Talk:Aerodramus

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Good article Aerodramus has been listed as one of the Natural sciences good articles under the good article criteria. If you can improve it further, please do. If it no longer meets these criteria, you can delist it, or ask for a reassessment.
November 14, 2007 Good article nominee Listed
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Good article GA This article has been rated as GA-Class on the quality scale.
Mid This article has been rated as mid-importance on the importance scale.
WikiProject Birds To-do:
To-do list for Aerodramus: edit · history · watch · refresh
  • add a range map
  • expand the shorter paragraphs
  • create an "external links" section

[edit] Good Article nomination

GA review (see here for criteria)
  1. It is reasonably well written.
    a (prose): b (MoS): (addressed)
  2. It is factually accurate and verifiable.
    a (references): (addressed) b (citations to reliable sources): c (OR):
  3. It is broad in its coverage.
    a (major aspects): b (focused):
  4. It follows the neutral point of view policy.
    Fair representation without bias:
  5. It is stable.
    No edit wars etc.:
  6. It is illustrated by images, where possible and appropriate.
    a (images are tagged and non-free images have fair use rationales): b (appropriate use with suitable captions):
  7. Overall:
    Pass/Fail:

This is a quality article, and it is clear and to the point, but it needs some work before I will pass it.

The lead is only five sentences long. There is no way these five sentences cover everything in this 11 kb-long article. Please consider expanding the lead, per WP:LEAD.

The second half of this article is well-cited, and looks rather good. The top half looks like it was written by a different editor: there are no citations until the last sentence of the 'Behavior' section, leaving 'Behavior' with one lonely citation, and 'Description' with none. Surely a citation for the size of these birds can be found? A citation for the sentence "Apart from swiftlets, the only other avian species to use echolocation is the unrelated Oilbird." would also be good.

The citations themselves need work, too: they're excellent sources, but the formatting is not great. On some, the author's last name is listed first; on others, the first name comes first! Pick one style. You may want to use the WP:CITET templates (don't if it will cause you to pull your hair out in frustration). I'm not a fan of the allcaps you've used on LASTNAME, either. At least one of the citations you use (#1, the only one I checked) is freely available on-line, here. Link to it! One of Wikipedia's strengths is as a starting point for further research: provide links to good sources such as this for the readers. Provide DOIs and ISBNs on the references. You have none on your inline cites. Put the names of articles in journals in quotation marks if you don't want to use the CITET templates.

The prose is generally good, but there are some minor issues:

  • "Typically, they leave the cave..." No cave was previously mentioned. A sentence before that should perhaps mention where they live, so the reader isn't confused by the out-of-the-blue mention of leaving the cave.
  • "It can echolocate but," grammar.

I am available if you need assistance. Firsfron of Ronchester 09:06, 12 November 2007 (UTC)

Jim, I'm checking the references now, and I'm having problems with ref 3. It's supposed to verify the sentence "Characteristics of behaviour, such as what materials apart from saliva the nests contain, can be used to differentiate between certain species of Aerodramus." But I seached through the entire PDF, and there are no instances of the word "saliva", or "nest", or "behavior"/"behaviour". Which sentence in the document verifies this statement? Firsfron of Ronchester 08:05, 13 November 2007 (UTC)

After checking several references, and after Jim reworked some sections, I am satisfied that this article meets the GA criteria. This is a wonderful little article; suggestions for improvement include: adding a range map, expanding some short paragraphs, and creating a succinct "external links" section where readers can find out more information (both technical and non-technical) about this genus from reliable sources. Thank you for your hard work! :) Firsfron of Ronchester 04:50, 14 November 2007 (UTC)

As an additional comment, there are still issues with this article with regards to the completeness criterion. There is nothing in the article on the organism's diet, and a section on habitat and geographic range is absent as well. The format and manual of style looks primarily good, and the prose seems good as well, so I won't boldly delist; though I'm not sure if the article would pass a Good Article Reassessment within the missing information. Dr. Cash 06:32, 14 November 2007 (UTC)

Are you looking at the same article? You state above that "There is nothing in the article on the organism's diet", but the article clearly states "Aerodramus swiftlets are aerial insectivores, which take prey like flies on the wing. They roost and breed in caves; during the day they leave the caves to forage for food, and return to roost at night.
You state "a section on habitat and geographic range is absent as well"; while there is no seperate section, the article states, "Its members are confined to southern Asia, South Pacific islands, and northeastern Australia, all within the tropical and subtropical regions."
The information isn't missing; you just missed it. You would be wrong to speedy delist this article, so I'm glad you haven't. Firsfron of Ronchester 06:43, 14 November 2007 (UTC)