Talk:Galerina

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The following users are actively contributing to this topic and may be able to help with questions about verification and sources: Peter G Werner (talk • email)

Contents 1 Confusion with Psilocybe? 2 Rewrite 3 Formatting issues 4 Blue Staining Galerina

[edit] Confusion with Psilocybe?

According to my guide to mushrooms in Scandinavia Galerina (marginata) can be easily confused with Kuehneromyces mutabilis. No other confusion possibilities are mentioned and I see no obvious similarity with the Galerina species and the most common Psilocybe: P. semilanceata. However, I dont know all species of either genus, and it is certainly also possible that some foreign species could be confused. Anyway, please provide citation to back up any claims in the article, or I will remove the claim. Expert opinion highly welcome. Jens Nielsen 22:51, 17 January 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Rewrite

I have given the article my "expert" best. If anybody thinks it still needs something, give me a holler on my talk page. Peter G Werner 08:09, 6 April 2006 (UTC)

It is, in my view, an exemplary short article, detailed and technical but clearly written and interesting. Great work! I just made some stylistic revisions, mainly on the referencing which I converted to the very handy new markup style - see m:Cite.php.

[edit] Formatting issues

I must admit I'm a little confused. Maybe it's because of browser differences or something, but I can't see the "huge mess" you mentioned at Galerina. What exactly is the problem there? --Stemonitis 07:43, 24 May 2006 (UTC)

I just don't like the way the "References" section looks when "ref" format is applied. I strongly prefer to use a name/year system for references, as is standard in biology, with an alphabetical list of references at the end. Unfortunately, at present, Wikipedia doesn't have a reference format where one can end up with an alphabetical reference list. Also, the "^" tags in the Reference section knock everything in the reference list out of alignment.

Also, I don't know why you changed the taxobox around – the way you've set it up, it actually contains less information.

Basically, the way I had the page set up, everything was neat and my references were clear. Your reformatting made the page look unnecessarily messy – its would be one thing if your reformatting was necessary to add more information, but I don't think it was called for in this case. As I understand Wikipedia rules on citation of sources, one has some leeway in terms of citation and reference style – I think when I rewrote the article, I chose a very good citation and layout style where the information was presented in a clear and easy-to-access manner, and was consistent with the reference style for its scientific discipline. (The reference and citation style I use follows that of Mycologia very closely.) I don't get is just why the formating of the article needs to be changed, especially when it makes the page look messy. Peter G Werner 08:11, 24 May 2006 (UTC)

Hmm.., well I guess "messy" is a subjective term. While there is indeed some leeway, all the high-quality articles I've seen (featured articles and so on) have used this sort of inline formatting, which is not standard for scientific journals, but Wikipedia is not a scientific journal. In your system, many of the references were given two different web-links, one inline, and a different one in the (unlinked) reference list. This is, at least, confusing.

As for the reduction of information in the taxobox, the only things I've taken out are the dates, which are not usually included under the ICBN. The description of there being "many" species hardly counts as information.

So, if your only real issue is an æsthetic dislike of the MediaWiki reference format, then I'll be tempted to return to my formatting, which is more in common with other Wikipedia articles, has greater functionality, and is easier to read, since the citation details are moved out of the body text. But I'll wait for your response before I make that change. --Stemonitis 08:22, 24 May 2006 (UTC)

I really do dislike the MediaWiki format, yes. I really do think the reference list looks bloody awful with that format applied - is there any way to make that format display better on the page? As for some of the inline references, those are mostly pointing to abstracts of articles when links to full text isn't available. Perhaps that might be better placed at the end of the references themselves as "Abstract available from: " The inline reference to the Northwest Forest Plan is there for a reason – its not a "citation" per se, but a page explaining what the Northwest Forest Plan is - I would have just as soon put a Wikipedia link there, but as of now, there is no Wikipedia article on the Northwest Forest Plan, so I put in an external link instead. As for the taxobox, I wasn't aware that dates weren't standard under ICBN – I guess remove them, if that's not the case. I think the subgenus names look better bolded and I think that should be kept. Adding a link to Franklin Sumner Earle only creates a redlink at present, so I'd just as soon not have a link there unless there's going to be a Wikipedia article on him soon. (In fact, I'd just as soon remove the link to "Cortinariaceae" for the time being.) Those are my thoughts on the matter, anyway. Peter G Werner 08:43, 24 May 2006 (UTC)

An addendum – I was just looking at the Wikipedia Generic Citations page, and at the bottom of the page, they have have a template for a linked version of the Harvard reference style. When I have more time, I'd like to try it out on the "Galerina" page. In the meantime, if you really feel it would be an improvement, go ahead and change it to MediaWiki for the time being. Peter G Werner 09:00, 24 May 2006 (UTC)

I've kept the inline citations, but have changed the author citation style to more closely match the outline format given in Scientific Style and Format (6th edition). This come much closer to the reference style in use in journals such as Mycologia and Ecology, and is much cleaner and easy on the eye, IMO. I would appreciate that not get reverted without very good reason. I'll reformat the "Further reading" list to conform to the formating of the inline reference list. At some point (when I have a little more time to work on this article), I'm going to reformat citations according to the inline Harvard Reference style I discussed above.

I also changed a few things in the taxobox, and got rid of the redlink for "Cortinariaceae". (Actually, Galerina is being moved into a newly expanded Hymenogasteraceae, and I'm just waiting for valid publication before I make that change.) Peter G Werner 15:44, 24 May 2006 (UTC)

No no, that all looks fine to me. We needn't be scared of red links, by the way. They encourage people to create missing articles, when they think, for instance, "What? There's no article about Frank Sumner Earle? Well, I'd better make one, then." --Stemonitis 07:29, 25 May 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Blue Staining Galerina

The article says "No Galerina has blue-staining tissue, though in some cases the flesh will blacken when handled, and this may be misinterpreted as a bluing reaction.^[1]". However the following article talks about Galerina Steglichii BESL which does stain blue due to the presence of psilocin: http://leda.lycaeum.org/?ID=10423 —The preceding unsigned comment was added by Alan Rockefeller (talk • contribs) 20:03, 22 January 2007.

I'll add a note about that – however, that's really unusual for a Galerina species, and to the best of my knowledge, Galerina steglichii is not a common mushroom. In other words, its not an exception that disqualifies the above rule. Peter G Werner 21:21, 22 January 2007 (UTC)