Talk:Thorny devil

The names of species, incl. in the title of this article

All of the names of SPECIES are common nouns, and they do not contain any words that are capitalizes -- except for some words that were proper nouns already. Otherwise, the words are not capitalized unless they fall at the beginning of a sentence or a title. Hence, use "Thorny devil" for the title of the article, and "thorny devil" within the text of the article. For some examples of names that are common nouns all the way:
albatross, blue whale, camel, chimpanzee, crocodile, elephant, emperor penguin, eucalyptus, fox, gorilla, grizzly bear, hawk, hedgehog, impala, jackrabbit, kangaroo, kukaburra, leopard seal, llama, mongoose, newt, orangutan, octopus, platypus, polar bear, raccoon, robbin, seahawk, stork, vampire bat, wildebeest, wombat, yak, zebra.

For some examples of names that contain proper nouns:
Andean condor, Burbank potato, California condor, Cape buffalo, Douglas fir, Japanese beetle, Norwegian spruce, Pacific bottlenose dolphin, Siberian wolf, Tasmanian devil, and Thompson's gazelle.
Stick with the plan and it is not hard to do.
98.67.163.16 (talk) 19:42, 22 July 2012 (UTC)

In the Central area of the Australian bush, circling Alice Springs really, these creatures are commonly known as "mountain devils". I lived there from 1954 and never heard them called anything else. As it seems that is the ONLY place they live, is not the name used locally likely to be the right one? Google can carry many false named things or animals or anything really. Number of hits I see as irrelevant, it's what people who see and play with them who know their name.

I'm surprised that no mention seems to have been made to the feel of the underside of these lovely lizards. Put one in your hand and it's feet are so tender and soft. The belly et al is also soft and not thorny at all. They feel wonderful to touch, pleasant feeling, so tender yet on top they appear fearsome. Only to ants.

Mention is made of a "false head" on the top of it's head. A barrel shaped object. I always knew it as their water supply, a place to store water much as camels do.

Any interest in Trilobyte's. Found them in Alice Springs in about 1960. They too appear to have a number of names.

Name of the species

We should probably swap this article, and its redirect, from "thorny devil", which I think is the more commonly used name... thorny devil, thorny lizard, thorny dragon are all common names that refer to this lizard.

Important Question

I was watching a show called "The Venom Cure" on PBS, and I saw a lizard in the opening credits that looked like this, but it was extra blue. Is it the same thing, or another type entirely? I can't find it anywhere. It caught my eye because it looked like a Dialga, from Pokemon. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 69.204.192.141 (talk) 21:31, 19 November 2009 (UTC)

Requested move 10 August 2017

The following is a closed discussion of a requested move. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on the talk page. Editors desiring to contest the closing decision should consider a move review. No further edits should be made to this section.

The result of the move request was: moved DrStrauss talk 16:42, 29 August 2017 (UTC)

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Thorny dragon → Thorny devil – Thorny devil is a much more common name for the lizard than thorny dragon. 124.171.71.97 (talk) 23:48, 10 August 2017 (UTC)--Relisting. —usernamekiran(talk) 03:11, 19 August 2017 (UTC)

• Oppose. No evidence offered, and two quick googles indicate that the current name is more common, I get 290,000 ghits for the current name vs 94,000 for the proposed. Andrewa (talk) 00:06, 18 August 2017 (UTC)

@Andrewa: are results location-based? Opening your links, I'm seeing 46,000 hits for the first search (dragon) and 88,300 for the second (devil). – Rhinopias (talk) 20:16, 21 August 2017 (UTC)

Interesting... Location does affect the rankings but I'm surprised if it affects the total number of ghits. Try https://www.google.com.au/search?q="thorny+dragon"+australia+lizard+-wikipedia and https://www.google.com.au/search?q="thorny+devil"+australia+lizard+-wikipedia which are the same links but stripped of some parameters Google added, and which give me the same results. Andrewa (talk) 22:14, 21 August 2017 (UTC)

Now I'm seeing your numbers but both are a few thousand higher. However, if you add "-devil" to the dragon search it decreases the hits to 63,200 for me. I wondered how many of those 300,000 results still primarily called the species thorny devil but just mentioned thorny dragon. (Not to mention this reddit result was on the first page and isn't even the right animal. How many websites like this got "thorny dragon" from this Wikipedia article that's been named as such since 2013?) Also, I'm very curious how this site ended up on the 2nd page of the thorny dragon search results when it does not have the phrase "thorny dragon" on the page, just mentions of the family which are called dragons. – Rhinopias (talk) 01:15, 22 August 2017 (UTC)

• comment as an uninvolved party: if there is any evidence/source for supporting to request, it is suggested it should be presented here. Best, —usernamekiran(talk) 03:13, 19 August 2017 (UTC)
• Support per article's unnecessary rename in 2013 and its current sources and links. The article was created as "Thorny lizard" in 2004 with "Thorny devil" redirecting to "Thorny lizard" a couple of hours later. The article was renamed to "Thorny Devil" in 2005. In January 2013 it was renamed to Thorny dragon in order "to match family", Agamidae, which are collectively called dragons.

This move shouldn't have been made as the species is overwhelmingly referred to as thorny devil. This Australian paper, this UT site—along with a few references at the bottom, including this paper—, another Australian paper, this UT database, and this Australian site, all used in the article, exclusively use the common name thorny devil. This reference primarily uses thorny devil but mentions thorny dragon and three others. These two articles referenced (1 and 2) use only the binomial. Additionally, I found this BBC documentary, Wired article, and two Australian sites (1 and 2) that use thorny devil. Searching for "thorny devil" australia -wikipedia gave me 110,000 hits while "thorny dragon" australia -wikipedia gave me 51,300. – Rhinopias (talk) 18:05, 20 August 2017 (UTC)

I get 130,000 and 62,200 which is consistent, and IMO means that based on those searches it's too close to call. Andrewa (talk) 22:23, 21 August 2017 (UTC)

• Support, although I'd rather see this just moved to Moloch horridus to avoid petty squabbles over which vernacular name is the common name; there's no evidence readers have any trouble finding articles at scientific name title from vernacular name searches when appropriate redirects are in place. Thorny devil does seem to be more commonly used than thorny dragon, and it's absolutely not Wikipedia's job to reject a more commonly used vernacular name in favor of a less commonly used one in order to achieve standardization. Plantdrew (talk) 20:49, 25 August 2017 (UTC)
• Support. The proposed title is several times more common on Google Books ([1] vs. [2]) and Google News ([3] vs. [4]) which supports the claims above that it is the WP:COMMONNAME in the sources.--Cúchullain ^t/c 19:06, 28 August 2017 (UTC)

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The above discussion is preserved as an archive of a requested move. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on this talk page or in a move review. No further edits should be made to this section.

Semi-protected edit request on 30 October 2021

Add "The amount of water needed to fill the skin capillary system is only 3.19% of its body mass, which is insufficient for drinking needs." to the Diet section after the last sentence in the last paragraph. Sinigangangg (talk) 01:59, 30 October 2021 (UTC)

 Not done: please provide reliable sources that support the change you want to be made. ScottishFinnishRadish (talk) 02:04, 30 October 2021 (UTC)

I would argue that the "Description" more than adequately addresses the "water" issue, such that the mention in the "Diet" section is redundant. Conversely, the entire paragraph concerning water in the "Description" should replace that in the "Diet" section. Skaizun (talk) 10:17, 14 August 2024 (UTC)

Extraneous Adjective

The word "intimidating" in the second paragraph of the "Description" is extraneous and subjective, such that "An intimidating array of spikes..." should have that word removed. Skaizun (talk) 10:19, 14 August 2024 (UTC)