Template:Did you know nominations/Varroa destructor

The following is an archived discussion of the DYK nomination of the article below. Please do not modify this page. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as this nomination's talk page, the article's talk page or Wikipedia talk:Did you know), unless there is consensus to re-open the discussion at this page. No further edits should be made to this page.

The result was: promoted by Bruxton talk 16:07, 3 December 2023 (UTC)

Varroa destructor

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Adult female Varroa mite

... that Varroa destructor, the Varroa mite, is an external parasitic mite that attacks and feeds on honey bees and is one of the most harmful honey bee pests in the world? Source: Zakar et al. 2014 "Currently, the Varroa destructor mite is the most serious parasite of honey bees (Apis mellifera) and has become a nearly cosmopolitan species."
- Reviewed:

Improved to Good Article status by KoA (talk). Self-nominated at 17:38, 1 November 2023 (UTC). Post-promotion hook changes for this nom will be logged at Template talk:Did you know nominations/Varroa destructor; consider watching this nomination, if it is successful, until the hook appears on the Main Page.

Ready for DYK Rublamb (talk) 03:54, 2 November 2023 (UTC)

Review Comments:

New Enough - updated to GA on Nov. 1 and submitted for DYK on the same day
Long Enough - character count 7500+
Extremely well-sourced
Neutral tone - yes
Plagiarism - copyvio detector showed 13% - violation unlikely
Image - freely licensed and used in article
Hook - I think it could be improved. What do you think of:

ALT1: ... that Varroa destructor, the Varroa mite, is an external parasitic mite that attacks and feeds on honey bees and can cause the death of an entire honey bee colony

QPQ - not requested
@KoA:: I've completed my review. Great article and extremely well sourced! See my proposed ALT1 and let me know what you think. Also, are you under 5 DYK or do you need a QPQ ? Rublamb (talk) 01:39, 2 November 2023 (UTC)
- @Rublamb:, first time DYK so no QPQ yet. As for the alt text, there are quite a few pests that can kill off entire honey bee colonies. I think the unique factor here is that sources frequently call this the most severe, damaging, serious, etc. threat to honey bees out of all of those, so that's probably the piece I'd stick with over anything else. Maybe something like:

ALT2: ... that Varroa destructor, the Varroa mite, is an external parasitic mite that is considered the most harmful pest to honey bees and can cause a hive to collapse with 2–3 years? KoA (talk) 03:43, 2 November 2023 (UTC)

@KoA:: That makes sense; thanks for explaining. Let's keep the original but use harmful instead of damaging; I like that variation you came up with. Rublamb (talk) 03:55, 2 November 2023 (UTC)