Wikipedia:Featured article candidates/California Condor

The following is an archived discussion of a featured article nomination. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the article's talk page or in Wikipedia talk:Featured article candidates. No further edits should be made to this page.

The article was promoted 14:14, 17 September 2007.

[edit] California Condor

Self Nomination Another bird article, and one that I have been working on for several months now (originally in my sandbox). I believe that this article fulfils the FA criteria, is comprehensive, has a good lead, conforms to the MoS, and has a bunch of good images and a range map. It has been peer reviewed (with most comments left on the talk page) and believe it is ready to become featured. Thanks. Rufous-crowned Sparrow 02:44, 10 September 2007 (UTC)

• Support as a late-in-the-piece tweaker and copyeditor I feel this one is over the line. The prose runs smoothly. The only issue is a couple of stubby paragraphs. To solve this I'd suggest in Relationship with humans that paras 3 and 4 be appended onto para 1 and unified to one paragraph. The last 3 paras of the Conservation section could be merged and the last para be the first of the 3. Other than that I'm happy. cheers, Casliber (talk · contribs) 08:42, 10 September 2007 (UTC)

Y Done I merged Conservation as suggested but only merged 3 and 4 in Relationship, leaving them seperate from the first paragraph. Should I continue to merge? I personally like it as is. Rufous-crowned Sparrow 23:41, 10 September 2007 (UTC)

• Support - looks pretty good to me, although I'd go along with Casliber's suggestion. Jimfbleak 17:59, 10 September 2007 (UTC)
• Support: In "Conservation", it says that ranchers "had been taught by their parents that the bird hunted calves and lambs." I think it would be better to say that they "mistakenly believed that the bird hunted calves and lambs." Because if it says that they were taught this by their parents, it implies that it was the parent's fault that ranchers were killing condors. Either that, cite an additional source saying that they were taught it specifically by their parents.--Jude. 18:56, 10 September 2007 (UTC)

Y Done Possibly change comment to support? Rufous-crowned Sparrow 23:41, 10 September 2007 (UTC)

Done. It's a very good article, great work! Cheers, Jude. 00:11, 11 September 2007 (UTC)

• Comment: reads well, but I have a couple of things I'd like to see (if you don't have time I'll add them myself): it needs mention of the two condor sanctuaries made specifically for this bird (the Sisquoc Condor Sanctuary in the San Rafael Wilderness, and the Sespe Condor Sanctuary in the SE part of the Los Padres National Forest, along with the reasons those sanctuaries were created (favored inaccessible nesting sites in terrain with lots of rocky ledges). Also, I have a problem with the range map. It shows a "U" shape in central California, and I'm pretty sure the "U" should, going counterclockwise, follow the coast range down to Santa Barbara/Ventura Counties, then go across along the Tehachapis and then up along the Sierra foothills. Right now the bottom of the "U" is within the California Central Valley. (I can make a fixed map if no one reading this can ... but I need a source to work from, since I'm not an ornithologist, and it would be a few days until I can get to it.) Nice work! Antandrus (talk) 00:33, 11 September 2007 (UTC)

Y Done and unable to do. I put in the condor sanctuary bit under distribution, but I have no clue how to do or redo a range map. If you want to make another one, BirdLife International's is probably the most accurate. Its at [1]. Thanks for your comments. Rufous-crowned Sparrow 23:49, 11 September 2007 (UTC)

Thank you! Oh, and Support, of course. I'll try to make you a range map in the near future, as soon as I have a few minutes with a computer with ArcGIS; the one at the link you provide is similar to another I found online here, and which I believe is more accurate (the existing range map doesn't even include the condor sanctuaries!) Antandrus (talk) 00:05, 12 September 2007 (UTC)

Thanks! Rufous-crowned Sparrow 00:56, 12 September 2007 (UTC)

• Comment:
  • "In relatively modern times, the California Condor roamed across the American Southwest." Could you use something a bit less vague than "relatively modern times"?

Y Done Rufous-crowned Sparrow 23:59, 11 September 2007 (UTC)

• • The image page of Image:Condorchick.jpg claims the animal depicted is a chick, while the caption claims it is an adult. One of the two probably ought to be changed.

It is most definately an adult's head, but I am not allowed to edit the picture's page. It doesn't exist or something (?) Rufous-crowned Sparrow 23:59, 11 September 2007 (UTC)

That's because the image is at commons, you have to click "description page there" right below the image to get to the description page there. Let me see what I can do.--Carabinieri 00:08, 12 September 2007 (UTC)

I've changed the information on the commons description page. I am unable to move the image, since I am not registered at commons, but I have add a move proposal template to the page and hopefully someone will move it soon.--Carabinieri 00:14, 12 September 2007 (UTC)

Thanks! Rufous-crowned Sparrow 00:56, 12 September 2007 (UTC)

• • Images generally should not have a specified width per WP:MOS. The exceptions listed there do not apply to most images in this article.--Carabinieri 00:41, 11 September 2007 (UTC)

OK. Thanks for your comments. Rufous-crowned Sparrow 23:59, 11 September 2007 (UTC)

• Support -
  • There are repeated references please clean them up with the name="blah" attribute. (1&61 , 8&9, 30&33 etc). #1 and #61 are broken also.

I'm still new to Wikipedia and have no idea what name="blah" attribute means, or how to fix the broken cites (someone specifically asked that #1 be included, though I personally think that it being in the article works) Rufous-crowned Sparrow 23:59, 11 September 2007 (UTC)

Left a message on how to do it on your user page. There are dead links in the references section, they need to be replaced. -Ravedave 13:31, 13 September 2007 (UTC)

Also I cant find the full bibliography for "Nielsen 2006". -Ravedave 13:35, 13 September 2007 (UTC)

I replaced the dead links (I was just on the LA zoo page, no clue why it vanished) and the full bibliography for Nielsen is in the Cited texts section. I'll get around to the name="blah" thing when I get a chance. Thanks for your comments. Rufous-crowned Sparrow 00:16, 14 September 2007 (UTC)

Y Done All references now name="blah"able. Rufous-crowned Sparrow 23:26, 14 September 2007 (UTC)

• • Please clean up the External links, and if possible dig up some video and audio to link to.

 :Y Done Will take a look at this and try to find video/audio. Rufous-crowned Sparrow 23:59, 11 September 2007 (UTC) UPDATE: Deleted one link and put in another movie link. I couldn't find any audio on the species though. Rufous-crowned Sparrow 02:08, 13 September 2007 (UTC)

• • Having more than one reference for the "Relationship with humans" section would be nice.

Other than that it looks pretty good! -Ravedave 04:29, 11 September 2007 (UTC)

Thanks for your comments! I'll search the web for some more sources, but I don't recall seeing any first time through. Rufous-crowned Sparrow 23:59, 11 September 2007 (UTC)

• Comment: - Some scientists, such as Noel Snyder, believe that this process of making ceremonial clothing helped contribute to the condor’s decline.[69] If so, this would be the only species that was endangered by the California natives. Then who killed off the prehistoric megafauna? Corvus cornix 18:18, 11 September 2007 (UTC)

I think that they mean that the bird was still doing fairly well in their reduced numbers, but hunting for the clothing dropped their numbers even further. Rufous-crowned Sparrow 23:59, 11 September 2007 (UTC)

• Lots of fixes needed. I just made a series of sample edits, fixing a number of WP:MOS issues, but there are still more needed. Please review my sample edits and fix throughout. Besides the sample corrections I made, there is still incorrect use of bolding in references (see WP:MOSBOLD), all references are not completely and correctly formatted (see WP:CITE/ES and sample correction on USA Today source, all sources need a publisher, author and date should be given when available), see WP:FN on how to use named refs for repeat refs (there are still a number of these to be done), and please be sure to doublecheck that you've gotten all occurrences of the sample edits I made (WP:MOSBOLD, WP:MOSNUM, WP:MOSDATE, WP:CONTEXT, WP:MOSLINK, WP:DASH and pruning of external links per WP:EL, WP:RS, WP:NOT). SandyGeorgia (Talk) 06:30, 14 September 2007 (UTC)

I just fixed all of the references that are repeated and de-bolded them. I'm pretty sure I got publisher, author, and date when available for the citations listed, so unless you have any specific examples of ones I missed... I'm going back through your edits now to make sure I didn't miss anything, but I think I knocked out the reference problems. Rufous-crowned Sparrow 23:26, 14 September 2007 (UTC)

Y Done OK, I think I dealt with all of the issues you raised. I may have missed a minor one, and if so please tell me, but I think I dealt with what you brought up. Thank you for your comments. Rufous-crowned Sparrow 23:53, 14 September 2007 (UTC)

Good start, keep going; I left more sample edits and an inline query. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 01:40, 15 September 2007 (UTC)

Y Done I fixed your inline query (I just copied and pasted the website's suggested citation) and delinked what I saw as the repetitive things in the article. I now think that the references are good (missed the publisher-author difference. Major oops). Now what? If there is another major ref problem, could you tell me what it is instead of trusting my poor brain to notice? Thank you for all of your copyediting of the article. Rufous-crowned Sparrow 23:35, 15 September 2007 (UTC)

Looks good; nice work! Now what? Help proofread bird? :-) SandyGeorgia (Talk) 00:38, 16 September 2007 (UTC)

Sorry. I'm currently rewriting the King Vulture article in my sandbox. Any chance you could change your comment to support? Rufous-crowned Sparrow 02:29, 16 September 2007 (UTC)

The above discussion is preserved as an archive. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the article's talk page or in Wikipedia talk:Featured article candidates. No further edits should be made to this page.