Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Gastropods/Archive 4

Archive 1

Archive 2

Archive 3

Archive 4

Archive 5

Archive 6

Archive page 4: Messages from September 2010 to end of 2011

Extant marine gastropods

(Note: not counted 9 families of Sacoglossa with 284 species.)

Extant marine gastropods	done by Ganeshbot	to be done from WoRMS
number of families	132	137
number of articles/species	15.000 articles (species + genera)	my guess is about 3.000-5.000 species, but it is certainly less than 10.000 articles

I have tried to count families precisely, but this table serves as an very approximate overview only. But it clearly shows, that the most diversified families are already done. --Snek01 (talk) 23:00, 14 September 2010 (UTC)

Thanks Michal, that is important and useful to know. Invertzoo (talk) 20:35, 15 September 2010 (UTC)

Family experts

What I offered was that if the bot operator told me who the Wikipedia family experts are I would discuss problems in their areas with Wikipedia articles the bot created. I can provide citations of important secondary and, in some case and even better, tertiary sources for some of the families. Speaking directly to mollusc family experts should not be considered. If the information is only available through primary resources it is not vetted to the appropriate level to be considered for an encyclopedia, in particular, a general encyclopedia. I'm overwhelmed with the talking and accusations at this moment and no longer feeling generous enough to spend my time doing this. JaRoad (talk) 18:32, 21 August 2010 (UTC)

Hi again JaRoad. We do not yet have a range of "family experts" here on WikiProject Gastropods. After all, there are 611 gastropod families and only 23 of us, counting several editors who are not very active. Most of us are not professional malacologists, and most interested people here are somewhat expert not on one family but on those species that live in one particular area that they have access to. However, if you look on this page [1] you will see that some of our 23 members have areas of special knowledge. To give you just a few examples, User:Snek01 is very good on pulmonate land snails, especially those of Central and Eastern Europe. I am pretty good on the Caribbean marine fauna, and that of California. User:Seascapeza is good on the nudibranchs of South Africa, and Antarctic-adventurer is also good on nudibranchs, mostly Indo-Pacific ones.

And as for the secondary or tertiary sources you can suggest to us for a family, that would be really good info to have, but whether we can actually lay our hands on the sources themselves is a different matter.

When you want to talk about problems with one particular family, the issue can be raised on the gastropod project talk page, and then it will become clear whether or not someone knows enough to take over dealing with what is "wrong" with that family. In reality it might take several of us to tackle it, sharing our knowledge. And as you know, generally on Wikipedia the thing to do if you are really confident about the sources of your information is to "Be Bold" and make the changes yourself, as long as you provide citations. It's usually good to check with the Project first before making sweeping changes though.

If you are too tired right now to deal with all this, I respect that, but the Project will still be here if at some point you have more energy. If you approach us in a friendly way, we don't bite! Actually most of us are pretty easy to get on with, and happy to make the acquaintance of another person who cares about slugs and snails. All good wishes, Invertzoo (talk) 19:15, 21 August 2010 (UTC)

I can send a particular review or taxonomic article to a single editor. I cannot post articles or send them to multiple editors. This is the reason I asked the bot runner for family expert specialist. JaRoad (talk) 23:50, 21 August 2010 (UTC)

Hello, feel free to send me anything. (I can resend it to other ones easily, if needed). I will be glad to receive it and I am very interested in the theme, that you would like to improve. Then I will focus on that theme on wikipedia to keep it up to date. Thank you. --Snek01 (talk) 18:45, 22 August 2010 (UTC)

I have received nothing from JaRoad. --Snek01 (talk) 00:09, 20 September 2010 (UTC)

Requesting Project members' input on BRFA Ganeshbot5

Points drafted by Invertzoo. Currently looking for input from other project members. Will project members please adjust these points as they feel is appropriate before they are submitted on the bot approvals page:

We completely agree that the bot was not authorized to create all these new stubs (other than the Conus stubs.) However, this was a genuine oversight and misunderstanding on our part, not a deliberate flouting of policy. We should not be subjected to punitive measures or restrictions as a result of this unfortunate misunderstanding. Any new suggestions as to how we should proceed at this point in time should be thought out as a completely separate issue.

1. There is consensus at "Tree of Life" that species are intrinsically notable and that species stubs are valuable to have for the reasons suggested: easy expansion, easy and fast adding of images and other info.

2. There is no Wikipedia guideline against stubs or against the number of stubs a project should have.

3. Thus there is no formal limit to the number of stubs a project should currently have, assuming the stubs are not full of errors. (In any case we are generating stubs by hand every day and have been for several years without a formal checking system in place for content errors; this is commonly the case in the rest of Wikipedia.)

4. At the Project we check the content of a planned family of bot-generated species stubs carefully before they are produced. After they are produced, a few in each family are checked by hand. It is not necessary to manually check every single one of them, as the content is standardized, and assuming the bot is running normally, the stubs within one family will all be similar in structure. The bot seems sound, and no problems with it have shown up yet, but were the bot to develop a weird glitch, that should be immediately obvious from checking a few stubs in each family. In the unlikely circumstance that a glitch were to come into effect, an automated fix should be quite easy and fast to implement.

5. There is no solid evidence that any of our new bot-generated stubs have genuine errors in them. If a few of them have things that some people argue are less than ideal, these are human choices, and were not due to the bot; plus these supposedly less than idea things are a matter of opinion, not of fact. In our experience over the last 3 years, human-generated stubs have been found to be more likely to contain small errors (such as typos or small omissions) than the Ganeshbot stubs have been.

6. If one word is considered seriously misleading, or if quote marks did need removing around one word in a large batch of stubs, that could be changed by automated software in a matter of seconds.

7. If taxonomy on the family level or below subsequently becomes somewhat out of date due to revisions by experts, or if the nomenclature has been tweaked subsequent to the creation of the stub, this does not in any way invalidate the species article, and should not be considered an error.

-- submitted here (with Invertzoo's permission) by Anna Frodesiak (talk) 21:30, 15 September 2010 (UTC)

Additional points explaining why it is so important and valuable to us (and to Wikipedia) to have a full set of stubs to cover the whole class of gastropods:

1. We are constantly finding new free images which can be added in to new stubs, that is assuming the stubs are available. JoJan currently has shell images of 2,500 species (!) that are waiting to be added to the project. A leading malacologist in Brazil has also offered to give us a large number of free images. We are constantly finding other new information (with refs) that can rapidly be added, that is, if a stub already exists. When stubs are not pre-existing, having to create a new stub by hand every time you need one is a slow process which is very wasteful of human time and energy. User:Snek01 creates a few new articles on species almost every day of the year (!) If he could use a pre-existing framework of stubs, that would enormously increase his productivity, enabling him to fix up and flesh out far more articles each day.

2. Wikipedia works precisely because people enjoy expanding articles and fixing them up. This is a situation where Wikipedia can really benefit from a "Be Bold" approach.

3. The Gastropods Project staff has expanded very significantly over the last 3 years, from 5 to 23; nine new people joined in 2009 alone! Even though not all of the 23 editors are extremely active, it does show that in another year or so we might have significantly more manpower and possibly manpower that is a lot more expert. We may have people who are quite willing to take on one whole superfamily or another large taxon and fix up all of the stubs in that taxon. We must think of the future as well as the present and we need to have faith in the overall Wikipedia process, which has proven to work so well over time.

Invertzoo (talk) 13:20, 16 September 2010 (UTC)

Can you give some examples of the human choices made? It looks like the bot owner listed a family or higher level taxon, then members said yes or no, or tweaked a single sentence to apply to all species in a genus. Is this what you mean by human choices? Have all 15,000 articles been checked for errors? --JaRoad (talk) 06:25, 16 September 2010 (UTC)

Hello again JaRoad. This is a provisional list, waiting for input from other project members. Once the lists of pointers has been finalized and submitted, then it will be appropriate to make a response. Thanks for your interest. Invertzoo (talk) 13:18, 16 September 2010 (UTC)

There is a comment above, "If a few of them have things that some people argue are less than ideal, these are human choices, and were not due to the bot; plus these supposedly less than idea things are a matter of opinion, not of fact." I would like to know what human choices were made that contributed to "less than ideal" results in the bot articles. I'll post on the bot board with this quote, though, if you're unwilling to answer here. The matter is relevant to that current discussion. --JaRoad (talk) 16:58, 18 September 2010 (UTC)

The above points sum up exactly what I think about this situation. However, I would like to add one more point to quench objections about us not being able to manage so many articles. All changes in WoRMS can be picked up by a bot and this list will be checked manually. If this is done regularly (e.g. every month) the number of changes should be manageable. Such changes agree with the fact that wikipedia is "a work in progress" and will be never finished. JoJan (talk) 15:08, 16 September 2010 (UTC)

I added some text to the first list of points. Here are some additional points. Please other project members give your input on all of the points both above and below:

1. The stubs which were generated recently are based on the website WoRMS, the highest quality source available to us, and one which is managed by some of the best professionals worldwide in malacology. JoJan is now in frequent email contact with WoRMS, so any ambiguities can be cleared up quickly.

2. As the WoRMS website updates their listings, these updates can readily be checked once a month and listed for us by a bot (this has already been done once) and the changes can then be implemented by hand by project members, as JoJan has being doing in the last week or so. When checked once a month, the number of changes will not be more than we can easily manage.

Thanks again. Invertzoo (talk) 21:52, 16 September 2010 (UTC)

Once the bot generates a list of changes, is there an intermediate step before the changes are manually made to the stubs? If so, what is that step. If not, can ordinary project members participate in updating stubs? Anna Frodesiak (talk) 22:57, 16 September 2010 (UTC)

Perhaps JoJan can answer this better than I can. There is no intermediate step exactly, however for each update, before implementing it, one first needs to think through whether there are other related articles that will need changing as a result of the update, and whether a new stub needs creating as well. (For example: when a species is moved to a brand new genus from out of another pre-existing genus, then the new genus stub must be created with that species listed in it, the old genus stub must have its species list shortened by one, and the species article must be "moved" to its new name, and all three of these changes backed up with the WoRMS reference. I think that someone with no background in taxonomy might need a little training in order to do a really good job of this and similar changes, but I think it could be done. Let's see what JoJan says. Invertzoo (talk) 01:34, 17 September 2010 (UTC) Expanded. Invertzoo (talk) 13:05, 17 September 2010 (UTC)

Indeed, performing these changes in taxonomy is not as simple as it may look at first sight. Invertzoo already specifies what has to be done, but there is more to it. When moving a species from genus A to genus B, one has to check the list of species of each genus thoroughly with WoRMS; otherwise, most probably, no one will ever touch it in years to come and other changes will remain unnoticed. If genus B doesn't exist, the article has to be created with a (sometimes long) list of species. Each species of this list has to be linked and italicized (a insipid task and a strain for the eyes). Many hours have already been lost this way. In many cases the links will be red, because Ganeshkbot has been brought to a halt. If the subfamily or family to which genus B belongs has no article, a new article has to be created as well (and check WoRMS with the Taxonomy of the Gastropoda (Bouchet & Rocroi, 2005)). An assessment template has to be added to the talk page of the new article of genus B (and to the possible new article of the subfamily or family). While checking genera A and B with WoRMS one sometimes encounters strange things. In those cases I've sent an email to WoRMS. They're very helpful. Their influence must be great as the best malacologists in the world deal with the problem in the shortest possible time (I think our WikiProject must be well known to them by now). All this results in a move that can sometimes take hours to perform. And don't forget that the useless talk page of the synonym in genus A has to be deleted, a synonym has to be added to the taxobox of genus B (and check if there are other synonyms not yet mentioned in that taxobox), the species has to be mentioned as a synonym in genus A and added to the list of species in genus B. I've probably forgotten to mention one or two more things, but this explanation shows that it is more than just a move or redirect and some knowledge of taxonomy is essential. JoJan (talk) 17:39, 17 September 2010 (UTC)

I understand. I would certainly be willing to handle linking and italicizing tasks. I can do many articles and big lists with the click of a key using a Microsoft Word macro. Thanks for taking the time for the comprehensive reply. Anna Frodesiak (talk) 00:00, 18 September 2010 (UTC)

Bot and project articles - primary literature?

Note inserted from Invertzoo: For policy explanation see Wikipedia:No original research#Primary, Secondary and tertiary sources Invertzoo (talk) 13:33, 19 September 2010 (UTC)

Are this project (and the bot discussed above) creating articles with up-to-the-minute taxonomies? If a single taxonomist revises a taxon in the literature, this is not an appropriate source for creating the taxonomy in an encyclopedia article. Even if that taxonomist's literature is then incorporated into the database. Taxonomies take some time to be accepted, even in gastropods.

How are these changes arising in the database? Are they coming from the primary literature, or are they coming from the database expert for that taxon? It is unnecessary and may not be encyclopedic to keep the articles changing every time a new taxonomists add something to the discussion. The primary taxonomy literature could be consulted while using an article from the secondary literature, and it would be appropriate to mention the primary sources in the taxa articles by more than a reference to the authority. But the primary literature is not generally a source for an encyclopedia article.

Many bot arguments seem to be about the value of species stubs, already well-established as belonging on wikipedia, in addition to how up-to-the-minute database changes are incorporated into the articles. If you want the bot to create these articles, a focused response would be helpful to other members of the wikipedia community.

Could this point about up-to-date taxonomies just be cleared up for me without a didactic and off-target lecture on points of taxonomy?

--JaRoad (talk) 17:25, 18 September 2010 (UTC)

I will summarize this:

• Primary sources are the best sources for gastropods. They include: original research articles, reviews and monographs.
• Secondary sources (for example WoRMS) can be normally used as references.
• Every source can be used on wikipedia immediately after it is published (there is no need for delay). For example when a new genus/species of dinosaur is published, then it will usually appear on Wikipedia the same day and in the less than a week on the Main page.
  • For example: family Diapheridae have been published in August 2010 (in scientific article, that is primary source). There was created article Diapheridae. Articles Sigmurethra, Streptaxoidea and Streptaxidae were properly edited to incorporate this new information. If there will appear new resources about those snails, then we will solve this. If there will appear no other references, then we will solve nothing.
• When two (or more) sources are contradicting each other, then wikipedians have always very difficult task. Possible solutions are: to mention neutrally both sources; use the most recent source; use the more references and then prefer that information supported by more resources. In the taxonomy is the situation much more complicated and there is no universal solution. Wikipedians are using their sources normally and they are adding informations to Wikipedia. WHEN some sources are contradicting each other THEN it is being solved. Mention some examples, if you want to receive more detailed answers. --Snek01 (talk) 23:09, 19 September 2010 (UTC)

Gastropods articles have been selected for the Wikipedia 0.8 release

Version 0.8 is a collection of Wikipedia articles selected by the Wikipedia 1.0 team for offline release on USB key, DVD and mobile phone. Articles were selected based on their assessed importance and quality, then article versions (revisionIDs) were chosen for trustworthiness (freedom from vandalism) using an adaptation of the WikiTrust algorithm.

We would like to ask you to review the Gastropods articles and revisionIDs we have chosen. Selected articles are marked with a diamond symbol (♦) to the right of each article, and this symbol links to the selected version of each article. If you believe we have included or excluded articles inappropriately, please contact us at Wikipedia talk:Version 0.8 with the details. You may wish to look at your WikiProject's articles with cleanup tags and try to improve any that need work; if you do, please give us the new revisionID at Wikipedia talk:Version 0.8. We would like to complete this consultation period by midnight UTC on Monday, October 11th.

We have greatly streamlined the process since the Version 0.7 release, so we aim to have the collection ready for distribution by the end of October, 2010. As a result, we are planning to distribute the collection much more widely, while continuing to work with groups such as One Laptop per Child and Wikipedia for Schools to extend the reach of Wikipedia worldwide. Please help us, with your WikiProject's feedback!

For the Wikipedia 1.0 editorial team, SelectionBot 23:04, 19 September 2010 (UTC)

Has anyone else looked at the list of articles that were chosen? A few could use a little bit of clean up. I might do some of that. Do project members think the choice of articles is suitable? Invertzoo (talk) 22:07, 22 September 2010 (UTC)

My fellow gastropod lovers, allow me to emit my opinion on the matter. I looked at the list, and I can't say that I agree with all the choices. Surely, Mollusca and Eustrombus gigas are Good Articles, they are some of our best works so far, and thus deserve to be there. But why are other Good Articles not listed as well? What about Love dart, which was one of the most popular DYKs in enWikipedia, and is also a GA? Socorro springsnail and Kerry slug are also excellent, and would be better representatives of our wikiproject if compared to Conidae or Pearl, for example... This list needs to be reviewed, IMHO. Daniel Cavallari (talk) 01:37, 23 September 2010 (UTC)

The release versions are not so much show cases of good writing and interesting articles as they are actual tools for a reader of an encyclopedia.

The idea is to include fundamentally important articles, not the best articles, so importance of the article takes precedence over quality. Then among the most important articles, these can be haggled over.

Wikiproject gastropod rates Pearl as Top Importance, Conidae and Love dart as equally High Importance and Kerry slug and Socorro springsnail as Low Importance.

There is an explanation somewhere of how these rankings are done if you want more information. --JaRoad (talk) 04:59, 23 September 2010 (UTC)

Oh, I see. Then I must confess that I didn't understand their purpose initially. But I still believe some of the choices may not be the best ones, even considering these standards. Perhaps some of these articles have been overrated, e. g. John Edward Gray. Biomphalaria glabrata is a medically important species, a B quality Top importance article, and should be included instead... Daniel Cavallari (talk) 16:02, 23 September 2010 (UTC)

They really need help and direction picking the most appropriate articles in each area to include. What is high importance to the project may be so for reasons that don't make it a great article choice, and this is where the projects can help out. So, reach a consensus, and get a good assortment of gastropod articles together and let those working on the editions know which ones should be there. They will listen to the voice of the declared wikipedia experts, project members, on this. --JaRoad (talk) 17:13, 23 September 2010 (UTC)

Note: if you can quickly put together a list of the articles that should be included, you have a couple of weeks of editing to get them in the best shape. I'll edit where I can when you get the list together. --JaRoad (talk) 17:14, 23 September 2010 (UTC)

Hey JaRoad, our suggestions for additional articles are at the link that Daniel provided in his message below. If you can improve the articles, that would be really great! Thanks, Invertzoo (talk) 12:35, 7 October 2010 (UTC)

Fellow members of the project and collaborators, I've suggested a few alterations in the list. Please comment if you feel it's necessary. -Daniel Cavallari (talk) 11:56, 28 September 2010 (UTC)

The authority for the taxon Gastropoda

Hallo again! I've found very suspicious authority of the name Gastropoda on the wikispecies. Frederic Cuvier is mentioned there but not Georges Cuvier. Have anybody an idea where the historical truth is? Mithril (talk) 19:10, 23 September 2010 (UTC)

It should in fact be Georges Cuvier, the elder of the two brothers. I am not sure which ref to use for this, but if you google >Gastropoda Georges Cuvier< the Britannica here [2] confirms it. One confusion is that Georges Cuvier's full name actually includes the name Frederic:, he was Baron Georges Leopold Chretien Frederic Dagobert Cuvier.

Best, Invertzoo (talk) 23:54, 25 September 2010 (UTC)

Yes, I've already noticed that both brothers were Fredrerics in some way. Thanks for the link. Mithril (talk) 06:58, 26 September 2010 (UTC)

The existence of that google result is a bit indirect evidence since it might be just mentioning of Gastropoda and Georges Cuvier on different pages. I've browsed google books and found the following page of Dictionnaire des sciences naturelles (I suppose malacological terms was written by de Blainville). My French knowledge is very poor but the phase Denomination que M. G. Cuvier, dans ses premiers travaux sur la classification des animaux mollusques, a substituee a celle de limax de Pallas.. should mean that name Gastropoda was established by Mr. Georges Cuvier in his early works on molluscan classification. Thanks however for showing the direction. Mithril (talk) 07:30, 26 September 2010 (UTC)

Thanks so much for tracking a decent ref down for that differentiation and fixing the Wikispecies page. That is an important and valuable correction. Invertzoo (talk) 14:41, 27 September 2010 (UTC)

It is Georges Cuvier. I have added the reference into the article. The online scan: page 448. --Snek01 (talk) 20:18, 27 September 2010 (UTC)

Excellent, that is all sorted out then. Invertzoo (talk) 14:47, 1 October 2010 (UTC)

Alien snail and slug species in the USA

Cowie R. H., Dillon R. T., Robinson D. G. & Smith J. W. (2009). "Alien non-marine snails and slugs of priority quarantine importance in the United States: A preliminary risk assessment". American Malacological Bulletin 27: 113-132. PDF.

Good article, but I do not know how to present info from this source in the wikipedia. All species from this have high importance (or at least higher importance than obvious species). If you are familiar with this theme (I am not), choose one species, show me an example what to do with this. --Snek01 (talk) 19:51, 5 October 2010 (UTC)

I had a quick look at the paper. One idea for using this info would be to add a note in the article of each listed species, perhaps in the Non-indigenous distribution section of each article, something like this:

"In the USA, this species is considered to represent a potentially serious threat as a pest, an invasive species which could negatively effect agriculture, natural ecosystems, human health or commerce. Therefore it has been suggested that this species be given top national quarantine significance in the USA".

and then give the reference.

How does that sound? Invertzoo (talk) 12:55, 7 October 2010 (UTC)

Sounds very good to me! Daniel Cavallari (talk) 13:07, 7 October 2010 (UTC)

Two versions are needed to avoid misunderstanding of a reader for:

• 1) species, that is already in the USA  Done
• 2) species, that is not yet in the USA.  Done

--Snek01 (talk) 19:58, 7 October 2010 (UTC)

OK, then perhaps we can say...

1. For species already in the USA:

"This species is already established in the USA, and is considered to represent a potentially serious threat as a pest, an invasive species which could negatively effect agriculture, natural ecosystems, human health or commerce. Therefore it has been suggested that this species be given top national quarantine significance in the USA".

2. For species not yet in the USA:

"This species has not yet become established in the USA, but it is considered to represent a potentially serious threat as a pest, an invasive species which could negatively effect agriculture, natural ecosystems, human health or commerce. Therefore it has been suggested that this species be given top national quarantine significance in the USA".

Thanks, Invertzoo (talk) 13:30, 8 October 2010 (UTC)

And for articles on the genera involved, it can read:

"Species in this genus have not yet become established in the USA, but they are considered to represent potentially serious threats as pests, invasive species which could negatively effect agriculture, natural ecosystems, human health or commerce. Therefore it has been suggested that these species be given top national quarantine significance in the USA."

Cheers for Project Gastropods

Just wanted to say that I was at a fundraiser for Wikimedia yesterday evening in NYC, and Jimmy Wales told me that when he is talking to other staff at the Wikimedia Foundation headquarters in California, he often mentions WikiProject Gastropods and uses it as a positive example. (I wanted to tell the project this so we can be proud of all our hard work and happy to be an inspiration to others!) Best wishes, Invertzoo (talk) 14:04, 8 October 2010 (UTC)

That's so good to know =)! One more reason for us to achieve our first FA! Daniel Cavallari (talk) 22:43, 8 October 2010 (UTC)

I agree. And once we have achieved one FA, I am hoping it will perhaps make it a bit easier for us to do other ones. I think as well as Kerry Slug and Eustrombus gigas, Love dart might possibly also be a good candidate to try to get up to FA. If any editors reading this want to try to see if they can tidy up and polish up any one of those three articles, especially on the MoS side of things, that would be very helpful indeed! Thanks and best wishes, Invertzoo (talk) 01:41, 10 October 2010 (UTC)

Ganeshbot 5

FYI, the bot task has been denied as "no consenus". I am a bit disappointed with the result. There was a lot of things I was hoping to do; get the rest of species created, create a bot to fill the gaps in existing approved families with newly accepted species, another bot to find out any change in status of the species on WoRMS. I have limited time to spend on Wikipedia, and am not able to work with arbitary number limits and wait-periods for article review. Thank you for your support during the BRFA. Please let me know if I can be of any help in the future. You were an awesome group to work with. — Ganeshk (talk) 11:44, 14 October 2010 (UTC)

I'm deeply disappointed with this refusal. It's like having our hands cut off. A lot of time will be wasted creating new articles that could have been done automatically. Thanks anyway to Ganeshk. JoJan (talk) 17:21, 14 October 2010 (UTC)

This isn't the end, people. We can keep on trying, we can always work on new bot proposals, new ideas. Don't give up just yet! Still, the project has expanded quite a bit thanks to Ganeshk. Perhaps this is the time for us to focus on the quality of our most important articles, or perhaps we should focus on attaining our first FA. It's always just a matter of patience and persistance. Daniel Cavallari (talk) 19:21, 14 October 2010 (UTC)

Yes, many, many thanks overall to Ganesh and to GaneshBot. GaneshBot has always performed perfectly. We can certainly still use Ganesh's very considerable software expertise to help us gather information that we can use to improve the existing articles. For example, if this is possible to do, I would very much like a list of all articles that have a red link for the genus so that I can start genus stubs for all of them. And as Daniel says, I am sure we will work something out in the future and be able to start using GaneshBot once again. This is only a temporary setback. Best to all, Invertzoo (talk) 14:14, 15 October 2010 (UTC)

Here is the genus list with red links. — Ganeshk (talk) 22:36, 18 October 2010 (UTC)

Thanks Ganesh. I am currently trying to create genus articles only for those genera that already have one or more species articles already existing. Invertzoo (talk) 13:21, 22 October 2010 (UTC)

I have left this WikiProject and provided comment at Wikipedia_talk:BRFA#Ganeshbot 5. --Snek01 (talk) 19:29, 15 October 2010 (UTC)

Unaccepted

I have updated the Wikipedia:WikiProject Gastropods/Unaccepted page. — Ganeshk (talk) 22:59, 24 October 2010 (UTC)

Thanks Ganesh, Invertzoo (talk) 01:19, 27 October 2010 (UTC)

A series of new genus stubs

I am making new genus stubs, but I am currently doing this only for those genera that already have species stub(s). This is so that the species stubs are linked into the whole taxonomy tree, rather than being left as "orphans". Under the list of species in each genus stub, I am including only those species for which we already have articles. I am making the genus stubs as quickly as I can, and I am not researching the genera in any way except to locate the correct authority and date, so it's possible (for example) that some of these genera are no longer considered valid for those species. However that kind of fine tuning I am leaving for someone else to do later. Best wishes,Invertzoo (talk) 16:16, 31 October 2010 (UTC)

That's fine. I wish I could help out, but, as you may have noticed, I'm busy with the list of "unaccepted" articles. JoJan (talk) 16:29, 31 October 2010 (UTC)

No problem, I just wanted to explain what I was doing. Invertzoo (talk) 18:01, 31 October 2010 (UTC)

WikiProject cleanup listing

I have created together with Smallman12q a toolserver tool that shows a weekly-updated list of cleanup categories for WikiProjects, that can be used as a replacement for WolterBot and this WikiProject is among those that are already included (because it is a member of Category:WolterBot cleanup listing subscriptions). See the tool's wiki page, this project's listing in one big table or by categories and the index of WikiProjects. Svick (talk) 21:02, 7 November 2010 (UTC)

Many thanks to Svick and Smallman12q, this will be useful to us! Invertzoo (talk) 01:07, 9 November 2010 (UTC)

More on the Portal:Gastropods

OK, so I spent several hours working on the Portal today. I think it looks a lot better now and also now has a fair bit more content in random rotation. I will keep adding content. I think fairly soon (once we have enough items in random rotation in each category) we could at that point resubmit the portal in an attempt to get Featured Portal status. The first time Snek submitted it for FP not too many criticisms were raised by the reviwers, basically they said it just needed more items. Any Articles or Biographies added need to be B status or better. So please, any active editors do take a look at it, and either make suggestions for improvements or possibly just go ahead and improve things yourself. If someone can find any more biographies of malacologists that are already at the B level or can perhaps improve a biography to bring it up to that level, that would be really great, as we need quite a few more of those. Best wishes, Invertzoo (talk) 22:00, 14 November 2010 (UTC)

I am also asking for suggestions for a really gorgeous image that reproduces well at a small scale. We need one like that to become our Portal icon. I was thinking maybe a really pretty nudibranch? The image I am currently using is a land snail which may be fine to use. I would rather not use the snail we have on the Gastropoda page because it is a nice clear image but not at all colorful. Best, Invertzoo (talk) 22:49, 14 November 2010 (UTC)

Although the Cepaea hortensis image was very colorful and looked nice at a fairly large size, in the end I went back to the original (Snek's) idea of using the very nice image of Helix pomatia that we have on the Gastropoda page. It has the advantage that it reproduces well at every possible size, including really really tiny! You will see that the snail image now is appearing in the small portal box within in every one of the WikiProject Gastropod templates on the talk pages of gastropod articles. Yay! Invertzoo (talk) 01:15, 18 November 2010 (UTC)

New article David Dwight Baldwin

Hello, I did an article on David Dwight Baldwin since I had done some other members of his family. He evidently wrote some papers on Hawiian land snails in the 19th century. If you have the time, I would appreciate someone who knows this area to take a look and make sure the terminology is correct, and he is linked in properly to any species of genera he is credited with discovering, etc. Thanks. W Nowicki (talk) 18:15, 16 November 2010 (UTC)

I've added some mollusk species named by him or named in honor of him. There are more species (esp. fishes) with the epithet baldwini, but I can't find prove that they were named in his honor. JoJan (talk) 08:49, 17 November 2010 (UTC)

Thanks for the quick response. Hope this can pass DYK review now. Indeed, there were other biologists named Baldwin, so suspect the other species are for them. W Nowicki (talk) 19:11, 17 November 2010 (UTC)

Biographies for the Portal including that of Lamarck

Hi again, I have been adding more content to the Gastropods Portal. Lamarck was a very important molluscan/gastropod taxonomist; would someone like to add to his biography article a partial list of the taxa he named and those that were named in honor of him? Thanks so much for any help. Any other gastropod-relevant biographies that are already at B level or above that someone can find, or any biography stubs that can be expanded to B level, that would be great. Thanks again, Invertzoo (talk) 15:24, 17 November 2010 (UTC)

I've added a number of species or links to databases. There are simply too many to add them all. JoJan (talk) 16:55, 17 November 2010 (UTC)

Yes there are certainly many hundreds of taxa that Lamarck named, and for all I know there may in fact be thousands! And there are a lot of species named in honor of him too. Thanks so much JoJan for doing the work; it is much clearer now how important Lamarck was as a taxonomist. Invertzoo (talk) 21:09, 17 November 2010 (UTC)

Portal

Would anyone be prepared to take over the care of the Gastropod Portal? The portal is in very good shape already thanks to Snek's work on it, and so it does not need very much work at all, but it would be good to add a couple of items every month or so in order to keep it updated and seeming fresh. Any offers? Invertzoo (talk) 13:17, 2 November 2010 (UTC)

I'm sorry, but I can't assume such a commitment righ now. I'm completely out of time lately, and I will be in this situation until the end of the year. Perhaps later... Daniel Cavallari (talk) 14:25, 2 November 2010 (UTC)

Hi Invertzoo. I don't have bags of time but if it is just a case of refreshing it twice a month or so (see note at bottom of this thread, Invertzoo) I can do that probably. As you say most of the hard work has already been done. Could you perhaps let us know a little bit more about what is required? Thanks Antarctic-adventurer (talk) 15:19, 2 November 2010 (UTC)

No problem Daniel, I understand how busy you are. And Antarctic-adventurer, thanks for your enquiry. If you look at the Portal now, it mostly looks very good. However here are some suggestions for things that could be done over time. One thing is to add to the Selected picture section any Featured Images of gastropods or gastropod shells as they become available. Right now there are 2 that can perhaps be added, even though they are long and narrow and therefore may not display that well. One is the Melo aethiopica image that is here, and another is the Chicoreus ramosus image that is here. If you need help writing a caption paragraph for either or both, I can help you.

As for In the news, don't bother too much about that section, but if you happen to come across any piece of interesting news about gastropods (maybe news about nudibranchs, and it certainly does not need to be only about taxonomy!) it could be mentioned there, assuming it is also mentioned in the relevant article.

We can already now add more B level articles to the selected articles section. Of course when we get any more articles up to GA, or even hopefully FA status, it would be good to add them to the Selected article section if they are not already in there, but I don't imagine we will be able to get any promoted for at least 2 or 3 months or even longer, because it's quite a lot of work to do.

When we eventually manage to get a few more of our biographies of malacologists into decent shape, they can be added to the Selected Biography section, but that could take a really long time unless someone gets inspired to do some solid work on a biography of their favorite malacologist.

The Did you know? section is not only for DYKs that appeared on the Main page, but also for any cute little gastropod fact you come across that would seem catchy and fun to include, and that links to an article of ours.

That's pretty much the whole story, I can't think of anything else really. Obviously we don't need something new in all the sections each month, but as long as there is something new added every month, so the Portal does not seem completely static, that would be good. Best wishes, Invertzoo (talk) 00:28, 6 November 2010 (UTC) Updated Invertzoo (talk) 21:01, 17 November 2010 (UTC)

I should explain that the Portal does not need to be freshened up twice a month. Once a month or once every two months is fine. For example, right now a new section of DYKs is already started, and once that section gets up to 5 items it can be added to the DYK rotation, so that should not be difficult to do. One possible source of rather easy new DYKS is the new articles listing by NewArtBot. By the way, if the Portal does manage to get Featured Portal status and then subsequently at any point it is not freshened up for 3 or more months, then it will lose the FP status. Invertzoo (talk) 17:48, 21 November 2010 (UTC)

ICZN maps to be available

I see that the IUCN Red List people have made their spatial data (which can be turned into maps) available. Maps are being created and and they are being uploaded to Commons. Volunteers are needed to help with this process of course, but anyway, here is the info [3]. It will be great (in time) for us to be able to add maps to all of the Red List species of gastropods! Invertzoo (talk) 01:38, 18 November 2010 (UTC)

Oh yes, you are right! There really are some maps available for some African species, for example. http://www.iucnredlist.org/apps/redlist/details/165794/0 So we can check continously, when they will release the data at http://www.iucnredlist.org/technical-documents/spatial-data . --Snek01 (talk) 22:56, 3 December 2010 (UTC)

Other possible sources:

• Species in European Union's Habitats Directive (including few tens of gastropods) are mapped by EU in detail. Maps are available at http://biodiversity.eionet.europa.eu/article17/speciessummary , but I found no distribution data for gastropods only. Despite the fact that many informations on official EU servers are under CreativeCommonsAttribution license, I found no informations about copyright status of such maps. It is possible that certain distribution GIS layers could be free (I think that they should be), but it is not sure.
• In the similar way, there are be available maps for the United States Federally threatened species List_of_non-marine_molluscs_of_the_United_States#Federally_endangered_or_threatened_land_gastropods , example [4] but we need to be sure about copyright status of the whole map (that is "powered by ESRI"(!) there) or try to get species distribution data layers. --Snek01 (talk) 02:12, 29 November 2010 (UTC)

Thanks so much Snek for those suggestions and links. Invertzoo (talk) 14:35, 29 November 2010 (UTC)

Can we claim Darwin for our Project?

As some may have noticed already I added Steven Jay Gould and Lamarck to our biographies because they both did so much work on snails. I now have my eye on Charles Darwin and I want to add him to our Project too. Darwin did do experiments on snails, and was very concerned to work out a mechanism by which land snails might have become distributed from island to island and as to how freshwater mussels might have spread from one area to another. The blog of the malacologist Aydin Orstan's has included pieces on Darwin's malacological work three times, see [5], [6] and [7]. And Aydin Orstan had a paper published on the subject of Charles Darwin the malacologist: pdf here [8]. Also there was a project on banded snails run by the Natural History Museum of London started in 2007 in honor of Darwin [9] and many other online sources. Would anyone like to see if some of this info could be placed somewhere in the main biographical article on Darwin? Or should we instead try to start an article about Darwin and malacology? Invertzoo (talk) 21:45, 21 November 2010 (UTC)

That is no useful to add him to the project. Every naturalist/zoologist who mentioned a snail in some of his/her work will not became malacologist, but he is still naturalist or zoologist only. Such people (also Linnaeus) are not listed under all descendant wikiprojects, but listing them under wikiprojects Animals, Plants and Fungi is (usually) enough. List under project only such people who devoted whole or majority part or very large part of his/her zoological work to gastropods. For everybody of this wikiproject is enough, when minor workers on gastropods are listed in List of malacologists. As a criterium of inclusion for this project can also help, if the person is listed in Category:Malacologists. My opinion is, that adding a human with LOW priority into this wikiproject will not help to improve the article. --Snek01 (talk) 00:28, 1 December 2010 (UTC)

Well obviously I was dubious, otherwise I would not have asked the question. I was trying a short cut to get some good solid well-delveloped biographies into our project so that we can show enough good quality biographies to qualify for Featured Portal status. I do still think it would be good at some point to create an article on Darwin and malacology, since he is arguably the most important figure in modern biology and he did at least turn his intelligence towards the biogeography of mollusks. Invertzoo (talk) 16:02, 6 December 2010 (UTC)

Roperia

Is Roperia a gastropod? The article lead suggests so, but the taxobox suggests it's a diatom. The two just aren't the same in any way. At least, I know of no photosynthesising single-cell snails. --Redrose64 (talk) 17:11, 12 December 2010 (UTC)

Thanks for bringing this to our attention. This is a rare case when two different genera carry the same name : Roperia Dall, 1898, a monospecific genus of murex snails and Roperia Grunow ex Peletan, 1889, a monospecific genus of marine diatoms in the family Hemidiscaceae . And in this case, the data from both genera have been mixed into one genus. I've corrected this mistake. JoJan (talk) 18:45, 12 December 2010 (UTC)

Identify

Neritidae

Nerita

There are only two free images from http://neritopsine.lifedesks.org/image_gallery The same source can also help in identification. Feel free to add annotations of determined shells to the image(s) at Commons for possible use in Wikipedia. --Snek01 (talk) 23:38, 14 December 2010 (UTC)

I can identify several of these species, but since the shells are not really arranged in clear columns, and they are not numbered, how can I clearly indicate which ones I mean to apply a name to? Some species are shown in 2 views, some have 3 shells and one operculum, some have two dorsal views and one ventral, some have four dorsal one ventral and an operculum. Sigh. I am not sure I can make it clear. For example, here's 3 IDs: the four small green ones in the middle on the right are Smaragdia viridis Linnaeus, 1758. The "bleeding tooth" nerite, top row, four images, two dorsal one ventral one operculum are Nerita peloronta Linnaeus, 1758. The six small black and white ones on the bottom just right of center, showing four dorsal views, one ventral view and an operculum are Puperita pupa Linnaeus, 1767. Invertzoo (talk) 15:28, 16 December 2010 (UTC)

You have to go its page at Commons http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Neritidae.jpg or to http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Nerita.jpg and then click a button "Add a note" then mark an area over the image with a certain shell and then write down there a name of the species. --Snek01 (talk) 20:48, 16 December 2010 (UTC)

Thanks for the explanation Michal! I can already recognize some species in the left picture. I'll try and identify some of these as well. Daniel Cavallari (talk) 22:28, 16 December 2010 (UTC)

Three missing family articles

This morning I discovered that we were completely lacking 3 gastropod family articles. The families Peraclidae, Cymbuliidae and Desmopteridae appeared as blue links, but in reality they were all circular redirects to the superfamily page. I very quickly made them into very stubby stubs but they currently have no refs, no genera listings and so on. There need work! There is however quite a lot of info on the superfamily page that can be copied in. I wonder if anyone would like to help out with fixing these three family articles up? Invertzoo (talk) 15:13, 16 December 2010 (UTC)

Halgerda paliensis

I'm thinking of filling in the last of the Halgerda redlinks. WoRMS accepts all but doesn't have Halgerda paliensis in its dBase. Does this and this say it's new and accepted? Anna Frodesiak (talk) 11:07, 17 December 2010 (UTC)

Also, the ref on the Halgerda article goes nowhere. Anna Frodesiak (talk) 11:09, 17 December 2010 (UTC)

That is difficult to say, but here, can user even with good intentions made bad things if he/she is not careful enough and not familiar with the subject, that is writing about. That is always bad idea to just filling red links with stubs based on randomly chosen information or randomly chosen reference. References for articles have to be scientific articles, not databases. I would like to point out some example: On the Sea Slug Forum species of Dorididae and Discodorididae are (incorrectly) classified within one family Dorididae there. But Discodoridae has more genera than Dorididae. Accidentally Halgerda has been changed by one project member 3× into incorrect Dorididae, because he used Sea Slug Forum (incorrect) and WoRMS (sometimes correct, but when he used that reference, it was incorrect(!) in time). So be critical to any information. That is absolutely necessary to avoid chaos. (I am also responsible for mistaken placement of some nudibranchs.) In this case, you can do nothing with Halgerda paliensis if you have doubts about it and you have not read full article doi:10.1046/j.1463-6409.2001.00054.x and other related (newer if exist) articles. There is no other way: you have to get and read necessary resources or focus on different theme. OR You can de facto use any source (even very old), but then it is useful to start an article with valuable content. That are just my actual thoughts, do not worry. --Snek01 (talk) 13:13, 17 December 2010 (UTC)

That is impossible to recommend a task, that could be done without thinking.

• even if you will use the best references for example from List of gastropods described in 2010 for starting those needed articles, there is always danger of errors if uninformed (or unconcentrated?) active user will add heterobrach between caenogropods (for example with copying a part of the wikicode from somewhere else).
• articles that needs to be started are at: Wikipedia:WikiProject_Gastropods/Task#Species from IUCN. But prior starting them, check out, if them have article on wikipedia under its synonymous name. --Snek01 (talk) 13:13, 17 December 2010 (UTC)

Thanks for the thoughtful reply. Well, in light of what I think you are saying, there might be no place for non-malacologists in creating articles. Perhaps I should just stick to improving existing ones.

Are you saying that WoRMS is not to be trusted?

By the way, if you check my contribs, I fixed the rest of the Halgerda taxoboxes following your lead, and am wondering if I got them right. Could you please spot-check a couple to see? Thanks. Anna Frodesiak (talk) 13:41, 17 December 2010 (UTC)

I'm confused about what your wrote about the family for Halgerda. I followed your lead and made them Dorididae. Is this right? If not, ask me to roll back the edits. It will be quicker than you undoing, as I see you are not a rollbacker. You should apply for that. It's very convenient. Anna Frodesiak (talk) 13:49, 17 December 2010 (UTC)

There are still mistakes, but not from today and not by Anna in this case. You did your improvements today correctly, but we still have left some mistakes unchanged. For example this Halgerda stricklandi written by Anna is great and mistakes in taxonomy were made 2×(!) by JoJan. All mistakes in Halgerda articles were made by JoJan, they are only taxonomic mistakes, but it is very annoying, if JoJan uses (unreliable) internet sources so uncritically, that he repeats errors not only in numerous articles but also in multiple times. I would recommend to JoJan to read Talk:Changes in the taxonomy of gastropods since 2005#Work in Progress. I hope that it is a warning for all of us. I will read some new papers about nudibranchs and continue slowly organizing articles to do it in next few weeks. --Snek01 (talk) 16:25, 17 December 2010 (UTC)

Different error in caenogastropods

In some about 50 articles there is an ERROR that was made manually.

error: In some articles about Hypsogastropoda there is incorrectly written above them clade Sorbeococoncha.

But in taxonomy of the Gastropoda (Bouchet & Rocroi, 2005) both of these clades are independent clades.

How to correct it: http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Semicassis_pyrum&action=historysubmit&diff=403099386&oldid=338820843

On the other hand in the taxonomy of the Gastropoda (Ponder & Lindberg, 1997) the one is a subtaxon of another. See also: http://www.marinespecies.org/aphia.php?p=taxdetails&id=382203.

I have "corrected" it (deleting Sorbeoconcha from those Hyspogastropoda taxa). But if Bouchet et al. (2005) have changed it without reason, then someone could consider it missing in the classification. Anyway it is unified now according to the newer reference, regardless if it is correct or not. --Snek01 (talk) 21:43, 20 December 2010 (UTC)

Error in Littorinimorpha articles by Ganeshbot

Correct classification of Littorinimorpha (compatible with taxonomy by Bouchet & Rocroi 2005 of course) is like this:

correct: clade Caenogastropoda / clade Hypsogastropoda / clade Littorinimorpha

All articles created by Ganeshbot at dates from 3 June 2010 to 10 August 2010 are with mistake: OMISSION OF ONE TAXON IN CLASSIFICATION. (These dates: 10 August 2010, 7 August 2010, 10 July 2010, 28 June 2010, 19 June 2010, 18 June 2010, 17 June 2010, 8 June 2010, 7 June 2010, 6 June 2010, 5 June 2010, 4 June 2010, 3 June 2010). There were made like this:

mistake (incorrect): clade Caenogastropoda / clade Littorinimorpha

Edits by Ganeshbot on 1 June and earlier are correct. Edits by Ganesbot made made on 15 August are corrected by me manually already.

How that happened? On 2 June one user on WoRMS have decided about Hypsogastropoda that "Classification: Includes Littorinimorpha, Ptenoglossa, and Neogastropoda. Although cladistically correct, this taxon is skipped in the classification scheme in order to avoid multiplication of ranks in the working scheme."

http://www.marinespecies.org/aphia.php?p=taxdetails&id=411667 2010-06-02 13:20:13Z changed Gofas, Serge

That is maybe useful for WoRMS, that they randomly decided, that one of taxon is redundant, and they do not view it in the classification for saving a little space on monitor.

But taxonomy of Wikipedia depends on:

• unified classification scheme so multiple people can cooperate
• peer-referenced scientific articles and peer reviewed monographies rather than on (unreviewed) databases.

So I will ask for bot to add a missing clade Hypsogastropoda into articles created those days. I would like to ask GaneshK if he can add this omitted taxon.

Example of Bot work, what is needed to do: http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Atlanta_oligogyra&action=historysubmit&diff=403104675&oldid=379113885

--Snek01 (talk) 01:56, 19 December 2010 (UTC)

Bot have been requested: TO DO: Wikipedia:Bot_requests/Archive_39#Taxonomy_of_gastropods_update but it received no attention! --Snek01 (talk) 23:50, 28 December 2010 (UTC)

I have created a bot approval request for this change. — Ganeshk (talk) 12:57, 6 January 2011 (UTC)

 Done The bot made around 2200 replacements. — Ganeshk (talk) 20:31, 8 January 2011 (UTC)

Bad featured image

File:Pulmonata.jpg belongs among the most unused image that I can imagine. I have removed it from the portal Portal:Gastropods/Selected picture/25. That image only shows, that it is possible to unprecisely draw a group of various subjects also with gastropods. It is from not important publication, by not important artist and the subjects are depicted very poorly. Using of this image is possible only in articles like Richard Lydekker and History of zoology (1859–1912). It is even not possible to use in List of important publications in biology (not important publication). It also shows not only poor knowledge about gastropods in 19 century (some species on the images are not possible to identify), but also strangely poor knowledge of todays humans (that became featured image status without detailed description). The image is colorful, but that is all. Nearly EVERY image on Commons is better than this one for using in gastropod-related articles. If somebody wants a similar image, then he/she can collect random number of species and take a photo of them together and then try to nominate it for Featured. --Snek01 (talk) 23:39, 29 December 2010 (UTC)

question from non-expert

I posted a question in this page Talk:Zeacolpus pagoda pagoda. I post this here as I saw in the banner to leave a note here. (BTW, I am not an expert, was just trying to de-orphanize articles, hope this helps and does not waste your time). Sorry for the redundancy of the post. Mpaa (talk) 02:29, 9 January 2011 (UTC)

There is clearly a problem here. WoRMS only recognizes Zeacolpus pagodus (Reeve, 1849) (with the Latin endings of -us in agreement) (http://www.marinespecies.org/aphia.php?p=taxdetails&id=446582), while gastropods.com recognizes Zeacolpus pagoda pagoda (http://www.gastropods.com/6/Shell_11446.shtml) (with the Latin endings not in agreement). Gastropods.com relies for its information on A.W. Powell's book "Seashells of New Zealand" (1976). Information from this book has, in my own experience, often been superseded with names being replaced with synonyms. It would be logical if this were also here the case. Personally I would vouch for Zeacolpus pagodus (as we usually follow WoRMS, where this name has been checked by a taxonomic editor). JoJan (talk) 15:53, 9 January 2011 (UTC)

As I am not very expert in wikipedia and even more in your field, I assume someone in the project will take over for the resolution. Correct? Just to make sure you do not expect me to do some action on this issue. Mpaa (talk) 16:56, 9 January 2011 (UTC)

No, you don't have to. If no one disagrees in the next few days, I will delete Zeacolpus pagoda pagoda. JoJan (talk) 20:08, 9 January 2011 (UTC)

Thanks to Mpaa for helping us with this. Presumably rather than deleting the article altogether, we could simply move it to Zeacolpus pagoda and then (if considered necessary) mention in that article the nominate subspecies as well as Zeacolpus pagoda powelli, which we also have an article for and which could presumably be deleted? Invertzoo (talk) 21:38, 9 January 2011 (UTC)

Another question is, if in this case "pagoda" was being used by the original authority as a noun in apposition, in which case it keeps the -a ending, or whether it was being used as an adjective in which case it needs the -us ending, I assume. Invertzoo (talk) 21:41, 9 January 2011 (UTC)

The name Zeacolpus pagodus has been checked by the taxonomic editor of WoRMS. Therefore, we may assume that this is the correct name. It is also indicated as thus in this list : [10]. As to Zeacolpus pagoda powelli ([11]), I can't find a serious publication about this species except a mentioning in the book of Powell, which is problematic in my eyes. All Google hits, that I have consulted, are related to our article in wikipedia, which again relies on this book. I wouldn't be surprised that this subspecies is nothing else than a color variation of the species itself. And WoRMS doesn't mention any subspecies. There are no images of this subspecies on the internet. In short, nobody seems to know anything about this subspecies, except it being named in the book of Powell, not to be repeated by any other serious publication. JoJan (talk) 09:39, 10 January 2011 (UTC)

Well then, I think we can safely ignore it. All we need is a species article, correctly spelled. The others should be deleted. Thanks JoJan, Invertzoo (talk) 01:34, 13 January 2011 (UTC)

List of non-marine molluscs of Dominica

Nominated for featured: Wikipedia:Featured list candidates/List of non-marine molluscs of Dominica/archive1. Review, Support or Oppose if you like. --Snek01 (talk) 00:15, 16 January 2011 (UTC)

I had time today to go through this article carefully, based on the current comments from reviewers. I tried to fix just about everything the reviewers found fault with so far. Invertzoo (talk) 20:39, 17 January 2011 (UTC)

Complaint of JoJan

I have a complaint of JoJan. Recently there was recategorizing within Dorididae and Discodorididae Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Gastropods/Archive 4#Halgerda paliensis by JoJan. Now he recreated Cyclostrematidae without any reviewed scientific reference, despite that it is a synonym of Liotiidae. I would recommend to people, if they are creating any suspicious change above subfamily level (creating or re-creating new family article, creating a category for some family, for example) to inform at least WikiProject Gastropods on this talk page. I do not mind, if he (or anybody) inform directly me (also). It will save my time on reverting such "improvements". Thanks. --Snek01 (talk) 01:54, 21 January 2011 (UTC)

Automatic taxobox

The Heterobranchia updates at the top of this page are evidence that the current process of updating articles to fix taxonomy issues is tedious. With the use of Automatic taxobox, these type of taxa changes would be just minor updates to few templates and the entire tree will get updated easily. Please add your comments here regarding adapting the autotaxobox across this project. See Lobatus gigas for an example usage. The background on why the template was created can be found at Template talk:Taxobox/Archive_19#Automatic taxonomy generation. — Ganeshk (talk) 02:43, 21 January 2011 (UTC)

Advatages of Automatic taxobox:

• Possibility of updating taxonomy in taxobox only.

Disadvatages of Automatic taxobox:

• When there is updated taxobox only, there is need to update also other parts of article and/or categories. When would only taxoboxes be updated and texts would became not-up-to-date, there usually remain inconsistency.
• There is difficult to add references in scientific classification.

Disadvantages of Automatic taxobox in WikiProject Gastropods:

• Majority of taxoboxes uses clades, that are differently viewed in Taxobox and in Automatic one. This is a style issue. But if only a part articles would apply automatic taxobox and other part would apply taxobox, there remain inconsistency.
• There are extremely low number of editors in this project. There is nobody (except of me), who is interested in taxonomy and is able to update taxonomy within standards of scientific classification and also under standards of Wikipedia. Or such people only did not appeared doing it. It's OK, they are doing different useful work here.
• If only a part of articles would apply automatic taxobox and other part would apply taxobox, then it would be maintain articles much more difficult. That is paradox, when the main advantage of automatic taxobox should be easier maintenance.
• Taxonomy of gastropods is extremely difficult. We need users, who are interested in taxonomy of gastropods. We do not need users, who are only interested in changing taxoboxes. Such users would made many errors. It happened in all or in over 95% of experiments, that tried to add automatic taxobox in some gastropods articles.

What would be ideal conditions of applying automatic taxoboxes in gastropods?:

• Users interested in taxonomy gastropods (not only in gastropods in general, and not only in taxonomy in general, but in taxonomy of gastropods) and are familiar with creating and managing automatic taxoboxes.
• Possibility of Robotical change to already correct taxonomy to newer template. I am nearly sure, that this will be necessary if automatic taxoboxes would be used in this project. Nobody will do it manually (that would not be finished in few years in such way) and nobody will check it after amateurs.

Comments:

• Are there any projects, that have applied automatic taxoboxes easily and effectively?
• Both types of taxoboxes are currently allowed. That is against unification. When the wikipedia community will add to Taxobox: "This template is superseded, use another template instead." then we will need to solve it. This did not happened yet.
• I will not check automatic taxoboxes if they will appear (that is more difficult for me). When I see and incorrect or incomplete automatic taxobox, it is much more easier to (for me) to correct the mistake with replacing automatic taxobox with normal taxobox.
• I see no practical to apply automatic taxoboxes in gastropods now. We have not enough human power for this experiment. We can wait, for example 1-2 years and then we can learn from other project to apply it as much easy as possible (if considered useful).
• I think, it would be useful to add a statement of this WikiProject Gastropods to Automatic taxobox help page (whatever statement it will be). My statement would be like this: "It is not recommended to use Automatic taxobox in gastropods articles yet. Its possible robotical application will be reconsidered in January 2012 for the easiest implementation."

Decide as you wish but decide realistically. I can imagine that it can work in the future, but under actual situation there are much more disadvantages than advantages. --Snek01 (talk) 15:21, 21 January 2011 (UTC)

• I agree with Snek on this. It is too much too soon for us. Invertzoo (talk) 00:31, 22 January 2011 (UTC)

Sure, no problem. — Ganeshk (talk) 01:15, 22 January 2011 (UTC)

DYK collaboration

This paper describes the first trophobiotic relationship between a gastropod and an insect. Does anyone here fancy writing an article on the gastropod (Euglandina aurantiaca) to complement an article on the insect (Enchophora sanguinea) I'm planning to write, to make a double DYK hook? If anyone does, it might be best to write in userspace first and then move it once the articles are completed. I will email the author of the paper to see if they can donate any photos to use as well. SmartSE (talk) 13:01, 14 January 2011 (UTC)

I will work on that User:Snek01/Pittieria aurantiaca. I can not guarantee that it will be good for a DYK hook, but it will surely accomplish your article. I will probably get some drawings of shells, but I will probably not get a photo of the live snail. Thank you very much for your cooperation. --Snek01 (talk) 21:27, 14 January 2011 (UTC)

Nice work, I'll get my half done today, but I need help getting some sources. I'll fire off an email and fingers crossed, we might get a cool image for DYK. SmartSE (talk) 10:17, 15 January 2011 (UTC)

My draft is done. I've emailed a few people to see if they have photographs they might donate, but got an auto-reply from the author of the main paper saying they won't have email access until the end of January. Are you ok waiting until then? Also, do you think you could explain in the article why it is now called Pittieria aurantiaca rather than Euglandina aurantiaca? Thanks again SmartSE (talk) 20:50, 17 January 2011 (UTC)

I just wanted to say that I cleaned up the prose a bit a few days ago, and today added a brief note about the species being in Pittieria. Invertzoo (talk) 02:40, 21 January 2011 (UTC)

Thanks. I'm still working on the photos, but fingers crossed, should get one soon. SmartSE (talk) 23:14, 27 January 2011 (UTC)

Unaccepted page

I have refreshed the Unaccepted page. — Ganeshk (talk) 16:42, 29 January 2011 (UTC)

Very well, but I haven't even finished with the previous "unaccepted" page, even after of months of tedious work (about 100 to go). The moving or redirecting from species A to species B (and deleting the talk page of species A) is the easiest work. The hard work comes in when adding content to species B, or searching for an image for species B and certainly when checking genus A and genus B for accuracy with all the forks this may entail to other genera and species. And let's not forget the Commons where wrongly named images have to be addressed. JoJan (talk) 16:53, 29 January 2011 (UTC)

JoJan, the pending species from the previous page will have rolled over to the new page. You can start from alphabet "P" if you would like. I would say more help is needed and non-admins can join too. Redirected talk pages can be marked for deletion by tagging them with {{db-talk}}. — Ganeshk (talk) 17:00, 29 January 2011 (UTC)

It have not listed Carinaria lamarcki as a synonym (of Carinaria lamarckii). Is it a list of synonyms of listing articles created by Bot only? Am I right? If so, you can try to widen the listing to catch more synonymous articles on Wikipedia. --Snek01 (talk) 23:06, 7 February 2011 (UTC)

The unaccepted page lists articles that were mostly created by a bot. It looks for the {{WRMS species}} template and extracts the Aphia ID from it. It uses the Aphia ID to compare with WoRMS. I have created another page, WikiProject Gastropods/Unaccepted by name that was generated by matching the article names with WoRMS. — Ganeshk (talk) 02:34, 10 February 2011 (UTC)

Copulation in protandrous sequential hermaphrodites

I do not know, how copulation in protandric hermaphrodite, Reproductive system of gastropods#protandrous sequential hermaphrodites works. Is there one universal principle on this or are there more possibilities? For example Lalli & Gilmer (1989) on page 102 (but I have no access to page 103(!)) describes copulation of Limacina helicina as "reciprocal exchange of spermatophores". What gender are mating with each other? Do females have stored its own spermatophores from its own male phase? Or do females have stored other spermatophores from its own male phase? How is it? --Snek01 (talk) 22:39, 5 February 2011 (UTC)

Guido Poppe

The article on Guido Poppe was recently deleted due to an expired PROD. From what I know, Guido Poppe is a big player in the fields of malacology and conchology and probably satisfies Wikipedia's notability criteria for academics. What do you guys think? mgiganteus1 (talk) 04:23, 10 February 2011 (UTC)

I've reinstated the article. This deletion was a big mistake for such a prominent malacologist. JoJan (talk) 09:44, 10 February 2011 (UTC)

Well maybe someone objected to the article because Poppe is best known as a successful commercial shell dealer with a fairly big for-profit company. I would not really call him an academic: as far as I know he doesn't teach in a university and I am not sure he has any degrees. However he has authored and coauthored many books on shells and has created a shell journal Visaya. Best, Invertzoo (talk) 01:16, 15 February 2011 (UTC)

Where does this species belong?

We have Elachorbis tatei (Angas, 1878) listed in the genus article Elachorbis taxobox as belonging to the subfamily Skeneinae of the family Turbinidae. But unfortunately we now also have it as Circulus tatei (Angas, 1878) in the family Tornidae within the Rissooidea, because today I created a stub to house the two images by Jan Delsing that we have of the shell of the species. I may not have understood this correctly, but I think these small glassy-shelled gastropods were originally all placed in the Vitrinellidae, then some were moved to what was Skeninae because they were thought to be turbinids, but then Bouchet and Rocroi moved them all into Tornidae which are Rissooidea. It was some sort of trajectory like that. Will someone have a look and try to sort this out? I am still too busy in RL to do it myself. Many thanks, Invertzoo (talk) 21:59, 15 February 2011 (UTC)

As far as I can tell, the right name seems to be Elachorbis tatei (see : Gastropods.com : Elachorbis tatei) Also Southern Australian gastropoda :Elachorbis tatei states on page 12 that it was originally named Cyclostrema tatei by Angas in 1878. The species isn't mentioned at all in WoRMS. However OBIS gives Circulus tatei as the name in current use (OBIS : Circulus tatei), relying on Trew, A., 1984. The Melvill-Tomlin Collection. Part 30. Trochacea. Handlists of the Molluscan Collections in the Department of Zoology, National Museum of Wales. But then OBIS also states that Circulus belongs to Vitrinellidae, while this family name has become a synonym for Tornidae. It looks like OBIS may be a bit behind recent developments. Gastropods.com puts Elachorbis in the subfamily Vitrinellinae of the family Tornidae. WoRMS doens't list the genus Elachorbis in Skeneinae (WoRMS : Skeneinae) (recently reviewed), but then Elachorbis isn't mentioned in WoRMS at all. I think we have to rely on the few data available and go for Elachorbis tatei, belonging to subfamily Vitrinellinae, family Tornidae.JoJan (talk) 09:48, 16 February 2011 (UTC)

That sounds like an improvement compared to the current situation! I am prepared to go with that assessment, assuming there are no comments to the contrary? Anyone want to weigh in on that? If not, then JoJan or I, or anyone else could move Circulus tatei to Elachorbis tatei and place the genus Elachorbis in the family Tornidae instead of in the Turbinidae. At some point it would probably be worth trying to check to see if there are other genera or species in this group that have ended up getting marooned in an out-of-date family. Invertzoo (talk) 22:04, 16 February 2011 (UTC)

Yes. Both genera (Circulus and Elachorbis) are within Tornidae. Elachorbis tatei is the type species of the genus Elachorbis so when there are any species of Elachorbis considered as valid (and there are various fossil species in the genus), then this species will be named Elachorbis tatei. --Snek01 (talk) 16:54, 17 February 2011 (UTC)

I've performed the move and added some data to Elachorbis tatei. JoJan (talk) 09:53, 18 February 2011 (UTC)

Cleanup listing

There is a cleanup listing for this project. I have added it to the tools section. — Ganeshk (talk) 19:41, 22 January 2011 (UTC)

Thanks Ganesh, I think this will prove to be very useful. Invertzoo (talk) 19:38, 20 February 2011 (UTC)

Citation templates now support more identifiers

Recent changes were made to citations templates (such as {{citation}}, {{cite journal}}, {{cite web}}...). In addition to what was previously supported (bibcode, doi, jstor, isbn, ...), templates now support arXiv, ASIN, JFM, LCCN, MR, OL, OSTI, RFC, SSRN and Zbl. Before, you needed to place |id={{arxiv|0123.4567}} (or worse |url=http://arxiv.org/abs/0123.4567), now you can simply use |arxiv=0123.4567, likewise for |id={{JSTOR|0123456789}} and |url=http://www.jstor.org/stable/0123456789 → |jstor=0123456789.

The full list of supported identifiers is given here (with dummy values):

• {{cite journal |author=John Smith |year=2000 |title=How to Put Things into Other Things |journal=Journal of Foobar |volume=1 |issue=2 |pages=3–4 |arxiv=0123456789 |asin=0123456789 |bibcode=0123456789 |doi=0123456789 |jfm=0123456789 |jstor=0123456789 |lccn=0123456789 |isbn=0123456789 |issn=0123456789 |mr=0123456789 |oclc=0123456789 |ol=0123456789 |osti=0123456789 |rfc=0123456789 |pmc=0123456789 |pmid=0123456789 |ssrn=0123456789 |zbl=0123456789 |id={{para|id|____}} }}

Obviously not all citations needs all parameters, but this streamlines the most popular ones and gives both better metadata and better appearances when printed. Headbomb {talk / contribs / physics / books} 02:51, 8 March 2011 (UTC)

Sea snail article

This morning I began to put together a first draft of an article on sea snail, since we already have land snail and freshwater snail. The draft is here [12]. Obviously it is not ready to go up into article space yet, so can I ask: would anyone please add to this article whatever they can, that they feel is appropriate? I can fix up the prose as necessary as we go along. Many thanks, Invertzoo (talk) 17:33, 20 February 2011 (UTC)

I went ahead and put the sea snail article into article space. It's about time: sea snail is the 12th most popular search in gastropod topics, see [13]. Invertzoo (talk) 14:14, 8 March 2011 (UTC)

So called "Most wanted articles"

So called "Most wanted articles" shows red links to which many articles are linking. They did not show articles, that are realy need to be written. Especially it is valid for names of subfamilies. All subfamilies are well explained in articles about its families. They are usually explained in context, also in historical context. Numerous genera are written in articles about families and their changing placement is more clear when changes of subfamilies within the family are explained. Subfamilies would duplicate this content! Masses are unable to understand that red links (per Wikipedia:Red link) are useful. Wikiproject Gastropod members should get ahead the others and create redirects from subfamilies to families to avoid duplicating content. For example: [14] Nobody here is able to keep updated duplicite lists of large number of genera. --Snek01 (talk) 01:08, 9 March 2011 (UTC)

 Done for now, for December 2010 links. For large families create redirects from subfamilies preliminarily, if needed. --Snek01 (talk) 01:41, 9 March 2011 (UTC)

Taxonomy of Heterobranchia

Taxonomy of nearly all taxa in Heterobranchia have changed in 2010 by Jörger et al. doi:10.1186/1471-2148-10-323. I have updated Acochlidiacea only. For other changes of higher taxonomy on wikipedia I will probably wait for some other articles citing this article made by Jörger et al. Taxoboxes can be updated by bots then. Special focus can attract those taxa, that were moved to "pulmonates": Glacidorboidea, Sacoglossa, Pyramidelloidea. But probably some other taxa will need to change introductory sentence also. It will be good to know if common terms "opisthobranch" and "pulmonate" will stay in use when scientific names Opisthobrachia and Pulmonata will disappear from the taxonomic tree. That is just an explanation why I will not hurry to update it as quick as possible. --Snek01 (talk) 00:23, 3 December 2010 (UTC)

OK, sounds good, thanks for the explanation. Invertzoo (talk) 16:03, 6 December 2010 (UTC)

Steps:

1) categorization:

• Lower Heterobranchia  Done (those taxa, that have stayed in "Lower Heterobranchia" will not need to update taxoboxes.);
• Nudipleura  Done
• Euopisthobranchia  Done
• Panpulmonata  Done

2) update taxoboxes by bot

• Lower Heterobranchia - no need to add Euthynera (meantime).

Nudipleura

• for all in Category:Nudipleura (including subcategories) change string from taxobox:

informal group [[Opisthobranchia]]

which is avilable in one of these rows:

| unranked_ ordo = ... informal group Opisthobranchia ...
| unranked_familia = ... informal group Opisthobranchia ...

to

clade [[Euthyneura]]

Remove word "opisthobranch" from the introductory sentence in the category Nudipleura (including subcategories), that is usually in the form ..."a marine opisthobranch gastropod mollusk" ... .

I have submitted a bot approval request. — Ganeshk (talk) 16:32, 9 January 2011 (UTC)

 Done Nudipleura updates are done. 700 edits were made. — Ganeshk (talk) 11:23, 13 January 2011 (UTC)

Good work! --Snek01 (talk) 15:55, 13 January 2011 (UTC)

Euopisthobranchia

• in taxoboxes change

informal group [[Opisthobranchia]]

to

clade [[Euthyneura]]<br/>clade [[Euopisthobranchia]]

• That is probably all for bot. Some details were done manually. Intro does not need o be changed by bot. Then manually search for string of three words "informal group Opisthobranchia" and change in into (remove from intro) if needed. --Snek01 (talk) 08:09, 11 January 2011 (UTC)

C waiting for any bot operator to do it.

 Question: Is there a category for this task? or will it be all articles that link to Opisthobranchia? — Ganeshk (talk) 00:49, 19 January 2011 (UTC)

Category:Euopisthobranchia. --Snek01 (talk) 01:20, 19 January 2011 (UTC)

Thanks. Please see question below as well. I would like to combine these tasks into one bot request. — Ganeshk (talk) 01:58, 19 January 2011 (UTC)

 Done

Panpulmonata

task 1

Ellobiidae

• in category Ellobiidae add this:

| unranked_familia = clade [[Heterobranchia]]<br/> clade [[Euthyneura]]<br/> clade [[Panpulmonata]]<br/> clade [[Eupulmonata]]

Systellommatophora

• in taxoboxes, where is Systellommatophora (categories Onchidiidae, Veronicellidae, Rathouisiidae), add this:

| unranked_familia = clade [[Heterobranchia]]<br/> clade [[Euthyneura]]<br/> clade [[Panpulmonata]]<br/> clade [[Eupulmonata]]<br/> clade [[Systellommatophora]]

Stylommatophora

• in taxoboxes of all Category:Stylommatophora add this:

| unranked_familia = clade [[Heterobranchia]]<br/> clade [[Euthyneura]]<br/> clade [[Panpulmonata]]<br/> clade [[Eupulmonata]]<br/> clade [[Stylommatophora]]

but KEEP those clades, subdivisions ranks according to the Stylommatophora#2005 taxonomy, that are normally mentioned under the word "Stylommatophora".

---

 Question: For all categories under Category:Panpulmonata, find all "informal group [[Pulmonata]]" and replace with "clade [[Euthyneura]]<br/>clade [[Panpulmonata]]". Is this correct? — Ganeshk (talk) 01:27, 19 January 2011 (UTC)

hmmm... no. Note that all those task are for taxoboxes only. Look at cladogram in the article Panpulmonata for overview.

That can be so easy for Stylommatophora only probably (that is the largest task). I think, that simple replace for Stylommatophora can hopefully work like this:

Replace

informal group [[Pulmonata]]<br/>

or

informal group [[Pulmonata]]<br>

with

clade [[Euthyneura]]<br/>clade [[Panpulmonata]]<br/>

If other tasks will be difficult for bots, then no problem. Try to do Stylommatophora first. --Snek01 (talk) 02:00, 19 January 2011 (UTC)

Mmm..not clear. Can you explain why this does not apply to all categories under Category:Panpulmonata? Isn't that search string the same for all the pages? The search string being informal group [[Pulmonata]]<br/>. — Ganeshk (talk) 02:28, 19 January 2011 (UTC)

It is because some of them does not have such word included in the article at all, because they were classified differently. (But hopefully it can work for 3 tasks of those six.) --Snek01 (talk) 15:37, 20 January 2011 (UTC)

Okay...that's not an issue. The bot will skip the pages that do not include the text. — Ganeshk (talk) 01:43, 21 January 2011 (UTC)

I have verified it. OK, do this for Ellobiidae, Systellommatophora and Stylommatophora. --Snek01 (talk) 12:44, 27 January 2011 (UTC)

BRFA filed — Ganeshk (talk) 17:16, 5 March 2011 (UTC)

 Done 2568 edits were made. — Ganeshk (talk) 12:31, 12 March 2011 (UTC)

(number of edits together with Euopisthobranchia). --Snek01 (talk) 19:25, 14 March 2011 (UTC)

Chilinidae and others

• in categories: Chilinidae  Done, Latiidae  Done, Acroloxidae  Done, Lymnaeidae  Done, Planorbidae  Done, Physidae  Done add this:

| unranked_familia = clade [[Heterobranchia]]<br/>clade [[Euthyneura]]<br/>clade [[Panpulmonata]]<br/>clade [[Hygrophila (Gastropoda)|Hygrophila]]

Example what needs to be done: [15]. --Snek01 (talk) 12:44, 27 January 2011 (UTC)

 Done manually. --Snek01 (talk) 22:46, 10 March 2011 (UTC)

Pyramidelloidea

• Pyramidelloidea. in category Pyramidellidae (others are done.) add this:

| unranked_superfamilia = clade [[Heterobranchia]]<br/>clade [[Euthyneura]]<br/>clade [[Panpulmonata]]

 Doing... --Snek01 (talk) 19:25, 14 March 2011 (UTC)

Sacoglossa

• Sacoglossa. In categories Oxynoidae, Juliidae, Placobranchidae, Limapontiidae, Caliphyllidae, Hermaeidae (others are done.) add this:

| unranked_superfamilia = clade [[Heterobranchia]]<br/>clade [[Euthyneura]]<br/>clade [[Panpulmonata]]<br/>clade [[Sacoglossa]]

Also remove word "opisthobranch" from intro sentence from these sacoglossans.

will be done manually later. C

3) update intros, texts, if needed. --Snek01 (talk) 23:37, 11 December 2010 (UTC)

Bot have been requested: TO DO: Wikipedia:Bot_requests/Archive_39#Taxonomy_of_gastropods_update but it received no attention! --Snek01 (talk) 23:50, 28 December 2010 (UTC)

I think, that all heterobranchs are categorized in proper categories now. --Snek01 (talk) 23:53, 10 January 2011 (UTC).

Several errors concerning species and pages

The following notes were provided by MerlinCharon (talk):

• The page Tibia martini should be Tibia martinii, with an extra 'i'. Also, the recent genus name is not Tibia, but Rostellariella for this species.

I have changed the species epithet from "martini" to "martinii". I have not yet attempted to change the genus, which would require more research and creating a new genus article. Invertzoo (talk) 14:09, 7 March 2011 (UTC)

• The page Cassis rufa is redundant; The official name is Cypraecassis rufa and this page already exists too.

I have now turned Cassis rufa into a redirect page. Invertzoo (talk) 14:05, 7 March 2011 (UTC)

• The page Melo aethiopica contains a large combo photo of Melo broderipii, not Melo aethiopica. Melo aethiopica has a yellow protoconch, not a red one like Melo broderipii.

I went ahead and did my best to fix this. Invertzoo (talk) 02:38, 8 March 2011 (UTC)

• The page Melo amphora has a beautiful main picture of a living animal. Sadly, the animal is most likely Melo umbilicatus, I pointed this out on the discussion page of this article.

I sorted this out. Invertzoo (talk) 14:30, 8 March 2011 (UTC)

• The page Melo umbilicatus shows a juvenile shell, which is somewhat more difficult to interpret, but this is, regarding the colour and spikes, likely Melo amphora, not Melo umbilicatus.

Also sorted this out as best I could. Invertzoo (talk) 14:30, 8 March 2011 (UTC)

• Page Charonia variegata shows old black and white picture of Charonia tritonis, not Charonia variegata. The artist of this picture lived more than a century before the author of Charonia variegata. The reason why it is tritonis, is because of the general form, and more specifically, the shell on the picture lacks the pairs of teeth on the mouth of the shell. Besides, it is left handed as well, which is confusing for regular viewers. Sinistral specimens of Charonia tritonis have not been found as far as I can tell. At least it should be mentioned that this mirror image is because of the printing process. But the main thing is that it is out of place on the C. variegata page.

I believe you are correct. The University of Toronto library site from which the image was taken is in error. I made a note of this fact on the Commons page for the image, but I did not myself attempt to change to name of the image, because I don't know how to do that on Commons. Invertzoo(talk) 02:21, 8 March 2011 (UTC)

MerlinCharon (talk) 02:19, 7 March 2011 (UTC)

Thank you so much for all this helpful work MerlinCharon! And thank you for the beautiful shell photographs (taken by you) that you have added to Commons! We very much welcome you as someone who really knows the classic collector's seashells. We have not had anyone in the project until now who has that expertise, and as you have discovered, that expertise is really needed here! If you like, over time I can show you how to go about making some of the changes I am making now. Also you may want to take a look at the general articles Seashell and Sea snail - both of which could benefit from a lot of improvements of various kinds. Best wishes, Invertzoo (talk) 14:42, 7 March 2011 (UTC)

And thank you for your compliments, Invertzoo. It's great to have such positive reactions. My main drive was and is the 1000s of photos that are needed, that was my first contact with the gastropods project. In January I was an absolute beginner concerning photographs, now it is getting better. I will look at the article, and see what I can do. But I am a bit disoriented by all the ways things should be done, even communicating has to be on the right page...

• I found another error however: the page Conus generalis has a picture of Conus vitulinus, a species with a highly variable shell. I have made some photographs of the shells of both species, but the Conus generalis in my collection is not a real beauty - it is at more than 85% of the old World Record Size however. The photo I made has good quality, but the shell itself is so-so.

Soon I will put the photo of Conus vitulinus in Commons; two varieties, then you can see it for yourself. The depicted cone in the article is not C. generalis.

And thank you for the nice welcome; I will be here often, slowly ploughing my way through...MerlinCharon (talk) 16:15, 7 March 2011 (UTC)

And I will be here thanking you and cheering you on! Invertzoo (talk) 02:16, 11 March 2011 (UTC)

Request for review

As I am not a native English speaker: Could someone please have a look at the Trochulus oreinos article? --Edmund Sackbauer (talk) 08:51, 17 March 2011 (UTC)

Hi Edmund. I see that JoJan already copyedited the article some today. I went through it just now and it looks very good, thank you for what now looks like a very nice article! I added some more lines to the intro, which is supposed to be a summary of the whole article. Your English is really very good but not quite perfect, so I changed the prose in several places. There were two things I did not understand that still need to be clarified. One thing is under "Description" where it says that the shell has an internal "rip". I don't know what that means. The other is under "Habitat" where you say that the snail prefers meadows with "loose structure"; equally I don't know what that means, so if you could explain those two to me I will fix them up in the article. Many thanks, Invertzoo (talk) 13:32, 17 March 2011 (UTC)

Thank you very much for your review. The "rip" is my mistake, it should have been a "rib". An "internal rib with a basal tooth" can also be found e.g. in the peristome of Petasina unidentata. "Meadow with loose structure" means, that not all of the surface is covered with dense vegetation, but many spots are totally free of vegetation. I will add some more information to some central european Gastropoda stubs if I have the time. --Edmund Sackbauer (talk) 15:51, 17 March 2011 (UTC)

I changed the sentence about the meadows and I think it is clearer now. Any work you can do on any of the other land snail articles will be welcomed. Invertzoo (talk) 00:52, 18 March 2011 (UTC)

Gurmatia

Hello, I think there is need a little more rewording of Gurmatia http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Gurmatia&diff=next&oldid=302429015 to avoid copyvio. --Snek01 (talk) 23:09, 22 March 2011 (UTC)

Losing a new member

Unfortunately we just lost a brand new member who was starting to make very valuable contributions to the project, mainly in the form of shell photographs and finding errors in species articles. He is now lost not only to our project but to all of Wikipedia and Commons, and almost certainly will never return! This is very unfortunate indeed. May I remind everyone that newcomers need to be welcomed not only with enthusiasm, but with great tolerance as they go about the process of learning the ropes. It is not appropriate to immediately issue a newcomer with a list of numerous different items that they are doing incorrectly. Try to avoid burdening a newcomer with a lots of protocol instructions when they are just starting up, because that can be very discouraging and cause someone to lose interest. It is not quite the same as "biting", but it adds up to the same sort of unpleasant impact. Invertzoo (talk) 18:23, 19 March 2011 (UTC)

Yes, that is sad. Despite all Welcoming committees, assuming good faiths, polite manners, knowing all those risks of loosing editors. 70% of newbies are leaving Wikipedia and why it is happening is unresolved problem. We for example do not know, if interaction of one editor and newbie is better or worse than interraction of three editors and newbie. We can for example only hope, that nobody (accidentally) marked any editor as more profilic than a newbie (there are no editors more equal than others). To avoid such feeling that some users are more equal than other, I have removed "honorary members" from the list of participants (for the second time already). We can only learn from our mistakes.Snek01 (talk) 00:09, 21 March 2011 (UTC)

I think you misunderstand: "honorary members" does not in any way mean "honored members" or "special members" or "more valuable" members. It simply means that these are some people who never signed themselves up with WikiProject Gastropods, and therefore are not real members, but we consider them to have given the project significant assistance or encouragement. As for "prolific", I believe no-one here referred to any of us as more "prolific" than a newbie, I think that was probably said in a private email from Lar. Also "prolific" simply means producing abundant works or results. Automatically a long-time active user will have more results than a newbie, by definition. Invertzoo (talk) 17:56, 22 March 2011 (UTC)

Consider my previous message as a speculation and generally speaking. - I do not consider them to have given the project significant assistance or encouragement. I think there is not need to worry about such subjective thing at all. Snek01 (talk) 23:09, 22 March 2011 (UTC)

The "honorary members" section was not intended as a earnest and serious item; it was a light-hearted humorous thing. I thought it was fun, and would make people smile. Invertzoo (talk) 16:23, 26 March 2011 (UTC)

Indeed it was fun, and did make me smile so I put it back. There is no need to remove it. Wikipedia is a consensus operation, not a one-man crusade. I am pretty sure that if we actually polled the members of this project there would be an overwhelming body of opinion to leave it in (I am not actually suggesting we do this for such a trivial thing though). Although we shouldn't overly trivialise the wiki, the fact is that keeping wikilove and humour alive is vitally important. Antarctic-adventurer (talk) 15:44, 27 March 2011 (UTC)

Thanks for the reminder Invertzoo. For a newbie, wikipedia can be very daunting and most people do not have enormous amounts of time to devote to the project. I tend to be off and on depending on my free time and interest at any moment (lately I have been off making edits for wikiproject ships for example - back here soon though I think!). Snek, I think I can guess why newbies are leaving across the whole of wikipedia. Firstly, it is inevitable that people try out something, and then leave after a short time, once the novelty wears off. So I always think that there will be a certain percentage of people coming and then leaving quickly. But I think jumping on the newbie also occurs a little too often. No reference to anyone at all here. Just look at how hard it is to become an administrator these days. Most users are not going to go through the hassle. Being especially polite, more than in real life, is very important on wikipedia, especially when there is disagreement. For my own part, I was welcomed kindly to the project and this extra motivation was definitely a factor in my coming back more and getting involved. Otherwise I might have just made a few edits and moved on. Although there is always a risk of 'scaring' off new members, I think everyone has done a good job of trying to encourage and welcome the newer members here. My 2 cents, anyway. Happy Editing! Antarctic-adventurer (talk) 04:06, 22 March 2011 (UTC)

Actually the exchange of messages that made this newcomer quit happened not here on Wikipedia but on Wikimedia Commons, where the newbie was uploading his images of seashells. Invertzoo (talk) 16:29, 26 March 2011 (UTC)

OK Thanks. I understand. As I don't really know anything about what happened, it is probably best I stay out of any discussion really ;) Antarctic-adventurer (talk) 15:44, 27 March 2011 (UTC)

Unaccepted page

The Unaccepted page has been refreshed. — Ganeshk (talk) 21:58, 27 March 2011 (UTC)

Free maps of gastropods from Australia

example image with "ideal" filename and file description, but there is crazy link to the source, so the only http://www.ala.org.au link is also fine.

Hello, free images of distribution maps of Australian species are available under {{Cc-by-3.0-au}} license at Atlas of Living Australia http://www.ala.org.au . Follow Wikipedia:WikiProject Gastropods/Links. --Snek01 (talk) 21:08, 24 March 2011 (UTC)

When the checklist web service will be available, I would like to request for a CSV checklist of gastropods of Australia (optimally if they could be distinguished to marine, freshwater, land) to complete our lists. --Snek01 (talk) 20:24, 28 March 2011 (UTC)

Errorneus authority?

Could be all authorities "Torre & Bartsch, 2008" in List of non-marine molluscs of Cuba an error in the source reference? It is difficult to verify it. --Snek01 (talk) 19:55, 6 April 2011 (UTC)

From A class to GA class

I've taken a look at some of our A-class articles, and I have some questions about them. Can A-class articles become FA-class candidates? If this isn't the case, then shouldn't we submit some of our A-class articles to GA review? Most of them can become GA's without any drastic changes, e. g. expanding introductions and such. Daniel Cavallari (talk) 14:01, 26 March 2011 (UTC)

Hi Daniel, Nice to see you again! Yes, any article at all can become a candidate for GA and FA if enough work is done on it to make it conform to the guidelines for GA or FA, and also assuming changes are made according to what the reviewers suggest when it undergoes the review process.

The interesting thing about "A class" is that it can be awarded by anyone at all without any outside review process, whereas GA or FA cannot. ("A class" is a remnant of an older system of ranking articles without external review.)

I think you will find that most of the eight "A class" articles we have do actually need a fair amount of work to bring them up to GA. For example Oospira smithi, Leptacme cuongi and Scutalus mariopenai are each based on only one reference. I think the A articles that are nearest to GA are probably Chittenango ovate amber snail (which used to be a GA but got demoted a few years go in a GA sweep) and maybe Adolph Cornelis van Bruggen.

I would like to see our rather nice Taxonomy of the Gastropoda article get GA, but again, it currently is based on one reference, is lacking many citations, does not have a proper intro and so on. However I would very much encourage you to think in terms of trying to get some of these A articles promoted!

I am currently still very busy taking care of my husband, and then will be going away for 3 weeks starting in mid April, but by the middle of May I hope to be more active again. All good wishes, Invertzoo (talk) 16:18, 26 March 2011 (UTC)

They are A class per Wikipedia:WikiProject_Gastropods/Assessment#Quality_scale and per Wikipedia:Version 1.0 Editorial Team/Assessment/A-Class criteria. They can be candidates either for GA-class or for FA-class. Those gastropod articles are either 1) complete in the sense for existing published information available. There are (thought) no other existing information from published sources about the subject. and/or 2) They are thought to be (above) GA-class level. --Snek01 (talk) 13:29, 28 March 2011 (UTC)

A. C. van Bruggen belongs probably to both. Novisuccinea chittenangoensis belongs to 2). All others belong to 1), but maybe they can pass the review of the GA article process; nobody tried it so we do not know it. --Snek01 (talk) 19:44, 29 March 2011 (UTC)

The correct reviewing process for "A" class

It appears that our current A class articles were promoted to "A" by one editor without using the proper review process as described here Wikipedia:Version 1.0 Editorial Team/Assessment/A-Class criteria (my emphasis):

"For WikiProjects without a formal A-Class review process, the proposal to promote to A-Class should be made on the article's talk page and supported there by two uninvolved editors, with no significant opposes. The review should also be noted on the discussion page."

Invertzoo (talk) 12:59, 13 April 2011 (UTC)

I guess this calls for some reassessment. From my point of view, it is important to always follow the WP regulations; Not doing so would seriously compromise the credibility of our project as a whole. Daniel Cavallari (talk) 21:14, 13 April 2011 (UTC)

OK, if you want to more formal process, could you add parameter

A-Class=

to the template {{WikiProject Gastropods}} (also for placing in Category:Requests for A-Class review), please? Thanks. --Snek01 (talk) 12:25, 19 April 2011 (UTC)

After the expansion of the introduction, I believe the Chittenango ovate amber snail article is more than qualified for GA-class review. I wouldn't even discard a FA review in the near future. Wouldn't it be better to nominate a GA, instead of A-class? -Daniel Cavallari (talk) 17:46, 19 April 2011 (UTC)

Yes, absolutely I agree. GA is an appropriate goal to aim for. I did some copy editing on the intro already, buy I won't be able to do too much WikiWork as I am on vacation doing shell research and also trying to recover from a sprained knee. Invertzoo (talk) 11:22, 24 April 2011 (UTC)

Minor tweaks for AWB

Minor tweaks possible to do in category/subcategories of gastropods:

spelling:

• Pokryseko -> Pokryszko

wikilinks:

• land snail -> land snail
• sea snail -> sea snail

I have checked and corrected the first 40 of these that come up in a search. Invertzoo (talk) 17:36, 9 April 2011 (UTC)

• freshwater snail -> freshwater snail
• freshwater air-breathing snail -> air-breathing freshwater snail
• [[List of molluscs recorded in -> [[List of non-marine molluscs of

authorities wikilinks in taxoboxes:

| binomial_authority = Pilsbry,
| binomial_authority = Pilsbry,

If genus authority is empty (in genera articles only):

| genus_authority = 
| genus_authority = {{No-gastropod-genus-ref}}

If genus authority is without ref (if possible to realize):

| genus_authority = SOMETHING, YEAR
| genus_authority = SOMETHING, YEAR{{No-gastropod-genus-ref}}

--Snek01 (talk) 12:31, 6 April 2011 (UTC)

Chittenango ovate amber snail

I have greatly expanded the article's intro; All I did was summarize the content as best as I could. Still, it is quite extensive, and could use some rephrasing and tweaks. Daniel Cavallari (talk) 03:31, 19 April 2011 (UTC)

I did copyedit the intro. If I can I will have another look at the intro and at the whole article, but basically I think it is pretty good already. Invertzoo (talk) 11:25, 24 April 2011 (UTC)

It looks good and I think it is ready to submit for GA review. However I will not have a lot of time to help out with answering reviewers comments etc until after I return from my trip.... although of course you are welcome to go ahead and start the process without me. Invertzoo (talk) 10:58, 27 April 2011 (UTC)

Signpost

According to an item in the Signpost of 2 May 2011 (Wikipedia:Wikipedia Signpost/2011-05-02/News and notes), the site http://marinespecies.org, a.k.a. WoRMs is ranked as #28 in the list of the top 1000 most linked domains from external links with 40,884 links (User:Emijrp/External Links Ranking). JoJan (talk) 15:35, 3 May 2011 (UTC)

Disambiguation pages for specific epithets?

Hi. I'd be grateful if editors which an interest in disambiguation could take a look at Tristis and let me know their thoughts on its talk page. Thanks SP-KP (talk) 10:17, 29 April 2011 (UTC)

I have replied to this giving my opinion, which is a strong oppose to the idea. Invertzoo (talk) 11:22, 29 April 2011 (UTC)

This article or dismabiguation page is now up for deletion. If anyone wants to give input, please do. Invertzoo (talk) 14:57, 30 May 2011 (UTC)

New articles up: Sea slug and Semi-slug

I believe we want to change Sea slug from a disambiguation page to an article, right? I started trying to draft a page here [16]. Please anyone feel free to work on it or take it over or put it into article space when it seems functional. Thanks, Invertzoo (talk) 11:49, 1 May 2011 (UTC) It's up now. Invertzoo (talk) 14:50, 30 May 2011 (UTC)

I have started also semi-slug article. Feel free to make wikilinks where needed. --Snek01 (talk) 18:58, 25 May 2011 (UTC)

Chittenango ovate amber snail, a new GA!

If anyone reading this message has not contributed extensively to the article on this snail, would they please consider reviewing it for Good Article status? Any person can do this, even another Project Gastropods member. All you have to do is to look carefully to see how well the article lives up to the list of Good article criteria here [17] and ask for changes to be made if the article fails to reach any of those criteria. The page where you would start the review is here: [18]]

If you ask for changes and we do a decent job of changing the article so that it then meets the criteria, then you can award GA status. Best wishes, Invertzoo (talk) 23:21, 11 May 2011 (UTC)

Thanks to recent hard work by Daniel, this article is now a new GA! Well done to everyone who contributed to this article so far! Invertzoo (talk) 14:53, 30 May 2011 (UTC)

Wow, a lot of work has been done on that article, well done to Daniel and all the other contributers! Interesting read. Antarctic-adventurer (talk) 12:24, 6 June 2011 (UTC)

Kanab ambersnail upgrade?

This was the article that was made a GA in 2006 and then was demoted in 2008. It seems that it probably has only a few aspects that need fixing. A list of items to be fixed in 2008 is on the talk page, so this might be a fairly easy one to fix up? Invertzoo (talk) 23:47, 2 June 2011 (UTC)

Hmm probably, yes. I'll see what I can do! --Daniel Cavallari (talk) 00:21, 3 June 2011 (UTC)

If you need some help (if it is something I can easily do), please let me know. Invertzoo (talk) 13:28, 7 June 2011 (UTC)

'Domain' and 'Conservation status' in taxoboxes

Any reason that we don't include either of these in the taxoboxes for WP:Gastropods? Above Kingdom is technically Domain... Antarctic-adventurer (talk) 12:19, 6 June 2011 (UTC)

I believe the Conservation status section is included in the taxoboxes of many species of land snail that have an official conservation status, taken from a Red List or whatever. Of course the great majority of gastropods have no official conservation status and are unlikely to get one in the foreseeable future. As for Domain, it certainly could in theory be included, but several editors outside the project have complained that our gastropod taxoboxes are too long already (because we include all the clades) so maybe it's better not to add another rank. Certainly I am willing to listen to other people's input on these questions. Invertzoo (talk) 13:39, 7 June 2011 (UTC)

OK, it sounds as if the current status quo regarding taxoboxes perhaps should stand then for the time being. Although I have no problem personally with long taxoboxes, and I don't think that ours are THAT long, ;). As for the IUCN Red list, I hadn't noticed that some of the snails had them. As for nudibranchs & others, we seem to be data deficient as you say. Thanks! Antarctic-adventurer (talk) 17:25, 7 June 2011 (UTC)

I also don't feel that any of our gastropod taxoboxes are too long, in fact I find the longer ones more interesting. Perhaps the people who don't like long taxoboxes are not very familiar with the intricacies of taxonomy and want things to be simpler than they really are? Or they don't like the look of a very short stub with a long taxobox? It seems to me that most people will not look at a taxobox unless they are actually interested in the taxonomy, in which case it is worth letting them see the full version. Or maybe if the length is a genuine concern, perhaps in the future some kinds of taxoboxes could have collapsible sections with a hide/show button or something. Invertzoo (talk) 12:02, 9 June 2011 (UTC)

Food web

Food web is currently being rewritten, and will hopefully go to FA. Any relevant contributions from people in this project will be much appreciated. --Epipelagic (talk) 06:15, 15 June 2011 (UTC)

Unaccepted

The Unaccepted page has been updated. — Ganeshk (talk) 22:43, 20 June 2011 (UTC)

New article, Chirality in gastropods?

I would be interested to hear what other think about this idea. I figure it would be helpful to start a new article named perhaps Sinistral shell or Chirality in gastropods. It seems to me the subject could use its own article, and that we don't currently have sufficient information about dextral and sinistral shells, even though the section in Gastropod shell called "Chirality in gastropods" is a good start. There is quite a lot of good info online about sinistral shells, both from shell collectors and from scientists. Invertzoo (talk) 12:51, 22 June 2011 (UTC)

"Chirality in gastropods" would be a good title for this much needed article. JoJan (talk) 14:32, 22 June 2011 (UTC)

Yes, and "sinistral shell" could be a redirect to it. Invertzoo (talk) 23:46, 22 June 2011 (UTC)

I think that it is not needed, but it depends on size. I can imagine that there will be a separate article, but I see no advantage of such name. "Gastropod shell" article is about 30 KB in size. If "gastropod shell" article is less than 60 KB do not split that. Follow approximately WP:SIZERULE. --Snek01 (talk) 14:37, 25 June 2011 (UTC)

Split of Category:Turridae stubs

I was about to perform a split of the Turridae stubs category when I found the notice at the top of the category.

My original proposal was earlier this month, and included two genera splits, as well as proposed splits by subfamily. I know I've brought up this subject before, and I'll wait for your input before retagging any articles. If you are still opposed to splits by subfamily, can we at least split off the large genera? (Comitas and Crassispira would classify as large genera) Dawynn (talk) 11:25, 1 July 2011 (UTC)

I think User:Snek01 is the person who feels most strongly about this kind of thing, so perhaps you should wait until he gives you his response to this idea. I do know that the family Turridae is extremely voluminous, but very little studied and very poorly understood, therefore the subfamilies are likely to be changing frequently and therefore may not be suitable as category splits. Personally I don't know whether or not it's an OK idea to split off a couple of genera as categories; It seems like a bit of an odd system, but we will see what other people think. Invertzoo (talk) 19:46, 4 July 2011 (UTC)

• Related discussion: Wikipedia_talk:WikiProject_Gastropods/Archive_3#Split_of_Category:Muricidae_and_Category:Muricidae_stubs
• There is no need to split Category:Turridae stubs. There could be possible to split Category:Turridae, but there have to be defined purpose and reason for it. I believe that there is no need to split Category:Turridae.
• In detail about stubs: recommendations about stubs.

1. Ensure better categorization of stubs. - Simple categorization of stubs is the best. "To Attract experts in specific areas" is the pupropse of stubs. I would presume that an expert of some gastropod family is an expert in all of its genera.
2. Ensure that stubs are sorted as uniformly as possible. - Stubs for gastropods are usually for families for convenience of editors.
3. Aim to keep categories at moderate sizes. - The best size for the reader is (according to my opinion) less than 200 articles, because 200 articles can be easily seen in the category on one page.
4. Maintain stub categories and templates. - unrelated to this discussion. But de facto if there is need a stub template or category, WikiProject Gastropods will start it by themselves. But when other ones "feel" that some category has not the moderate size, they propose splitting and when some other will support that according the size of the category only, then they think that it must be a genuine idea regardless of its usefulness.
5. Ensure that any new stub categories and templates are reasonable, usable, and useful. -

I would like to try to define some things how to maintain gastropod related categories:

1. There exist the category for every family of gastropods as a standard.
2. Stub categories for families are OK (if needed). Stub categories for subfamilies are not useful. Stub categories for genera are not useful.
3. Categories for subfamilies are not useful. Categories for superfamilies are also not useful. (Last sentence added later --Snek01 (talk) 10:16, 30 August 2011 (UTC))
4. When there is feeling to split some category, that is larger than 200 articles, try to make a plan what categories to start to get the category bellow 200 articles and use categories for genera. (You have to know, how many species exist in certain family to make such plan.) (Examples: Category:Planorbidae, Category:Helicidae, Category:Hygromiidae - these categories have added information, how to categorize them the best.)
5. If there is inapplicable a point above, you can easily have category of family name with few hundreds of articles. (Per discussion Wikipedia:Stub types for deletion/Log/2011/January/18, the moderate size for category is standard of 60-800 articles.) It is better to have one larger category (for family) + no subcategories, than numerous subcategories + over 200 articles.

--Snek01 (talk) 22:35, 6 July 2011 (UTC)

The worst example of categorizing is Category:Conidae.

   [−] Clathurellinae (7 C, 36 P)
   [×] Bathytoma (23 P)
   [×] Borsonella (11 P)
   [×] Clathurella (13 P)
   [×] Crockerella (11 P)
   [×] Glyphostoma (41 P)
   [+] Mitromorpha (1 C, 108 P)
   [×] Typhlomangelia (11 P)
   [−] Conus (1 C, 202 P)
   [×] Conus stubs (603 P)

M

   [−] Mangeliinae (10 C, 74 P)
   [×] Agathotoma (19 P)
   [×] Bela (gastropod) (25 P)
   [×] Benthomangelia (12 P)
   [×] Brachycythara (11 P)
   [×] Clathromangelia (10 P)
   [×] Ithycythara (16 P)
   [×] Kurtziella (23 P)
   [+] Mangelia (1 C, 62 P)
   [×] Pyrgocythara (23 P)
   [×] Tenaturris (13 P)

O

   [−] Oenopotinae (5 C, 5 P)
   [×] Curtitoma (17 P)
   [+] Gymnobela (1 C, 76 P)
   [×] Obesotoma (20 P)
   [+] Oenopota (1 C, 63 P)
   [×] Propebela (51 P)

R

   [−] Raphitominae (15 C, 199 P)
   [×] Asperdaphne (32 P)
   [+] Daphnella (1 C, 95 P)
   [×] Eucyclotoma (13 P)
   [×] Kermia (38 P)
   [×] Lusitanops (12 P)
   [×] Nepotilla (20 P)
   [×] Otitoma (1 P)
   [×] Phymorhynchus (18 P)
   [+] Pleurotomella (1 C, 78 P)
   [×] Pseudodaphnella (20 P)
   [×] Raphitoma (46 P)
   [×] Taranis (21 P)
   [×] Tritonoturris (15 P)
   [×] Veprecula (15 P)
   [×] Xanthodaphne (26 P)

Μ

   [−] Conidae stubs (7 C, 916 P)
   [×] Conus stubs (603 P)
   [×] Daphnella stubs (96 P)
   [×] Gymnobela stubs (77 P)
   [×] Mangelia stubs (63 P)
   [×] Mitromorpha stubs (107 P)
   [×] Oenopota stubs (63 P)
   [×] Pleurotomella stubs (79 P)

And despite the huge and complicated structure of subcategories, it still contains 428 articles in Category Conidae. It would be better to have all of its members in one category + genera that contains more than 100 species in separate subcategories. All work of WikiProject Stub sorting members and of User:Ka Faraq Gatri in categorizing Conidae despite their good intentions was useless and harmful. --Snek01 (talk) 22:35, 6 July 2011 (UTC)

Article Ctenidium

It seems like a good idea to have a short article on this, as well as a disambiguation page. Invertzoo (talk) 00:00, 12 July 2011 (UTC)

Good idea. Disambig started. --Snek01 (talk) 13:17, 20 July 2011 (UTC)

Article started. Needs refs. Also the word ctenidium needs to be mentioned in the article Respiratory system of gastropods and become a link there. Thanks. Invertzoo (talk) 14:41, 25 July 2011 (UTC)

Specific name kirki vs. kirkii

The only species in the genus Chytra was originally described as "Limnotrochus Kirkii". It is based on surname Kirk. Should the name be Chytra kirki (Brown 1994 uses that) or Chytra kirkii (Strong & Glaubrecht 2010 uses that)? There exist some other species named either kirki or kirkii. --Snek01 (talk) 15:01, 25 June 2011 (UTC)

The genitive of Kirk is kirki. In this respect Chytra kirki should be the correct name (ICZN 31.1.1), unless the original spelling by the author was kirkii (ICZN 31.1.3 and 32.2). A special case is if the name of the person has been latinized, e.g. Cuvier gives cuvieri, but its latinized form Cuvierius gives cuvierii. In this special case the name of the explorer Kirk was probably not latinised to Kirkius, and therefore the genitive should be kirki and nor kirkii. That's how I see it. JoJan (talk) 14:42, 26 June 2011 (UTC)

Thank you for your good insight. The original spelling was kirkii. The most recent 2010 reference doi:10.4002/040.052.0108 follows that original spelling. I think we should use kirkii. OK? --Snek01 (talk) 15:35, 2 August 2011 (UTC)

The original spelling has precedence. JoJan (talk) 17:19, 2 August 2011 (UTC)

Invitation to assist in adding donated content: GLAM/ARKive

Hi,

I am the Wikipedia Outreach Ambassador to ARKive, who have kindly agreed to donate an initial 200 article texts about endangered species from their project, to Wikipedia, under a CC-BY-SA license. Details are on the GLAM/ARKive project page. The donated texts include some about gastropods. Your help, to merge the donated texts into articles, would be appreciated. Guidelines for doing so are also on the above page. Once articles have been expanded using the donated texts, we are also seeking assistance in having those articles translated into other languages. Please let me know if you have any questions or concerns, on the project's talk page, or my own. Andy Mabbett (User:Pigsonthewing); Andy's talk; Andy's edits 20:50, 1 August 2011 (UTC)

Not some, but the only one. The only gastropod there is Rhachistia aldabrae [19]. If there is known the author of the text, we can give him/her an attribution. --Snek01 (talk) 00:01, 2 August 2011 (UTC)

There's Black abalone, too, though that's done now. Attribution to ARKive using {{ARKive attribute}}, as described on the project page, will be adequate. Andy Mabbett (User:Pigsonthewing); Andy's talk; Andy's edits 14:27, 3 August 2011 (UTC)

Spironema

There is some nomenclatural confusion (possibly only on my part) about the application of the name Spironema. We now have a disambiguation page at Spironema (disambiguation), where two animal genera appear to be currently known as Spironema; the elder of the two is a gastropod genus, so I was hoping that someone here could help. (If nothing else, a better link than simply "[[gastropod]]" would be an improvement – perhaps a family?) Spironema Klebs, 1893 [or 1892] appears to still be in use for the protist, even though a replacement name was published in 1970. Is there some reason why the new name is being ignored? Has the gastropod genus been renamed? Are there papers on the gastropod that explain the nomenclature of the protist? Any help would be much appreciated. --Stemonitis (talk) 16:17, 8 August 2011 (UTC)

According to the guidelines for disambiguation pages, a disambiguation page is a navigation aid, not an article. On a disambiguation page the only items listed should be the names of articles that already exist, and there should be no references. Take a look at [20].

As for Spironema as a gastropod, it appears to be a fossil snail genus according to [21]. No family is given there, only "Neotaenioglossa" and "Sprironema perryi Stephenson". I found a couple of papers online that mention that species from the Paleocene. In this pdf [22] on page 271 it seems to say pretty clearly that the genus is in the family Naticidae, but I can't find any confirmation of that anywhere else. Currently none of us here are paleontologists, and the fossil history of the Gastropoda is a gigantic study in itself. Most malacologists are not also paleontologists. Invertzoo (talk) 01:03, 10 August 2011 (UTC)

Thank you for both for valuable comments and suggestions. I have started the article Spironema (gastropod). --Snek01 (talk) 16:35, 11 August 2011 (UTC)

So, both the gastropod and the flagellate are treated as valid names? That's a problem, but I suppose it's not our problem. It might mean that it's appropriate to move the disambiguation page to "Spironema", and the flagellate to "Spironema (flagellate)" (it's only a redirect, so that's easy). --Stemonitis (talk) 16:44, 11 August 2011 (UTC)

I am not sure if there is more than one Spironema genus taxonomically valid. You are right. Spironema can be disambig page, because they are all so poorly known and I think, that there is no primary topic for it. --Snek01 (talk) 17:00, 11 August 2011 (UTC)

The flagellates are in the Kingdom Protista, not the Kingdom Animalia. As I understand it, it is OK for the same genus name to be used in different Kingdoms. Invertzoo (talk) 21:17, 11 August 2011 (UTC)

It's often stated that way. In truth, the name must me unique under any given code of nomenclature. Thus, a genus of plants cannot have the same name as a genus of fungi, because both are covered by the International Code of Botanical Nomenclature (recently renamed the International Code of Nomenclature for Algae, Fungi, and Plants). Likewise, no two genera covered by the International Code of Zoological Nomenclature (which covers protists and animals) can share the same name. --Stemonitis (talk) 06:32, 12 August 2011 (UTC)

That said, the International Code of Nomenclature of Bacteria is again separate, and Spironema is also included on our list of Bacteria genera. I don't know much about microbiology, but I'd have thought they could tell a eukaryote from a prokaryote! Anyway, I've move the disambiguation page to the title Spironema. Thanks for your assistance. --Stemonitis (talk) 06:40, 12 August 2011 (UTC)

Thank you for clarifying that for me Stemonitis, it is much appreciated! I went to the new article and took off the disambiguation tag. I also expanded the intro sentence and grouped the examples under their individual phyla. I think it may be worth mentioning (and linking to) the role of the International Codes in laying down the rules to use in cases of synonymy like these. Best wishes, Invertzoo (talk) 19:47, 14 August 2011 (UTC)

Whelk

I put an entry on the Discussion page of the "Whelk" article, re something I couldn't straighten out on my own. Doprendek (talk) 21:26, 12 August 2011 (UTC)

Thanks for bring this to the attention of WikiProject Gastropods. Part of the problem here is the perennial problem of common names, which are applied extremely casually, and very often do not correspond to the scientific classification of groups. But the other problem is that gastropod taxonomy has been greatly in flux recently. Although taxoboxes have been mostly kept up to date, the text in various articles (especially general articles) has not always been updated to reflect those changes. I will try to see what I can do to fix this. Thanks again, your note was very helpful! These more general gastropod articles are very often consulted, and need to be kept in good condition. Invertzoo (talk)

Having looked more closely at the article in its new state, although I appreciate all the hard work you put into it, I personally don't think it's a good idea to try to have in the "whelk" article a simple alphabetical list of all of the species that are sometimes called "whelks" (common names vary a great deal from one area to the next, even within the same country, and some authors of field guides give species "common names" that are never used by the general public and which also often vary tremendously from one author to the next). I personally believe that a list would not end up being very helpful to readers; the family Buccinidae alone has over 1500 species. (By the way, from the whelk genera list I had to remove 6 names that were actually subfamily, family or superfamily names.) It's true that we need to expand the Whelk article, and it's not very good as it stood, but I believe that a long list of species or even genera is probably not the way to go. I am happy to hear other suggestions or opinions. Best wishes, Invertzoo (talk) 16:28, 14 August 2011 (UTC)

Just to let folks know, this is not trivial; the article Whelk is the 15th most popular article in Project Gastropod in terms of how many people view it each day! I would encourage people to look at the list of most popular articles here because there are some real surprises in it! Invertzoo (talk) 19:19, 14 August 2011 (UTC)

Categories for new sea slug articles

Hi folks, and User:Snek01 in particular. We have a brand new contributor who has already created several new nudibranch articles, which he is illustrating with images he himself created and uploaded onto Commons. Can we create the appropriate categories on Wikipedia and on Wikimedia Commons? Currently these articles are going into the family category, but I assume it would be good to have at least a category for the genus Noumea which currently has no category and now has 4 new articles and counting. Thanks all, Invertzoo (talk) 15:47, 14 August 2011 (UTC)

hmm... I thought that I have written my comments about categorizing above at section Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Gastropods#Split of Category:Turridae stubs.

You can either decide to have all Chromodorididae in one category (consider, that it can be also useful) or if you wish to categorize (optimally: if you have some reason for categorizing), I would recommend this:

Snek01's guide to categorization:

• step one) is there more than 200 species (or articles) in family (in category)?
  • no --> stop categorizing
  • yes --> select the largest genus, create the category for that genus, categorize articles and go to the "step one".

I do not know how many species are in Chromodorididae. So, according to my guide above, feel free to do this: I think that Chromodoris is the largest genus; create category Chromodoris and stop categorizing. --Snek01 (talk) 18:57, 14 August 2011 (UTC)

Are you willing to talk about your project?

Hi. :) Some of you know me as User:Moonriddengirl. I'm not here in that capacity, though, but as one of my assignments under my contract for the Wikimedia Foundation, as its temporary community liaison. I've been asked to talk to a few projects and see if I can inspire some self-assessment: WMF wants to know what you think you guys are doing well and what might be improved. It would also be good if we can get some dialogue going on how projects can help welcome and nurture newcomers interested in their areas. This information will be compiled into a report to help understand the dynamics of projects and also to generate ideas for best practices for other communities.

If you're willing, I'll set up a subpage so we can talk without overwhelming this one and keep the conversation concentrated in one area. That page will be included in my report to the WMF along with my summary of the conversation (which I will present for your approval before submitting).

Are you guys willing to chat? --Maggie Dennis (WMF) (talk) 14:08, 18 August 2011 (UTC)

Hi Moonriddengirl/Maggie, I am certainly willing to talk. Invertzoo (talk) 01:22, 19 August 2011 (UTC)

Hmm. Is it likely to be just the two of us, or do you think others would join in? :) --Maggie Dennis (WMF) (talk) 11:10, 24 August 2011 (UTC)

I think you may perhaps have to ask people individually whether they are willing to participate. You see, there are a couple of other very important discussions going on right now, for example a major bot approval discussion. I think people may either not really have noticed your message or felt that this task was not as pressing as the other things that are happening. Also I think perhaps that not everyone in Project Gastropods has this page watch listed. Invertzoo (talk) 22:52, 24 August 2011 (UTC)

Template:Edible molluscs

Extended content

I would like to revamp the navbox. My suggestions: Break the wall of text into groups that are broadly recognized in the culinary field, such as: clams, snails, oysters, etc, with possible subgroups like cockles. Pipe species names to display common name where possible. Add top bar and bottom bar with something useful like categories. Add an nice image of a dish. Possibly add "Related" or other group as the last group, with items like clam bake, or snail fork or something. I have added an "inuse" to the navbox, and dumped a copy in my User:Anna Frodesiak/Violet sandbox spread out for easy viewing. Please feel free to modify it, sort the items, make suggestions, improve the layout, disapprove of the entire plan, or simply ignore "another one of Anna's jugheaded projects". Best, Anna Frodesiak (talk) 02:43, 24 August 2011 (UTC) Before Now Bear in mind, this navbox is a work in progress. It is designed for a target visitorship of gastronimically-minded people. Like chefs who want to find out what the heck they just bought, and what that was at the market that they didn't buy. NOTE: Please don't modify this. If you want, modify the master at User:Anna Frodesiak/Violet sandbox Feedback, please. Tear it apart. Anna Frodesiak (talk) 08:37, 24 August 2011 (UTC) You tell me what should be done, and I'll do the work. Anna Frodesiak (talk) 09:08, 24 August 2011 (UTC) An outsider's perspective: it looks much more readable to me. Good job. --99of9 (talk) 09:11, 24 August 2011 (UTC) Well thank you kindly. In fact, I've given it a fairly good read over. It has a few issues, but I think it is at least as good as the previous version. I'm going to boldly update it. Cheers and thanks for the positive feedback! Anna Frodesiak (talk) 09:42, 24 August 2011 (UTC)

 Done

Possible duplicate article

I'll let others sort this one out:

• Pink abalone and Haliotis corrugata

Anna Frodesiak (talk) 08:51, 24 August 2011 (UTC)

 Done Good finding. Fully duplicite. I have redirected/merged it. --Snek01 (talk) 13:09, 24 August 2011 (UTC)

Thanks. Long time. Hope you're well. Anna Frodesiak (talk) 13:14, 24 August 2011 (UTC)

Common name capitalization conventions for gastropods

Hi folks. Long time not posting here. Could those qualified please fill in the last row of the table at: Wikipedia:WikiProject Animals/Draft capitalization guidelines. Many thanks. Anna Frodesiak (talk) 23:44, 19 August 2011 (UTC)

First, do we even have a consensus on this? We tend to not capitalize the common names, I think, but I would like to see what others say. Invertzoo (talk) 00:04, 24 August 2011 (UTC)

Well, that's what I'm wondering. The point of the draft is to find out if each project's members agree on their own subjects' conventions. I'd say, you, JoJan and Snek01, et al could discuss it here and then add the convention to the draft. I will actually, formally post this sort of thing on many such talk pages very soon. Anna Frodesiak (talk) 11:17, 24 August 2011 (UTC)

This has always been a contentious issue. As far as I know there are no strict rules in this concerning gastropods. In WP: Tree of LIfe there seems to be a general consensus against capitalization (except for birds). I used to capitalize the common names of gastropods, following the custom in several of my books (e.g. The Hamlyn Guide to Shells of the World, National Audubon Society: Field Guide to North American Seashells; Collins Guide: Sea Shore of Britain and Europe and some more). Other books avoid the problem by giving the common name in small capitals. Scientific literature doesn't mention common names. Nowadays, I tend to go along with Tree of Life, and I don't capitalize common names of gastropods anymore (except in proper nouns).

See also lengthy discussions at :

• Wikipedia:WikiProject_Tree_of_Life#Common_name_capitalization
• Wikipedia:CAPS
• Wikipedia_talk:WikiProject_Tree_of_life/Archive_29#English_names_of_biological_species. JoJan (talk) 14:33, 24 August 2011 (UTC)

I think I am in favor of no capitals, but as JoJan says, experts do not agree on this question. Invertzoo (talk) 22:40, 24 August 2011 (UTC)

Thanks for the input. I guess that's a "no consensus" from the project. If the table ends up in the guidelines, I think a "no consensus" is useful too, as it can be cited to resolve editing and page move disputes. Cheers. Anna Frodesiak (talk) 03:21, 26 August 2011 (UTC)

I think the project members may actually agree on no capitals for common names (except for the obvious ones for place names or person's names). However, we were just commenting that there is no standard in the literature that we can follow, so we would have to arbitrarily chose a way. Is that a NPOV problem or not? Invertzoo (talk) 04:16, 26 August 2011 (UTC)

Comparing lists

I've often needed a utility for comparing lists. (I know about AWB). I found this little util for comparing "what links here" and cats and species lists, and just raw text list, etc. http://jura.wi.mit.edu/bioc/tools/compare.php Thought some of you might like it. Anna Frodesiak (talk) 03:19, 26 August 2011 (UTC)

Identification help

unidentified snail

Please can you help me to identify this snail from North-East Queensland. I have geocoded, but I can't get an ID. Thanks in advance for any help you can give. --99of9 (talk) 06:49, 15 August 2011 (UTC)

Hi 99of9, nice to talk to you again! OK, this is a bit difficult, for me anyway. Can I say, next time you photograph a land snail, if you could also pick it off the surface it is on, and photograph the other side as well, the side with the opening, with the soft parts retracted, that would be really helpful. And if you have a water bottle with you, you can in addition pour some water over it and chances are it will emerge and walk around some and then you can get a picture of the whole animal. In any case, I believe this is not a pulmonate, and does have an operculum. I think it's in the family Cyclophoridae. I know someone else in Australia who sometimes finds snails and he gets them identified by an expert, so let me talk to him and get back to you because maybe the expert would look at this image also. Best, Invertzoo (talk) 12:50, 16 August 2011 (UTC)

Thanks for the useful tips. I've now got a macro lens, so hopefully I'll get a chance to use your suggestions. Thanks also for your attempt at finding an ID - I understand if it's impossible from one pic. --99of9 (talk) 23:07, 16 August 2011 (UTC)

You're very welcome. I suspect it may be possible to ID the snail at least to genus and maybe to species. I am waiting to hear back from User:Poyt448 about whether he can send your image to the snail expert. Invertzoo (talk) 13:58, 17 August 2011 (UTC)

I just found another pic which looks like it has the same shell and is from the same region. It's also unidentified, but it might make it easier for you experts to see the body. --99of9 (talk) 14:11, 17 August 2011 (UTC)

I see that User:Poyt448 has already forwarded your image to the expert at the University of Queensland. We should perhaps hear back shortly. I will also send Poyt the link to the other image you found, because yes, it does appear to be the same species. Invertzoo (talk) 12:34, 18 August 2011 (UTC)

Ah, I might be wasting everyone's time, that wiki with the second pic does have a species: Noctepuna cerea [23]. Now we just need to check if it seems right... --99of9 (talk) 12:38, 18 August 2011 (UTC)

I think that Noctepuna cerea may not turn out to be the correct name for this snail because it seems to be an operculate species and probably in the family Cyclophoridae. Let's wait and hear what the specialist has to say and then we'll make a stub if he IDs it. Thanks! Invertzoo (talk) 13:35, 18 August 2011 (UTC)

• Here is the original description of Noctepuna cerea:

A NEW PAPUINA.

BY CHARLES HEDLEY, SY'DNEY', AUSTRALIA.

Papuina cerea Hedley.

Shell thin, translucent; contour trochoidal, color waxen white becoming yellowish on the 3rd and 4th whorls, encircled below the suture by an opaque white thread, nowhere are translucent lines or spaces visible. Sculpture : surface of a waxen polish ; transverse growth lines can be detected by the unaided eye, and spiral grooves, almost effaced above but plainer on the base, may be deciphered with a lens. Whorls Sl^, flattened, regularly increasing, the last constituting five-eighths of the shell's height, angled at the periphery, descending considerably and abruptly at the aperture, gibbous at the point of flexure. Suture impressed. Aperture very oblique, anterior margin waved ; columella oblique, wide, extending nearly to the angle of the aperture, subtruncate below. A thin, translucent, shining callus extends over the imperforate axis to the insertion of the anterior margin of the lip.

Height 135, major, diam. 16, min. diam. 14 mm.

Hab. Bloomfield River, North Queensland.

• So I conclude that it's supposed to be white (thus may still apply to my pic), not brown as in the other external pic. The location is also good - first discovery was 20 miles from where my pic was taken. But apart from the colour & place, most of this is too technical for me. In fact, I still can't see why you think my pic has an operculum. What on earth does height 135 mean?? It certainly wasn't 135mm in any dimension - I've never seen a snail bigger than a tennis ball! --99of9 (talk) 05:01, 19 August 2011 (UTC)

As for how I judged that it was an operculate snail, the image you showed us of the snail that was shown crawling around (not your snail) had only two tentacles and the eyes were positioned at the base of the tentacles. I also thought I could see the tiniest bit of the operculum at the back under the shell. Invertzoo (talk) 04:31, 24 August 2011 (UTC)

Ah, ok, now I know what to look for! I've answered one of my questions above... I think the 135 was actually a 13.5 where the . went missing during the OCR scanning. 13.5mm matches up with the pics. --99of9 (talk) 06:47, 24 August 2011 (UTC)

OK! This is all sorted out now. Thanks 99of9 for making the necessary stub articles! I was quite wrong on what I thought I saw, sorry about that! Invertzoo (talk) 17:40, 3 September 2011 (UTC)

Smith

All articles created by PolBot based on IUCN red list were incorrectly automatically linked to Andrew Smith (zoologist) when the authority was Smith. As far as I know, Andrew Smith described no gastropod species (I have found no scans of his works). All of them or many of them should be linked to Edgar Albert Smith or to some other malacologist. I am working on E. A. Smith's taxa.

Tasks:

• delink unreferenced gastropod authorities from Andrew Smith (zoologist) to Smith (taxonomic authority)
• clarify Special:WhatLinksHere/List_of_taxonomic_authorities_named_Smith
• you can strategically work on other Smith authors.

--Snek01 (talk) 10:38, 26 August 2011 (UTC)

Template:WikiProject Gastropods

Two things can be done to improving(?) the Template:WikiProject Gastropods:

1) Adding parameter

A-Class=

as discussed on Wikipedia_talk:WikiProject_Gastropods/Archive_4#From_A_class_to_GA_class

2) Adding possibility to add option "File" like this:

class=File

for categorization of gastropod files (only for {{PD-US-1923-abroad}} and for very few or only one(?) Fair use images, because other ones should be on Commons) in a similar way as other files used by other projects Category:File-Class articles. --Snek01 (talk) 17:54, 11 September 2011 (UTC)

Unfortunately that way would not show previews of images. Therefore I think, that a normal category would be much better. Sounds OK? --Snek01 (talk) 21:03, 11 September 2011 (UTC)

Isn't point #1 same as class=A? — Ganeshk (talk) 23:57, 11 September 2011 (UTC)

Three options:

| A-Class=current
| A-Class=pass
| A-Class=fail

For current review; for passed review and then the will get class=A; for failed review. It is documented for example on Wikipedia:WikiProject Military history/Assessment/A-Class review. --Snek01 (talk) 22:03, 12 September 2011 (UTC)

Purple

What is terminology of natural dyes (purple) from sea snails?

• Tyrian purple - from Bolinus brandaris and from Nucella lapillus only?
• Phoenician Red, Phoenician purple - from Hexaplex trunculus only? Is Phoenicain purple only a shade/tone of Tyrian purple?
• Purpura patula from America.

This should be clarified and properly referenced in all of these articles. --Snek01 (talk) 21:53, 12 September 2011 (UTC)

Good questions. Yes this really does need more research and some citations! But with these ancient purple dyes from the Mediterranean, information such as which dye came from which species, and what was meant by the ancient words used for the snails and for the dyes, or what was said (sometimes incorrectly) in old historical accounts of this, I think that all this information is just not very well known. Historians mention these things, but they are not usually concerned at all about the biology or taxonomy. Even archeologists (who sometimes find the broken shells of the species that were used) are not always reliable when it comes to species identification, etc.

As for the two American dye murex species, the Western Atlantic Plicopurpura patula (Linnaeus, 1758) and the Eastern Pacific congener Plicopurpura pansa (Gould, 1853) they would have had local names as dye sources in pre-colonial times and even more recently, but it's possible that what the names were/are for either the dye or the snail is not available in the literature.

Here is one useful webpage: [24] Having the more up-to-date binomial name makes it easy to get good search results. Invertzoo (talk) 22:24, 13 September 2011 (UTC)

New section on portal

Hello, I have prepared Portal:Gastropods for adding "On this day" anniversaries in the same way as they are depicted on Portal:Biography (we have about 200 existing articles about malacologists, so there are enough anniversaries). I have prepared prototype example (with example data) for not up to date yesterday: Portal:Gastropods/Anniversaries/July 26. There will be family (with example image if we have some) of the day also to show great variability of gastropods without bias (some days in the year will have more than one "family of the day", but each day will have at least one.) It may (or may not) initiate organized improvements of articles about some neglected groups among gastropods. I have plan for it even for 1 April and 29 February. Also each country will have its "list of the day" if the list exist (there is a list available for every third or fourth day meantime). I will continue with this in few days to see if any objections and or suggestions will appear. --Snek01 (talk) 02:28, 27 July 2011 (UTC)

This is an unexpected idea which might make the portal richer and more multi-faceted. Anyone else have comments? Invertzoo (talk) 14:35, 8 August 2011 (UTC)

The first step will be to add anniversaries (births and deaths) of all malacologists (that have referenced dates). After then I will probably add other parts... --Snek01 (talk) 20:38, 8 September 2011 (UTC)

I think this is a cool idea, thanks for all the work you are putting in to it. Invertzoo (talk) 17:25, 17 September 2011 (UTC)

Callus (mollusc)?

I see the disambiguation page for Callus has a mention of the callus in a Nautilus shell, but no mention of the callus in gastropod shells. Maybe we could use a new short article on that subject in gastropods and Nautilus and then it could be linked to from the disambiguation page? Invertzoo (talk) 19:54, 14 August 2011 (UTC)

I think, that "Callus (mollusc)" is all right as it is for now. Compare with for example "Whorl (mollusc)", "Mantle (mollusc)", ... --Snek01 (talk) 15:28, 13 September 2011 (UTC)

But, I can imagine, that names of articles (or maybe only redirects?) from malacological terminology can be improved. I think, that overview of all terms could clarify how to improve all of these names. --Snek01 (talk) 11:16, 17 September 2011 (UTC)

But naming of the article "Siphon (mollusc)" will require input from number of you at Talk:Siphon (mollusc). --Snek01 (talk) 15:28, 13 September 2011 (UTC)

New bot request (Ganeshbot 10)

It's been a year since the last failed bot request. I have taken this time to think about creating a request that handles the concerns mentioned. I have created a new bot request, Wikipedia:Bots/Requests for approval/Ganeshbot 10. I request the project members to actively participate in the process and respond to any questions raised. Please stay positive and friendly through the whole process. I hope we get the community behind us on this one. Thanks again. — Ganeshk (talk) 01:36, 18 August 2011 (UTC)

Thanks for your efforts Ganesh. I hope things go smoothly this time. I will be away for almost 3 weeks but I will be online, just not as much as usual. Invertzoo (talk) 01:24, 19 August 2011 (UTC)

I have updated the bot request page. Please review and comment. Thanks. — Ganeshk (talk) 15:49, 16 September 2011 (UTC)

WRMS species

 Question: When a user will expand and update the article for example like this replacing WoRMS template with something else, then the article will be omitted during the process of checking and creation of Unaccepted page User:Ganeshbot/Animalia#Steps_to_create_Unaccepted_page. Is it so? --Snek01 (talk) 23:35, 27 August 2011 (UTC)

Yes, that's correct. If the WoRMS template is removed, the article will be skipped from checks for the Unaccepted page. — Ganeshk (talk) 01:41, 28 August 2011 (UTC)

I have restored the template [25]. For some reason, the nowiki is required around the url for the full text to show up correctly. — Ganeshk (talk) 01:49, 28 August 2011 (UTC)

Thanks for explanation how it works. hmm... That is difficult way and it is not user friendly for editors (I will not use it) and especially it is not reader friendly (reader does not need the same information twice). Editors even do not know, that normal updating the reference in this way can affect something (I didn't know that and I certainly updated some unknown number of articles this way during last year). I believe that we do not need to take care about low number of articles updated this way. - Optimally we should use some more sophisticated way of checking that would include also few thousand (about 2.000-3.000?) articles created manually, if needed. For example: when there will be on Wikipedia all taxa (of Gastropods) existing on WoRMS, then there will be possible to get a list of necessary changes quite simply like this: you will get all taxa (of Gastropods) that changed its status on WoRMS. Sounds like a plan? --Snek01 (talk) 22:38, 28 August 2011 (UTC)

Michal, agree, it is complicated. I will look into fixing it. I will post here once done. Please do not remove the WRMS template from the articles. That is the only the way bot can figure out the WoRMS ID. — Ganeshk (talk) 02:01, 29 August 2011 (UTC)

ALT1

Although it would be additional work for editor, the most user friendly way how to keep the template and update the reference relatively easily would be to let the template with the ID only. Is it possible to alter the template that the code

{{WRMS species|225383}}

will generate no text? Then the reference

<ref>{{WRMS species|225383}} Gofas, S. (2011). ''Bullia mozambicensis'' E.A. Smith, 1878. Accessed through: [[World Register of Marine Species]] at http://www.marinespecies.org/aphia.php?p=taxdetails&id=225383 on 2011-08-27</ref>

will serve all purposes. I did not wanted to propose that, but if you still want to fixing that, I think that you can use it as a (provisional?) solution. --Snek01 (talk) 17:20, 29 August 2011 (UTC)

ALT2

I have updated the template now. I have replaced the validity parameter with a editor parameter. The editor is the person who entered the taxon into the WORMS database.

Syntax

{{WRMS species | id | name | editor | accessdate | citation }}

For example:

{{WRMS species|225383|''Bullia mozambicensis'' E.A. Smith, 1878| Gofas, S. (2011)|2011-08-27}}

will produce

Bullia mozambicensis E.A. Smith, 1878. Gofas, S. (2011). Retrieved through: World Register of Marine Species on 2011-08-27.

The template now produces a citation that similar to what is available on WoRMS. — Ganeshk (talk) 12:34, 10 September 2011 (UTC)

See diff for Bullia mozambicensis. — Ganeshk (talk) 12:40, 10 September 2011 (UTC)

This is an interesting alternative of (hopefully) improving the template. (By them way, it has two same links twice, which is redundant.) But neither ALT1 nor ALT2 gives enough freedom to the editor. You DEMAND from all editors to use the only WRMS species species template. It could be one of example, when Invertzoo said: "it's also important to stay loose". They are not allowed by you to use free text between ref tags. They are not allowed by you to use for example {{Cite web}} that is much more standard than WRMS species. Completely different approach is needed to solve this problem. --Snek01 (talk) 18:35, 10 September 2011 (UTC)

It makes duplicites not only in altered ones, but in all cases when the template is used.(!) It is better to keep it as it was before discussion. --Snek01 (talk) 22:54, 12 September 2011 (UTC)

 Done I have fixed the duplication issue. — Ganeshk (talk) 01:17, 13 September 2011 (UTC)

Thank you. If the Bot will use this improvement (there was added new parameter "editor") when it will be generating new articles, then it will increase quality of the reference, which is really good. Unfortunately I am afraid that no living editor will use this. - You should add information to the documentation(s), that it may not be useful to replace the reference with free text reference. --Snek01 (talk) 12:19, 17 September 2011 (UTC)

The bot is not able to harvest the editor separately. The webservice provides the citation as a free text; and so the bot uses the last parameter (just added above) to add the full citation. The first 3 parameters are mainly for use by the human editors. — Ganeshk (talk) 12:24, 17 September 2011 (UTC)

For example, here editor and accessdate are missing:

<ref name="WoRMS">{{WRMS species|565363|''User:Ganeshk/sandbox/Lobatus costatus'' (Gmelin, 1791)|||Bouchet, P. (2011). Lobatus costatus (Gmelin, 1791). Accessed through:  [[World Register of Marine Species]] at http://www.marinespecies.org/aphia.php?p=taxdetails&id=565363 on 2011-09-17}}</ref>

— Ganeshk (talk) 12:27, 17 September 2011 (UTC)

ALT3 and ALT4

I certainly do not demand that this template be used. The bot is able to validate species status on articles that use this template. I hope you understand that for bots to be helpful, they will need some input. Another option is to use TaxonIds template to identify the WoRMS ID. But you were opposed to that as well. — Ganeshk (talk) 19:01, 10 September 2011 (UTC)

Thank you for your understanding, because I was aimed at that. :) Use Metadata, as I have said at Wikipedia_talk:WikiProject_Tree_of_life/Archive_27#Identifiers. That is non-controversial. That would usefully fits its purpose, because only Bot need it. --Snek01 (talk) 20:49, 10 September 2011 (UTC)

Is this what you had in mind? — Ganeshk (talk) 15:34, 11 September 2011 (UTC)

No, do not torment me, please. --Snek01 (talk) 17:54, 11 September 2011 (UTC)

You are extremely difficult to please. :) — Ganeshk (talk) 20:14, 11 September 2011 (UTC)

ALT5

What are your thoughts on this collapsed box? I know you would prefer it disappear altogether from the article. This is kind of the middle ground. — Ganeshk (talk) 03:33, 12 September 2011 (UTC) {{TaxonIds |name = Bullia mozambicensis |worms = 225383 }}

Wrong. Even if it will be invisible and every of its variants are wrong. --Snek01 (talk) 12:26, 17 September 2011 (UTC)

I thought you were in agreement with it being invisible like Persondata. See [26]. — Ganeshk (talk) 12:34, 17 September 2011 (UTC)

The reason I am proposing this is so that the bot can start using cite template instead the WRMS template. It can additionally post the TaxonIds template in the external links section for use with the quarterly unaccepted validation. See example. — Ganeshk (talk) 12:53, 17 September 2011 (UTC)

Comments on our project please?

Even the less active members, please take a look at this linked page and leave any remarks that might occur to you in response to the questions at this page. This survey is to allow the Wikimedia Foundation to work out if there are things they can do to make it easier for the various projects like ours to do what we need to do. Many thanks, Invertzoo (talk) 00:43, 14 September 2011 (UTC)

Thanks so much to several people who have so far commented on that page. Anyone who has still not commented, please go and leave a note (or a few notes), just giving your point of view on the questions about the project. If there is anything you can think of that the Wikimedia Foundation might be able to do to make it easier for projects like ours to succeed, let them know and maybe we will get those special advantages in the future! Invertzoo (talk) 18:28, 17 September 2011 (UTC)

Request for Comment: Capitalization of common names of animal species

Informal poll on common names

Can we please just see whether we have a consensus among us members? (Even if there is not a solid consensus in the literature.) The question is: should all the common names of gastropods be written like this, "Lightning Whelk" or like this, "lightning whelk"?

• Invertzoo: My opinion is taken from the 1998 publication, "Common and Scientific Names of Aquatic Invertebrates from the United States and Canada: Mollusks", Second Edition, American Fisheries Society Special Publication 26, by Turgeon et al, I would go with "lightning whelk", in other words I prefer to use sentence case. Invertzoo (talk) 20:47, 17 September 2011 (UTC)

• Snek01: If Invertzoo, so do I. Turgeon et al. is "classical" work. --Snek01 (talk) 23:31, 17 September 2011 (UTC)

• I also prefer the sentence case. JoJan (talk) 17:23, 18 September 2011 (UTC)

Please tell us, what do you prefer? All members and those loosely affiliated with the project are welcome to comment. Three comments is good, but we need more comments before can claim we have a consensus. Please leave a note with your preference.

Update

Since no-one in the project seems to feel strongly enough to voice any objections to common names being in sentence case, I have put this forward as a weak consensus. However it is not too late to object if any wishes to. Invertzoo (talk) 18:46, 28 September 2011 (UTC)

Automatic taxobox 2

Since we are getting ready to create new articles using the bot, can the project members please give another thought about the use of Automatic taxoboxes? The bot can start using the automatic taxobox when creating new articles if there is consensus here. This was discussed earlier this year with a decision made to revisit at a later time. This will make the process of fixing taxonomy changes really easy. — Ganeshk (talk) 02:57, 20 September 2011 (UTC)

No. That premature not very good experiment belong to Sandbox, Wikimedia Strategic planning, Wikimedia Laboratories and to Wikimedia Usability Initiative. Stop that and do not contaminate existing articles. --Snek01 (talk) 05:22, 21 September 2011 (UTC)

I've had problems in the past with automatic taxoboxes when moving an article from one name to another. It seems that the template of the automatic taxobox has to be changed too in such cases. This is explained nowhere, as far as I know. One has almost to be an expert to do this. Such an action doesn't agree with the basic principle of wikipedia where everyone must be able to contribute. JoJan (talk) 04:49, 20 September 2011 (UTC)

JoJan, I wanted to run a test with this issue. I have moved Lobatus costatus to Aliger costatus (I know it is not a good idea to test on the articlespace). Can you attempt to fix the problem on the Taxobox and let me know what your experience was? The template for Aliger needs to be created. — Ganeshk (talk) 05:19, 20 September 2011 (UTC)

This was some months ago. If I remember well, there was a change of family involved. The new taxobox was a mess. I didn't know how to handle this. I raised the issue on Template talk:Automatic taxobox (at least I think it was there). Their answer was that this was indeed an issue not covered in the automatic taxobox. One had to change the template manually in such a case. They would try to fix the problem in a couple of months. I haven't followed up the problem since automatic taxoboxes are not allowed in our project, and I haven't encountered a new one since. Recently, on the same talk page, someone else also made a complaint in this sense Template talk:Automatic taxobox #Really horrible to update. I wonder if an automatic taxobox at this moment is a good idea. JoJan (talk) 13:50, 20 September 2011 (UTC)

Here is a link to the issue that you reported, Template_talk:Automatic_taxobox/Archive_8#Anatoma_proxima. Martin did come up with a solution for the issue by creating the {{Speciesbox}}. The speciesbox does not require the template to be created for each species. It picks up the taxonomy from the genus template. See Lobatus costatus. When you move the species to a new genus, you will need to create the template for the target genus. See Template:Taxonomy/Aliger that was created yesterday. Rank and Parent are the two required values on the template.

I have not seen a lot of complication on Gastropod taxoboxes. If it worked on Lobatus costatus, it should work on every other mollusk out there. On the long run, this will save us a lot of time with updating. Please feel free to ask more questions. I will try to address your concerns with examples. Thanks. — Ganeshk (talk) 22:47, 20 September 2011 (UTC)

I understand the appeal of automatic taxoboxes, but... the way the whole thing is currently set up is far too difficult, clunky and off-putting; it seems to be in too early a stage of development to make the automatic taxobox usable for everyone, especially for brand new users of Wikipedia! (The encyclopedia is greatly in need of more new dedicated users, as you all know.) Until now, a newbie creating a new gastropod species article could simply copy and paste a taxobox from a related taxon and fix it up manually, very easy to do. I feel that the current system would cause people to struggle and then give up. Invertzoo (talk) 16:57, 21 September 2011 (UTC)

I think automating taxoboxes is a great idea, but I don't see robust programming skills and good communication with other editors going on at the automatic taxoboxes project. I don't think it is an appropriate addition to this bot. --68.105.141.221 (talk) 21:47, 21 September 2011 (UTC)

The automatic gastropod taxoboxes need of course to be able to readily and very easily accommodate every possible kind of necessary taxobox change, and to be free of any significant bugs, but an equally important part of the whole process is creating a user interface, introduction and instructions that are truly user-friendly and very easily intelligible, even to a complete newbie. No degree of familiarity with the underlying process can be assumed. I feel that this is often as much of a challenge as writing the code in the first place. Invertzoo (talk) 15:15, 23 September 2011 (UTC)

Invertzoo, It is similar to MediaWiki code; it was a challenge for each of us and we got used to it. The documentation is getting much better. It is really easy once you get the genus template created. I suggest you please give it a test. Try converting a couple of species articles to use {{Speciesbox}} using Lobatus costatus as an example. — Ganeshk (talk) 13:58, 24 September 2011 (UTC)

I appreciate all the work that you guys are putting into this, and I do not doubt that the instruction pages for these automatic taxoboxes are currently getting better and better, but I am sorry to say the instruction pages are still far from being really helpful, crystal-clear and suitably user-friendly. They currently read more like shopping lists. I have a lot on my plate right now including a badly sprained knee which may require an operation, and when I look at those instruction pages as they currently stand, they give me a headache and a sinking feeling, and I just don't care enough about the cause to make the effort to try to overcome that. By the way, I learned MediaWiki markup not from the so-called Wp help pages (which were, and probably still are, horribly written), but simply from copying what other people had done on edit pages. I can't do that with these autotaxoboxes. Invertzoo (talk) 19:46, 24 September 2011 (UTC)

The new box can be copied across articles as well. I will need more specific examples on what you see as complicated. I hope you feel better soon. — Ganeshk (talk) 00:36, 25 September 2011 (UTC)

OK, I will try to get back to you with examples as soon as I reasonably can. So much stuff is happening IRL now that I am very tired currently. Invertzoo (talk) 18:17, 28 September 2011 (UTC)

Wording the "Distribution" sections

To those of us for whom English is not our first language, I wanted to say that the word "Distribution" is fine, but when you say that a species "is distributed in" a certain area, it sounds really weird to native English speakers (as if Fedex comes along and drops the snails off here and there). Please use the phrase "occurs in" instead. Also rather than saying a marine species occurs "along" a country, it is better to say either "off of" that country or "along the coast of" that country. Thanks, Invertzoo (talk) 19:26, 24 September 2011 (UTC)

"Off of" sounds like weird-American to me :-). I prefer "off the coast of", "along the coast of", "in the intertidal zone of coastal", or some such expression. --99of9 (talk) 00:22, 28 September 2011 (UTC)

Yes those all sound better to me too! Thanks 99of9, Invertzoo (talk) 18:16, 28 September 2011 (UTC)

I must agree with 99of9 here. Daniel Cavallari (talk) 21:09, 29 September 2011 (UTC)

Hypobranchial gland, please add to this new article

Do we perhaps need a short article on the hypobranchial gland in gastropods? Quite a lot of articles refer to it. Is there a section on it in another article, or not? Invertzoo (talk) 15:23, 27 September 2011 (UTC)

Why not? A good source to begin discussing (or rather describing) the subject would be British Prosobranch Molluscs by Fretter and Graham (1962). I would gladly add some info in case you decide to create the article! Daniel Cavallari (talk) 21:06, 29 September 2011 (UTC)

I quickly threw something together. Maybe you can fix it up a bit Daniel? I am rather preoccupied with a serious knee injury, seeing a lot of doctors etc, also some unpleasant dentistry too :( Invertzoo (talk) 19:01, 30 September 2011 (UTC)

Edits to Conidae articles

Could someone review the changes made by User:Shadowshador? If the edits are good then a number of articles will need to be moved to agree with their taxoboxes. mgiganteus1 (talk) 12:40, 18 September 2011 (UTC)

Thanks so much for this heads up, it might have taken us a long time to notice this. These taxonomy changes are being done by a brand new editor to Wikipedia (started yesterday) who obviously is interested in cone snails. Just now I left him a couple of welcoming and inviting messages on his talk page. If he replies to me I will explain what needs to be done, but if I don't hear back I will leave another message explaining the best way to go about changing nomenclature on a big group like this. Invertzoo (talk) 15:49, 18 September 2011 (UTC)

I have now left a note explaining to Shadowshador a little about how best to do these kinds of changes, updating the nomenclature of such a large group of species which have now been assigned to many new genera. I have also invited him to join this project. Hoping to get a reply over the next few days. Invertzoo (talk) 16:41, 18 September 2011 (UTC)

The genus Conus is a tough nut to crack. Tucker and Tenorio (2009) proposed a split up of this genus in many genera (such as Africonus, Gladioconus etc.); This seems to be accepted provisionally by Bouchet et al. (2011) in "A new operational classification of the Conoidea (Gastropoda)". However, they also mention that a new molecular phylogeny of the Conidae is currently in preparation. WoRMS, on the other hand, accepts all these new genera as "alternate representations" of Conus (see : [27]). These changes were done by dr. Bouchet himself (see: [28]) It is my opinion that we stick to the policy followed by WoRMS, awaiting a definitive study. We can always mention the alternate representation in the taxobox. JoJan (talk) 17:02, 18 September 2011 (UTC)

The most modern clasification of Conoidea is Bouchet et al. (2011). I would like to aks, where there is exactly written, that Bouchet et al. (2011) have accepted those genera by Tucker and Tenorio (2009) provisionally? Maybe I have overlooked it, but those genera are used in that classification normally (they are used as genera, they are not used as synonyms). (I do not care how those genera and families are used in WoRMS, because WoRMS is NOT peer-reviewed resource. WoRMS is changed every day based on actual mood of taxonomists. We can not always blindly follow WoRMS.) There is also not possible to wait to anything in preparation, which is too vaguely. Such preparation can lasts for years. You personally can wait for such work that is claimed to be in preparation, but you can not obstruct other wikipedians to use classification from the most recent peer reviewed resource. --Snek01 (talk) 23:56, 18 September 2011 (UTC)

Update

The new user Shadowshador (up to the time of this message) had been continuing to make similar edits, however I just got a message on my talk page as follows.I will try to reply to it after I have lunch.

Family: Conidae

Hi there Im Shadowshador and the Family: Conidae is out of date here so It needs an update. Im new to Wik and use to working on flickr so editing help is needed.

Heres a link to my Flickr. http://www.flickr.com/photos/29287337@N02/

Shadowshador — Preceding unsigned comment added byShadowshador (talk •contribs) 17:18, 18 September 2011 (UTC)

I told Shadowshador I liked his photos and asked him if he wanted to make some shell images for this project and here is his reply:

...............

Hi there again, You can use my photos as long if you say some where that I Shadowshador took them and link them to my flickr. Also some of my photos may be of some help as with some spp only I have taken photos of some. I also do microscopic photo life, as I have seen on wik some info is there but not the photos.

Heres a link to some of my microscopic work. Kingdom: Chromalveolata http://www.flickr.com/photos/29287337@N02/collections/72157621761398979/

Kingdom: Amoebozoa http://www.flickr.com/photos/29287337@N02/collections/72157623261935732/

Kingdom: Eubacteria http://www.flickr.com/photos/29287337@N02/collections/72157623519941529/

Shadowshador

.................

I have to explain to him that his Flickr shell pictures appear to be "all rights reserved" so we can't use them here. (Snek, am I correct about this?) Also, the microorganism images he has made may be very useful indeed elsewhere on Wikipedia, but not to the gastropod project. Invertzoo (talk) 20:22, 18 September 2011 (UTC)

Yes, the flickr shell pictures are copyrighted. Two ways to go about this, ask the user to change the flickr license to CC, or have the user upload the photos directly to Commons and release them under CC. — Ganeshk (talk) 00:18, 26 September 2011 (UTC)

Ganesh, would you mind telling him this yourself? Currently there are so many messages from me on his talk page and not many from anyone else. My thanks to you, Invertzoo (talk) 18:25, 27 September 2011 (UTC)

 Done I have posted a note to the user about licensing. — Ganeshk (talk) 21:30, 27 September 2011 (UTC)

Thanks Ganesh, Invertzoo (talk) 18:19, 28 September 2011 (UTC)

................

Shellnut

I have been following the evolving nomenclature with great interest. Molecular phylogeny, particularly with the advent of nuclear DNA testing in addition to the mDNA testing (testing in the Conidae started by Christopher Meyer and Alan Kohn) appear to have fully vindicated Tucker & Tenorio's proposed nomenclature for the Conoidea as it relates to the "Cone shells" as a group. Clearly there is more than one genus in the Conidae, the scientific evidence is overwhelming. WoRMS should not just reflect the opinions of one or two members of the scientific community, it should reflect either the accepted consensus or at least the current literature. I agree with Shadowshador that the use of "provisional" acceptance or "alternate" representations of the Family Conidae is inappropriate. Dr. Bouchet is not the only expert on the subject; e.g. Alan Kohn, Nicholas Pulliandre, Christopher Meyer, Baldomero Olivera, J.K. Tucker, M.J. Tenorio, Y. Kantor, J.P. Rocroi, A.J. da Motta, A. Valdez, and many others. People outside of the "scientific community" look to these secondary sources as setting forth "scientific truths" and rely on them. People adding content to WoRMS and Wikipedia should at least do their very best to portary the latest cutting edge science and not steadfastly stick to 18th century ideas until there is a "definitive study" so to speak. When might that ever be? People are still debating "global warming" (and evolution for that matter) and refusing to accept that it occurs, waiting for a "definitive study." The science is out there so let's move on already. The days of blindly lumping hundreds of species in a single genus in a single family are over. It might take decades to perform detailed genetic testing on each and every species, that does not mean that the science that has already been performed should be ignored. I hope that this comment sparks some legitimate debate by the professional experts and educated non-professionals in the field on the topic. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Shellnut (talk • contribs) 03:47, 29 September 2011 (UTC)

When I googled the book, Tucker J.K. & Tenorio M.J. (2009) Systematic classification of Recent and fossil conoidean gastropods, I ran into this article. Will this work for our reference purposes? — Ganeshk (talk) 12:15, 29 September 2011 (UTC)

I've been using this article in my reviews of the articles in Conoidea in the last couple of weeks. I've restricted myself mainly to the Turridae, reviewing the new families in alphabetical order. I have now arrived at Drilliidae, having finished Clavus. But still a very long way to go, with over 4,000 species in Conoidea. That will take months. I haven't touched Conidae and especially Conus since I could not find consensus about this subject. Dr. Bouchet is co-author of the above cited article and at the same time marks genera such as Africonus as an alternate representation in WoRMS. This is confusing. But now it seems the general opinion is moving towards Tucker & Tenorio. That's a good reason not to undo the changes made by Shadowshador to Conus. However, every changed article has to be moved to its new name in order to have consistency between the title and the text. And the discussion page of each old article has to be deleted. As an admin I can do all this. It's just, I don't know how to find the time to do it all. I'm very busy in real life at this moment and can spend only fleeting moments at my computer. JoJan (talk) 12:59, 29 September 2011 (UTC)

Yes, Ganeschk, that is the correct citation to the Tucker and Tenorio work, and I have seen Dr. Bouchet's 2011 article - which appears to support Tucker & Tenorio's classification system, making it even more odd that Dr. Bouchet states otherwise in WoRMS: "Traditionally, all cone shells have been included in the Linnean genus Conus. Tucker & Tenorio (2009) have recently proposed an alternative shell- and radula-based classification that recognizes 4 families and 80 genera of cones. In WoRMS, we currently still recognize a single family Conidae (following Puillandre et al. 2011), but Tucker & Tenorio's 80 genera classification is presented as "alternative representation". [P. Bouchet, 14 Aug. 2011]". I agree with JoJan that it is particularly confusing that the most recent definitive work on the nomenclature of the Conidae has not been accepted with open arms by everyone, especially Dr. Bouchet. As an aside, the Conidae has been a taxonomic "nightmare" by anyone's best description for almost 300 years. Well over 1,000 species have been named, about 700 are accepted species today - and all in the sole genus Conus. Dozens of genera or subgenera have been named, and various classification systems proposed only to be shot down by others. A.J. da Motta proposed a generic classification of the Conidae in 1991, which was widely ridiculed. Thus, it seems no one until recently has had the fortitude to put up another generic classification scheme for this large and diverse family, until Tucker & Tenorio in 2009. This leads to the current dilemma. Who is right? I personally believe that the recent articles by N. Puillandre, et al. in 2011, with mDNA and nuclear DNA testing of the Conoidea have vindicated Tucker & Tenorio, and that their nomenclature system for the Conidae is valid and should be used, if and until proven wrong.(See recent 2011 articles, The dragon tamed? A molecular phylogeny of the Conoidea (Gastropoda), J. of Molluscan Studies (2011) 77(3): 259-272, and Genetic divergence and geographical variation in the deep-water Conus orbignyi complex (Mollusca: Conoidea), Zoologica Scripta (2011) 40(4) 350-363.) Calling it an "alternate representation" system in WoRMS and in Wikipedia articles seems like an insult given that for all outward appearances their science is good and has not been disproven in any peer reviewed professional publications. Any thoughts out there? Shellnut (talk) 04:59, 1 October 2011 (UTC)

I tend to concur with the reasoning given by Shellnut. Splitting up Conus, with over 600 accepted names and a total of 1830 accepted names + synonyms, into about 80 new genera will be a gigantic task that eventually will have to be done. I can only hope that this will be the last time, because Conus has always been a nightmare to malacologists. JoJan (talk) 14:24, 1 October 2011 (UTC)

If the split is clearly identified, I can get my bot to update the articles. — Ganeshk (talk) 15:34, 1 October 2011 (UTC)

I am glad to see discussion being sparked here, JoJan, Invertzoo, and Ganeshk. What would be really nice would be to hear input from Tucker, Tenorio, Puillandre, Meyer, Bouchet, and Kohn. I personally met Alan Kohn years ago at Washington State University when I took a summer (live in) Marine Invertebrate Zoology course at Friday Harbor Marine Labs. I have had e-mail correspondence with Dr. Kohn regarding this topic, three to four years ago. At that time it was his considered opinion that somebody would "crack the nut" in the near future. We discussed the newest technology then being performed, mDNA testing by Christopher Meyer, which worked out the Cypraidae nicely. Dr. Kohn related to me that they had tried that with the Conidae but it did not explain the variability sufficiently. Now with nuclear DNA testng as well it may be good enough. Dr. Bouchet, et al.'s recent article (2011) hints that a complete molecular phylogeny of the Conidae is in the works by Dr. Meyer. Ever curious, I e-mailed Dr. Meyer, with no response; maybe I have a bad/old e-mail. Does anyone have any further informtion on the work? The several recent articles by Dr. Bouchet, et al., and Dr. Puillandre, et al. seem to make the case that the systematics proposed by Tucker & Tenorio are valid and supported by DNA testing. I consider myself pretty conservative on these issues and am loath to make huge changes in systematics to my personal collection (of roughly 30,000 or more) as change for its own sake is time consuming and tiring, but after these recent articles it appears to make sense. Thoughts? Shellnut (talk) 19:59, 1 October 2011 (UTC)

Hi again Shellnut. On Wikipedia, sticking to our basic overall published source is often much more necessary than expressing our opinion of the validity of the latest published taxonomy paper. Here on Wikipedia in Project Gastropods we basically have to go with one or two overall sources as the foundation of our information, so as not to complicate things too much. One great advantage of the on-line database WoRMS is that it can be searched and info extracted using robotic software, a bot called Ganeshbot that our member Ganesh created. The other inescapable thing we always struggle with is the fact that there are only a very few really active editors in the gastropod project, maybe seven of us, and the amount of work involved in project gastropods and the time it takes to do is truly staggering. You have not really done any significant article editing yet, so you have no idea how fast it eats up the hours. We often have to compromise like crazy because we just don't have the manpower. We are all volunteers, we all have busy lives outside of Wikipedia. We just do what we can and that's that. It may look like fun from the outside to a newbie but a lot of what we do is just bone-crushingly routine. It takes a lot of dedication. Invertzoo (talk) 22:13, 1 October 2011 (UTC)

Reliable sources for gastropod taxonomy?

Recently, in discussions with two contributors who are not yet project members but who have done work on gastropod articles, the subject of what we choose to use as our basis for the taxonomy has come under discussion. As far as I can tell, our current project members agree that the 2005 Bouchet and Rocroi paper is suitable at the present time to be used as a foundation for our overall taxonomic treatments at family level and above. We don't have much choice in this, as we are more or less forced to use one taxonomy that treats the whole class Gastropoda, otherwise if we tried to put together a taxonomy piece by piece, the overall organization of the gastropod taxa articles would become completely chaotic. For a foundation, it makes sense to use the most recent overall treatment of gastropod taxonomy, and one that has been well-recieved professionally.

Within our Wikipedia discussions with two non-project editors, there has been some disagreement about which (subsequent to 2005) taxonomy updates we should use, from which kind of source. Unfortunately most of us simply don't have access to all the primary literature as it comes out. User:Snek01 is in favor of using only primary literature to update our taxonomy, with author citations that meet the ICZN guidelines. Some of the rest of us feel that two of the best of the online professional databases:

• World Register of Marine Species (WoRMS)
• [29][30] the Paleobiology Database

are appropriate for us to use as reliable sources, even though they are not primary literature, they are not peer-reviewed, and the taxonomy in these databases does not always correspond to what has been published in the most newest papers on certain families or subfamilies of gastropods. One of the great advantages of a database source is that it can be mined for new articles and additional information using a bot. Another advantage is that the people who put together and update the databases are concerned to make their whole classification fit together properly, rather than tackling it piecemeal.

I wanted to raise this issue here, because it affects the project as a whole. Invertzoo (talk) 15:28, 29 September 2011 (UTC)

Susan, WoRMS is peer reviewed. It's not as if it were a scientific journal, but Philippe Bouchet, Gary Rosenberg, Serge Gofas and many other very well known mollusk specialists are constantly reviewing the information in their database. I'd say with a good degree of certainty that it is quite reliable. Can't say anything about Paleobiology Database, though. Daniel Cavallari (talk) 20:56, 29 September 2011 (UTC)

I concur with Daniel Cavallari. WoRMS is updated every day and follows every new scientific publication. We can hardly be faster than they are. In the case of Conus, this is a different matter. The same co-author says one thing in a journal and does another thing in WoRMS. Very confusing. An email to Dr. Bouchet might bring clarification. Anyway, we're following, as agreed, WoRMS, except when newer publications have not been adopted yet by WoRMS. But then we mention this in the article. I don't think wikipedia is to blame for anything in this respect. We're following logical rules. As to the Paleobiology Database, there is not much to be said by me, since I don't use it (but I probably should). JoJan (talk) 21:13, 29 September 2011 (UTC)

I concur with the above, especially JoJan's comment about Dr. Bouchet and his failure to agree with what appears to be the emerging scientific trend in the Conidae and related famil(ies) [Conorbidae, and Conolithidae]. I would add that Bouchet & Rocroi, Nomenclator of Bivalve Families, Malacology (2010) 52(2): 1-184, is the latest peer reviewed publication on systematics of the Bivalvia, following Bieler & Mikkelsen, Bivalvia - a look at the branches, Zoological Journal of the Linnean Society (2006) 148: 223-235. What would be a really interesting debate would be to have John Tucker and Philippe Bouchet argue their respective positions on the taxonomy of the Conidae. To quote John Tucker, "What be Conidae? ... Having done my very best along with Manuel Tenorio's heroic efforts, I hope we have pushed the cone shells over the precipice. Time will tell." (The Cone Collector, Issue #16, p. 70) It is FINALLY about time.Shellnut (talk) —Preceding undated comment added 06:11, 1 October 2011 (UTC).

This is the gastropod project, and so we don't really deal with bivalves here, except very rarely and incidentally. Anyway, as I understand it, the problem with the Tucker & Tenorio 2009 work is that it is morphology-based... shell morphology, radula morphology, that kind of thing. That approach is a very old-fashioned, sort-of mid-20th century approach to taxonomy, so unfortunately the paper is out-dated by definition, no matter how recently it was published. These days if you attempt to make a taxonomy for a large taxon like Conus without doing all the necessary molecular work (DNA, RNA), then you can't really expect the hard-core professionals to take your work seriously. Time and time again in other gastropod groups, morphological characters such as shell shape etc have been proved to be very misleading. I certainly would not call T&T's paper an "emerging scientific trend", not that particular study. Trying to sort out the Conoidea, yes, that is ongoing research. However I do understand that many shell dealers and shell collectors will have enthusiastically embraced T&T's publication; shell dealers in particular love it when taxa are split, because it gives them opportunities to sell more items under new names. I think there are very good reasons why Dr. Bouchet has not implemented T&T's taxonomy on WoRMS. (I have worked behind the scenes at AMNH for more than 10 years, and in the early 1980s at MCZ for 2 years, so I have personally seen how extremely the field of malacological taxonomy has changed in recent years.) Invertzoo (talk) 19:30, 1 October 2011 (UTC)

Older taxonomy for paleontologists

Hi everyone. We now have an article on the taxon Trochina which is a suborder that paleontologists use (or used to use?). It does not exist in Bouchet & Rocroi's taxonomy. However, if it is still regularly in use in paleontology then I assume it is good to have an article on it. I tried to fix up the article a bit, but I would be grateful if someone else could take a look at it. Invertzoo (talk) 14:02, 7 October 2011 (UTC)

Query

See Talk:Calliostoma_palmeri#Query. — Ganeshk (talk) 23:14, 10 October 2011 (UTC)

Resolved. Invertzoo (talk) 11:43, 19 October 2011 (UTC)

Snail slime

It could be entitled Gastropod mucus instead... might make it less prone to vandalism? Invertzoo (talk) 19:54, 26 October 2011 (UTC)

We have a new article which is currently entitled "snail slime". I think it may possibly have been started on a COI basis by someone who cares a bit too much about the uses of snail slime in the cosmetics industry.... however, I am trying to see if the article can be rescued and turned into something worthwhile. I have cleaned up the prose as best as I can but I have not researched the subject at all. Please anyone who is willing, would you take a look and try to make the article more scientific and find some better references and/or do any other clean up? Many thanks, Invertzoo (talk) 18:45, 25 October 2011 (UTC)

Also does anyone know if we have a good image showing the slime trail of a snail or slug? If so it would be very handy for this article. Thanks. Invertzoo (talk) 18:56, 25 October 2011 (UTC)

I removed the claim that snail slime contains the items below. I googled with site:edu and google scholared these key words, but couldn't find anything. Lots of claims at commercial sites though.

• snail allantoin
• snail elastin
• snail collagen
• snail glycolic acid
• snail antibiotic

Thanks for removing that info then, much appreciated Anna. Invertzoo (talk) 19:54, 26 October 2011 (UTC)

I searched commons for a slime photo. Nothing. Maybe it can't be photographed, like air or vampires. Anna Frodesiak (talk) 01:42, 26 October 2011 (UTC)

I am pretty sure we have one or two images that show the silvery slime trail right behind the snail/slug, I just can't remember what species it/they were. It is a very common thing to see those slivery trails on concrete or similar surfaces in the morning after a damp warm night when the snails and slugs have been out and about. Invertzoo (talk) 19:54, 26 October 2011 (UTC)

Assessment of "A" class articles

As most of you may have noticed, in our table of numbers of gastropod articles listed by quality and importance we have had (for quite some time) 8 articles that were supposedly assessed as "A" class. "A" class is considered to be very close to Featured Article in standard, the highest standard that Wikipedia recognizes. However, it appears to be the case that the proper A-class assessment procedure was not followed when A status was first awarded to these eight articles. The necessary qualifications for an article to reach A class, and a description of the proper procedure for awarding A class, are described here [31].

It would be very helpful if we can attempt to have these articles properly assessed, one by one, to see if any of them do currently qualify for an exceptionally high rating, or can rapidly be improved to meet a very high rating standard. However, any of these articles that currently cannot qualify as higher than a "B" or cannot rapidly be improved to rate higher than that, should remain as "B" class until they are further improved.

In several of these articles, in hidden text on the talk page, the original editor claimed that all existing published information on the little-known species is already included in the article, however, even when that is the case, that in itself is not sufficient basis to award "A" status. In addition, "A" status cannot be awarded by the same person who first put together the article. Invertzoo (talk) 13:01, 29 October 2011 (UTC)

Spire (mollusc)

Hi everyone. I wonder why our Spire article is entitled Spire mollusk instead of Spire gastropod...? As far as I know gastropods are the only mollusks that have a spire in their shell? Unless perhaps some of the Cretaceous ammonites? I was going to move the article name, but will listen for any objections before doing this. Invertzoo (talk) 13:44, 6 October 2011 (UTC)

It looks as if the term "spire" is at least sometimes used in shelled cephalopods. I am checking with project cephalopods, and if they say yes, I will add to the article the fact that this is also applied to cephalopods. Invertzoo (talk) 13:53, 7 October 2011 (UTC)

I did not hear back from the Cephalopod project but from a google search it seems that the word spire was certainly historically applied to ammonites, and may still be an accepted part of the terminology, so for the time being I will leave the title as it is. Invertzoo (talk) 13:44, 31 October 2011 (UTC)

CIESM Atlas

I ran into this website, The Mediterranean Science Commission Atlas. Please review and add it to links page if you feel it is useful. — Ganeshk (talk) 23:02, 5 November 2011 (UTC)

Hey thanks Ganesh for finding this resource. It looks really good to me as far as I can tell after a quick inspection. Invertzoo (talk) 00:02, 6 November 2011 (UTC)

I've made it a bookmark. JoJan (talk) 21:36, 6 November 2011 (UTC)

Unaccepted

I have refreshed the Wikipedia:WikiProject Gastropods/Unaccepted page. We have about 527 unaccepted species pages. — Ganeshk (talk) 11:56, 21 October 2011 (UTC)

Thanks Ganesh and to JoJan who is gradually doing all the work to fix these. Invertzoo (talk) 19:46, 23 October 2011 (UTC)

What's an "unaccepted species"? I only as this because I have recently added photos to a number of these pages.Shellnut (talk) 21:01, 4 November 2011 (UTC)

I had written a bot to check the validity of the species articles on Wikipedia by comparing them with the WoRMS database. I run it quarterly and list any species with a status other than "accepted" on this page. The listed species are either a synonym, an alternate representation, a nomen nudum or nomen dubium as per WoRMS. The project members will then go through the list and redirect/move the species page to the accepted name. For example, Aesopus spiculum. — Ganeshk (talk) 00:35, 5 November 2011 (UTC)

Shellnut, when a species article turns out to be using an unaccepted name and gets "moved" to another name, your image will get moved along with it. However when that happens, it would be good to get the image file name "moved" also, so the name of the image is accurate. I am figuring that the ones you are talking about are Coralliophilinae? Invertzoo (talk) 21:06, 5 November 2011 (UTC)

Invertzoo, yes that was what was on my mind at the time. Now it is also with Megastraea as well. Boy, you guys really work fast on those new ones! Special thanks to Ganeshk, JoJan, and Invertzoo for all the help on the genus and my favorite local "star turban" shell!!!!Shellnut (talk) 18:22, 9 November 2011 (UTC)

Fossil versus living gastropods

Yesterday I noticed for the first time that we have an article on Pleurotomarioidea and also one on Pleurotomariacea. The latter terminology is favored by paleontologists who have a different view of this superfamily. This one small problem represents the tip of a rather large iceberg. I am not sure how we should handle this: one taxonomy (Bouchet & Rocroi, 2005) is used by students of living (extant) gastropods, whereas it seems that another one (Treatise on Invertebrate Paleontology) is still very much in use by paleontologists. I hope to get some input on this question from paleontologists. Comments are welcome. Invertzoo (talk) 01:51, 9 November 2011 (UTC)

Megastraea undosa - rather than Lithopoma undosum

Please note: nomenclature of Lithopoma undosum is BAD according to WoRMS, it should be Megastraea undosa now, see WoRMS species 528084, and references therein. New genus article for Megastraea and new species article for Megastraea undosahave been added, so this one can be deleted. There are two species in the genus, both Eastern Pacific, including M. turbanica. Both articles have images.

I have redirected Lithopoma undosum to Megastraea undosa. Please check Redirect to learn how this is done. — Ganeshk (talk) 12:24, 9 November 2011 (UTC)

One minor problem I cannot fix is that when I entered the species article, I mispelled the species as Megastraea undosua and the letter "u" had to be removed afterwards. I just can't get the species article to change its name to match everything else. Argh! Fat fingers and newbie syndrome.Shellnut (talk) 07:47, 9 November 2011 (UTC)

I have renamed Megastraea undosua to Megastraea undosa. Please check Moving a page to learn how this is done. — Ganeshk (talk) 12:24, 9 November 2011 (UTC)

Thank you Ganeshk!!!Shellnut (talk) 16:02, 9 November 2011 (UTC)

Request for review

I have started to enlarge the article Helicodonta obvoluta. Like in the case of Trochulus oreinos I would ask preferably some native English speakers to review the style of my sometimes clumsy English. Next week I will add a section about habitat and conservation. Many thanks, --Edmund Sackbauer (talk) 13:04, 4 November 2011 (UTC)

Thanks for the very welcome expansion on this interesting species. I went through the article once tonight fixing the prose up a bit, but I will go through it again tomorrow when I am less tired. Best wishes, Invertzoo (talk) 23:46, 4 November 2011 (UTC)

It looks very nice now. Thanks for your work! Invertzoo (talk) 19:34, 10 November 2011 (UTC)

Thanks to you for the improvements in style and grammar! I´m still thinking on even more expansions of this article, but my real life is quite chaotic at the moment.--Edmund Sackbauer (talk) 08:50, 14 November 2011 (UTC)

It looks really nice already. I enjoyed reading about this species because I learned quite a lot from your expansion of the article. Whenever you have time to get round to adding more info will be plenty soon enough, there is no rush. Best, Invertzoo (talk) 02:48, 16 November 2011 (UTC)

Intimate Contact Induced Surface Separation (ICISS)

It is "...a method used to quickly inhibit terrestrial snails’ nervous system..."

Just bringing it to your attention. I don't know what to make of it. Anna Frodesiak (talk) 16:41, 17 November 2011 (UTC)

Very weird and not really suitable for Wikipedia for several reasons. let's see if it gets deleted or not. Thanks for the heads up on it anyway. Invertzoo (talk) 02:40, 19 November 2011 (UTC)

Discussion on the new genera of Conus

I wanted to let everyone know that there is currently an ongoing discussion on User:Shellnut's talk page as JoJan, myself and Shellnut try to work out a good format for starting to include the 82 new proposed genera (from the Tucker & Tenorio 2009 paper) into the cone snail classification. I am not copying the whole discussion onto this page because it is very lengthy. This is partly because Shellnut is still a rather new contributor, and so we have to explain a lot of Wikipedia conventions as we go along. I will try to post updates here, but anyone who is interested, please feel free to come over to Shellnut's talk page and make any comments you feel may be helpful. Invertzoo (talk) 14:49, 20 November 2011 (UTC)

How many species of Conidae were changed on their species pages to read a genus name other than Conus outright, rather than reflecting the traditional genus name Conus and a listing of the "alternate representation" in the taxobox (as is standard to follow WoRMS)? I have done a reversion on a number of species pages so far ... looks like I may have to check all 640 species pages to keep the family consistent.Shellnut (talk) 04:44, 22 November 2011 (UTC)

It has been discussed here, User_talk:JoJan#What_to_do.3F. — Ganeshk (talk) 04:49, 22 November 2011 (UTC)

Thanks Ganeshk! That will save me a lot of searching. I will get to this soon and "revert" those articles to be consistent in style with the consensus on Wikiproject Gastropods. Do you have an opinion on the form and content of my Africonus article (and its sister article in Asprella? You comments would be greatly appreciated.Shellnut (talk) 16:23, 22 November 2011 (UTC)

I think it is okay to have the proposed genera articles. They are recognized by WoRMS as accepted. I suggest you write up the justification, Significance of "alternative representation", in a separate article. For example, Proposed split of genus Conus. It is kind of redundant to repeat the section in every article. — Ganeshk (talk) 20:52, 24 November 2011 (UTC)

Hello Ganeshk! Your link helped a lot. I have been able to "revert" more than half of the species articles to be consistent in style with the general consensus, back to Conus with the other genera and the species name listed under the synonyms section. Only 18 more to go; which I will save for another day.Shellnut (talk) 05:02, 23 November 2011 (UTC)

I have completed this task. All 41 genus annotations have been reverted to Conus as is consistent with WoRMS and the Wikiproject Gastropods standard format. Alternate representations are noted as synonyms at this time.Shellnut (talk) 07:18, 24 November 2011 (UTC)

Thanks so much for doing that, Shellnut, that is certainly what was needed for the time being anyway and it is a nuisance task which it is kind of you to do. Thanks for your work, it's really nice to have another enthusiastic and educated pair of hands around here! Invertzoo (talk) 21:24, 25 November 2011 (UTC)

About intros and general intelligibility

Hello folks, Two general points. Firstly a reminder that we should try to keep articles, and particularly the intros, intelligible to a general reader as much as possible. Articles should not be aimed at a specialist in the subject; Wikipedia is after all a general encyclopedia, not a biology encyclopedia or a malacological encyclopedia. We need to try to keep the technical jargon to a minimum, and when we do use a technical term, we can either blue link it, or explain it. And another point that often gets neglected by all of us, the intro (aka the "lede") of an article is supposed to be a concise summary of the whole article. I guess intros get neglected partly because summaries are hard to write well, and also because it is easy to forget that an intro need updating every time significantly more info is added to the body of an article. Thanks to everyone for your time and effort. Invertzoo (talk) 14:42, 26 November 2011 (UTC)

Pyramidellidae

The bot has been approved for trial. I would like to create 50 trial articles for the species/genus under Pyramidellidae[32]. Can you please confirm the introduction sentence and the taxonomy? I will need at least two members to add Approved to this bot run. Thanks. — Ganeshk (talk) 15:14, 23 October 2011 (UTC)

X
Scientific classification
Kingdom:	Animalia
Phylum:	Mollusca
Class:	Gastropoda
(unranked):	clade Heterobranchia clade Euthyneura clade Panpulmonata
Superfamily:	Pyramidelloidea
Family:	Pyramidellidae
Genus:	X
Species:	X. X
Binomial name
X. X

Genus

X is a genus of sea snails, marine gastropod mollusks in the family Pyramidellidae, the pyrams and their allies.

Species

X is a species of sea snail, a marine gastropod mollusk in the family Pyramidellidae, the pyrams and their allies.

WoRMS classification

Biota > Animalia (Kingdom) > Mollusca (Phylum) > Gastropoda (Class) > Heterobranchia (Subclass) > [unassigned] Heterobranchia (Infraclass) > Pyramidelloidea (Superfamily)

Perhaps the "genus" text could be expressed as follows :

Genus

X is a genus of parasitic, turriculated snails, gastropod mollusks in the family Pyramidellidae, the pyram family, or pyramid shells.

I would keep the "species" text as it is (because it is dangerous to become too specific on such basic level, using a bot) and perhaps add : the pyram family, or pyramid shells. JoJan (talk) 18:14, 23 October 2011 (UTC)

I would suggest that in both species and genus articles it should read: "of sea snail" or "of sea snails" and "marine gastropod mollusk" or "mollusks". The fact that they are marine is rather important. Invertzoo (talk) 19:27, 23 October 2011 (UTC)

Also I would leave out the word "turriculated", firstly because not all pyrams have a shell of that shape, (and secondly it would not in any case be correct to say a "turriculated snail". One would need to say a snail with a turriculated or perhaps better yet, tower-shaped or high-spired shell.) Invertzoo (talk) 19:27, 23 October 2011 (UTC)

• The bot will choose between sea snail vs snail based on whether the marine flag is set. If is marine flag is yes, "sea snail" and "marine" are added to the lead sentence, if not it will just say snail. Isn't it incorrect to identify snails living in brackish and fresh water habitats as sea snails?

• The taxonomy on the Pyramidellidae page (clade Heterobranchia, clade Euthyneura and clade Panpulmonata) does not match with the taxonomy on WoRMS. Please review.

— Ganeshk (talk) 02:30, 24 October 2011 (UTC)

I go along with InvertZoo with the use of "sea snail" according to the "marine flag" in the bot. The word "turriculated" (or augurlike) isn't really necessary. On second thought this could be inserted in the description of the genus or the species. A bigger problem is that the taxoboxes contain an older taxonomy. This goes down to the level of subfamilies, tribes, genera (see Chrysalida and species. However, a number of genera already contain the exact taxonomy (see: Miraldella). This is another job for a bot because manual work would be too cumbersome and time consuming to correct this. This could have remained undetected for some time, because, as far as I know, no one is really working on the Pyramidellidae at this moment. This is one of the advantages of setting the Ganeshbot at work. We will have to deal with "uncharted territory". JoJan (talk) 08:14, 24 October 2011 (UTC)

JoJan, it was Snek01 who updated the taxonomy to reflect Jörger et al. (2010). See edit

Jörger et al. (2010) have redefined major groups within the Heterobranchia and they moved Pyramidelloidea to Panpulmonata.

References

— Ganeshk (talk) 11:15, 24 October 2011 (UTC)

Sorry, I must have overlooked this recent change, being too busy in other parts of the Gastropoda. Then it goes without saying that the new taxonomy must be applied. And this goes for all the Panpulmonata. JoJan (talk) 14:50, 24 October 2011 (UTC)

I have updated the lead sentence and taxonomy above. I have left out parasitic and turriculated. Are we good to go? — Ganeshk (talk) 02:03, 25 October 2011 (UTC)

Which is better, "the pyrams and their allies" or "the pyram family, or pyramid shells"? — Ganeshk (talk) 02:04, 25 October 2011 (UTC)

I think "the pyrams and their allies" will cover it all. JoJan (talk) 17:58, 25 October 2011 (UTC)

Updated. — Ganeshk (talk) 01:26, 26 October 2011 (UTC)

Section break 1

I have created the first 50 articles. Please review each of them and let me know if they need any corrections. Thanks. — Ganeshk (talk) 04:12, 26 October 2011 (UTC)

They look OK to me, except that there are a lot of white spaces in the articles. JoJan (talk) 08:01, 26 October 2011 (UTC)

I have manually removed the extra white spaces on all the articles. I will look into this in the next run. — Ganeshk (talk) 11:15, 26 October 2011 (UTC)

I found a genus Costabieta with no species on it. Should these be created? — Ganeshk (talk) 04:26, 26 October 2011 (UTC)

This is one of the instances where we hit the limits of WoRMS. As this database isn't complete yet, we have to handle such cases manually and fill in the species, as I did in this case. JoJan (talk) 07:55, 26 October 2011 (UTC)

Section break 2

Good news. The bot request has been approved. I will create the next 100 articles and post back here. — Ganeshk (talk) 16:10, 31 October 2011 (UTC)

Please review the 100 new species articles and let me know they are good. — Ganeshk (talk) 13:34, 5 November 2011 (UTC)

Checked and OK. While I was at it, I've already added some text and images to Chrysallida fenestrata and Chrysallida terebellum. JoJan (talk) 15:06, 5 November 2011 (UTC)

The next 100 are ready to review. Should Eulimella (Bacteridium) be deleted? — Ganeshk (talk) 22:51, 5 November 2011 (UTC)

Checked and OK; Eulimella (Bacteridium) (last edit in WoRMS in 2006) has been moved to Eulimella carinatum (based on a report from 2010). JoJan (talk) 14:56, 6 November 2011 (UTC)

The next 100 are ready to review. I wish I had asked for a 250 limit. :) — Ganeshk (talk) 17:16, 6 November 2011 (UTC)

Checked and OK. Data added and a few moves made. Needed articles of genera : Megastomia, Miralda, Monotigma, Mormula, Noemiamea, Odostomella. JoJan (talk) 17:53, 8 November 2011 (UTC)

The next 100 are done. There were a couple of genus articles with no species on them. — Ganeshk (talk) 03:31, 9 November 2011 (UTC)

Checked and OK. Some genera of the Pyramidellidae in WoRMS haven't been edited since 2004. Dr. Bouchet wrote to me in an email that there are ca. 1500 species (of Pyramidellidae) in WoRMS, while the total number of valid species is about 3,500. He wants to wait for the results of the research of Lafolette et al. before adding the missing species. This could take some time. Therefore, I didn't add missing species that I found in other databases, since these could be synonyms and this would complicate things afterwards. JoJan (talk) 18:19, 9 November 2011 (UTC)

The next 100 articles are ready for review. Thanks for your help, JoJan. — Ganeshk (talk) 01:43, 11 November 2011 (UTC)

I corrected a few strange glitches of the bot in the section "synonyms" of Turbanilla. "Chrysallida thetisae" : I didn't know your bot could pick up new additions to WoRMS. That is certainly a major asset. Checking further.... JoJan (talk) 13:11, 11 November 2011 (UTC)

Checked and OK JoJan (talk) 19:04, 13 November 2011 (UTC)

The next 100 articles are ready for review. — Ganeshk (talk) 00:52, 14 November 2011 (UTC)

Checked and OK. JoJan (talk) 18:26, 28 November 2011 (UTC)

The next 106 articles are ready for review. — Ganeshk (talk) 17:53, 29 November 2011 (UTC)

Pleurotomariidae taxonomy issue in article

Please note: Bayerotrochus africanus is the recognized name of the species, not Pleurotomaria africanus (see WoRMS) and the second species article should therefore be deleted. Additionally, the Pleurotomaria genus then no longer has any species in it as all have been moved to other genera, making the genus article useful only for historical purposes and to draw readers to other genus and species pages for the family Pleurotomariidae. Shall I fix it?Shellnut (talk) 18:43, 26 November 2011 (UTC)

Fixed. Pleurotomaria remains a nomen conservandum. I've deleted Pleurotomaria africanus + talk page, I've created Pleurotomaria africana as a redirect. JoJan (talk) 20:15, 26 November 2011 (UTC)

Thank you JoJan!! I am adding images and fixing up some species articles in the family.Shellnut (talk) 20:52, 26 November 2011 (UTC)

JoJan and Invertzoo, I saw a need and fixed up one Pleurotomariidae species article (by adding description and distribution sections and an image), and added four more complete species articles. I had five species of "slit shells" in my collection and realized that Wikipedia was sorely lacking in images from that family so I decided to take some photos and post them. Enjoy!Shellnut (talk) 04:21, 27 November 2011 (UTC)

It's great to have this fascinating family better represented on Wikipedia! Really nice photos too! Many thanks Shellnut! Invertzoo (talk) 14:07, 27 November 2011 (UTC)

Invertzoo, I bet that working at a museum you have access to more specimens and more species ... image possibilities abound!Shellnut (talk) 19:47, 27 November 2011 (UTC)

Well, I have volunteered in the AMNH for more than 10 years, but sad to say the Malacology section of Invertebrate Zoology closed about 4 years ago and I had to move over to Invertebrate Paleontology. All of the shell collection is locked up. You have to apply in writing to make a special appointment to even look in one cabinet. It put a big crimp in my research. Invertzoo (talk) 01:26, 30 November 2011 (UTC)

Taxonomy vs Classification vs Systematics vs.....

Debate on taxonomy sections listed at Wikipedia_talk:WikiProject_Tree_of_life#Taxonomy_vs_Classification_vs_Systematics_vs..... It follows on from discussion at Wikipedia_talk:WikiProject_Plants#General_structure_for_plant_articles_and_lists cheers, Casliber (talk · contribs) 10:44, 27 November 2011 (UTC)

In the future, Coninae

In the future (probably within a year or 18 months), when WoRMS finally fully accepts a new classification of what is now Conus (the cone snails), using "new" genera and "new" families (presumably those that will be used in the anticipated upcoming paper on this topic) we will need to do a lot of changes:

1. Make family articles for any "new" families, and list all their genera
2. Greatly revise existing Conidae article
3. Create genus articles for any additional genera or different genera, i.e. ones that were not recognized by T&T (this could happen!)
4. If that does happen, make any necessary revisions in any articles that are affected by genera that are changed compared with the T&T taxonomy
5. Revise all of the current genus taxoboxes to remove the existing taxonomy from family to genus levels, and put in the "new" families as needed
6. Remove, change or greatly trim the text from the "new" genus articles where they refer to alternative representation
7. Revise the text and taxoboxes for all of the existing species articles that are currently in Coninae
8. Make sweeping changes to, or eliminate the "List of Conus species" article
9. Presumably make Coninae into a redirect
10. Work on all related changes

Invertzoo (talk) 16:55, 28 November 2011 (UTC)

Just to make it clear: all of these changes needs to wait for the future when WoRMS accepts a whole new taxonomy for this group. We can't show two systems of taxonomy simultaneously in the same articles, and we can't shift over to the "new" taxonomy until WoRMS does. Invertzoo (talk) 13:14, 2 December 2011 (UTC)

Mitromorphidae - BOT help please

I was working on the superfamily Conoidea, looking for broken links, old taxonomy, etc., and came upon an empty family article, Mitromorphidae, so I wrote a start article. The problem is that the genus Mitromorpha has a lot of species articles which ALL refer to old taxonomy (pre-2011 Bouchet, et al.) and have the genus in the family Conidae and subfamily Clathuerllinae. These all need changed over, and seem to be a job for the BOT. Any thoughts?Shellnut (talk) 20:03, 10 December 2011 (UTC)

 Done I have updated the taxonomy for all the species under Mitromorpha (106 edits). — Ganeshk (talk) 16:05, 11 December 2011 (UTC)

Thank you Ganeshk!! I ran into these families while perusing the Conoidea and noted the red links. I saw that JoJan had written a few of the sister articles and followed his lead. Have you had a chance to see my updated genus articles under the Conidae? I have two more (bigger) articles in my sandboxes also. Thank you again for your help.Shellnut (talk) 16:39, 11 December 2011 (UTC)

I was dealing with the changes in Conidae and Turridae when I had to switch to the new articles created by the GaneshkBot. I'm busy now with the Pyramidellidae, a little studied family with almost nothing on the internet. I've taking the opportunity to write a great number number of articles (with images) on Odostomia, making Wikipedia the almost unique offerer of content on this genus. If I hadn't done it now, probably no one would have ever touched those articles in perhaps another 10 years.Then I'll continue with GaneshkBot. JoJan (talk) 09:38, 12 December 2011 (UTC)

I know you are busy JoJan and just thought that I would help out a bit. I have not forgotten you on the Pyramidellidae though, and I intend to try to re-shoot those images better. I also have one more species in the family (from St. Maarten in the Caribbean) that I can photograph as well. Ganeshk's help really went a long way to cleaning up these two families. I have fixed all but one of the disambuguous genus links in the Raphitomidae and intend to get the other one done asap. Thanks again Ganeshk!!Shellnut (talk) 22:28, 13 December 2011 (UTC)