Talk:Lion/Archive 2

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Contents

how they love their prey

Is there any reference to back up the lin

"The prey is usually killed by a bite into the nape or throat."

This page: http://www.african-lion.org/lions_e.htm states "usually killing it by strangulation or suffocation, showing incredible strength in doing so." Just noticed the differences when reading, if its incorrect someone please update it :) - anonymous 07:58, 13 March 2007

Second largest big cat?

Lions are "the second largest feline species, after the tiger", THE LION: The Lion rangers from 330 to 500 lb. An average fully grown male can be estimated to be in the low 400's.

"Their diet consists of little children."

? If they have been known to attack and kill (human?) children for food, fine, but the wording of this sentence is just strange because it sounds like their diet is mostly children.

No they don't kill children for food. In majority cases of a lion actually killing a human for food the lion had a severe injury which made it extremely difficult to catch anything. Lions are not man-eaters but will kill people to get rid of competition or self defense which is called intraguild predation. Meaning predators kill other predators to get rid of competition for example a lion will also kill a leopard or cheetah but not for food.Mcelite (talk) 17:45, 20 February 2008 (UTC)mcelite

Felis or Pantera?

Here: http://onlinedictionary.datasegment.com/word/felis+leo, the lion is identified as Felis Leo. That coincides with my 9th grade biology class (1984).

On this page, the lion is identified as Pantera Leo. What's going on?

--Mrfelis 03:53, 2 March 2007 (UTC)

The Lion is a Panthera. It is one of the 4 roaring cats.

Lion and tiger size -cape buffalo

I disagree on 1: You forgot the indochinese, a forgotten tiger subspecies, which grows to bengal-like size. It's never been a focus of tiger study due to its rarity and political difficulties in its region. In fact, I have watched documentary which dismisses the distinction between 2 subspecies. So what it means: Siberian > Bengal ~ Indochinese > lion > sumatra. The indochinese is also particularly aggressive.

By the way, is there any proof that lion can kill adult buffalo alone? I would like to know —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 203.220.146.21 (talk) 10:24, 10 March 2007 (UTC).


1. Siberian Tiger 2. Bengal Tiger 3. Indochinese Tiger & African, Asian Lion

Buffalo Issue: I have NEVER seen a lone male lion killing a full grown Cape buffalo. Now, that's not to say that they can't. But that would be a rarity. Cats are cats, not super-animals. This also applies to the Tiger. All the crap that's written how 1 tiger can take down a full grown Gaur. Some fools even claim that 1 tiger can bring down an elephant!!! LMAO! The fact is, there is no photo or video evidence of a singe male lion or tiger bringing down anything larger than a deer (or wilderbeast/zebra in lion's case). That's a fact. A full grown buffalo would be too much for any cat to take on solo. Again, not to say it can't happen as there are always exceptions, but logic is logic. And a cat is a cat.

As I said, the studies on indochinese tigers are really limited, no wild indo. tiger has been measured; the weights are taken from captive specimens. So if you choose to belive the article, it's fine, but it's biased(btw, I already read that article long time ago). One documentary I have watched about tiger said there is no indochinese tiger. Bengal and indochinese both belong to the mainland subspecies. It explained the fact that quite a few indochinese tiger skins well over 3m in total length, and some killed specimen that weighed over 300 kg. These data are nowhere on the internet, though.Mane lions are usually have less weight than the hairy lions

About predation, I searched alot on youtube, but couldn't find any. I think a tiger can kill a buffalo or a gaur, but by no mean easily; only the most experienced tigers will take them on. If you speak of video, no doc. about Bengal tiger has been made outide ranthambore and bandhavgarh NP( the NG guys really suck), where buffaloes, rhinos and gaurs don't exist. I guess cos' of tiger's elusive nature, plus its very low number, it's much harder to film than lions, the ratio of lion/tiger doc. must be about 20/1. But I have a few photos of gaur kill, and below is one of them.

http://flickr.com/photos/anilbapat/136765610/

Looking at the head and horns, this must be a very large gaur. Btw, I don't think people should consider tiger or lion merely "big cats"; it's an insult to them. Even if a domestic cat grows to the size of lion/tiger, it's nothing like them, a cat is a cat, yes; but a tiger or a lion is no cat. They just look like one, the same way we are no monkey.

Indo-Chinese Tiger issue. Not having wild speciments to measure is the reason for the exadurations in size. Captive animals are MUCH bigger in weight (fat) than the wild counterparts. So yeah, I'm sure they found a 300 kg Indo-Chinese, but same can be said for Captive Lions as well. Just like with the Siberian Tiger. There have always been the 700 lb/320 kg exadurations. In reality (studies have confirmed this many times) the wild Siberian Tigers are around 500 lb. In fact, no wild Siberian Tiger measured in the last 20 years have been over 550 lb. That's a fact. The old hunting stories that claim 700 lb tigers can't be taken as facts.

Buffal Hunting. I have been debeting this issue on Tigers for years. I've read a lot of books and seen a lot videos. In the end, there is not concrete proof that a Tiger can kill a full grown Buffalo or a Gaur. NONE. Pictures like you shown don't really prove a kill. It may have been an old animal that died on it's own and a tiger fed on it. Maybe it was sick or injured and no effort was needed to bring it down. Regardless, I've never seen any proof that 1 Tiger can kill a healthy, full grown buffalo. Look at the lions! I mean, it takes several females or AT LEAST 2 males to bring one Buffalo down! It is silly to assume that 1 tiger can do something that takes a group of lions to do. It's just as rediculous as the claims that a tiger would attack a rhino or an elephant. That's just dumb. The only time I've EVER seen an elephant (full grown) brought down was by a whole pride of lions (and there were a couple dozen of them!). 1 Tiger can't do that.

My friend, your argument captive animal larger than wild is not always true. I've seen a siberian tiger in the local zoo, and it turned out to weigh only 180kg, a male. Wild animal with abundant food grows huger than those in zoo, as in the case of northern Indian tigers, which surpass any other tigers, incl. Siberian in size, with one weighed as much as 388kg, that's an utopia for wild cats. And when I talked about a 320kg indochinese, it's a wild too, killed in 1958. Ther's only a handful of captive indochinese tigers if you care; and the weights are therefore,biased. Who knows about the origin of that tiny captive population? And regard Siberian, well, it's the 2nd largest feline in the world, after the North indian race. A siberian weighs an average of 230kg, that's obvious. I don't know from where you got the figure no wild siberian tiger exceeding 550lb from, the same way some people say Bengal stops at 258kg. Well, siberian tigers can go as much as 295kg, as confirmed by Igor paelanov, a leading authority on Siberian, please read the book:tiger in the snow for that. the largest cat of course is the tiger of North india, which can surpass 360kg and averages 250kg for male. But, according to so-called scientific journals, they come second!!Sounds great!

And now, predation. My main subject here is the size, so this will be my last talk on predation, to avoid starting another tiger lion comparison. Well, for the professional wildlife photographers, it's easy to distinguish btw kill and eaten carcass. And a gaur of that size(look at the head), well, be objective, must be extremely powerful! Tigers do kill gaur, and adult, though rarely, that's what the observation and feces analysis in Bandipur and Nagarhole NP have concluded. Why there's no documentary? I said above already, and documentary is not the only way to prove one thing. You really think when wwf pusblishes a newsletter, they love the issue of tiger owning lion so much that they decide to exaggerate the tiger's deed by saying it has killed a mother rhino? How about the guys who discover that indochinese tigers majorly hunt banteng ,a cape buffalo-sized ox in Laos? A lion pride is a single entity, don't take them individually. To say that a tiger can't kill a 1500 kg gaur or rhino that would take a pride of lions is really... Is that a rule? What do you base on to come up with such idea? Well, I don't mean to offend you, so if you find my word offensive, please be a bit forgiving, I really don't mean it. Lastly, you might find the following news and reports mostly...educational:

http://in.news.yahoo.com/050528/43/5yq31.html //tigress fights bull elephant in north india, the latter dies from injury. Coincidentally, the tusker killed by a tiger in the late 1950s was also in northern india. http://www.savethetigerfund.org/AM/TemplateRedirect.cfm?template=/CM/ContentDisplay.cfm&ContentID=2225 //indochinese hunts banteng in Laos http://www.panda.org/about_wwf/where_we_work/asia_pacific/where/nepal/news/index.cfm?uNewsID=18912 //mother rhino killed by tiger, wwf takes care of calf. Well, actually a mother rhino is less than a gaur bull, so this deed is trivial. gaur bull = rhino bull. http://www.mypage.bluewin.ch/raonline/pages/np/tour/nptour_chitw02b.html#rhino02 //3 rhinoes were killed by tiger, also in chitwan

My argument is that when you look at hunting footage of lions you can clearly see that a single lion can't bring down something like a full grown buffalo. A tiger is not that much bigger, on average, than a lion. It's silly to say that he could do that. And while I hear all those reports, there's never any evidence. Decads of studying tigers and all those experts can't find ONE shred of photo or video evidence to prove that a tiger can kill larger game... A tiger is a tiger... not a super cat. The lion is on the same size scale and it can't bring animals that size down solo. That stands to reason that neither can a tiger.

I've read a number of source materials detailing single tigers taking down adult gaur, even Corbett himself recounts such a story in one of the Man Eater books. Can't remember which. In any case, it's apparently much more prevalent than single lions taking down adult cape buffalo (although for the record, a ranger I talked to at Mala Mala Reserve in SA told me that he had twice seen single lionesses do it and once a single nomadic male). The very fact that it isn't featured on one of the many lion documentaries is evidence enough that it's rare, everyone knows it would be a difficult task for a single lion and lions prefer to hunt in groups whenever possible in any case. But there are also substantial differences in temperament and volatility between the cape buffalo and gaur, the latter being a much more docile animal.Ronnymexico 20:49, 3 April 2007 (UTC)

"But there are also substantial differences in temperament and volatility between the cape buffalo and gaur, the latter being a much more docile animal". It's wrong. Aggression toward human is different from aggression toward other animals. Cape buffalo, I've seen it being chased by hippo quite a few times, and every time the hippo charges, the buffalo( taller) backs off submissively. The gaur has not been in any documentary at all, that's why it's much less famous than the cape. The perception of a docile animal is biased & incomplete. have a look at the gaur article and you'll see why.

http://flickr.com/photos/anilbapat/136765610/ //adult gaur bull killed

Looking at the huge head and horns, it's obviously a very huge gaur, in the range of 1400 - 1500 kg. But, looking at the coat, it's dark brown, not jet black. Bull gaur 9 years old and older always possess jet black coat. You can see it here:

This makes it very clear that this gaur bull is a normal, healthy adult bull, by no mean "near dead" or even old. Bull 14 years or older is considered an old bull.

http://kalyanvarma.net/photography/photo.php?id=27&tag=Kill //gaur cow killed

likewise, looking at the coat, shows that this gaur cow is about 4-5 year old, another healthy adult cow of about 700 - 750 kg. Female older than 8 have dark brown coat.

This proves that tiger can and do kill healthy adult gaur, bull and cow.

I forgot 1 thing: in the book "Monster of god" pub. in 2003, pg 86-87, the author, an american naturalist, have observed that in the Gir forest, it takes a pride of lionesses to kill a male Sambar. Asiatic lions have simlilar size compared with African lions. A single tiger/tigress can kill a sambar.

Lastly, the indochinese tiger's size data has been taken in the early 1970s, at which time there's no zoo outside Indochina has this tigers in captive. That's a time of warfare and poverty, the zoo is like a refuge camp. The tigers are in very bad conditions, hence the low weight. Think about it, if in the wild, the indochinese can weigh as much as 300 - 315kg, and 3.2m long, it must averages about 200 kg, right? So has the gaur data. That's why u see so many sources, in 1000s, said a very stupid bullshit: "gaur bull weighs up to a ton". Oh man, nothing can be anymore stupid and ridiculous.

There is a lot of evidence, which say, that tigers can kill adult gaurs by their own. If someone says, he wants to see a video to believe that, I would say, that kill-videos of tigers are very rare. Actually one could also argue, that a tiger can not kill a muntjac. I have never seen a video where a tiger kills a muntjak...--Altaileopard 13:21, 1 June 2007 (UTC)

Evidence of a single lion killing an adult male cape buffalo

This is from the site of a game reserve in South Africa (part of the Sabi Sands which borders Kruger National Park):

"March ended on a high note when Solly’s guests saw a lone male lion take down a buffalo bull on his own. Buffalo are normally difficult for a whole pride of lions to bring down, so it is quite remarkable for the guests to have witnessed what they did."

http://www.djuma.co.za/drumbeat0407.php

This confirms that such predation is rare but within the lion's capabilities and occurs on occasion. Ronnymexico 13:36, 31 May 2007 (UTC)

Wow! That's just fantastic. What a great source, kinda says everyone's right. :D Alastair Haines 02:15, 8 July 2007 (UTC)

Population decrease . . . why?

Now, most of the population lives in eastern and southern Africa, and their numbers are rapidly decreasing, estimated as between 16,000 and 30,000 living in the wild, down from an estimated 100,000 in the early 1990s. In addition, the remaining populations are often geographically isolated from each other, which can lead to inbreeding, and consequently, a lack of genetic diversity.

Why is this happening? What has been going on over the past 15 years to cause the population to plummet? We need an explanation. Funnyhat 20:48, 12 March 2007 (UTC)

Roitr

I suggest someone in the know to take a close look to this diff [1] made by Reboti (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · block user · block log). It looks like an unconditional revert to some earlier version, typical for long-term vandal WP:LTA/Roitr who seems to have a particular obsession with this article, among many others. --Dmitry (talk •contibs ) 14:30, 18 March 2007 (UTC)

Anyone? [2] --Dmitry (talk •contibs ) 05:52, 20 March 2007 (UTC)

Feline aids

Most male lions have been exposed to a feline form of HIV, but show no symptoms, this is curently being researched as a possible cure for human AIDS.

I have removed this sentence from the article as it makes a number of assertions and is completely unsupported by references. I suggest it not be readded until reliable sources can be found to confirm this. WjBscribe 00:13, 19 March 2007 (UTC)

I don't have a source at the moment, but it is true for the Filine AIDS. My cat has that and I spoke with the Vet about it. I don't know about research on human aids, but the lion is the only species of cat that is know to live comfortably with AIDS. It's dowright imune to it. Again, I never heard anything about using that to cure human aids, but it maybe possible to create something for the feline AIDS based on the lion's resistance.

see FIV--HoneymaneHeghlu meH QaQ jajvam 02:00, 14 June 2007 (UTC)

Extinction dates of European lions

Can someone provide a reliable source for the contention that lion populations were alive and well in Southern and Western Europe in historical times? While I have read about lions having survived in the Balkans up to the 5th century B.C., the possibility of Julius Caesar standing face to face with a Gallic lion is completely new to me. I have placed similar fact tags in the European Lion article. Iblardi 19:29, 2 May 2007 (UTC)

I have removed most of the unsourced statements. For the time being, an Asiatic population surviving in the Caucasus well into Medieval times doesn't seem so far-fetched, so I left that one. Iblardi 21:00, 3 May 2007 (UTC)

italy quality page

when you want, you can add this tl: {{Link FA|it}} thanks ;)

Ja ja :D Multo grazie amico mio! Ciao! Alastair Haines

Kathy

hi, lion.

Li-on what?--Nadezda-Tatiania 14:56, 28 May 2007 (UTC)

I think cathy is a Liger lout!--86.29.247.13 14:57, 28 May 2007 (UTC)

New Classification

I am very sorry to say that the Lion is now an Endangered Species. I updated the page as well. -zootycoonfreak

Care to provide any references? It's still listed as vulnerable in the IUCN Red List, so I reverted your change until you can provide any supporting evidence. MCoca 09:35, 29 May 2007 (UTC)

I'm having a bit of trouble finding the name of leaders of a prides. Do you know were I could find out the name, or if you know it yourself, could you tell me.

I think you've done very well with the page. It's very interesting.

P.S. I'm new to Wikipedia (less than a month).

--59.100.191.112 00:28, 4 June 2007 (UTC)

250 kg it's 550 pound, not 500 pounds.

Paw Print

Can we start getting some track images for animals? 74.129.182.66 07:42, 21 June 2007 (UTC)

Toward FA status

I've rearranged the article like Cougar which just gained FA status. There are alot of photos but I'm sure there'll be alot more text to go in here too, so I haven't moved any so far.

To-do list

  • Enlarge pop culture section to succinct but comprehensive summary and link. Y Done
  • Needs large conservation section - there must be loads of stuff here - reserves/subspecies etc. (actually maybe will not be that large) - (partly done)


  • More on taxonomy and structured. We need to clean up the number of valid subspecies.
That´s difficult. All the african subspecies (exept the barbary lion) are probably invalid and can be united to one or two subspecies.--Altaileopard 09:20, 10 July 2007 (UTC)
okay, there are definitely too much of them... I will delete all recent subspecies, which are not accepted as valid by this book: Graham Batemann: Die Tiere unserer Welt Raubtiere, Deutsche Ausgabe: Bertelsmann Verlag, 1986. (seven subspecies are accepted here.
Sorry, now we have even more subspecies in the list, but I think it is better. The list in the book I mentioned above is probably incomplete. So I followed now Heptners Mammals of the Soviet union, which says, that usually 11 african subspecies are accepted, but most of them are probably invalid. I wrote it in this way in the text and added two missing of these subspecies. --Altaileopard 15:48, 10 July 2007 (UTC)
The extinct subspecies are okay (perhaps with the exeption of Pantrhera youngi, but that is mentioned in the text)... but the european lion is a thorn in my side. I think this article is not confirmed and should be completely deleted.--Altaileopard 16:02, 10 July 2007 (UTC)
I commented out the list of subspecies for now, then realized that someone - you - had been working on it very recently. Might I ask that you convert this list to prose, paragraph form? We generally avoid having bullet points in articles, especially so early on in the article. Thanks. –Outriggr § 06:45, 11 July 2007 (UTC)
Is it better now?--Altaileopard 09:26, 11 July 2007 (UTC)
Because of the reason, that the book is quite old, I updated the subspecies according to newer papers, which are mentioned under references in the article. These four subspecies are not recognized in the newer literture:
  • Panthera leo hollisteri - Congo Lion. Northern bank of Lake Victoria.
  • Panthera leo kamptzi - Cameroon Lion. Northern Cameroon and the region south of Lake Chad.
  • Panthera leo nyanzae - Uganda Lion. Uganda.
  • Panthera leo vernayi - Kalahari Lion. Kalahari (Botswana), southwest Africa and southern Angola.
Actually I do not want to have them in the article, but I mention them here, to prevent me (and others) from further confusion.--Altaileopard 18:31, 19 July 2007 (UTC)
  • references in Attacks section
  • Lion-baiting needs a summary and its own subsection and link in last section (partly done)
  • I've tagged a few places which need refs. Please try to add tem in cite format. If a book, book page is good, journal articles from peer-reviewed journals would be great!

(Add more jobs here) cheers, Casliber (talk · contribs) 22:06, 5 July 2007 (UTC)

Zakouma National Park in Chad had extended coverage in National Geographic March 2007, my copy got rained on in the mail box. :(

  • Online: Lion cubs — very cute, but sad story.

The focus of the article was elephants. There is coverage of lions killing baby elephants:

  • "Nathalie came on the radio this morning. She had spotted a baby elephant killed by lions near the den on the Machtour. We found the carcass later that afternoon; it was a three year old femlae, still tuskless, whose mother may have been killed by poachers." [p. 56.]
  • "Nathalie said that lions in the park commonly prey on young elephants. ... Elephants orphaned by poaching become the prefered prey of lions in Manovo-Gounda-Saint Floris National Park." [pp. 56f]
  • Video: lions eating baby elephant

Cheers, Alastair Haines 02:30, 8 July 2007 (UTC)

Schaller's book The Serengeti Lion is still the foremost authority on hunting/pack/cub-rearing, etc. for anyone that can get a hold of it. It's only cited in the article once. Bendž|Ť 08:07, 10 July 2007 (UTC)

Agree - looks like a great book. We'd need the book as now at FAC it is prudent to have the cited text and individual page refs (and I'm sure there'd be a few..) cheers, Casliber (talk · contribs) 11:54, 10 July 2007 (UTC)
I have to say that this article contains several traces of informal language and colloquial terms, something which is usually frowned upon in our best articles. I have cleared some of it up, but there may be more. Examples include '...unlike the regular lion which blends in with its surroundings', '...it can be given away by its colour' and '...has a disadvantage when it comes to hunting. Maybe I'm being overly concerned, but I found all of these three examples in a single, small piece of text. I think a general cleanup of language/language style may need to be added to the 'to-do' list. -- Anonymous DissidentTalk 06:24, 12 July 2007 (UTC)
Absolutely - just hadn't gotten there yet. I'm finding a good way of doing these FAs is:
  1. Get all info and layout right - bits and pieces of copyediting is good at the time but don't waste too much time at this point as when you move chunks of text you may find words repeated close together again after you'd spent time making the text look non-repetitive in the first place
  2. Get refs - you may have to leave out some cool stuff which is unreferenced
  3. When all the content is more or less right, have a go at polishing the LEAD which is a summary of the article anyway (I'm impatient and generally sneak editing the lead beforehand - naughty me)
  4. Copyedit and copyedit again
  5. Then and only then ask one of our overworked wikimicroscopes to mercilessly review/copyedit the article. (Kla'quot has very kindly offered to chip in here.)
  6. GA nom can be good if you find yourself unclear about how to proceed on a topic but I don't worry too much about it.

Ta-daaaaa —Preceding unsigned comment added by Casliber (talk • contribs)

Sounds good. I'm back from my little holiday now, so I'm ready to give this article some proper attention, starting tomorrow. -- Anonymous DissidentTalk 16:53, 14 July 2007 (UTC)

Population

Is there any countrywise data on lion population?Anwar 12:44, 6 July 2007 (UTC)

Subspecies: Panthera leo roosevelti - Abyssinian lion

Somebody has edited the subspecies list, and there have been some changes. I am missing the abyssinian lion. What happened to it? Is it just missing from the new list or has it lost it subspecies status? The subspecies list should be updated with comments for the changes. 84.189.90.54 11:55, 10 July 2007 (UTC)

After my literature, this subspecies is not accepted.... the lions from Ethiopia belong to Panthera leo massaicus.--Altaileopard 09:29, 11 July 2007 (UTC)
Okay, thank you! 84.189.109.137 20:16, 12 July 2007 (UTC)

Consensus on capitalization

Dear all - up till now I've worked on fairly specific lifeforms where the names were capitalized as per MOS - eg Red-tailed Black Cockatoo, Common Raven..but lion is a different kettle of fish as it is clearly a common word which is both specific and general:

I'll outline 3 options and can people please vote below -I've trawled through a few weighty discussions lately and I think my eyes will fall out if I have another - I figured we'd better get this straight before we went any further:

Option 1:lion small letters, but subspecies such as Asiatic Lion/Cave Lion capitalised

(place vote here)

  1. Casliber (talk · contribs) 11:00, 19 July 2007 (UTC)
  2. Danny 11:38, 19 July 2007 (UTC)
  3. — Laura Scudder ☎ 14:00, 19 July 2007 (UTC)
  4. Second choice (sorry I made a mistake) Fowler&fowler«Talk» 15:40, 19 July 2007 (UTC) (subspecies should be written as "Asiatic lion," not "Asiatic Lion." (See my post "Style and Convention" below. See also the excerpts from Britannica posted there.)
  5. Second choice Kla’quot (talk | contribs) 16:29, 19 July 2007 (UTC)
  6. (not really competant to vote but ...) Asiatic lion/Cave lion as per Fowler.and.Fowler Alastair Haines 03:50, 22 July 2007 (UTC)

Option 2:all variants capitalised

(place vote here)

  1. UtherSRG (talk) 11:26, 19 July 2007 (UTC)

#Altaileopard (talk) 15:45, 19 July 2007 (UTC)

(I don´t see any reason, why a subspecies should be small and a species capitalised. What happens if someone finds, that cave lions are a distinct species? So I say everything small or everything large!--Altaileopard 13:53, 19 July 2007 (UTC)
Actually I would prefer everything small, but i don´t care to much about that and I think, we will come to a consensus earlier, if I choose this option.--Altaileopard 13:57, 19 July 2007 (UTC)

Option 3:lion always in small letters, whether subspecies or not

  1. First choice Kla’quot (talk | contribs) 16:30, 19 July 2007 (UTC)
  2. First choice. Fowler&fowler«Talk» 16:35, 19 July 2007 (UTC) (Subspecies: Asiatic lion, or Indian lion)
  3. Altaileopard (talk) 18:52, 19 July 2007 (UTC) (exactly: Species: lion; Subspecies: Asiatic lion, or Indian lion)
  4. This is also acceptable. — Laura Scudder ☎ 19:20, 19 July 2007 (UTC)

Discussion

OK - succinct discussion below here please. PS: See Wikipedia:WikiProject_Mammals#Capitalization

See WP:BIRD for the logic. While the Lion is unquestionable, there are many many mammal species whose names follow those of birds': <adjective-clause> <noun>. This format makes distinguishing a species from a more general grouping. A good example is also on the WP:BIRD page. - UtherSRG (talk) 11:31, 19 July 2007 (UTC)

  • Would expect a work like MSW http://nmnhgoph.si.edu/msw/ to have discussed the rationale for this. If such a discussion exists, I would vote for following a comprehensive work such as MSW rather than guidelines developed here by consensus. From what I see on the common name query on the Smithsonian MSW website it looks like the bird-style name seems to be followed. Shyamal 11:42, 20 July 2007 (UTC)
  • The MSW is a taxonomy guide, appropriate for short descriptions, like a field guide (written in terse sentence fragments). However, Wikipedia articles are comprehensive full-length essays that not only have description of characteristics, distribution, and habits (as in a field guide), but also fossil record, form and function, genetics, behavior, ecology etc. The comprehensive guide to nomenclature in this context is Mammalian Species published by the American Society of Mammalogists (the same people who have compiled MSW3, see secondary sources section below), which has full-length essays 5 or 6 pages long (like Wikipedia). Note that, on their taxonomy page, they say: "Subfamily Pantherinae: Panthera leo, 762, Lion; onca, 340, Jaguar; tigris, 152, Tiger; Uncia uncia, 20, Snow Leopard." and they also say: "The taxonomy used by Mammalian Species for species indentification follows that of Mammal Species of the World (MSW3) used by the Smithsonian Institution's National Museum of Natural History." However, in their full-length essays, they do not capitalize. I couldn't locate their Panthera leo page, but here is their "tiger" Panthera tigris page. It's sections are: 1) Context and Content, 2) Diagnosis, 3) General Characters, 4) Distribution, 5) Fossil Record, 6) Form and Function, 7) Ontogeny and Reproduction, 8) Ecology, 9) Behavior, 10) Genetics, 11) Literature Cited. As I said above, they do not capitalize. The citation is: Mazák, Vratislav. (1981). Panthera tigris, Mammalian Species, No. 152, pp. 1-8. (The citation requires JSTOR access; however, I will be posting excerpts from it and other sources below.) Outside of taxonomy, the convention in all other fields, (like Wildlife Studies, Ecology, Genetics, Behavior, Reproduction, Conservation, Geography, History, that have scholarly journal articles about the lion) is unanimously not to capitalize. Fowler&fowler«Talk» 13:05, 20 July 2007 (UTC)
PS I found another site for Mammalian Species. Here is their Main Page. Click on PDF and go to #20 (Snow Leopar), #152 (Tiger), #200 Mountain Lion, and #352 Jaguar. Fowler&fowler«Talk» 13:18, 20 July 2007 (UTC)
PS And I found the Mammalian Species lion article as well. Here it is: Haas, Sarah K., Virginia Hayssen, and Paul R. Krausma 2005. Panthera leo, Mammalian Species, No. 762, pp. 1–11, 3 figs. (Published 15 July 2005 by the American Society of Mammalogists). As you can see "lion" is not capitalized. (Initially, when they are dealing with taxonomy, they use Panthera leo, but after page 3, "lion" is used.) Fowler&fowler«Talk» 16:05, 20 July 2007 (UTC)
  • Ouch! I don't feel competant to vote. However, may I recommend patience. This is an important and helpful, but big issue. It needs time to understand the variety of conventions in the literature. The pay-off would be a clear convention for Wiki. Perhaps an interim consensus so this article is internally consistant would be a good thing. But don't let that stop settling the bigger issue. Two meta issues seem important to me: ease of comprehension for a reader, and simplicity of convention to promote contributions from editors. I think the meta issue of original research is not applicable, that policy is to protect reliability of content, not issues of typeface etc. Were I to vote, I would vote for capitalization of Cave lion (or Cave Lion), because cave lion could look to a reader like any lion in any cave, not a specific sub species. However, I also like removal of capitals, because context rather than typeface should make meaning plain. Alastair Haines 03:42, 22 July 2007 (UTC)
Well put. Your counsel for patience is well taken too. I have moved the discussion of the larger issue to the section below (where I am also collecting secondary and tertiary sources) so that the interim consensus for the lion page can be reached expeditiously. Fowler&fowler«Talk» 01:46, 23 July 2007 (UTC)
(Shuffles feet and looks at ground)...gosh. what do we do now....cheers, Casliber (talk · contribs) 20:40, 5 August 2007 (UTC)

Style and Convention

I just noticed the above discussion after I saw changes made on the Snow Leopard page. Let me first say, that the consensus in the reliable sources is definitively against capitalization. I am not sure where WP editors have come up with this notion of capitalizing English names of mammalian species. Here are excerpts from Encyclopaedia Britannica's "lion," "tiger," "snow leopard," "puma (cougar)," and "jaguar" pages. (I have boldfaced the names for easy recognition; Britannica itself doesn't do it.)
Even for birds, for which Wikipedia editors have chosen to capitalize across the board, Britannica chooses not to capitalize. Here are some excerpts from its "parrot" page:
As you can see from the excerpts, they write "parrot," but "African gray parrot." For mammals, the consensus in the literature is even more lop-sided against capitalization.
Please see my post on Talk:Snow Leopard#Recent Changes. I am in a hurry right now, but :I feel that there is a very real danger of an en masse application of original research here. I will keep adding excerpts from reliable secondary and tertiary sources for the rest of the day. Fowler&fowler«Talk» 15:31, 19 July 2007 (UTC)
PS I was thinking about why Wikipedia editors have capitalized many names, and I wondered if some (or many) of the people involved in these WikiProjects are taxonomists or have interest in taxonomy. There is a tradition in systematics for capitalizing names, essentially a result of replacing the Latin names (in which the genus name is capitalized) by English ones. For example, in my old copy of the Book of Indian Animals by S. H. Prater, all animals are capitalized, and in the Field Guide to the Mammals of the Indian Subcontinent, they are capitalized as well. The problem is that in taxonomy books, the descriptions are often very terse; they focus on a few things: distinctive characteristics, geographical distribution, and habits, and they can often get away with not mentioning the name at all, except at the very beginning. Wikipedia, however, is not a taxonomy guide. The articles on the lion, tiger, snow leopards and other cats have (or can have) much more than just the species' systematics. And, outside of taxonomy, the convention is unanimously against capitalization. I just went through almost a hundred papers (read their titles and abstracts) on the lion, in journals of wildlife biology, ecology, reproduction, molecular biology, etc. In none of them was "lion" capitalized. The tertiary sources like Britannica or Encarta, also don't capitalize. It's one thing to capitalize in a terse description (often composed of sentence fragments) as in taxonomy; it's another to capitalize in an essay which touches on many many things beyond taxonomy. Fowler&fowler«Talk» 23:49, 19 July 2007 (UTC)
This should be treated under style and convention and not under the purview of WP:OR. Does EB use any type-setting difference to set the name apart from the rest of the text ? Some book authors get past the problem by using all caps. While I can understand lion and tiger being accepted as established English words which can be used in lower case, I cannot see how it would be used for something like Indri, Avahi etc. What is the EB convention here ? Shyamal 13:12, 20 July 2007 (UTC)
In the Mammalian Species article, they use the Latin name (I. indri) for the most part, but when they use the common name, it is not capitalized. For example, "but indri can perhaps detect songs up to 3,000 m away (Oliver and O’Conner 1980; Pollock 1975, 1986)." or "The Malagasy name for the indri, babakoto, means father of koto (koto, a little boy)—so given because the calls made by indri seem to be those of a wailing father calling his lost son. The common name for the indri was used in naming ..." See Mammalian Species account 694. In Britannica, the names are in bold-fact, but never capitalized. Here is their indri entry: indri (Indri indri) slender, long-limbed primate found in the forests of Madagascar. The largest of the lemurs, it is 60–70 cm (24–28 inches) long, with a rudimentary tail and large hands and feet.... Active during the day and thoroughly arboreal, the indri clings to trees and climbs in an upright position as it feeds on leaves, fruit, flowers, and other vegetation. ....The indri is an endangered species found only in remote parts of northeastern Madagascar ..." It would be OK to put the names in bold-face, but lower-case. Fowler&fowler«Talk» 13:36, 20 July 2007 (UTC)
Sorry, I thought Britannica entries were in bold-face (but that was an artifact of the search process—it was bold-facing what I was looking for!) Here is a portion of their entry on the avahi (also not capitalized): "The eastern avahi (Avahi laniger), which lives in rainforests, is grayish brown to reddish, is about 28 cm (11 inches) long and 1.2 kg (2.6 lbs) in weight, and has a furry reddish tail of about body length or longer. The three species that live in western Madagascar's dry forests are smaller, weighing only 800 grams (28 ounces). They are lighter gray with a cream-coloured underside. The Betsiboka avahi (A. occidentalis) has a light facial mask and broad dark rings around the eyes, whereas the recently described..." Fowler&fowler«Talk» 14:14, 20 July 2007 (UTC)

I am collecting below excerpts from different secondary and tertiary sources, starting with Ernest P. Walker's Mammals of the World, (Johns Hopkins University Press) a pre-eminent reference for mammals. I will soon add excerpts from American Society of Mammalogists' publications Mammalian Species and Journal of Mammalogy (which use MSW nomenclature for their systematics, but do not capitalize English names), Encyclopaedia Britannica, and others. I will eventually move the discussion to WikiProject Mammals, since this problem is wider than just for the "lion" page. Fowler&fowler«Talk» 18:30, 21 July 2007 (UTC)

Secondary and Tertiary Sources and Capitalization

Fowler&fowler«Talk» 18:30, 21 July 2007 (UTC)

  • Mammal Species of the World: A Taxonomic and Geographic Reference, 3rd Edition. Don E.Wilson and DeeAnn M. Reeder (eds.). Johns Hopkins University Press, Baltimore, 2005, 2,142 pp., 2 vols., ISBN 0-8018-8221-4. In the review of MSW3 by B. D. Patterson (J Mammal Evol (2007) 14:67–69 DOI 10.1007/s10914-006-9022-6), Patterson states, "Like its predecessors, the third edition of Mammal Species of the World (MSW3) is a product of the Checklist Committee of the American Society of Mammalogists. ... Information in each account of MSW3 follows a standard format that lists sequentially: scientific name, author, year and publication details; common name; type locality, sometimes verbatim but more often standardized; distribution, listing all range countries in which the species occurs; conservation status, denoting the most recent CITES, U.S. ESA, and/or IUCN listing for the species; any designated synonyms (including their authorship and year of publication) and recognized subspecies; and comments, ... The potential to link the edition’s rich taxonomic information with the extensive biological details of Walker’s Mammals of the World (also published by Johns Hopkins) and with the IUCN’s assessments of species status and threats is rich."

Sources that do not capitalize:

  • IUCN Red List of Threatened Species. See their Species Information: Neofelis nebulosa (Clouded Leopard). Note that in the taxonomy section, they write the common names in block capitals: CLOUDED LEOPARD (E), PANTHÈRE LONGIBANDE (F), PANTHÈRE NÉBULEUSE (F), PANTERA DEL HIMALAYA (S); however, in their detailed documentation, "clouded leopard" is not capitalized. (e.g. " The clouded leopard historically had a wide distribution in China, south of the Yangtze ... The clouded leopard is found from eastern foothills of the Himalayas through most of southeast Asia ..." (Boldfacing mine.)
  • Macdonald, David. 2006. The Encyclopedia of Mammals (searchable on Amazon). Facts on File. 976 pages. ISBN 0199206082. (David Macdonald is Professor of Wildlife Conservation at the University of Oxford, Founder and Director of the Wildlife Conservation Unit at Oxford, and creator of the documentary Meerkats United.) The only instances of capitalization are either in the titles of articles or in the table of contents, but never in the text. This goes for all mammal species, big and small, well known and little known.
  • Gould, Edwin, George McKay, and David S. Kirschner. 1998. Encyclopedia of Mammals. Academic Press. ISBN 0122936701. (See index on Amazon). (Edwin Gould is Curator Emeritus of the National Zoo, Smithsonian Institution, after 16 years as Head of the Department of Mammalogy.)
  • Perrin, William F., Bernd Wursig, and J. G. M. Thewissen. 2002. Encyclopedia of Marine Mammals (Searchable on Amazon). Academic Press. 1414 pages. ISBN 0125513402. (William Perrin is with the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA)).
  • Mammalian Species published by the American Society of Mammalogists, with 25-35 individual species accounts issued each year. Each uniform account summarizes the current understanding of the biology of an individual species including systematics, distribution, fossil history, genetics, anatomy, physiology, behavior, ecology, and conservation. The accounts vary from 2-14 pages depending upon what is known about the species (See their editorial board here; it includes Kristofer M. Helgen, Division of Mammals, National Museum of Natural History, Smithsonian Institution.)
  • Journal of Mammalogy also published by the American Society of Mammalogists. (ISSN 1545-1542, Bimonthly, the journal the flagship publication of the American Society of Mammalogists. Published since 1919, the highly respected international scientific journal promotes interest in mammals throughout the world by the publication of original and timely research on all aspects of the biology of mammals; e.g., ecology, genetics, conservation, behavior, and physiology.) Read the abstracts here. Not capitalizing vernacular or common names has been a long-standing convention in the journal. Here is the relevant instruction from the Suggestions for Preparation of Manuscripts Page, Journal of Mammalogy, Vol. 16, No. 1. (Feb., 1935), "3. Do not capitalize vernacular names of animals or plants. Examples: raccoon; song sparrow; red maple."

GAC

I think this is a pretty good article. Anyone against a GAC right now?--SidiLemine 13:23, 30 July 2007 (UTC)

Thanks for noticing. A couple of us are in the process of shaping it up for a tilt at FAC - I'll make a to-do list below.. cheers, Casliber (talk · contribs) 20:39, 5 August 2007 (UTC)

To-do list as of 5th Aug 07

Right - let's drop notes here. cheers, Casliber (talk · contribs) 20:41, 5 August 2007 (UTC)

  • Finish referencing Cultural depictions section (will also be very useful for subarticle).

*Reviewing pix in gallery and placing within article and removing the gallery.

  • More in Conservation section about breeding programs etc?
  • getting refs for cite needed tags.
  • Would be nice to get a little info on some of the other subspecies not elaborated on yet.

OK....let's go (strike out when done or add more) :) cheers, Casliber (talk · contribs) 23:15, 5 August 2007 (UTC)

NB: Still need Schaller's book The Serengeti Lion.....cheers, Casliber (talk · contribs) 23:17, 5 August 2007 (UTC)

Peer Review?

Would this be a good idea before putting it in to the FA candidates? Might get some good feedback from some outside editors. Thoughts? -- Anonymous DissidentTalk 23:25, 10 August 2007 (UTC)

Not bad - I'd worry it'd just sit there. The person I nag alot about these is Circeus; Clayoquot offered to copyedit but I still had some issues with the comprehensiveness of the content. OK, place it there and if no-one offers after 7-10 days I'll get a usual suspect. :) cheers, Casliber (talk · contribs) 00:20, 11 August 2007 (UTC)
YesY Done - I have made the peer review. Let's hope we get some useful feedback. -- Anonymous DissidentTalk 02:13, 11 August 2007 (UTC)

gallery

Why was the allery removed?

Profberger 15:02, 19 August 2007 (UTC)

I was wondering the same. Someone said it was "superfluous" I think, but I can't see why... -- Anonymous DissidentTalk 21:59, 19 August 2007 (UTC)
Sorry, I meant to leave a note -general galleries are not promoted as good for style of articles and we're working this up for FA nomination. What people are encouraging is to upload images to Wikipedia Commons from where all language Wikipedias can access them and the Lion page there functions as a more comprehensive image gallery. Then, on the lion page we try to work pictures beside the text they are relevant to. I was trying to figure out where and how we could use the images. Again, sorry for the removal and the images deifinitely are appreciated. cheers, Casliber (talk · contribs) 01:45, 20 August 2007 (UTC)

Copyedit

Hi everyone. Do folks think any sections are ready for copyedit? I'm ready to get started but can only do a little bit at a time, so if there is a chunk I can get working on that would be great. Kla’quot (talk | contribs) 04:27, 27 August 2007 (UTC)

I think everything down to the subspecies subsection is more or less doen contentwise. Still chasing some stuff for subspecies, and possibly conservation status. Attacks on humans could do with some text-massaging too. cheers, Casliber (talk · contribs) 01:06, 28 August 2007 (UTC)

Update

I got this Schaller book, which is a great read. I'm thinking we need a small section on communication which can go under group organization, though I am mindful the article is getting quite large. Still, fascinating stuff. cheers, Casliber (talk · contribs) 09:26, 29 August 2007 (UTC)

  • More thoughts - I can put more into general activity about sleeping/eating etc or do we think it is enough detail as is? forget it, done. cheers, Casliber (talk · contribs) 09:31, 29 August 2007 (UTC)
  • I have only skimmed the book. I had to change the feeding stuff as it was wrong. If it is ambiguous, let me know and we can work on it. I'll be away from keyboard for a while now. back later. Y Done cheers, Casliber (talk · contribs) 09:31, 29 August 2007 (UTC)
  • Finally...how big shall I make the communication section? It is as brief as i could be now, but could be a helluva lot bigger...made it a bit bigger...cheers, Casliber (talk · contribs) 11:57, 30 August 2007 (UTC)

External link to lion videos

I would like to add the following links to the article:

THe linked pages have no ads, no content besides the videos, and are simple pages.

I would add a "Media" section to the article but Wikipedia's video media inclusion is too much in its infancy for me (it seems to require a link to a player on the personal page of some guy on another wiki site) - once this matures I would contribute my media to the commons and include that way - but for now an EL to a video hosted on another site seems to be the best way to go (by the way, my site is not fly-by-night, it's been up far longer than wikipedia has.) If I don't hear anything in 72 hours I will assume approval and re-add the link. Isewell 14:28, 28 August 2007 (UTC)

See 'Links normally to be avoided' on WP:EL: "Links to blogs and personal web pages, except those written by a recognized authority." Personal sites are almost always deprecated here because of reliability concerns and because we don't want EL sections swamped. We need to see that these videos clearly add to the article and that they cannot be readily replaced by a reliable source. In the case of this animal, I doubt the videos pass on the second count. Marskell 14:47, 28 August 2007 (UTC)
A reliable source? How is gmaxwell's wikipedia page (where the player for theora files resides) a "reliable source" and any better than a web site that has been up longer than wikipedia itself? I understand the spirit of WP:EL but it seems to me that since wikipedia has no viable alternative for video, that the policy should take this into account and be more accepting of links to externally hosted videos. In addition, the recommended maximum for media files on the commons is 5M. This is insufficient for any decent quality, decent length videos, and given the worldwide proliferation of broadband, this is insufficient. Isewell 20:01, 28 August 2007 (UTC)

female lion pic

There is no image of a female lion, which has no facial hairs. See image in Lion King, which has both male and female lions. Lara_bran 11:40, 30 August 2007 (UTC)

Presently, there are images of female lions in the article, including one just added to the taxobox. Please see discussion below for ideas of about images to include/exclude. --Cody.Pope 09:39, 5 September 2007 (UTC)

Vote on taxobox image

Righto - do we have a strong opinion on the taxobox images?

First - one image or two - state preferences under here:

Two Images I was the one to originally insert the female lion picture in the taxobox. Per the taxobox usage guidelines, I feel that the sexual dimorphism of the species and article length justify the inclusion of a second image here instead of later in the article. Field guides and standard encyclopedias often include two (or three) "type species" images where there are large differences between males, females, and sometimes juveniles (most often the juvenile distinction is in bird field guides, so it may not be relevant here and I'm not advocating a juvenile lion image). Anyway, so I say two images for those reasons. --Cody.Pope 09:30, 5 September 2007 (UTC)

Second, which image. If different to the one currently there, please place a thumb or link here. I am switching back currently as the one just put in is blurry and indistinct.

Keep Current The present image of the male lion is a featured picture and much better than the alternate that was there. The female image is my own, so I am biased, but presently it is a FPC with a good chance of being promoted, in that event, keeping both FP is best. ---Cody.Pope 09:30, 5 September 2007 (UTC)

Cheers, Casliber (talk · contribs) 00:59, 5 September 2007 (UTC)

  • I like the current inclusion of the male and female pic in the infobox. I think it further completes it. -- Anonymous DissidentTalk 09:48, 5 September 2007 (UTC)
The second version of my lion pic was promoted to a FP. It's been changed in the taxobox. --Cody.Pope 09:02, 7 September 2007 (UTC)
  • I love the idea of having two pictures. Let's keep 'em. Kla’quot (talk | contribs) 00:08, 9 September 2007 (UTC)
Yippee, we've reached a consensus... cheers, Casliber (talk · contribs) 00:13, 9 September 2007 (UTC)

IP vandalism

We seem to be getting quite a bit of it on this article after the release of the SP. Might it be an idea to re-apply it? Thanks -- Anonymous DissidentTalk 10:46, 5 September 2007 (UTC)

Ugh, are you an admin AD? I say put a temp block on the 58ip right now. Also, I support returning it to SP. --Cody.Pope 10:51, 5 September 2007 (UTC)
Yes, I am a sysop. If the 58ip keeps it up I will put on a temp block, but he hasn't been warned in due process yet. I'll wait to see what others think before I SP, though. -- Anonymous DissidentTalk 10:54, 5 September 2007 (UTC)
I have gone ahead and semi-protected. The IP vandalism persists and is kind of going out of control. -- Anonymous DissidentTalk 06:52, 6 September 2007 (UTC)
Beat me to it. thanx dude. cheers, Casliber (talk · contribs) 07:07, 6 September 2007 (UTC)
No worries :) -- Anonymous DissidentTalk 07:22, 6 September 2007 (UTC)

The rare cave lions...

"Cave paintings of european cave lions show excusively animals with no or just hinted manes, what is evidence to suggest, that these prehistoric lions where more or less maneless[19]."

It makes it sound like there might have been some sad little cave-restricted lions back in the day. Quite the mental image. Someone please reword this or delete it altogether. The grammar and spelling could use a little help (okay a lot) also. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 209.30.194.51 (talk) 01:33, 6 September 2007 (UTC)

Yeah, wasn't added by me. This is a big article and I was thinking what to do with this myself...I had left it in case anyone expanded on it as we've got a bit of a run-on on this article at the moment.cheers, Casliber (talk · contribs) 01:48, 6 September 2007 (UTC)
Sorry, but I wrote this. I am not a native speaker and have sometimes problems with grammar. Greetings.--Altaileopard 15:16, 6 September 2007 (UTC)
That's great. I can't talk as I can't speak any other language :( But seriously, does anyone have any refs on lions in zoos at all? cheers, Casliber (talk · contribs) 21:23, 6 September 2007 (UTC)
The WAZA Web site contains useful summaries of their studbooks that I believe should be considered reliable. (The studbooks themselves are quite difficult to track down, or at least they were for pygmy hippos... I was unsuccessful.) Here's their summary of the lion studbook: Virtual Zoo - Panthera leo. Maybe that will be of some use. --JayHenry 18:31, 7 September 2007 (UTC)
(as Popeye says..)...well blow me down. Well spotted! (big sigh of relief)...this section is the last major block before a run at FAC so I'll muse on't.cheers, Casliber (talk · contribs) 21:37, 7 September 2007 (UTC)

The largest lion

The largest verifiied lion in the wild isn't 225 kg. It's 272 kg. The 272kg specimen represent the highest verified weight for a wild lion in recent years. The source is the article "Panthera leo" from the American Society of Mammalogists. 272 kg lion —Preceding unsigned comment added by 24.166.188.29 (talk) 06:33, 9 September 2007 (UTC)

FA?

What is left? I am going to go on a big ref hunt tomorrow, see if I can find some more refs, maybe a bit more content - but what is there really left to do? This is FA material, I think. -- Anonymous DissidentTalk 10:56, 10 September 2007 (UTC)

There are a couple of things it would be good to address/fix before the baptism of fire that is FAC (especially for larger articles like this one) - the in captivity section was threadbare. Circeus unearthed some books here but i couldn't find any but found some other fascinating ones in UNSW library and added a bit today to which I need ato add a bit more and polish. The Hybrids section could do with a book citation or three, and I'd love to add a bit to the Baiting and taming section. The Man-eaters section I've not really read through and digested yet. If you can find anything on baiting and taming or hybrids that would be extremely muchly appreciated, while I finish up the zoo bits with the books I just got and then have a look at the maneater bit...cheers, Casliber (talk · contribs) 11:28, 10 September 2007 (UTC)
I'll attempt to locate a few today myself then. Circeus 15:06, 10 September 2007 (UTC)
Also would be good if someone could bluelink Arly-Singou ecosystem...if I get a chance after a few days I'll havea crack at it meselfcheers, Casliber (talk · contribs) 15:17, 10 September 2007 (UTC)
Beat you to it Cas ;). I hope my little shot at it looks ok. Its not a stub; might even make it to DYK with a *tad* of beefing up. -- Anonymous DissidentTalk 14:53, 11 September 2007 (UTC)
Good idea - I added some cats too (categories not felines, that is). cheers, Casliber (talk · contribs) 22:38, 11 September 2007 (UTC)
I have given the Hybrids section some book refs, but a couple more wouldn't go amiss... -- Anonymous DissidentTalk 10:18, 12 September 2007 (UTC)
Great! (chipping away, chipping away..) ...now for some circus stuff as well....cheers, Casliber (talk · contribs) 13:16, 12 September 2007 (UTC)

Pretending it's at FAC now

I'm going to pretend that this is already at FAC as it's so close. I've started going over the prose and there isn't much to complain about.

  • At four sentences, I think the LEAD spends too much time on captivity. I would shorten this to two sentences and add one or two re attacks on humans, which isn't mentioned. Y Done
  • I notice that we don't actually have a full paragraph on habitat. It's mentioned in passing but not directly addressed. (Under what conditions do they take to forest?) I prefer Distribution and Habitat to Range as a section title. In that section, I think too many words are devoted to Iran.
No, there is not to much about Iran there is to few about the rest.--Altaileopard 10:07, 15 September 2007 (UTC)
I have to agree with Altaileopard -it doesn't feel like there's too much and I've found info is pretty patchy. I can try and see what comes up cheers, Casliber (talk · contribs) 21:03, 15 September 2007 (UTC)
  • While it's not make it or break it at all, the placement of Hybrids has bugged me. I think it follows under Physical charactistics or (probably better) Reproduction. Taxonomy doesn't really make sense as hybrids don't have distinct taxonomic status (I think).
I agree it bugs me too, but I prefer hybrid section down the bottom somewhere as I think it is relatively unimportant. I actually wanted taxonomy further up as in other articles, but it has been moved down due to its length. I was wondering myself whether the whole section should be moved up (except hybrids which can be placed under description which will be after it.cheers, Casliber (talk · contribs) 06:16, 17 September 2007 (UTC)
  • As I've mentioned to Cas before, I don't understand the General / Specific format in the references. It's not a bibliographical form I've seen before. Y Done

I'll update as I go along. In other news, the Red List update arrived over the last couple of days. Along with a moment of silence for the newly extinct and endangered species, people might want to check the IUCN link for any changes. Marskell 19:24, 13 September 2007 (UTC)

  • "Cave paintings of European cave lions show exclusively animals with no or just hinted manes, suggesting that these prehistoric lions were more or less maneless." Unpack 'these.' Prehistoric lions of a particular locale? Of Europe in general? Or the entire species? (I'm recollecting reading that manelessness in Tsavo may represent a more primordial form.) Marskell 13:38, 14 September 2007 (UTC)
Hmmm..it seemed clear as I wrote it that 'these' referred to those cave lions being illustrated - unfortunately we can't generalise - and other ways of writing would be cumbersome 'lions of that locale and/or time', or repeat 'european cave lions' - I can make it 'they'....cheers, Casliber (talk · contribs) 00:57, 15 September 2007 (UTC)
I do not see the problem about that sentence. All known prehistoric cave-paintngs show exclsively lions without or just hinted manes. As far as I know most european cave paintins are from france or spain, but that doesen´t matter and cave lions count not as seperate species.
It's no biggie. I would read to suggest that all European lions lacked manes. Marskell 10:16, 15 September 2007 (UTC)
I've used the specific/General format plenty of times, but generally that's for when the "general" refs do not have specific notes calling them, which is the case here (when I grouped it so, one ref had no calls, I seem to remember). Circeus 03:03, 14 September 2007 (UTC)

I have a ref quandary now - namely how reliable is imdb consdered to be? I was going to ref King Leonardo and his short subjects with this - is this OK? I don't have cartoon texts at home....cheers, Casliber (talk · contribs) 03:58, 14 September 2007 (UTC)

Given it's comprehensiveness, the IMDb has become established on Wiki. I would call it borderline (I won't dig them up at the moment, but their disclaimer and info pages suggest as much); it's suitable to an EL but usually not the body. If you simply want to source that a movie exists with a given title to the IMDb, that's fine. No plot details or judgements of quality, however.
Incidentally, it was this disclaimer, and the fact that their mainpage seems too commercial, that put me off Tigerhomes; their about page suggests people with experience but I've always avoided using it when it comes up on searches. In fact, I generally avoid zoos unless it's quite generic—colour of the coat and so on. Marskell 09:12, 14 September 2007 (UTC)

Update

FWIW, I reorganized along the lines of all other cat articles for uniformity. The evolution and taxonomy stuff is interesting and no less important than that of other articles. It is also shorter with the number of subspecies reduced and the hybrids moved further down the article. cheers, Casliber (talk · contribs) 09:15, 17 September 2007 (UTC)

I will say that a given topic area doesn't have to have uniform TOCs. It's nice to see the consistency, but different article pressures—that Lion is simply a much bigger topic than any other cat, for instance—may demand different structures.
Looking at it now: this is an excellent TOC. Really, this is a very good balance between specificity and not being overwhelming. Going back five hundred edits, I think the TOC was much less precise and browsable. I'm not in the "TOC is incidental" camp—I think TOCs are essential to content presentation, particularly for long articles. Well done. Marskell 22:21, 21 September 2007 (UTC)

Some other new weights

I want to repeat again that 225 kg is not the largest recently verified weight (not even second largest). Bruce Patterson in his book "The Lions of Tsavo" (2004) lists three lions from Aberdares that were 180 kg, 200 kg, and 230 kg. Here is the scan from his book. [3]

The Aberdares sample included in the book contained four adult males for linear dimensions but only three of these were weighed. The Abderdares Mts are close to Mt Kenya, where Bongo Woodley was a warden where he shot that lion that I mentioned above as the largest verified 272 kg lion 24.166.188.29 00:13, 11 September 2007 (UTC)

Thanks - we got it in. cheers, Casliber (talk · contribs) 20:46, 16 September 2007 (UTC)

Diet re larger herbivores

The way the section currently reads, it appears as if lions do not prey on buffalo or giraffe bulls any more frequently than on elephants, rhinos and hippos, and that's not entirely accurate. I know the source cited states that they rarely prey on buffalo or giraffe bulls but I've seen a number of sources that contradict that. While both giraffe and buffalo bulls are formidable and maybe are not preferred prey in all circumstances, they're definitely more common as prey than the other three (with only the huge prides in Savuti and a couple other locales daring to take on adult elephants or hippos). I just wonder if there was a way to distinguish between those groups so that it explains that while buffalo and giraffe bull predation is dangerous for lions, it still happens occasionally, unlike elephant, rhino or hippo predation. Ronnymexico 19:10, 13 September 2007 (UTC)

Yes, lions regularly prey on giraffe
"The most extensive study of large African predators has been done by Pienaar (1969), who studied 46,181 kills in the Kruger National Park from 1933-46 and 1954-66. During these periods 675 giraffe were killed by lion, two by crocodiles, and two young calves by cheetah. In the two following years lions killed 108 giraffe, 56% of which were identified as males and 31% as females. Of the total number, 64 (60%) were adults, 18 were subadults and juveniles, 12 were suckling young, and 14 were unidentified. These figures resemble the age composition of the stable population of giraffe in the Nairobi Park. Therefore, it seems that lion choose their giraffe prey at random according to age, not predating any one class significantly. They may kill males more than females because the bulls are more often alone and less likely therefore to be warned of approaching danger." Source: Anne Innis Dagg's The Giraffe. 24.166.188.29 04:45, 14 September 2007 (UTC)

What's happening to the pictures?

Why are all the pictures blanking out, one by one? ---Sluzzelin talk 11:28, 15 September 2007 (UTC)

Most probable cause is some issue at meta which will probably be corrected really soon. 70.51.117.130 14:16, 15 September 2007 (UTC)
Thank you, yep I saw this now. ---Sluzzelin talk 14:25, 15 September 2007 (UTC)

Zoon

This should be explained or wikilinked in the text, I think. Firsfron of Ronchester 16:41, 17 September 2007 (UTC)

Hey yeah...well spotted. (I didn't put that bit in) cheers, Casliber (talk · contribs) 20:41, 17 September 2007 (UTC)

Taxonomy at the beginning?

I think it is not good to have the taxonomy at the beginning of the article. Actually my personal interrest belongs to taxonomy and pleistocene mammals, but I think the average user is not happy with a list of some debatable subspecies at the beginning of the text. Better would be physical characteristics.--Altaileopard 17:32, 19 September 2007 (UTC)

There are now a significant number of other FAs with this layout/order of sections. I pondered over this and during the development of the article the section moved up and down a bit. In the end I figured that although it was unfortunate this section was so hefty here, I wasn't keen on juggling contents for each biology article I work on. It is now in more or less the same order as other cat FAs. I also noted a description of a lead somewhere as something someone could read if they didn't want to read the article (which they can here, and the TOC comes next so they can flip over it). cheers, Casliber (talk · contribs) 19:59, 19 September 2007 (UTC)
What are the other cat FAs? I'd like to put my two cents in on the FAC, but want to compare it to other FAs (and other encyclopedias, too). Firsfron of Ronchester 21:46, 19 September 2007 (UTC)
Bobcat, Cougar and Jaguar (unless I missed one). Circeus 23:04, 19 September 2007 (UTC)
Thanks, Circeus. I'll take a look later today. Firsfron of Ronchester 23:38, 19 September 2007 (UTC)
okay.--Altaileopard 22:11, 19 September 2007 (UTC)

Conservation merge

I'm looking at the subsection I've added under "Captivity" and thinking it should really be merged with "Population and conservation status", any thoughts? Circeus 23:12, 19 September 2007 (UTC)

(Dammit - pages loading really slowly here) - yes I agree - good spot which may reduce some duplication. My access will be patchy today and looks like my connection is slow. I am more than happy for you to do it but if you can't I'll do it sometime in the next day or two. (hopefully my connection will speed up soon). cheers, Casliber (talk · contribs) 23:41, 19 September 2007 (UTC)
PS: I am still looking at article length on this one, its just that it is so dense and succinct already... :( cheers, Casliber (talk · contribs) 23:41, 19 September 2007 (UTC)

historic lion range

Would like more info, showing the references, on historic lion spread in Europe. Also, like to know why the lions died out in Americas? —Preceding unsigned comment added by TCO (talk • contribs) 19:28, 21 September 2007 (UTC)

Thanks for input -the article is pretty big as is and would have loved to add more. Am considering a fork article. Or it will be written about on American lion subarticle cheers, Casliber (talk · contribs) 21:46, 21 September 2007 (UTC)

Mention of the lion dance?

I don't feel comfortable just adding things willy-nilly to big articles like this - but could the Chinese lion dance be mentioned? It's the only cultural depiction worth mentioning that isn't in this article. Otherwise this is a great article - I enjoyed reading and editing it. Graham87 00:43, 26 September 2007 (UTC)

Hmmm I see it's already in cultural depictions of lions but I think the lion dance should be mentioned in the main article if possible because it's very well-known. I should be working now, not adding random things to talk pages :-) ... Graham87 00:50, 26 September 2007 (UTC)
Gosh, good pick-up. I'd completely forgotten about that. Umm...I don't mind if you wanna try and stick it in but try to get a ref and format and I will try and streamline...cheers, Casliber (talk · contribs) 03:14, 26 September 2007 (UTC)
I've added a paragraph on lions in China - it's more about the depictions of lions in Chinese art than the lion dance, but IMHO it covers things reasonably well. Graham87 14:10, 26 September 2007 (UTC)

Reaching up to over 272...

Someone please correct the awful line "...Reaching up to over 272 ". If it can be "over" then it isn't only "up to". If it is only "up to" then it cannot be "over". Is 272 a limit, or isn't it? Thank you. Now I can relax. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 81.187.233.169 (talk) 20:09, 18 October 2007 (UTC)

Hi, well spotted (now how did that get there...)..and fixed cheers, Casliber (talk · contribs) 23:23, 18 October 2007 (UTC)

and can be between 800 and 1,000 pounds or more

Spoke too soon. If a thing can be between two amounts, *and* it can be "more" than the greater of those two ammounts, then the upper limit becomes an arbitrary and meaningless limit. Why not just, "can reach over 1,000 pounds"? That would indicate that we are sure that they can reach over 1,000 pounds but that we are not sure by how much.

I would dearly love to correct this but the page is locked and I can't be bothered to register. Please, some kind person change the passage to actually mean something. Remember, lions are usually big but when they are not, they can be half that size. That's a fact. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 81.187.233.169 (talk) 20:35, 18 October 2007 (UTC)


Found a mistake but can't correct

The sketch of two lions at this page is attributed to 'Alfred Durer.' His real name, in German, was ALBRECHT DURER (w/ umlaut U). ALBRECHT, NOT ALFRED. Also, someone might want to add that the cognate of 'pura' (in the section mentioning 'SINGAPORE' = "lion city") is noneother than the Greek -polis, in words like metropolis, metropolitan, Minneapolis, Indianapolis, megalopolis, etc. One could just add: cognate with Grk. polis. ---20/10/2007 —Preceding unsigned comment added by 71.210.85.197 (talk) 02:57, 21 October 2007 (UTC)

I've done both those things - thanks for catching the mistake and for the suggestion. I copied the Greek characters from the metropolis article. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Graham87 (talk • contribs) 14:05, 21 October 2007 (UTC)

maximal speed given is erroneous, I have corrected it

The article states the lion's maximal speed 80 km/hr, ostensibly on the basis of Schaller's findings (p233). What Schaller actually writes is: "Howell(1944) listed it as 80 km/hr, a figure which is too high; Guggisberg (1961) mentioned 48 to 59 km/hr and this estimate agrres with mine." —Preceding unsigned comment added by Soz101 (talk • contribs) 07:31, 22 October 2007 (UTC)

Ligers are the biggest cats

The lion article says that lions are the second-biggest cats after tigers. This is excluding ligers. Is there a reason for this? I have changed it before but people keep reverting it as vandalism. -- 24.3.21.56 11:29, 25 October 2007 (UTC)

I suppose it should say the lion is the second biggest species of cat - but this would be wordier and all because of a few odd hybrids in captivity somewhere. essentially the liger is not a species nor is it natural.cheers, Casliber (talk · contribs) 11:53, 25 October 2007 (UTC)

Request

The article needs a world distribution map showing the approx distribution range for lions both for the present as well as the past. Can someone make and add one. The article seems incomplete without it. AshLin (talk) 08:51, 19 December 2007 (UTC)

I suppose, but as they occurred everywhere except Australia and Antarctica at some point may be tricky to have on same map as current distribution, then having two maps seems like overkill really...cheers, Casliber (talk · contribs) 12:42, 19 December 2007 (UTC)

weight of a male lion

Does a male weigh 500 or 600 lbs? The reason I am asking this question here is because I do not want to start or get involved in an edit war. In the physical characteristics section, it says that ONE MALE was 600 lbs. It also says that the weight of lions ranges from 330 lbs to 500 lbs. Footballfan190 (talk) 06:23, 6 January 2008 (UTC)

Sorry to revert you before. Most websites got their original refs from books. When we did a major overhaul of the article to get it to Featured article status we trawled through alot of high quality refs to come to the article as it stands. I've been busy lately but will have a closer look soon. thanks for your interest. cheers, Casliber (talk · contribs) 06:26, 6 January 2008 (UTC)
This touches on a point which has caused me to scratch my head in the past when writing about sizes. A "male" doesn't weigh any particular number of pounds; the sizes are distributed, often over a fairly large range, with over 90% of a population within a couple of standard deviations of the mean. There will always be some extreme values which people seem to care about a lot - they are often one of the first numbers invoked is a species description (e.g. the 600 lb lion is at the top of the lead in this article, just as the 4500 lbs walrus is in it's article). But it doesn't make sense to include extremes in a size range that is presented as typical of a species. No one would lead an article about humans with "reaching 9 feet in height", although that's technically true.
The unanswered question is, what do all of the ranges in the "Physical characteristics" section actually refer to? Mean plus and minus one s.d? Two s.d.'s? A 95% interval? The error around an estimate of the mean? The most meaningful (no pun intended) information would be a mean, a variance and a comment on the distribution (is it gaussian? skewed? fat-tailed?). This detail is almost never given - and often doesn't exist. While it's basically OK just to state that "most" animals are withing a certain range and mention some record-holders (which is what this article does), casual readers (e.g. high school report writers that might be reading this) should be aware that there is no single "answer" to the question "how big is a lion", and the ranges in these articles give, in fact, a somewhat vague idea. Anyways, it's still a great article. Best, - Eliezg (talk) 05:14, 8 January 2008 (UTC)

This is an article that says the range is 330-530 lbs:[[4]]. I don't know if we can trust it or not. The size of just about any animal can be heavily disputed. Footballfan190 (talk) 03:28, 10 January 2008 (UTC)

Yeah, that's a personal userpage so I wouldn't weight too heavily on that one. I'll get to the others. cheers, Casliber (talk · contribs) 01:52, 12 January 2008 (UTC)

These articles up to 530 lbs [[5]] [[6]] [[7]]. Well, many sources say that a lion weighs 530 lbs. I will change the 600 lbs part to 530 lbs if I know that an edit war will not start over this. Footballfan190 (talk) 00:37, 12 January 2008 (UTC)

OK, essentially there seems to have been one real biggie of 272 kg but otherwise most ranges are much smaller. All the zoo webpages are tertiary sources who've got their material from elsewhere. I did get a textbook by Schaller which I have now returned to the library. If you want to alter it again, include the word 'generally' or 'usually' in the wieght range so it doesn't conflict with the one record and can you please format the ref with accessdate etc. The smithsonian one would be best. cheers, Casliber (talk · contribs) 02:04, 12 January 2008 (UTC)
OK, can you use the Cite web template on this page then and see if you can fill some categories if you can? cheers, Casliber (talk · contribs) 03:06, 12 January 2008 (UTC)
I think the links above are not really reliable sorces. Walkers mammals of the world says 150 to 250 kg (ca. 330-550 lb) for a male and 120-182 kg (264-400 lb) for a female. I can add this info if you want. I guess, that fat 550 lb lions are probably only known from captivity.--Altaileopard (talk) 11:49, 12 January 2008 (UTC)
Good point, Footballfan I think a good book ref trumps the net in most cases, Altaileopard I would be very happy if you swtiched the refs for the usual wieghts to that ref you have. cheers, Casliber (talk · contribs) 22:09, 14 January 2008 (UTC)

There have been more than one male lion on record over 250 kg. Two were 272 Kg and one I know was 260 kg. And these are in reliable scientific papers/books. These are not hunting records either. I can post the references if you want to. The one reference for one 272 kg is already posted above. I can post the others if you want to. OneGuy (talk) 14:47, 30 January 2008 (UTC).

Your link looks like a valid publication. I think you can add the size of up to 272 kg for exeptional large lions (additional to the data from walkers mammals...), but you must add a complete reference, that others know where they can find and check it.--Altaileopard (talk) 17:27, 30 January 2008 (UTC) This link alone is not enough!--Altaileopard (talk) 17:28, 30 January 2008 (UTC)

{{editprotected}}

The Royal Scotch standard under "Cultural depictions" should be changed to the SVG Image:Royal arms of Scotland.svg. 68.39.174.238 (talk) 20:50, 14 January 2008 (UTC)

Umm, when I get a sec...cheers, Casliber (talk · contribs) 22:09, 14 January 2008 (UTC)
Y Done. east.718 at 23:30, January 15, 2008


can somebody tell me ,how long is loin's jump,how long can he jump?--Vule91 (talk) 13:41, 10 February 2008 (UTC)