Talk:Reindeer/Archive 2

Archive 1

Archive 2

Etymology

I will roll back the latest edit, adding "In Dutch it's called 'rendier', which literally translates to running animal. This again is derived from the German word 'rentier'." It is obvious that the word rendier in Dutch, as the German Rentier, has the same origin as Swedish ren, Norwegian Rein, French Renne etc. from the mentioned Indoeuropean root hraina, meaning horned. See M. Philippa e.a. (2003-2009) Etymologisch Woordenboek van het Nederlands, as cited on http://www.etymologiebank.nl/trefwoord/rendier The association with running is mentioned as a popular etymological deformation. --Laplandgerard (talk) 10:26, 29 December 2016 (UTC)

America-Centric, Inconsistent

The very first sentence on this page says that the article is only about the Eurasian reindeer, NOT American caribou. But the rest of the article is mostly about North America, with little mention of Eurasia, and 100% America in some sections. If the article is meant to be global then it needs to be balanced, not America-centric, and should be merged with Caribou. If it's meant to be about only the Eurasian reindeer, then all the caribou stuff needs to be moved to the Caribou article. -- 209.162.56.112 (talk) 16:17, 2 May 2014 (UTC)

I agree that the current situation is not good and have proposed re-merging back to one article. See Talk:Caribou#re-merge reindeer. Beeblebrox (talk) 18:33, 27 July 2014 (UTC)

They are the same animal and there should only be one article. Why the much newer (Jan. 21, 2014 vs. this one from 2004) caribou article was even created, with large copying from this one (and still survived), is a mystery to me. It's basically a one-man project, and not a collaborative project. The consensus has always been (and admins always strictly enforced it), that a redirect exist pointing to Reindeer. Regardless of final title, there should only be one article. -- Brangifer (talk) 14:57, 3 September 2014 (UTC)

A merge discussion is occurring at Talk:Caribou, so this conversation should continue there. Please comment. -- Brangifer (talk) 16:07, 3 September 2014 (UTC)

Restoration of deleted content

Due to many edits (many deletions) which weakened this article, in favor of the competing Caribou article, I have restored the deletions. Some good edits got deleted in the process, and I will restore them later. -- Brangifer (talk) 23:23, 4 September 2014 (UTC)

Which of the edits favoured the article Caribou? I removed the section entitled Bibliography because there was only one item in it which was already in the references. I believe I created that section at one time and put that item in myself. You had commented that the references were a mess and I was trying to tidy them up, particularly any items that I had edited in originally. I removed the section entitled Caribou-specific links (North America) and copied and pasted the three items in that section to the general External Links section to declutter. Just as you spent a lot of time creating and contributing to the article Reindeer hunting in Greenland, I have spent a lot of time creating and contributing to the article Caribou (North America). Problems arose when it was renamed simply Caribou by another editor. This article on reindeer was criticized for being too North American centric and I have been editing it ever since to add new content and references that are not North America centric and removing those that are to the article Caribou (North America). Suggestions have been made on the Caribou talk page that elements from the Reindeer article have been copied from it. In most cased I wrote the original copied material and have been re-editing it in both articles so the content reflects the North American context or the Eurasian context. I don't think this is a COI issue since I am quite open about the intentions. Is there a problem with the caption on the image you use in your Reindeer hunting in Greenland? The photo of a porcupine caribou or Grant's caribou (Rangifer tarandus granti) taken by Dean Biggins of the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service in Alaska is by far one of the best photos of caribou I have seen. But you use this image in an article about barren-ground caribou (Rangifer tarandus groenlandicus) in Reindeer hunting in Greenland with no reference to Alaska. I think this is the issue. Caribou refer to only a small number of subspecies and a number of ecotypes in North America. Reindeer refer to other subspecies and ecotypes in Eurasia. If we don't caption images carefully the content becomes confused. When someone has just read an article about caribou they should not be diverted to an article about reindeer. In the Inuit Circumpolar Conference they use both terms reindeer and caribou, depending on the country discussed. There is room in Wikipedia for two articles. Oceanflynn (talk) 00:23, 5 September 2014 (UTC)

Removal of any content from the Reindeer article which tended to split the subject into a false dichotomy of caribou vs reindeer was detrimental to the Reindeer article and created an argument for creating a second article about Caribou. Your last sentence above is the key: I don't think there is room for two articles, since the subject would largely be duplication. We're talking about the same animal (Rangifer tarandus), with several subspecies, and terminology variations which are not exclusive or consistently distinguish between species.

One article was covering the whole subject. If it wasn't doing it well enough, the answer is not to split off content, but to build that content into the main article. Your creation of a new article and removal of that content from the main article was not proper.

The terminology aspect is covered pretty well by the IUCN:

1. "Rangifer tarandus (Caribou, Peary Caribou, Reindeer)".
2. "The reindeer has a circumpolar distribution in the tundra and taiga zones of northern Europe, Siberia, and North America (Corbet 1978, Hall 1981, Koubek and Zima 1999, Wilson and Ruff 1999)."
3. "There are large numbers of reindeer (locally known as caribou) in North America."

There is a good name etymology section in the reindeer article which discusses the variations of terminology. They are a matter of history, language and geography, and not exclusively a matter of species. Trying to force a clear separation which does not exist in reality is wrong. -- Brangifer (talk) 04:03, 5 September 2014 (UTC)

BTW, when I commented that the references were a mess, I was referring to the Caribou article. There should not be multiple references sections. Right now you have Notes, Citations, and References. That could all be combined. -- Brangifer (talk) 04:09, 5 September 2014 (UTC)

References and Citations are part of the Sfn citation template, a highly respected and accurate form of referencing in Wikipedia. It involves creating a list of references in alphabetical order and the reflist generated citations. See Sfn and here Why I prefer Sfn citation template from an article posted by User:Diannaa Oceanflynn (talk) 5 September 2014

It's really not that big of a deal. It just looks very messy and it's not typical to have differing reference section styles. I've seen two at times, but never three. -- Brangifer (talk) 02:55, 6 September 2014 (UTC)

IUCN

The IUCN Red list regarding Rangifer tarandus is highly problematic regarding the status of caribou in North America. The full paragraph from which User:Rangifer takes his quotation includes a blanket statement that "This species is listed as Least Concern due to a wide circumpolar distribution and presumed large populations." In North America, there are subspecies and ecotypes of Rangifer tarandus that are endangered. While the large numbers globally cannot be dismissed, the situation for caribou in North America is cause for concern.

While IUCN is a respected institution it is not without controversy. In this article entitled Seeing Red: Inside the Science and Politics of the IUCN Red List by Lisa M Campbell published in the journal Conservation and Society in 2012, the author discusses a broader debate regarding the a crisis of legitimacy of the IUCN list and its role in the "science-policy interface as it relates to wildlife and biodiversity conservation." By maintaining two separate articles, one for Caribou (North America) and one for Reindeer this type of over-generalization cannot happen. In North America, subspecies like the Boreal woodland caribou have been declared endangered by Committee on the Status of Endangered Wildlife in Canada (COSEWIC). Inuit and First Nations are working closely with industry, NGOs and different levels of government on caribou counts in every province because of dwindling herds from coast to coast. This discussion is not part of the article on reindeer. A casual reader would assume that since all reindeer look alike and there are a lot of them, there is no need for concern. This should not be a popularity contest. Of course there will be more searches for reindeer partly because of its mythical cultural weight among other things. Oceanflynn (talk) 5 September 2014

I certainly agree that the various subspecies have widely differing degrees of endangered status. Some have only small herds left. Some are extinct. Some have enormous herds without any danger, at least at present. This can be covered in one article. -- Brangifer (talk) 03:01, 6 September 2014 (UTC)

Former range

Is there any concrete proof (fossil finds with dates, historical accounts, paintings) that they have existed naturally in Britain and/or Ireland since the Pleistocene? I've seen claims they existed in Scotland as late as 1000BP, but unlike wolf, bear, lynx there doesn't seem to be much if any evidence. Also what about the north European plain (Denmark or north Germany in particular)? If they got to Britain via the old land bridge they must have survived quite late there too.

Walshie79 (talk) 16:37, 22 September 2014 (UTC)

Santa Claus' reindeer

Just a minor annotation, the German word for lightning is "Blitz", not "Blitzen" (Believe me, I'm German. Blitzen is just a special case, plural.) For the sake of correctness, I advice a change of the text to something like "...Blixem was later changed to Bliksem, then Blitzen ("Blitz" being German for "lightning")". — Preceding unsigned comment added by 2003:6E:4F57:3E94:B4F4:E5E1:72CD:41BF (talk) 17:30, 25 December 2014 (UTC)

Thanks. Done. Dger (talk) 19:02, 25 December 2014 (UTC)

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Falkland

Although this is not depicted on the map nor directly mentioned in Reindeer in South Georgia, the latter refers to a source that talks about successful introduction of SG reindeer to Falkland in 2001. It's been 15 years since, so the data should be renewed, of course, but I'd say it is worth mentioning along with the other southern introduction attempts. --85.253.66.252 (talk) 21:51, 17 September 2016 (UTC)

Reindeer are domesticated caribou?

I remember reading somewhere, but can't recall where, the term reindeer applied only to caribou that were domesticated. Now whether or not that is true, I think if it is something that people believe, then perhaps it deserves discussion in the article. I have no idea where to check if the story I heard is a myth, but I figure someone here can. If you can't find any mention at all elsewhere of such a story, perhaps my memory is bad. The memory in question is at least 10 years old.

I should note the the first 4 letters of "reindeer" happen to be the English word "rein". Relevant? I find the possibility that the origin of the word "reindeer" might be "deer that wear reins". Just a thought. Will (Talk - contribs) 22:44, 21 December 2016 (UTC)

The current situation is not good. We had a few editors who unilaterally decided that "caribou" is the only word anyone uses for this animal in North America, and "reindeer" is the only word anyone uses elsewhere, and now we have two articles on the same animal as a result. I can tell you with a high degree of certainty that this is a false premise and, at least in North America, domesticated caribou ae in fact referrred to as reindeer. (I happen to live near a reindeer ranch.) In fact a consensus was reached at Talk:Caribou#Merge reindeer to merge the two articles back together, but nobody ever actually did it. Beeblebrox (talk) 23:11, 21 December 2016 (UTC)

I agree that this is a bad situation. Almost all taxonomists do agree that there are a number of subspecies of the species Rangifer tarandus, of which some are called caribou (as it happens the ones in North America) and some are called reindeer. Besides, there are descendants of European domesticated reindeer which were imported in the 20th century in North America. Of course, since we deal with a number of subspecies within one species, there should be only one article.Laplandgerard (talk) 09:36, 22 December 2016 (UTC)

As we have a pre-existing consnesus to do so, the caribu article can be merged back here at any time by anyone. I suspect nobody has done it because it's been so long since they were split that a merge may be somewhat complicated. However, a simple merge, just redirecting the caribou article here And leaving the details for later as the page history would still be intact, is also a possibility. Beeblebrox (talk) 09:53, 22 December 2016 (UTC)

I think this simple merge solution may be the way to go, but I wouldn't know how to go about it. How difficult is it? Robocon1 (talk) 22:34, 22 March 2017 (UTC)

The original issue I mentioned hasn't been addressed from what I saw. To me, it needs a special section or subsection to discuss the matter. Will (Talk - contribs) 09:26, 1 March 2018 (UTC)

Merge Caribou/Reindeer consensus, but no action

I just posted this on the Caribou article's Talk section: "So, in Sep 2015, the conclusion of the debate to decide whether to merge the caribou and reindeer articles was that they should be merged - which is surely self-evident. Personally, I can't see that it makes much difference whether the new article is titled caribou or reindeer (although I would favour reindeer, on the grounds that 'reindeer' is used in both north America and Europe), the point is that 18 months later there are still two articles being added to, edited and generally pointlessly duplicating effort."

The first sentence of the Caribou article presently reads: "This article is about the North American animal. For the Eurasian animal, see Reindeer. For other uses, see Caribou (disambiguation)." Which is clearly nonsense. As is stated in both articles, there is one animal with several subspecies. What does it take for this idiocy to stop, and both articles to be merged? Robocon1 (talk) 19:20, 6 March 2017 (UTC)

Somebody just needs to take on the actual job of doing the merge. Beeblebrox (talk) 20:17, 6 March 2017 (UTC)

Hm...that might be easier said than done. See the dialogue under 'Another contradiction' on Caribou: Talk. Robocon1 (talk) 22:04, 6 March 2017 (UTC)

The Caribou article is specifically about the North American subspecies, while the reindeer article is about the species in general. There is no contradiction. Mediatech492 (talk) 22:49, 6 March 2017 (UTC)

You're missing the point, we have an established consensus to merge, it's just that nobody has actually done it yet. Anyone can merge these two articles at any time if they want to. Beeblebrox (talk) 23:13, 6 March 2017 (UTC)

I am not aware of any such consensus. If there actually was one I would think someone would have followed up and done it. The fact that so much time has passed with nothing done would seem to show there is no collective interest in such action. Mediatech492 (talk) 23:25, 6 March 2017 (UTC)

I would like to generally draw attention to the dialogue on this subject on Caribou Talk: Another contradiction https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Talk:Caribou#Another_Contradiction . Merging these two articles will be time consuming. Perhaps the 'simple merge' solution suggested by Beeblebrox in the section above is the way to go? Also - what's to stop someone starting another Caribou article straight afterwards? There was mention in the preserved discussion that preceded the consensus to merge of involving a senior administrator. .Robocon1 (talk) 22:30, 22 March 2017 (UTC)

@Mediatech492: Just so we're clear, for the majority of the history of Wikiepdia there was in fact one page for this animal, with sections dealing with subspecies. Then, in 2014 a single user decided they were going to split it, based on the premise that in North America they are always called caribou, and they created an entirely seperate page at the unfortunate title "Caribou (North America)". This was later moved over the redirect to the caribou page. After some discussion of the wisdom of this split, I opened an discussion aimed at putting the two back together. That discussion was open for a very long time and there was a notice on both articles that it was underway. Look at any diff from either page between the second half of 2014 and mid-September 2015 and you'll see a large banner at the top of the article, this was no secret. An uninvolved administrator eventually closed it with a finding that there was a consensus to merge, and that caribou should be merged back into reindeer. Every last bit of the entire thing is still on the talk page of the caribou article, it's a bit overdue for archiving. Beeblebrox (talk) 22:50, 22 March 2017 (UTC)

That is of no concern to me. If you think something needs to be done then do it. Mediatech492 (talk) 22:57, 22 March 2017 (UTC)

Well, you said you weren't aware of any such consensus, so I was just pointing al that out, so I'm a little puzzled by your reply, but whatever. Beeblebrox (talk) 20:01, 23 March 2017 (UTC)

Wikipedia aspires to be the English-speaking world's online encyclopedia. We have the one species but with two articles, which does not make sense. Regards, William Harris • (talk) • 12:19, 5 May 2017 (UTC)

Since there was a clear consensus on the subject, and I'm an uninvolved editor, I went ahead and performed the merge to the best of my abilities. I tried to be as inclusive as possible so as to conserve a maximum of content from both pages. As a result, however, the page could benefit from a bit of a copyedit and trim.

Unfortunately, in order to not break the citations of the Caribou page, the page currently uses a mix of citation styles. I will fix it gradually, unless someone else wants to give it a go, I did as much as I could do for the moment.

Also as a result of the large amount of content that's migrated over from the Caribou page, the article is quite NA-centric. Adding information about the lappish people and similar reindeer cultures would greatly help to balance the article.

If anyone wants to improve on the merge, the merged articles were Reindeer and Caribou. Wasechun tashunka^HOWL_TRACK 20:47, 19 October 2017 (UTC)

Also, the current level of indentation in the headers is a bit of a joke... Wasechun tashunka^HOWL_TRACK 20:48, 19 October 2017 (UTC)

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To clarify.

• Caribou - 172,000 K
• Elephant - 146,000 K
• Lion - 141,000 K
• Cat - 141,000 K
• Brown bear - 139,000 K
• Wolf - 138,000 K
• Tiger - 138,000 K
• Dog - 128,000 K

Now do you understand that by this information, not only 7 raindeer exist(I'm talking about Santa's raindeer) but there are actully 172,000 K. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 66.42.8.188 (talk) 20:39, 18 February 2021 (UTC)

Are we clear? LittleJerry (talk) 13:33, 1 February 2020 (UTC)

@LittleJerry: No, because you have not identified why this is a problem, what would be solved by "fixing" it, and how that fix might be implemented. Beeblebrox (talk) 02:40, 2 February 2020 (UTC)

The problem is straightforward. The article is too long to navigate. The solution is straightforward, trim it down. I'm not going back and forth with you, especially since you don't seem to be a regular editor to the article or any animal article. LittleJerry (talk) 13:38, 2 February 2020 (UTC)

"Too long to navigate"? Huh? Is it a problem on your cellphone or something else? I have no problems at all. -- BullRangifer (talk) 17:29, 2 February 2020 (UTC)

The point is, there is no reason why it should be far longer than other mammal species articles. Particularly more popular animals like dog or tiger. LittleJerry (talk) 19:58, 2 February 2020 (UTC)

We have no policy which allows the regulation of article size based on the popularity of the subject. See WP:OTHERTHINGS. Each article develops on its own, often independently from other subjects.

You should be thankful that so many editors have worked so hard to document the subject of such a notable animal, described as "the species of single greatest importance in the entire anthropological literature on hunting." No other deer species is domesticated either.

BTW, they are delicious. I authored the Reindeer hunting in Greenland article and have shot 17 of them. -- BullRangifer (talk) 21:28, 2 February 2020 (UTC)

Agree with all that, don't agree with LittleJerry trying to personalize this discussion about content, and still don't see any explanation of why this is a problem. I don't wish to edit war but without an clear, specific, policy-based reason presented I believe the "too long" tag should be removed. Beeblebrox (talk) 16:55, 3 February 2020 (UTC)

Article concerns

I just performed a quick read of this article and it was hard, to say the least. From an editorial point of view, I don't see a need for six paragraphs in the lead. Other concerns are the length. I don't see splitting as a necessity but certainly, a trimming could facilitate improvements, especially in some subsections by using summary style editing. A quick example is the "Antler" subsection (10 paragraphs and a quote) that curiously does not even link to that article. The "Distribution and habitat" shows to have Reindeer distribution as the main article yet has five paragraphs. Linking (see:H:WIKILINK) is considered an "important feature" and can be used in lieu of over-informational or the rehashing of content. Boreal woodland caribou has an article but no link and the same with the Peary caribou subsection.

There are eight instances of quotations. It would seem that an editorial preference for quotes could be better served as direct statements in the Wikipedia "editorial voice" that could lead to less over-editorializing.

B-class articles should conform to the criteria (#1), The article is suitably referenced, with inline citations. It has reliable sources, and any important or controversial material which is likely to be challenged is cited, so there should not be any "citation needed" or "dubious – discuss" tags.

At a point, "someone" might want to try to see if the article can be elevated to a higher classification and many of these issues likely will have to be dealt with. --Otr500 (talk) 17:06, 29 May 2021 (UTC)

Since we don't have articles yet

@Largoplazo: I did not remove the [[:Species:]] because they were there before the anonymous editor made them in to refs. I simply reverted that change. Someone else must have put those links there as we have no WP articles for them. I agree with that idea but I will not revert you. Invasive Spices (talk) 28 December 2021 (UTC)

I see, no worries! If I had come upon them in their pre-ref-tagging state I would have removed them as well, on the grounds of never havings seen any taxonomic article having WikiSpecies links inserted into text before! If anything, it seems like there might be a template for inserting such links at the bottom of the article. Largoplazo (talk) 17:46, 28 December 2021 (UTC)

I have seen those so yes I am sure we could use those, except that this is the article for all reindeer and not those specific subspecies. However, I suppose we could still add all the subspecies at the bottom. I assume the templates don't complain if you have than one in the same article. I had not thought of that. Would that look alright? Invasive Spices (talk) 28 December 2021 (UTC)

Minor edits

Hello @Moxy: and 2601:ca:4380:3a20:49c2:d076:ae11:6573. I fail to see the necessity of this reversion. Can you explain why you rolled them back? Invasive Spices (talk) 2 January 2022 (UTC)

Cremated the lede

The opening sentence of this article was destroyed on 7 Aug 2022. Please fix it. Grahamaross (talk) 12:49, 15 October 2022 (UTC)

Thanks for the heads-up. I fear the damage is much deeper than that, reviewing the page history. I took a shot at repair with portion of lede from before that date, but there have been so many intervening edits - vandalism and legitimate - it's very hard to tell. I've submitted a request for page protection. cheers. anastrophe, an editor he is. 19:15, 15 October 2022 (UTC)

Which edits are in dispute? Invasive Spices (talk) 15 October 2022 (UTC)

There's hundreds of IP edits, randomly, many reverted, some not (which is where it becomes problematic). You're welcome to do a diff of my attempt at restoration from an earlier version, and the state of the lede before it. It was badly garbled before, hopefully it is less so now. But ultimately it would take a day of sifting through all the hundreds of edits to weed out the bogus/non-productive ones from the good ones. cheers. anastrophe, an editor he is. 19:26, 15 October 2022 (UTC)

Species confusion.

The article now says "Porcupine caribou" and "Grant's caribou" are two different subspecies. If this is true, citations are needed to support the claim and the "Porcupine caribou" article needs to be updated.

Also, There are at least 3 species in the table R. a., R. c., and R. t.. Common names should not be used in a "Species" column. The only full species name I found in the article is tarandus. User-duck (talk) 19:09, 17 November 2022 (UTC)

Yes, this table is very confusing. For one thing, it seems to me that it is giving WP:UNDUE prominence to a single, very recent, article that revises the taxonomy of reindeer - this may be worthy of mentioning, but I haven't seen any evidence that it's widely accepted yet and deserves such detailed coverage. Plus, as you say, it contradicts what's currently stated elsewhere in the article - if that's no longer true, we should say so. Perhaps it needs updating, but this is currently the page for R. tarandus not for the genus as a whole, and if there's wide acceptance among zoologists that R. caribou and R. arcticus (which I think is what are being referred to here, although the current text is unclear on this point) are separate species then they need separate pages, not a section within this page. As would the genus, of course, since it currently doesn't have one - or this could be the genus page, and R. tarandus added as a new page. The table needs cleaning up, and, in my opinion, it either needs more confirmation that its scheme has been accepted and used in other sources besides the original, or rephrasing to something like the way the proposed "new" species are handled at giraffe. Anaxial (talk) 19:42, 17 November 2022 (UTC)

Oh, and the current lede is far too long, and littered with citations, many of which don't appear elsewhere in the article - not what a lede is supposed to do. I think this page needs cleanup. Anaxial (talk) 20:17, 17 November 2022 (UTC)

I am by no means a reindeer expert. I am an experienced editor currently working on CS1 errors/warnings. I make others edits when I believe it will improve the article. I really don't like the new "Species" column. I combined two columns to improve the display of the table. Caribou and reindeer appear to be synonymous for members of the Rangifer genus. I would suggest that the table be expanded for all species/subspecies. Also the article should be renamed to Rangifer to avoid the confusion inherent to using common names. Caribou and Reindeer would both redirect. There are already articles for some of the subspecies and details specific to a subspecies should be moved to them. User-duck (talk) 04:46, 18 November 2022 (UTC)

PS: I missed the other species in the confusing lede. User-duck (talk) 04:46, 18 November 2022 (UTC)

What subspecies does Porcupine caribou herd belong?

Based on Harding (2022), it is not clear (to me) the subspecies that the Porcupine caribou belong to. It is clear that they are not R. a. grantii. Statements about Porcupine caribou need to be checked and updated as needed. User-duck (talk) 16:20, 20 November 2022 (UTC)

This appears to be fixed in an edit that occurred while I was researching. Thanks. User-duck (talk) 16:28, 20 November 2022 (UTC)

R. c. terraenovae or R. t. terraenovae?

Both R. c. terraenovae or R. t. terraenovae are used in the article. Which is it? Please update all references. User-duck (talk) 17:19, 20 November 2022 (UTC)

Sorry I didn't get back to you sooner. I hadn't finished editing the page on 20 Nov. R. t. terraenovae is the name first given to Newfoundland caribou by Allen (1896), spelled terranovae by Jacobi (1931) and used up until Hall and Kelson (1959), synonymised by Banfield (1961) and resurrected by Geist (1991) and others subsequently. But genetic data and other showed that it is part of the woodland caribou clade, so a recent revision changed it to R. caribou terranovae. Fortidens (talk) 18:18, 27 November 2022 (UTC)

Migration

Here's a job. Migration (and maybe distribution and habitat) seems to be dealt with in more than one section. Unless there's a good reason to do it, that should be fixed. -- Valjean (talk) (PING me) 01:55, 22 November 2022 (UTC)

I suspect that a number of the issues in this article are artifacts of an incident detailed in the archives here and also at Talk:Caribou. The article was split at one point, under the mistaken assumption that because wild reindeer in North America are usually referred to as caribou that meant we should have two articles. It took way too long to get it merged back, by then the caribou article was rather long, and the merge maybe was sub optimal. Beeblebrox (talk) 17:06, 22 November 2022 (UTC)

Good point. Maybe the old caribou article should be mined for good content that didn't get merged. It would be a shame to lose it. -- Valjean (talk) (PING me) 18:05, 22 November 2022 (UTC)

Comments on page: Rangifer

I'm new to Wikipedia editing, and made multiple errors since I started on 17 Nov., but am learning fast. Some of the problems mentioned above result from my having been unable to complete editing the whole article in a day, and left with conflicts or confusion within the page. Then I kept getting conflict errors when I tried to continue, or to fix problem pointed out to me, or ones that I found just proofreading. Now I'm trying to put proposed edits for the next sections in the Rangifer/talk page, or in my "sandbox", instead of in the article, as recommended, but I'm afraid I'm having trouble figuring out how to do this. I'm taking the comments to heart and will address them ASAP. Sorry for the grief & confusion. Thanks to all for helping me through this. Lee Harding (Username "Fortidens", but I've applied to change to my real name, to make it easier for folks to castigate me). Fortidens (talk) 18:08, 24 November 2022 (UTC)

You're doing fine. These are just normal beginner difficulties. We've all been there. Feel free to go to my talk page and ask for help. -- Valjean (talk) (PING me) 19:03, 24 November 2022 (UTC)

@Fortidens: For the first item in the Note section, it's just two asterisks. What does this refer to? - UtherSRG (talk) 16:38, 27 November 2022 (UTC)

UtherSRG: Thanks. I don't know. But I've finished my main goal of updating the taxonomy and now I'm going to go through the page, Reindeer, and eliminate duplicate references, and fix other references that seem to me not very specific, or in the proper format, and review the Notes.

Next I'll proofread the other pages I've edited (Porcupine caribou, etc) and then look at Reindeer Distribution.

And I'll upload some images, once I figure out how to tag them with a Creative Commons license. Some of these would be in the public domain and are not mine: I need to figure out how to do that, too.

I'd like to make a page for Greenland Caribou/Reindeer, once I figure out how to make a new page.

Okay? --LEH 27 Nov '22 Fortidens (talk) 17:49, 27 November 2022 (UTC)

Before creating new pages, would be good to update all of the existing pages so that they are in alignment with the updated taxonomy. After that, I can help you with making new pages. - UtherSRG (talk) 18:26, 27 November 2022 (UTC)

How many species

Is there one or six species? 24.150.121.149 (talk) 20:14, 17 February 2023 (UTC)

There is some disagreement, but six is about right. -- Valjean (talk) (PING me) 20:26, 17 February 2023 (UTC)

So if there are six species, then shouldn't this article be split into 6 different articles?24.150.121.149 (talk) 20:28, 17 February 2023 (UTC)

If you look here, you'll see that some of those articles have been created. Feel free to create more. -- Valjean (talk) (PING me) 20:34, 17 February 2023 (UTC)