broad category. My best example is Category:Frogs. I split that up quite a while ago, and now the frog category does not contain any taxonomy of the frog, just general information. The species, genera etc. are in the subcategories. As for how to do Fauna of XY categories, I cleaned up Category:Fauna of Australia quite a while back. The groups which weren't large enough to justify a split have remained in the main category until I can be bothered to further split them. I also only put species in, never genera, even if they are endemic.

I think the community needs to talk about how to split up the world to justify Fauna of XY articles and categories. I think it is silly to seperate two countries with the same fauna, based purely on political lines. I think New Guinea is the best example. It is owned by two different governments, Indonesia and Papua New Guinea. I have recently created the Fauna of New Guinea article, ignoring the political line, and basing the distinction on geography and zoogeography. This is how I think things should be done, especially in Europe, Asia, South America and Africa. Maybe we should bring it up on WP:TOL.

Oh, and there probably isn't a need for a serpentines wikiproject, there is already WP:AAR. --liquidGhoul 00:44, 10 August 2006 (UTC)

liquidGhoul! I was wondering when you'd pop up again. However, for once we can agree on something: I think Category:Frogs is a good example of how it should be done. With the snakes, I don't think Category:True vipers will ever need to be split, but Category:Vipers will. Category:Pit vipers will need to be as well -- there are just too many of them (certainly with all the subspecies). Perhaps dividing them into three regions -- for Asian, North American and Central/South America -- would be a good idea. Of course, that Category:Snakes should be split goes without saying; it's already too big! I can only image that that will be a lot of work, though. Or do you have some magic tool at your disposal?
Why no genera, though? I can only imagine that this attitude helps to reinforce the trend to ignore these articles. Most of them seem to be little more than lists of species based on various unknown taxonomies, which I find sad. Good descriptions of generic taxa help people to identify species they've never seen before. It can also help to cut down on duplicate (and often inconsistent) information in the related species articles.
Regarding "Fauna of xy" categories, why bother to create them in the first place, when you know in advance that they have the potential to become so large? You might as well create categories for things like Numbers between 1 and 1,000,000. Better to think first in order to avoid a lot of unnecessary work later on, if you ask me. --Jwinius 18:39, 10 August 2006 (UTC)
I don't know much about snakes, so please ignore my ignorance. I am going to assume that vipers are a family of snakes. If the viper category gets too large, you can split the family category into genera categories. I don't have a special tool to do it, though I think there must be one out there, as all the Fauna of Papua New Guinea articles changed category recently, check out the history of Fauna of New Guinea.
If you create a fauna of XY category, I agree that it would be good to create the subcategories straight up. However, most of the Fauna of XY categories have been created, so we can't. Hindsight is a good thing :)...
I would like to bring this to WP:TOL, because it would be good to have useful fauna of XY categories. At the moment, most of them are a joke. --liquidGhoul 00:02, 11 August 2006 (UTC)

As I was saying, it may be a good idea to split up Category:Vipers (Viperidae), but this only has the potential to grow to a little over 400 articles. That may seem like a lot, but this is one of the advantages of using scientific names for the titles: in an list like Category:True vipers, the genera all group together to give you an orderly overview anyway. However, Category:Snakes is more urgent, since this has the potential to grow to some 3500 taxa or more (guesstimate); even if it uses all scientific names, that's way too long to be of any use. For Category:Snakes, I think an excellent solution would be for it to contain only snake family categories, like Category:Vipers, so that it would contain only 18 items. All we have to do is create the necessary family categories, add those to Category:Snakes and then edit all of the snake articles, swapping out the "Snakes" tags for the right "Family" tags.

However, to believe that it's possible to tackle the "Fauna of xy" categories problem in the same way is to fall into a trap. To split these up into subcategories like "Mammals of xy", "Birds of xy", "Snakes of xy", etc., and proceed from their on may seem like an obvious solution, but remember that there are potentially almost 250 country categories as opposed to only one for snakes. So, no matter how efficiently the "Fauna of xy" categories are split up to begin with, there will still be up to almost 250 subcategory tags available for any one fauna article. The result? Articles for certain widespread organisms, such as dust mites, soil bacteria, and certain fungi, may end up containing almost all of those tags. For a case in point, take a look at the number of countries Bitis arietans is found in: 46 (and the actual number is probably even higher). Would it be practical to add even that many "Snakes of xy" category tags to this one article? Certainly not. So, yes: this issue urgently needs to go to be discussed at WP:TOL before things really get out of hand. --Jwinius 02:19, 11 August 2006 (UTC)

To interject myself, as I happen to have Jwinius' page on watch - looking at my shelf of field guides, the vast majority of them are based on political boundaries. At the very least they cover a single island or some other clearly definable area. I really think that as far as "what is to be commonly understood by the layman", using political boundaries is probably the easiest method of creating categories. Though "Fauna" may be too generic, and probably needs further sub-categorization. At the same point, I also believe we should categorize by taxonomy, as well to show relationships between species. -Dawson 03:23, 11 August 2006 (UTC)

If you mean sub-categorizing just "Fauna", that's fine, because then all the subcategories are unique, such as "Mites". However, if you actually mean "Fauna of xy", then that would still lead to almost 250 "Mites of xy" subcategories -- simply not practical. --Jwinius 12:03, 11 August 2006 (UTC)

There is an experiment currently underway at Category:Banksia, this is the best way to categorise, and I think it should be adopted for all living things. --liquidGhoul 06:50, 11 August 2006 (UTC)

That looks excellent to me. Big genus, though; not all are so large. The biggest one that I know of for venomous snakes is Micrurus (coral snakes) with over 60 species. However, those Banksia articles all use scientific names for their actual titles; I thought you were against that, wanting to follow the official policy instead. Have you had a change of heart? --Jwinius 12:03, 11 August 2006 (UTC)

Common names just don't work for most plants, the common name tends to be the scientific name, and they never go down to the species level (look at Banksia). --liquidGhoul 12:17, 11 August 2006 (UTC)

Ah! Okay, just checking. You had me worried there for a moment. ;-) --Jwinius 15:52, 11 August 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Snake stuff

Considering your love for snakes, I thought I would make you aware of this list. It is based on the same format as the two featured lists: List of Anuran families and List of Testudines families. It still needs some work to get to FL, but I am currently working on too many articles.

Oh, and sign up to WP:AAR, we need as many people as we can get! --liquidGhoul 00:08, 11 August 2006 (UTC)

Aware of what list? That article doesn't exist yet. However, it looks like something I might want to navigate to using the taxobox, for instance. Actually, the higher reptile taxa were already on my To-Do list.
I've also signed up to WP:AAR. Seems like a good idea. I'll read more about it later. --Jwinius 02:36, 11 August 2006 (UTC)
The list he meant to point to is List of Serpentes families. -Dawson 03:18, 11 August 2006 (UTC)
Hehe, sorry about that, was in a rush. --liquidGhoul 06:47, 11 August 2006 (UTC)

Okay, thanks, Dawson. I've left a comment in Talk:List of Serpentes families. Looks like we're going to have to discuss taxonomy at one point, specifically: which taxonomy to follow. --Jwinius 16:00, 11 August 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Re: Echis carinatus

Thanks for the kind words but they belong to Shyamal for placing them here. I only added his images. Regards, AshLin 10:53, 29 August 2006 (UTC)

Oh no. The credit goes to my dear friend Saleem Hameed [1] [2] who contributed those amazing pictures. Shyamal 11:09, 29 August 2006 (UTC)
Well, thank you both, and thank Saleem Hameed for me as well! These pictures are of excellent quality and filled in a obvious gap. They make the articles look nicer too! --Jwinius 11:14, 29 August 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Taxonomy

Hi Jwinius! Thanks for your message. Soon I will comment on "Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Amphibians and Reptiles#General taxonomy" In brief, I think that, (1) ammount of knowledge on the phylogeny of amphibians and reptiles is not the same, thus information sources and how good they are is highly variable. We know more on amphibians than for reptiles. FOR REPTILES: I personally use EMBL to track names, especially old ones, or to check for references. But, to get updated information about the nomenclature and taxonomy (reflecting various oppinions) I prefer to go directly to scientific publications, among them the authoritative McDiarmid et al. that you mentioned in the discussion, and to periodically check herpetological journals (try http://www.herplit.com/contents). FOR AMPHIBIANS: I trust 98% in Frost 2006 at the AMNH. Even though there is some controversy regarding some issues on amphibians phylogenetics as presented, it is the most authoritative work up to August 2006... Many issues are going to change in the near future. For example, Frost 2006 (and its main source Frost et al. 2006) considered Allophrynidae as part of Centrolenidae (Glassfrogs) - I do not agree, but, it will change only after someone presents scientific evidence. Meanwhile, Allophrynidae should either be placed under Centrolenidae or a comment regarding this possiblity should be placed instead. ITIS is of course a good database... however, in certain cases, where you have lots of controversies, it is better to go directly to the scientific papers.

About the second discussion "Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Tree of Life#Nomen nudum, nomen conservandum, and other nomenclatural terms"... I am not really into nomenclature itself, but rather into taxonomy and systematics.

Cheers! --DFCisneros 02:02, 3 September 2006 (UTC)

(By the way. If you are going to work on Neotropical pitvipers, the most trustable source is the book by Campbell and Lamar on the venemous snakes from the Western Hemisphere.

[edit] Banded Krait

Hi Jaap, A rare treat for me, I caught a Banded Krait on 19 Sep 06 and left it today afternoon. Went haywire taking snaps of this uncommon venomous elapid, some of which are on Bungarus fasciatus. And of course, I completely rewrote the article. My first poisonous snake. Regards, AshLin 19:48, 20 September 2006 (UTC)

Whoa, cool! Congratulations! I am jealous! Way to go, dude! Excellent pictures, too. I think the only way you could have made better pictures, is if you had killed the snake first. Real herpetologists often do that (probably with an injection), although I find the thought somewhat distasteful.
I'm sure you know, however, that there was some risk involving in handling the snake the way you did (or was that somebody else?). From what I've read, B. fasciatus is not very aggressive or difficult to handle, but Bungarus species are exceedingly venomous: even with prompt hospital treatment, a bite would be an experience you'd not be likely to forget. We wouldn't want you to take any unnecessary risks just for the sake of a Wikipedia article. Still, your improvements to the current version are very welcome! But, promise me you won't try the same thing with Daboia russelii. ;-) --Jwinius 20:42, 20 September 2006 (UTC)
Length 111cms, but forgot to weigh it. My query - how can one differentiate the sex w/o hurting the snake. How do I photograph the hemipenis or lack of it. Any other angles I should have photographed? Can/Should I attempt to photo the fangs/teeth? Cant promise not to do the same with D russelli, remember, its antivenom is available - so theoretically its safer to handle Russells than banded krait;) AshLin 13:47, 22 September 2006 (UTC)
Perhaps I need to expand the venom section of the D. russelii article a bit. You don't seem to appreciate how dangerous this snake is; it's one of the last species I would ever want to see someone suffer a bite from. Some victims say it's as if a hot coal is suddenly placed on your hand or foot -- and you can't shake it off! There's antivenin, sure, but even if you're bitten inside a hospital, you can bet that there will be plenty of pain suffering between the moment you're bitten and your supposedly quick recovery. And what happens if you're allergic to the venom, or the antivenin? Then you're in seriously deep trouble. Remember, it's for this same reason that more people die of bee stings every year than snake bites. In other words, it's better not to get bitten in the first place. And don't forget that D. russelii is notoriously difficult to handle -- ask anyone who milks them for a living. They often continue to struggle vigorously even after being grasped firmly behind the head.
As for sexing snakes in general, the easiest way to do this is by looking at the length of the tail and how it tapers off after the cloaca. Females have relatively short tails that taper off quickly, while the males have longer ones that start out a little thicker. This is because the two hemipenes are stored in an inverted position (outside-in) within the tail. They come out immediately after the cloaca. With neonates, it's possible to "pop" them with your thumb and forefinger: applying gentle pressure, you roll your thumb forwards up the tail and the the hemipenes usually pop out. However, this does not work on older snakes. In cases where it's difficult to judge the sex from the length and shape of the tail alone, it's sometimes necessary to use a probe. The probes I've used were always metal, less than 10 cm long, a few mm thick and with a blunt tip. You grease it down (with animal fat, not vegetable fat) and gently try to insert it into one of the inverted hemipenes. If a short length can be inserted without any difficulty, it's a male. If not, it's a female. --Jwinius 23:50, 22 September 2006 (UTC)
Thanks, this useful info gets you a rewrite of Daboia and if you give me your email id on my user page (will delete later) images of how I caught and handled Bungarus. Regards, AshLin 13:26, 24 September 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Nomenclature of new articles

Point noted. Saw this kind of usage somewhere. Please create redirects if you like or will do so later myself. Only a couple more scales to go. BTW I now have a Ptyas mucosus, one Amphiesma stolata & three Xenochrophis piscators of various sizes.AshLin 23:22, 3 October 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Hi, regarding the puff adder

Hi, thanks for the welcome. Yes, I love venomous snakes and have worked with many species in my lifetime. The puff adder article is a great one, but I found the sentence "One of the most toxic of vipers" a little bit off. The snake is definitely venomous, but among the most venomous vipers? I can name a few vipers off the top of my head that are more venomous, including the saw-scaled viper and russell's viper. Now, I may be wrong as I am more versed in the elapids, particularily the mambas and cobras. Regarding the puff adder being responsible for more deaths in Africa -- I am pretty sure that this cannot be because the Egyptian cobra and saw-scaled viper are by far the most common snakes involved in fatalities in Africa. Do you have a source for the statement? I have sources claiming otherwise. Victims of Egyptian cobra bites and saw-scaled vipers have quite a high mortality rate, meanwhile puff adder bite victims rarely succumb. Jacky62 15:17, 7 October 2006 (UTC)

Jwinius, I must say that you have done a terrific job on both bitis arietans and bitis gabonica. They are definitely the most comprehensive and accurate snake articles on Wikipedia. I think you are right in regards to fatalities in Africa. If your reputable sources claim this, than I am all for it. My sources regarding the echis carinatus and naja haje are sketchy and aren't quite clear. However, the misconception that echis carinatus and naja haje are responsible for most deaths in Africa is quite persistent. It's "right" as far as percentages go (more people succumb to naja haje and echis carinatus for every 10 bites) -- naja haje and echis carinatus are relatively much more dangerous. If say naja haje or echis carinatus were responsible for as many bites as bitis arietans, than surely the fatalities attributed to naja haje and echis carinatus would be considerably more numerous. Then again, a much higher percentage of dendroaspis polylepis victims die as a result of a bite (as compared to echis carinatus or naja haje), but bites are exceptionally rare nowadays.
In regards to the venom potency, I will remain reserved on that.
I was looking at some of the elapid snake articles and they are just horrible. I plan on enlarging the dendroaspis polyepis and several other articles and follow your style of referencing and such. It's going to take some work, but elapids are what I know best. I'm not as good with vipers or pit-vipers, lol. Unfortunately, some of the elapids are poorly studied and remain a mystery. The cobras are the ones with the most research, so perhaps I will start there.
Yes, I have several snake books. Jacky62 16:12, 7 October 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Need for an annotated Viper head image(s)

Hi Jaap, we'll need annotated viper head image too to show the new scales that you have added to the glossary of Snake scales. Will you be doing that. Regards, AshLin 02:58, 13 October 2006 (UTC)

Sounds like a good idea. However, the problem will be finding one good enough to serve as a general example. The scales are small, so the image needs to be sharp. Also, and the specimen cannot be too darkly colored, or else it won't be easy to distinguish the individual scales, and the head has to be angled properly. Images like this are hard to find. Still, I'll try to find one like this for the Snake scales article, as well as examples for all of the individual scale articles. --Jwinius 09:50, 13 October 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Snake scales

Hi! I just read your message. Unfortunately I can not recommend a single book where you can find definitions for all kind of scales. However, all colubrids and elapids have a pretty standard set of scales that you will find for sure described in most books dealing with snakes in general (e.g., Reptiles of Central America by G. Kohler), pitvipers and the small worm-like snakes (and all the cilindrical snakes of the families Leptotyphlopidae, Anomalepididae and similars) have a different set of scales. I remember that there are some great monographies on African worm-like snakes published by the Paris Natural History Museum where you can find nice descriptions of the scales of those snakes. Whereas, for vipers and pitvipers I recomend you to check the books "Biology of the Vipers" and "Biology of the Pitvipers". Hope this helps a little.. Cheers! --DFCisneros 01:57, 20 October 2006 (UTC)

Great, thanks! Even if they aren't exactly what I was hoping for, they do look like a couple of excellent books. I've been asking around and I'm starting to get the impression that a comprehensive checklist of snake/reptile scalation does not yet exist. What's more, Dr. Peter Eutz (of the EMBL) tells me that such diagnostic information exists for only about 300 species of snakes. Amazing! --Jwinius 10:53, 20 October 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Trinidad name for Bushamaster

Dear Jwinius:

Why did you remove the mention I made to the common name for Bushmasters in Trinidad and remove the reference? I notice the reference you added gives Mapapire balsain for the Bushmaster and Mapapire zanana for the Fer-de-lance and I am happy with these but the Bushmaster is often simply called Mapapire or sometimes Mapapire grande (to distingush it from the Fer-de-lance which tends to be somewhat smaller). Furthermore, the reference I inserted gave an approximation of the Trinidad pronunciation which is not obvious from the spelling. This may help people with the identification. I am really pleased with the other changes you have made - but I would like to reinsert the pronunciation of Mapapire and give the reference again. Would you object to this? John Hill 02:22, 27 October 2006 (UTC)

My apologies if my unilateral action seemed arrogant. Since McDiarmid's distribution description for L. muta doesn't include Trinidad, I went looking for a confermation. The reference I've used was one of the first I found and, purely by coincidence, includes what is undoubtedly a more complete common name than the one you first provided. I guess mapapire is simply a general term for a venomous name. Anyway, having found a more complete name, it seemed a little silly to take so much trouble to explain how to pronounce only half of this name, leaving out the more specific part (which is arguably the more important). Now, if someone were to find a reference explaining how to pronounce the entire name, wouldn't that be a bit more useful? --Jwinius 10:33, 27 October 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Distribution map of Vipera aspis

Hello Jwinius, you asked about the source of the map in commons. It's from

  • Axel Kwet: Reptilien und Amphibien Europas. Franck'sche Verlagsbuchhandlung, Stuttgart 2005, ISBN 3-440-10237-8

I've written the german article of de:Aspisviper an made it for that. I hope it will help you. Greetings from Berlin, Achim Raschka

Excellent. I've added the distribution map with your reference to the English article on V. aspis. Thank you very much! --Jwinius 12:35, 30 October 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Source for B. asper

Hi, Jaap! My source for (I think) all the unfootnoted material in Bothrops asper was http://www.venomousreptiles.org/articles/133, the forum post that's cited in the article. Sorry not to be specific. I know that's not the best kind of source, but it looks reliable to me.

Synonymy—I'm impressed!

Can I suggest that even for a short encyclopedia article, complete sentences are preferable? That is, "The terciopelo is found in…" rather than just "Found in…" —JerryFriedman 00:12, 7 November 2006 (UTC)

(See my reply on your talk page. --Jwinius 02:20, 7 November 2006 (UTC) )

[edit] Cerastes cerastes

The problem is not at all with the quality of the videos, solely their copyright status. Unfortunately, we can't take quality into account. The page linked to gives no licensing information at all. We have no reason be able to believe this is self-made and owned. If you are in correspondence with the creator, please ask him to add a source and copyright status to the videos, and then the links can be readded. Dmcdevit·t 05:53, 10 November 2006 (UTC)

"It sounds to me like you're against linking to YouTube video material on principle, simply because few (if any) of these kind of videos include copywrite information." Yes, that's exactly right. We can't link to clips like this that don't give copyright information. Saying it's "obviously homemade" is no reason at all to believe that it's not a copyright infringement. Without a lisence, it can't be linked. Dmcdevit·t 17:35, 10 November 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Reply to your comments on my Viper edits

Hi Jaap! Thanks for your detailed note on your concerns about my edits. It is good to see your concern for accuracy as it is certainly very true there is a lot of nonsense repeated about poisonous snakes. It is my object too to make the articles "as accurate, reliable and trustworthy as possible."

Actually, you have raised one of the main difficulties with the Wikipedia - because it can be edited by practically anyone, and because many writers are either pushing a particular line, or are poorly informed, it becomes more and more necessary to give good, reliable references. However, this approach also has its weaknesses as can be seen here in this discussion. Even scholarly, peer-reviewed works can contain mistakes and/or important omissions. Sometimes personal knowledge is more reliable.

You have based a column on the range of Lachesis muta in the Lachesis species table on a particular work by McDiarmid et al. (1999) who, for whatever reason, have omitted a portion of the well-known and well-established range of this species. I tried to rectify this omission by adding Trinidad to the range but neglected to notice that you had already given a reference for the information in the box.

I do believe Trinidad should be listed in this box - especially as it is a country off the mainland of South America and it is of interest to see that the Bushmaster has spread to Trinidad (though not to nearby Tobago or other West Indian islands). However, I agree I should have given an additional reference after I added Trinidad to the list. Under the circumstances, you were quite justified in removing Trinidad from that list - but I would like to add it again with reference(s).

Now, the presence of this species in Trinidad is referenced in several sources already given in the specific article on Lachesis muta. Should I just refer to that article or should I copy over some or all of the references from that article? I could easily find further references to the Bushmaster occurring in Trinidad if I was near a good library - but, unfortunately, I now live in the bush in northern Queensland, Australia, some 350 km from the nearest small city - so my access to books other than the ones in my personal collection is extremely limited.

About my comments that Bushmasters prefer upland forests (and, in the article on Fer de lances, that they prefer wet lowland forests): This is something that all of us who had to hunt and work with these snakes knew well. I clearly remember Dr. Wilbur Downs who was an internationally renowned naturalist and, the Director of the Trinidad Regional Virus Laboratory as well as my boss and teacher at the time, remarking someone had reported that he had caught a "Mapapire" (often the locals would use this non-specific name when they were not certain which of the two large venomous snakes in Trinidad was involved) near the Caroni Swamp, that it must have been a Fer de lance and not a Bushmaster because it wasn't caught in the hills. On our return to the laboratory in Port of Spain, this was, of course, quickly confirmed, by a quick examination of the captured snake.

I was reminded of this recently when I was looking up birds I used to study and work with in the excellent, The Birds of Trinidad and Tobago by G. A. C. Herklots (1961). He makes a brief reference to this difference in the ranges of the two snakes in his introduction on page 10. I could make reference to this book - and perhaps I should, as I don't know anywhere else that this information has been published. However, I suspect that Herklots got this information originally either from Dr. Downs or Dr. William Beebe (who was the Director of the New York Zoological Society's Research Station at Simla in Trinidad at that time), or from local hunters who certainly knew where to look for each species.

In other words, I believe both Dr. Downs and Dr. Beebe probably knew as much or more about the range of these snakes than Dr. Herklots, having had more direct experience with them. I myself have had considerable experience both hunting for and working with both these species. I am quite happy to quote Dr. Herklots but I regard the knowledge of Drs. Down and Beebe plus my own experience of working with these snakes over some 7 years to be perhaps even more reliable than the brief written note of Dr. Herklots in the introduction to his book on the birds of the region.

What I am wondering is, in this case, should I just refer to Dr. Herklot's reference - or should I do that plus add an additional note in the Discussion page?

Any suggestions from you about how to handle these matters would be most welcome.


Cheers,

John Hill 07:21, 12 November 2006 (UTC)

[edit] pit viper edits

Hi Jwinius, thanks for your comments re my edit to the pit viper page. I haven't got my head round how to add a citation yet hence there isn't one on re the sensitivity of the pit organs. The source is "Comparative Vertebrate Neuroanatomy" second edition by Ann B Butler and William Hodos (2005) No I'm not a herpetologist but have always been interested in snakes! regards Doctorpete 18:38, 16 November 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Viper edits

I should have said this earlier, but SmackBot has been making some irritating edits to the collection of over 150 articles under Category:Vipers. I've developed a rather unique style for the beginning of these articles that consists of a list of common names above the introduction. This list is separated from the introduction by two blank lines. Smackbot keeps deleting the second of these two blank lines and I'd like it to stop doing that. The latest example is Daboia. Thanks, --Jwinius 13:02, 23 November 2006 (UTC)

Hi, I've put in a special rule to ensure two blank lines after the Common name line in members of rattlesnake, pit viper and true viper categories. I'm a bit uneasy about a set of pages with "special layout", certainly the common names should be in bold, perhaps the style used for redirects as at the top of Autopsy might be better. Rich Farmbrough, 09:28 24 November 2006 (GMT).
P.S. please let me know if this layout changes. Rich Farmbrough, 09:51 24 November 2006 (GMT).
Thanks for modifying your bot for me. I'm aware that my style is not that popular with the other editors, but it's not like I didn't give it any thought (see style). I am fundamentally opposed to Wikipedia's common name naming policy for article titles and by extension the popular introduction style. This solution works best for me, and let's not forget that the right to ignore the rules is also an official policy. In addition, I've been receiving encouragement from many non-editors, and a while back Bitis arietans and Bitis gabonica were given Good Article status despite being different, so the style I've developed must not be all that bad. Nevertheless, should anything change I'll let you know.--Jwinius 12:57, 24 November 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Rattlesnake Venom

I left what I felt to be a decent reference, though it isn't entirely focused on the proteolytic effects of rattlesnake venom; instead it focuses on certain mammals' tendency to resist these effects. It does, however, give information on the proteolytic venom found in rattlesnakes in the first paragraph (and loosely in subsequent paragraphs):

"In snake venoms that cause extensive hemorrhage, such as those of rattlesnakes and other vipers and pitvipers, the toxins responsible for hemorrhage have been identified as snake venom metalloproteases (SVMPs). These enzymatic toxins cause localized hemorrhage, either through damage to endothelial cells (Ownby et al. 1978; Ownby and Geren, 1987) or through gaps produced between endothelial cells as a result of damage to the basement membrane of blood vessels (Ohsaka, 1979; Markland, 1998). Hemorrhage produced by SVMPs can subsequently lead to edema, shock, tissue necrosis, and reduced ability to regenerate muscle tissue (Gutiérrez and Rucavado, 2000). Additionally, leakage of blood from affected vessels also helps spread other venom toxins to their target tissues."

So while hemotoxic hemorrhaging is the rattlesnake's predominant toxic effect, it's venom is not solely a hemotoxin. Perhaps I should have, or should, make that clear in the article.

aside from all that... I saw my first wild rattlesnake (eastern diamondback) down here in the sunshine state a couple weeks ago. It looked to be about 4 or 5 ft long and crossing a road near my house. I couldn't get it to rattle it's tail though... dang... --the oreo 17:15, 2 December 2006 (UTC)

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