Talk:Lepidodendron

Problem with page loading

Hey - I just checked out the page for an undergraduate paleo class, and it appears to be half missing. I don't really know how to fix what isn't there - so I thought I'd post a little message here. I found old info in a previous edit, thanks.

That doesn't appear to be a problem at this end. It could be your browser or your internet connection. --EncycloPetey (talk) 04:28, 23 September 2009 (UTC)

Removal of content by "Encyclopetey"

I spent some time improving this article; my edits were reverted by Encyclopetey, with the following edit summary:

• rv change back to genus status; we have pages for genera and orders.

Contrary to this statement, he then replaced the page for the order with a redirect to the genus:

• moved Lepidodendrales to Lepidodendron over redirect: restore to previous location

My edits, including the incorporation of images of the various organs of the plant, and the addition of structure to the article per the Manual of Style, were all removed without explanation. I fail to believe that none improved the article; indeed, I can see no clear reason for the revert. If somebody wants to change every occurrence of "lepidodendrales" to "lepidodendron", or vice versa, I have no problems with such petty details, but removing a couple of hours' worth of edits with no explanation strikes me as unwarranted. Therefore I have restored those edits, and welcome criticism of the factual accuracy of what is included, or an explanation of why they breach the manual of style.

Verisimilus T 19:53, 23 April 2008 (UTC)

Please give all the facts, instead of only some of the facts. Fact (1) We had a page about the genus Lepidodendon. Fact (2) You changed the content of the page to cover the order Lepidodendrales instead of the genus, then moved it to the location of the order name. (3) I reverted your changes and moved it back to the prior location. The redirect was created automatically by the software as a result of the move. If you would like to create an article on the Lepidodendrales, please feel free to do so, but do not obliterate the work of others in doing this. --EncycloPetey (talk) 21:47, 23 April 2008 (UTC)

I wish you'd pointed out the problem to me at the time, and requested that I moved my good-faith edits to this new page, rather than just obliterating them. Apologies for misinterpreting your edit summaries, which made it sound like there were going to be pages for genera and orders. Whatever's happened, I'll create the page Lepidodendrales now, and look forwards to seeing new articles appear on the genera! Smith609 Talk 19:09, 30 April 2008 (UTC)

Are the genera in this order even noticeably distinct from each other? I see that the article in the Columbia Encyclopedia has one article for both Lepidodendron and Sigillaria, and according to the following text from [1] (which I can't verify as the good references for this, as far as I know, aren't online), it is far from clear to me that an article on each genus, as opposed to the order, really even makes sense:

The Lepidodendrales comprises three main genera, Lepidodendron, Lepidophloios, and Sigillaria, distinguished on the basis of the ratio of scale width to height - they are otherwise identical. In addition, many "organ taxa" have been identified to the Lepidodendrales: each stigmaria ("root"), leaf and cone was originally given a different generic name before it could be shown that they belonged to the same organism.

Anyway, it seems better to try to first reach some agreement on whether to merge all the content for this order into one article, or split it out. I think either choice could probably work, but I'm reluctant to try to make any edits until there is a bit more agreement. Kingdon (talk) 15:55, 24 April 2008 (UTC)

The statement about indistinguishability is outdated. The work of DiMichele in particular has added lots of ecological information, showing real differences among the various included taxa. I don't know that a separate family article is warranted; it may be identical to the order and I don't know this off the top of my head. I'll need to check some sources. However, there definitiely needs to be an article on each major genus (organismal). Some of the organ taxa may also warrant a page, or might be covered in a genus (taxon) article (if it is limited to one taxon), or as a section or paragraph in the ordinal article if it is common to several plants. --EncycloPetey (talk) 18:18, 24 April 2008 (UTC)

Sounds like a pretty good argument for separate articles to me (based on what is posted here, that is; I didn't read any of the DiMechele articles although I will point out his bio at [2] which includes a list of publications). I'd suggest giving it a day or so, in case people want to express other opinions, and if there is no dissent, making a stub (instead of a redirect) for the order. I would also think some of the images Image:Lepidophloios.JPG, Image:Lepidodendron leaf.jpg, Image:Lepido_with_leaves.jpg, Image:Lepido_root_top.jpg, Image:Lepdio_root_bottom.jpg would be worth bringing back, although I never have really gotten too deeply into the area of trying to pick how many images (and which ones). Kingdon (talk) 04:37, 25 April 2008 (UTC)

Combine info from stub Stigmaria?

The page for Stigmaria, the fossilized roots of Lepidodendron and Sigillaria is basically a one sentence stub with some nice pics. I've suggested on that page that this information should be copied and pasted into both this page and Sigillaria and that page should be deleted as it would take much much work to transform it into anything but a stub (something that I find extremely unlikely). Considering in my quick scan of this page I didn't see anything on Stigmaria, something probably needs to be added either way. Please comment as you see fit. Ckruschke (talk) 12:51, 13 January 2014 (UTC)Ckruschke