In line with the recent upgrades to WikiProject Mammals a bulletin board has been created to keep all members up to date with the Project, consider it similar to the Wikipedia Signpost however focused on WikiProject Mammals. I would ask that you add this page to your watchlist in order to get the latest information about WikiProject Mammals. Kind Regards
— mw (talk) (contribs) is wishing you Happy Holidays! This greeting (and season) promotes WikiLove and hopefully this note has made your day a little better. Spread the WikiLove by wishing another user Happy Holidays, whether it be someone you have had disagreements with in the past, a good friend, or just some random person. Happy New Year!
Spread the cheer by adding {{subst:Happy holidays}} to their talk page with a friendly message.
The newsletter will not be returning to a monthly format (mainly because the author is busy failing every exam imaginable) and is on a bimonthly schedule for the foreseeable future.
The second round of the WikiCup was very competitive, requiring the highest points total to advance since 2014. Two TOL editors, AryKun and Fritzmann2002, advanced to the third round.
The March edition of our monthly rolling contest was won by simongraham, who amassed 118 points from 21 articles on various species of jumping spider; in second place was Quetzal1964 with 109 points from 53 articles on marine ray-finned fish.
Quetzal1964 and simongraham were also the top two in the April edition, although Quetzal was ahead this time, with 68 points to simongraham's 48. In the annual leaderboard, Quetzal and simongraham are in first and second place respectively, with 291 and 246 points; in third place is Snotoleks, with 76 points.
... that the cherry blossom was used symbolically in Japanese World War II propaganda, with falling petals representing "young soldiers' sacrifice for the emperor"? (8 March)
... that the Kīlauea lava cricket disappears from a lava field as soon as any plants start to grow there? (13 March)
... that Julian Assange's lawyer argued that the rules set by the Ecuadorian embassy requiring Assange to take care of his pet cat Michi were "denigrating"? (13 March)
... that mule deer sometimes prefer the flavor of one Rocky Mountain juniper tree, like "ice cream", over another? (21 March)
... that the skeleton panda sea squirt was known on the Internet for its skeleton-like appearance years before its formal description? (26 March)
... that only one fruit but several thousand seeds were known when Allenbya collinsonae was named? (26 March)
... that while named for alliums, the fossil Paleoallium(pictured) was not necessarily directly related to any allium species? (27 March)
... that the extinct genus Mixtotherium, meaning 'mixed beast', has traits of both extinct primates and hyraxes? (28 March)
... that the fossil fern Dickwhitea was described from a single block of chert? (28 March)
... that only six years after its 2016 discovery, the Meratus blue flycatcher(pictured) was found being sold in Indonesian songbird markets? (30 March)
... that the spirit liverwort is called such because of its proximity to the Māori afterlife? (31 March)
... that cultures of the fungus Lentinus brumalis have been flown on three different satellites? (31 March)
... that the English herbalist Nicholas Culpeper claimed that eating alkanet leaves would make a person's spit deadly to serpents? (31 March)
Eufriesea purpurata
Korowai gecko
Paleoallium billgenseli fossil
Male Meratus blue flycatcher
April DYKs
... that despite its name meaning 'unscented', Hypericum × inodorum can smell strongly of goat? (1 April)
... that color-changing cats(artist's impression pictured) could help us communicate with the future? (2 April)
... that the white-tailed jay(example pictured) found in Ecuador and Peru was once thought to have been brought to Mexico by pre-Columbian trade? (5 April)
I boldly moved Caleb Francis to mainspace, since I think the revamped page is a pretty undisputed GNG meet. Would you be inclined to restore Talk:Caleb Francis too, in order to continue the history of that talk page including its old prod notice as well as a DYK notice? Geschichte (talk) 10:51, 8 May 2024 (UTC)[reply]
Looks good. Thanks for your work. I've restored the talk page. (I usually do that when I do a draftify restore. I must have missed it. Thanks for the poke. - UtherSRG(talk) 12:55, 8 May 2024 (UTC)[reply]
I don't know if this is even worth doing anything about (ie., if it's me getting worried about something that doesn't matter), or if it is worth fixing, so I thought I'd bring it to you as the un-deleting admin. A few of those redirects had deleted revisions that - judging by the deletion log timestamps - weren't viewable before they were originally G8ed; however, since being deleted and then undeleted, those previously-deleted revisions are now viewable again in the pages' history. (e.g., Tm 103 was G7ed in January 2011, but the pre-G7 revisions are now visible in the history.)
All the best (and apologies if I'm getting in a twist over nothing!)
—a smart kitten[meow] 16:16, 8 May 2024 (UTC)[reply]
Since it was only G7, I'm not going to worry about it. If it were G12, that would be significant and I'd RD1 the versions. Other deletion reasons mainly fall somewhere between those reactions. No worries, but thanks for the thought. - UtherSRG(talk) 19:41, 8 May 2024 (UTC)[reply]
Hi. Just so you're aware: the reason I inserted so much verbiage into the Pedinorrhina article and associated articles, is because there is a single very prominent and popular source that is based in part on unpublished original research by the website owner - namely, BioLib. For most taxa under its vast, vast umbrella, BioLib matches the consensus classification. For some idiosyncratic reason, several of the links to cetoniines in BioLib are in direct conflict with all of the published literature; I spent four days trying to find any published sources that corresponded, and came up empty. In this particular set of genera, BioLib is the only source I can find after 1984 (examining a fair number of published sources) that does not accept the homonymy of Plaesiorrhina Burmeister (December, 1842) and precedence of Plaesiorrhina Westwood (July, 1842). That throws all of the species in the affected genera, including Pedinorrhina, into genera that no other existing sources (post-1994) place them in. This one bad source has had a "ripple effect" in Wikispecies (mostly resolved now), Wikidata, and Wikimedia Commons, and it's a minor nightmare. In this case, BioLib is definitively acting as a primary source of original research rather than as an aggregator, and it is not peer-reviewed or published. Yes, I know this borders on the pot insulting the kettle in my case, but - as I said - I spent a great deal of effort to make certain that I was not missing any crucial references. The point is that I expect that many editors who are strong adherents of BioLib are going to try eventually to edit these articles to match the BioLib classification, and it seems to me the best way to stave that off is to explain, in the article itself using the relevant sources, what the taxonomic history is, and the actual demonstrated consensus, so it is visible to any would-be editors how significantly the BioLib scheme deviates from it. A question: do you think it would be appropriate to place, on the talk pages of these articles, a brief summary such as this to explain why BioLib should not be used as a source for these taxa? Thanks. Dyanega (talk) 17:42, 17 May 2024 (UTC)[reply]
You do like to be long winded... :) I think a brief discussion of taxonomic disagreement is relevant on the article, but a discussion of sourcing should go on the talk page.
In addition, we should never use references within a sentence like you did with ... as a subgenus of Chondrorrhina (e.g.[5][6]), ...; make assertions, and then follow those assertions with references: ... as a subgenus of Chondrorrhina,[5][6] ... The references used need not be an exhaustive list; the references need only provide verification for the assertion. - UtherSRG(talk) 17:54, 17 May 2024 (UTC)[reply]