Wikipedia:Peer review/Ring-tailed Lemur/archive1

This peer review discussion has been closed.
I've listed this article for peer review because I plan to submit it as a FAC shortly. I am looking for comments that would facilitate a favorable FA review. Copyediting would be appreciated. Suggestions for citation clean-up are also strongly encouraged. Otherwise, a general review would be much appreciated.

Thanks, Visionholder (talk) 17:37, 10 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Finetooth comments: This is an interesting, well-sourced, and well-illustrated article. I can't help with the biology, but I have a few suggestions about Manual of Style issues that might be useful.

  • Digits and the units they modify need to have non-breaking spaces between them to keep them from from being separated by line-wrap on computer monitors. Please see WP:NBSP. The first two of these occur in the lead in the phrase "19 years in the wild and 27 years in captivity... "
  • The preferred arrangement for the citation numbers in the main text is ascending order. This is a minor point, but you might consider moving the citations for "the brown lemurs were moved to the genus Eulemur in 1988.[1][15][14]" so that the numbers appear as [1][14][15]. This appears in the "Changes in taxonomy" section. I see a [12][17][14] in the next section, and there may be others.
  • Instead of "The pelage is dense, with the ventral (chest) coat and throat being white or cream, and the dorsal (back) coat and neck being gray to rosy-brown" I might suggest "The pelage is dense. The ventral (chest) coat and throat is white or cream, and the dorsal (back) coat is gray to rosy-brown." The problem here is that "with" and "being" don't work well as logical connectors. This leads me to a more general suggestion. A top-to-bottom copyedit aimed mainly at prose flow would probably identify similar constructions and improve the prose. The prose is generally good in this article, but I'm thinking of further polishing to meet the 1a criterion at FAC. I see quite a few similar "with" plus "-ing" combinations that are generally frowned upon. Re-casting these in various ways might be the most significant thing you could do to improve the prose in this article.
    • That instance has been fixed per your suggestion, also correcting for s/v aggreement. I agree that a good top-to-bottom copyedit is needed. I have been trying to improve my skills using the guide How to satisfy Criterion 1a. I've gone on to apply what I could to the lead, today's fix of the "Anatomy and physiology" section and last night's re-write of the "Conservation status" section. I will continue my efforts at copyediting, although outside assistance from a skill copyeditor would be appreciated. But thank you for the suggestion and example. - Visionholder (talk) 22:56, 17 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I hope you find these suggestions helpful. If so, please consider reviewing another article, especially one from the backlog. That is where I found this one. Finetooth (talk) 21:07, 17 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]

  • Thank you very much for your time and effort. Although I am very busy with numerous planned re-writes and reviews, I will try to help out in the future with the backlogged peer review page. - Visionholder (talk) 22:56, 17 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]