Talk:Salmo trutta fario

"River trout" not an accepted common name

The use of the name "River trout" to describe riverine forms of the brown trout is confusing and not supported with sources. Fishbase does not list "River trout" as a common name for Salmo trutta or any of its synonyms. [1]. --Mike Cline (talk) 18:12, 5 October 2016 (UTC)

Hi Mike, that might be true in the US, but not in the rest of the world. I checked sources before making the changes and there is abundant evidence in book sources that "river trout" is commonly used and about 1,000 times more common than "riverine brown trout", whether associated with fario or not. Here's the data from Google Books:

• "river trout" - 30,800 hits
• "river trout" + "fario" - 1,390 hits
• "riverine brown trout" - 37 hits
• "riverine brown trout" + "fario" - 1 hit

So I'd be grateful if you'd revert your changes to reflect this. --Bermicourt (talk) 18:27, 5 October 2016 (UTC)

1) "River trout" is extraordinarily ambiguous as it could apply to any species of trout that lived in rivers, not just brown trout. 2) Search for "river trout" is very problematic as most instances returned are actually from the construction [name of river] trout, ie. Kern river trout. 3) "River trout" is not listed as a common name in FishBase (the accepted authority for fish related articles.) 4) The "fario" morph is not a subspecies, so any brown trout that is stream resident, regardless of global geography is merely a riverine ecotype of brown trout. 5) Since widespread stocking of brown trout raised in hatcheries has taken place in Europe for decades, there is little chance that the brown trout that live in European rivers today, are genetically pure "fario" morphs as classified in the 18th century. 6) A search of scholarly literature (JSTOR) returned only 115 hits on "river trout". The great majority of returns were of the [name of river] river construction and did not refer to "river trout" in the context you suggest. Of the few (~10) that mentioned "river trout" in the context you suggest, most of those were referring to the use of "river trout" in captions on ancient Japanese artwork. 7) The same JSTOR search with "river trout" AND "fario" returned only 2 citations that properly combined S.t.fario and the common name "river trout". They were dated 1885 and 1931. I do not see the case for using "River trout" as the common name -- it is ambiguous and inaccurate. --Mike Cline (talk) 12:59, 6 October 2016 (UTC)

Article title

If fario is just a morph name, then the article should not be at "Salmo trutta fario", since under the ICodeZN, the third part of a trinomial is a subspecies name. I have no expertise in this area, so I don't know whether fario is an accepted subspecies name, or a morph name (not a 'rank' accepted in the ICodeZN). Peter coxhead (talk) 09:18, 3 August 2018 (UTC)

The previous name of "river trout", which is what this fish is called in other languages, was rejected for the reasons given above. So, unless we go back to that, the fario is needed to distinguish it from the many other forms of Salmo trutta: Salmo trutta lacustris, Salmo trutta trutta, Salmo trutta ferox, Salmo trutta marmorata, Salmo trutta carpio, Salmo trutta labrax, etc. Bermicourt (talk) 09:38, 3 August 2018 (UTC)

@Bermicourt: my point is about the name, not the taxon. You wrote many other forms of Salmo trutta: Salmo trutta lacustris, ..., but these are not forms, but subspecies, since the third part of the trinomial scientific name of an animal is always a subspecies. See my response to Nick Thorne below. Peter coxhead (talk) 11:24, 3 August 2018 (UTC)

Having just read this article, it seems to me that the lead makes the case for this article to simply be merged into Salmo trutta. This is not a recognised taxon, why do we have an article? This should simply be a redirect and a line added to the main article that this is an obsolete synonym of the main species. - Nick Thorne ^talk 10:19, 3 August 2018 (UTC)

@Nick Thorne: I have no view on whether the taxon is recognized as a morph or a subspecies or neither, having no expertise in the area. My point is solely that if the article exists, then its text, which uses "Salmo trutta morpha fario", and the its title, currently "Salmo trutta fario" (which is a subspecies name, not a morph name), should be consistent. Peter coxhead (talk) 11:24, 3 August 2018 (UTC)

I agree, however see my next section. - Nick Thorne ^talk 12:02, 3 August 2018 (UTC)

Merge this article into Salmo trutta

Fishbase contains a record for this subspecies[2] which states that the name Salmo trutta fario is not currently accepted. In other words, this taxon is not recognised. Consequently I propose that any unique info from this page be moved to a subsection about obsolete synonyms within the Salmo trutta article and this article be converted to a redirect to that page. If I do not recieve any substantive objections to this I will proceed with a formal merger proposal. - Nick Thorne ^talk 12:09, 3 August 2018 (UTC)

Oppose at least until proper research justifies this. Salmo trutta is a species with several subspecies and morphs, all of which are studied and discussed separately in the scientific press - there are thousands of books and journals that refer to Salmo trutta fario (first classified by Linnaeus) to distinguish it from other subspecies and morphs. This is clearly its WP:COMMONNAME. Regardless of whether it is a taxon or not, it appears to justify a separate article. Part of the problem may be that our language only has one name, "brown trout" for most of these forms, whereas other (mainly European) languages clearly recognise them as separate.

An option might be to move it to Salmo trutta morpha fario, a name which is also used, albeit far less frequently that Salmo trutta fario, so we'd need to find the Wiki policy logic for not using WP:COMMONNAME. Bermicourt (talk) 12:28, 3 August 2018 (UTC)

Google Scholar shows some 3,000 papers published in the last 10 years that use the subspecies name Salmo trutta fario. About 230 use Salmo trutta morpha fario. So on this basis, I can see no case for the morph name. Peter coxhead (talk) 12:37, 3 August 2018 (UTC)

Agree WRT the "morpha" name, however how do we distinguish uses of S. trutta fario in the context of obsolete synonyms - these would still record a hit. I have only conducted a superficial search ATM, but so far all the recent articles on S. trutta taxonomy that I have seen do not mention fario. There is discussion of a species complex, but none of the mentioned lineages are named fario that I have seen so far. I think we need to be mindful that the taxonomy/cladistics of species has undergone a major revolution since the advent of relatively cheap and available DNA sequencing. Much of previous taxonomic division has been shown to be incorrect, and indeeed new divisions have become apparent in some cases. I trust Fishbase as an excellent tertiary source in this matter to be relatively up to date and in the absense of some pretty good very recent sources with similar standing to the contrary I stand by my proposal. - Nick Thorne ^talk 13:16, 3 August 2018 (UTC)

Support based on many debates within WP:FISH that resulted in a consensus to use Fishbase as the definitive source for fish taxonomy. The limitations of Fishbase have been long discussed, with the primary objection that the taxonomy tends to lag behind scientific consensus, but the lag is acceptable since those changes eventually are integrated into Fishbase. No objection to breaking the article back into a subspecies article once it is recognized there, but as long as Salmo trutta fario shows as not currently accepted there, Wikipedia should reflect that. Another discussion could be started at WP:FISH to alter that consensus to use Fishbase in favor of another resource, but it comes up every few years, and after a discussion it is always recognized that although Fishbase isn't perfect, it is the best choice to use, for consistency, reliability, and accessibility to editors. Neil916 (Talk) 16:58, 3 August 2018 (UTC)

Comment. I know of no other Wikipedia topic where one source (in this case Fishbase) is considered as the sole arbiter of whether something exists or not, and the only source of article names. No wonder it is repeatedly disputed! Like all reliable sources, Fishbase should be a guide, not a Bible. The main Wikipedia convention in this area is WP:COMMONNAME and it is clear that Salmo trutta fario is widely used in the scientific community, even today, to study a particular type of Salmo trutta that is confined to rivers, whatever its taxonomic status. We are meant to follow the sources, otherwise it is WP:OR. This is not an obsolete term - see Peter coxhead's research above. Bermicourt (talk) 07:55, 8 August 2018 (UTC)

@Bermicourt: my comments above do not show that the taxon is not obsolete. Whenever new research shows that taxa need to be merged, split or renamed, the old name and usage will show up in searches for years afterwards. All that my "research" shows is that if the taxon is accepted now, the subspecies name is more common than the form name. Peter coxhead (talk) 19:33, 9 August 2018 (UTC)

Google hits are not a reliable way of establishing anything. A hit for S.trutta fario cannot distinguish between occasions using the name as an extant taxon and words to the effect that it is an obsolete taxon. None of the recent sources I have been able to find use the name, despite their reference to a species complex. I agree that Fishbase is not perfect, but what alternative are you proposing? Do you have a recent source using the name, and if so, can you show that it represents the scientific consensus? That is why Fishbase is a good source for our purposes, it is a tertiary source, the kind we are supposed to prefer. - Nick Thorne ^talk 10:04, 8 August 2018 (UTC)

Google hits are not, but the sources they lead to are. And we are NOT supposed to prefer tertiary sources. WP:SECONDARY says "Policy: Wikipedia articles usually rely on material from reliable secondary sources. Articles may make an analytic, evaluative, interpretive, or synthetic claim only if that has been published by a reliable secondary source." Meanwhile WP:TERTIARY states "Reliable tertiary sources can be helpful in providing broad summaries of topics that involve many primary and secondary sources, and may be helpful in evaluating due weight, especially when primary or secondary sources contradict each other. Some tertiary sources are more reliable than others, and within any given tertiary source, some entries may be more reliable than others." Wikipedia prefers secondary sources, tertiary sources are clearly intended as an aid or guide; no more. This merge is unnecessary and will result in confusion, which is what we had before. Bermicourt (talk) 12:09, 8 August 2018 (UTC)

• comment: Without looking any deeper than above, Salmo trutta fario L. seems to be available and unproblematic as a title. Elaboration of the nomenclature makes good content, it needs a taxonomy or classification section instead. The lead in the article makes a declaration that is inferred from the FishBase discussion of the species, that contribution is deserving of a trout award :) — cygnis insignis 03:27, 10 August 2018 (UTC) I missed a link above, and dug down to the citations [3]. Authors have said the synonym is valid as a morpha or subspecies (2001—2016). cygnis insignis 03:58, 10 August 2018 (UTC)

That link points to The Catalogue of Fishes with a reference for this taxon of Kottelat, M. 1997 [ref. 22952] European freshwater fishes. Biologia (Bratislava) v. 52 (suppl. 5): 1-271. That's 21 years old. None of the more recent articles I've been able to find name this as an extant taxon, although many discuss the species complex and name other subspecies. It should not need pointing out that a great deal of progress has been made in the last couple of decades in sorting out species/subspecies relationships and there are many taxa that were previously considered valid that are no longer, as well as many taxa now recognised as divided into several separate species or subspecies. In the absense of any reasonably recent RS that names this subspecies, I still believe we should follow Fishbase which explicitly states that this taxon is no longer recognised. - Nick Thorne ^talk 09:43, 10 August 2018 (UTC)

Oh! I didn't check that link, and it took me while to reproduce the result. Put in a search using this page title and the following turns up, [ direct link ]

fario, Salmo Linnaeus … Synonym of Salmo trutta Linnaeus 1758, but a valid subspecies fario Linnaeus 1758 -- (Svetovidov in Whitehead et al. 1984:383 [ref. 13675], Pequeño 1989:29 [ref. 14125], Talwar & Jhingran 1991:721 [ref. 20764], Wu & Wu 1992:128 [ref. 21205], Zhang et al. 1995:43 [ref. 22734], Zhu 1995:10 [ref. 25213], Dorofeeva 1998:442 [ref. 24680] as a valid morpha, Rafique 2000:323 [ref. 25220], Mirza 2003:3 [ref. 27265] as a valid subspecies, Gabrielyan 2001:24 [ref. 25867], Vassilev & Pehlivanov 2005:164 [ref. 28369], Shestha 2008:202 [ref. 29923], Gurung et al. 2013:4884 [ref. 32969], Zhang et al. 2016:212 [ref. 34477]). [emphasis added]

which I summarised as "Authors have said the synonym is valid as a morpha or subspecies (2001—2016)", but could be I'm missing something. cygnis insignis 16:41, 10 August 2018 (UTC)

• Oppose. There is disagreement over whether this fish should considered a subspecies, morpha or neither. Currently, neither Fishbase or Catalog of Fishes currently recognise either, but this is due to lack of agreement rather than a definitive decision. That said, it seems reasonable to use Salmo trutta for the taxon name, at least for now.

However, this doesn't mean the article is not notable. It has long been recognised as a distinct fish with a different life cycle to the rest of the species. There is considerable research on the fish that considers it a distinct population of scientific and commercial interest. The best comparison is with the kokanee salmon (Oncorhynchus nerka), which is the non-anadromous form of the sockeye salmon. It has an article even though it is not considered a separate subspecies from the anadromous sockeyes. There are many articles on domesticated animals and plants that aren't considered distinct subspecies (e.g. Cauliflower, Jersey cow, Siamese cat, etc.). Not being a valid taxon name is not a reason for not having an article, just as having a valid taxon name is not always justification for a separate article.

The main problem seems to be what to use as the title for the article. But this difficulty isn't justification for a merger.   Jts1882 | talk  10:44, 10 August 2018 (UTC)

I have just re-read the article. There really is nothing in this article that is unique to this alleged subspecies and in fact the entire article reads as one that is about brown trout overall. About the only thing unique to this article is the name 'fario. This fish is not distinct and does not have a unique life cycle. The fact that it is not an extant tason is the icing on the cake. This article is really just a content fork for the brown trout article. A sentence or two in the main article is all that fario deserves, the duplication of information here in a separate article is unwarranted. - Nick Thorne ^talk 12:27, 10 August 2018 (UTC)

Well spotted and thank you for pointing that up! I've just realised what's happened here: an earlier editor completely re-wrote the original translated article, which was about S.t. fario, into a more general article about brown trout, turning it as you say into a content fork. I have now restored the text as it was intended to be, but kept the more recent infobox. It will probably need cleaning up, but you can see the intent. I suggest we keep the article tightly focussed on the fario morph of its parent article to avoid exactly this sort of confusion arising. Bermicourt (talk) 15:38, 10 August 2018 (UTC)

I've just restored the recent edit by @Cygnis insignis:. Once Wikipedia's servers stabilise, I'll go through the others and add them in provided they relate to the morph and not its parent species. Bermicourt (talk) 15:44, 10 August 2018 (UTC)

• Proposal withdrawn OK, fair enough, I accept that this article should stand as it now is. Thanks guys for your input. - Nick Thorne ^talk 02:46, 12 August 2018 (UTC)