Wikipedia:WikiProject Palaeontology/Article workshop

Welcome to the Article workshop of the WikiProject Palaeontology, a place for collaborative article editing. Paleontology-related articles of any length and quality can be listed here – to obtain feedback for your latest work; to get help in developing an article or request copy edits; to bring an article up to B-class level or to prepare for a Good or Featured Article Nomination; to collaboratively rework our oldest good and featured articles; and more. Submissions here invite everyone to contribute with comments, edits, and/or content additions. It is expected that the nominator will act as the main author, taking the lead in developing the article and responding to comments. This workshop is a novel concept that aims to combine the traditional formats of WP:Peer Review and WP:Collaborations. Unlike the Peer Review, we will not only list comments on this page, but edit the article directly wherever possible. Unlike collaborations, we do not vote on which article to work on together, but rely on a main author who submits the article and feels responsible for taking it forward. The aim of the workshop is to make article work less daunting and more fun by sharing some of the workload. Articles can benefit from the combined skills of several contributors. It also invites everyone to contribute to the listed articles with quick edits or comments, or even substantial content contributions that can lead to spontaneous collaborations. We aim to officially "approve" successfully reworked old Good and Featured Articles once they have been peer-reviewed and are without outstanding issues. In this case, the approved version and a link to the workshop discussion will be listed in the Article history section on the article's talk page, after archival of the review. Reviews should be announced in the WikiProject to gather as many comments as possible. So far, we approved one reworked Good Article (Dracopristis) and two reworked Featured Articles (Thescelosaurus and Lambeosaurus). Listed articles will be automatically archived after 100 days of inactivity. Archived articles may be re-submitted any time. History The current Article workshop has several predecessors. The Dinosaur collaboration started in 2006; a total of 29 collaborations took place, resulting in 14 "featured articles" and 7 "good articles". Its last successful collaboration was Brachiosaurus, which was promoted to "featured article" status in 2018. In 2019, the Palaeontology collaboration was initiated as a supplement, focusing on less complex articles. Its only collaboration was Acamptonectes, which was promoted to "featured article" status in 2021. The Paleo Peer Review was started in 2020, with a total of 43 articles receiving substantial comments, of which 6 were subsequently promoted to "good article" status and 3 to "featured article" status. The Article workshop itself was launched in October 2024 as a direct continuation of the Palaeo Peer Review in a revamped format. Click here to submit an article

Submissions

Triassic-Jurassic extinction event

I recently unsuccessfully nominated Triassic-Jurassic extinction event for the Featured List. A number of those who identified problems with the article are in this group, and I'm wondering if we can get its flaws resolved and renominate it once the two-week wait period between nominations expires. The consensus seemed to be that the article was rich in information and that the main problem was the lack of readability for a general reader, as while I am very good at adding information, my prose is very technical and not the most engaging, and I'm wondering if I can get some assistance from other WikiProject Palaeontology editors in making it more readable for an average Joe. Anteosaurus magnificus (talk) 07:07, 31 October 2024 (UTC)

Jens

Will have a detailed look when I got the time, but in general I think this is what we need:

• a background section. This should very briefly introduce mass extinctions, say how large this one was compared to the others etc. Then, I would say briefly something about the fauna/flora and events preceeding this mass extinction (PT extonction, Carnian Palluvial episode etc.). It should be especially easy to read and understand.

• technical language: introduce/explain difficult terms and concepts at first mention, or replace with plainer wording where you don't loose pecision.

• A FAC also need to be very comprehensive. I don't see anything about research history? --Jens Lallensack (talk) 09:13, 31 October 2024 (UTC)

I have just added a fairly barebones paragraph-long section on the research history of the TJME (that can be built on easily), discussing the ancient, dogmatic, uniformitarian theories about gradual climate change and sea level fall being the culprit, to talking about the asteroid impact craze of the 1980s and 1990s when the Cretaceous-Palaeogene extinction event was found to be caused by the Chicxulub impact and everybody was going around attributing every mass extinction to some impact event, to the development of the modern day consensus that the TJME was caused by the activity of the Central Atlantic Magmatic Province. Anteosaurus magnificus (talk) 19:19, 31 October 2024 (UTC)

Looks good content-wise, but this new section, too, needs to be made more accessible to the general public. Let me know if you need further help with that. --Jens Lallensack (talk) 20:31, 2 November 2024 (UTC)

Yes, I'd appreciate if someone with better prose could help with altering the wording to be more readable for the general public. When authoring Wikipedia article, I'm already trying to write at a level lower than what I typically write at in any academic or professional writing I do, and my baseline knowledge is so far from the general public's that I'm not sure how to convey information accessibly; whenever I'm at public outreach events for palaeontology and get asked something, I regularly end up having to explain something twice or thrice even though the first explanation was already "dumbed down" to what I thought was a very basic level. Anteosaurus magnificus (talk) 23:41, 3 November 2024 (UTC)

I tried to edit the lead and the history section accordingly. Will try do some more when time allows. Some more things I noted:

• We should not provide citations in the lead (exceptions may apply), since everything is supposed to be cited in the main body. It's like the abstract of a paper, where we also don't have citations.
• Plants, crocodylomorphs, dinosaurs, pterosaurs and mammals were left largely untouched,[4][5][6] allowing the dinosaurs, pterosaurs, and crocodylomorphs to become the dominant land animals for the next 135 million years. – This is repetitive and inaccurate (Crocodylomorphs were not really the dominant land animals, for example). Can we remove this?
• The lead only says something about the extinction of archosauromorphs but nothing about the marine roam, for example, so this seems quite incomplete. --Jens Lallensack (talk) 23:53, 5 November 2024 (UTC)

@Jens Lallensack I have overhauled the lead so that it no longer has in-text citations in it and have given the lead a little bit more context about what happened on land and in the sea regarding the extinction and survival of different clades, as well as addressing the many points raised by @Dunkleosteus77. Do you think the article would be ready for a Good Article nomination or a Featured Article nomination at this point, or is more work still needed in the lead and/or in main body sections of this article? -- Anteosaurus magnificus (talk) 01:12, 23 February 2025 (UTC)

Regarding taking it straight back to FAC in two weeks, I'd recommend instead taking it through WP:GAN first, even most experienced FAC nominators continue doing that, it's the safest step towards FAC. FunkMonk (talk) 09:28, 31 October 2024 (UTC)

Dunkleosteus77

• "The earliest research on the TJME was conducted in the mid-20th century" I mean surely someone must have noticed a major extinction event between the Triassic and Jurassic way earlier when the terms Triassic and Jurassic were coined? Dunkleosteus77 (talk) 03:02, 14 December 2024 (UTC)
• "were dismissed as catastrophism" link catastrophism and it might make more sense to the reader if you mention catastrophism's association with young Earth creationism Dunkleosteus77 (talk) 03:02, 14 December 2024 (UTC)
• "gradual environmental changes were favoured as the cause of the extinction" any specific environmental changes anyone suggested? Dunkleosteus77 (talk) 03:02, 14 December 2024 (UTC)
• "caused by a bolide impact" would meteor not work here instead? Dunkleosteus77 (talk) 03:02, 14 December 2024 (UTC)
• "The theory that the TJME was caused by massive volcanism" it wasn't because someone dated the formation of the CAMP to around the time of the TJME? Dunkleosteus77 (talk) 03:02, 14 December 2024 (UTC)
• What is Modern evolutionary fauna? Dunkleosteus77 (talk) 03:02, 14 December 2024 (UTC)
• Maybe include a picture of the Triassic timescale with how often you reference it? Dunkleosteus77 (talk) 03:02, 14 December 2024 (UTC)
• "The Lilliput effect affected megalodontid bivalves, whereas file shell bivalves experienced the Brobdingnag effect, the reverse of the Lilliput effect" You could just say that they shrank or grew and in parentheses say the actual term Dunkleosteus77 (talk) 03:02, 14 December 2024 (UTC)
• "weathering of the CAMP's aerially extensive" why specify from the air? Dunkleosteus77 (talk) 03:02, 14 December 2024 (UTC)
• "Some clades recovered more slowly than others, however, as exemplified by corals and their disappearance in the early Hettangian" you already said this with the Hettangian coral gap Dunkleosteus77 (talk) 03:02, 14 December 2024 (UTC)

  Sorry for the wait, but my latest edit to the page addressed nearly all the points you made, other than the timescale picture and pre-1950s research on the TJME (I couldn't find any). The Modern evolutionary fauna is very briefly described as the marine fauna that dominates oceans to this day, "bolide impact" is changed to the simpler "impact event", the dating of the CAMP showing a temporal correspondence with the TJME has been mentioned in the research history section, the Lilliput effect is now briefly described in layman's terms, the redundant part about the coral gap is gone, the relevance of the aerial extent of the CAMP is clarified, the gradual environmental changes once thought to have caused the TJME are now more specifically described, and the association of catastrophism with creationism is mentioned. Anteosaurus magnificus (talk) 18:21, 19 February 2025 (UTC)

Parahelicoprion

I've worked on this article for the last month(ish) or so and have gotten it into what I consider a decent state, thanks to some help from a few other editors. If anyone would be willing to provide a content assessment/further feedback it would be appreciated, I'm trying to get this one up to B-class. Not promoting to GA until I get access to/English translations of a few extremely obscure sources, but for the time being this is about as far as I think I can go content-wise. I'm especially looking for fluent/intermediate Russian speakers, since most of the relevant sources are in Russian and I've had to rely on a combination of machine translation and very unenthused acquaintances to figure anything out. Gasmasque (talk) 20:13, 2 November 2024 (UTC)

• Looking very good. I did copy edits of the entire article [1]; as always, feel free to revert anything you do not like.
• The characteristics of this whorl are unique to fishes of the order Eugeneodontida, – this somehow implies that taxa outside Eugeneodontida also have whorls, is this the case?
• Later sources have reported a holotype specimen spanning 25 cm (10 in) across and consisting of six tooth crowns,[9][13][24] based on a reconstructed cast of the material photographed by ichthyologist Svend Erik Bendix-Almgreen during the 1970s – should say "incorrectly reported", because a reconstructed cast is never a holotype, right?
• I probably messed this up in my copy edit, but you use both "Denticles" and "serrations"; I guess you use "serrations" when you talk about them collectively?
• The Artinskian deposits of Krasnoufimsk, or the Arta Beds – In the lead, you call them "Artinskian Beds"
• We usually have the section on size (here "Estimated length") in the "Description" section. Consider moving it up, because at the moment, size is mentioned earlier but the reader does not know at this point that the genus was particularly large, this information comes a bit late.
• "... might have been over 30 meters (100 ft) in lengths - perhaps the largest fish of all time", – just checking, does the original quote indeed include the conversion to feet, has the typo "lenghts", and does not use a proper ndash?
• a claim made based on extrapolating size from the preserved section of the whorl. – I am not sure this adds anything; of course the estimate is based on preserved fossils, I don't think this needs to be mentioned?
• authors Dagmar Merino-Rodo and Phillipe Janvier – why "authors" instead of "paleontologists"? Does this mean they are non-academics (and even if, we should still call them paleontologists if they publish academic papers).
• "... unless it (Parahelicoprion) was an animal with a gigantic head or outlandishly oversized teeth, it had to have been a monster, at least 100 feet long and maybe more." – in case you added "(Parahelicoprion)" to this quote yourself (?), it needs to be in square brackets instead to indicate this.
• Physonemus grandis? (Moore) – In the taxonbox; do we have a year to add here? --Jens Lallensack (talk) 21:37, 2 November 2024 (UTC)

  Thank you so much for this!

  • Several other groups of extinct fish, including Onychodus, some acanthodians and the iniopterygians also had tooth whorls, although these were often "parasyphyseal" and paired and were unrelated to those of eugeneodonts
  • I agree incorrectly would be right here, both Zangerl's 1981 handbook and the description of P. mariosuarezi make no note of the fact that the material is a cast, despite Bendix-Almgreen saying so and them attributing the figure to being drawn from his photograph. Side note, either this exact specimen or another model of it is/was recently on display at the Moscow Paleontological Museum, and I've already tagged the talk page asking any Russian editors if they could photograph it or its label. Said label may have information that clears up when and why this reconstructed cast was made
  • Serrations is the term used for the large number of curved indentations in clerci, and denticles is used for the three at the base of the "wing" on mariosuarezi. Since the two structures are homologous I see no issue with the same term being used for both
  • Arta Beds seems to be a mostly historic term now that more specific formations are defined, although the 2010 Handbook of Paleoichthyology continues to list P. clerci as originating from the "Arta Beds". I'll update the lead, but Arta in this case is meant to be synonymous with Artinskian-aged. The description of Artiodus from the Divya Formation notes P. clerci as being from its same formation, so it may be worth changing the lead to say Divya Formation. I'm keeping it as "Arta Beds" for now, but do let me know what you think
  • If I'm being quite honest the "estimated length" section was a bit of an afterthought. I was genuinely shocked when I found out there were actual (reputable, may I add) sources saying such nonsense, which I had previously assumed was relegated to mid-2010s internet blogs and lying Wiki editors. I can move the section to "Description", which would be in accordance with the similar situation regarding Walking with Dinosaur's Liopleurodon "estimate". I'm still giving it its own section and not integrating it into the section about known material, if that's alright, since I worry of giving undue weight
  • The passage in Perrine's book does indeed have strange grammar, misspell "length", and state 100 ft as equivalent to 30 m. It is not, however, a directly quote from Lund (only something he "calculated") as I had written before, and I've changed the text to accommodate. That misattribution is purely a mistake on my part
  • They are paleontologists, I can change that
  • Can change to square brackets. This quote is real by the way, along with a similar passage about Edestus giganteus. Lund was cited as one of the primary scientific advisors for this book, too, although not explicitly for the Parahelicoprion line
  • Neither Baird nor Karpinsky (nor Obruchev's 1952 summary of the Edestidae) provide the date for Physonemus grandis, although Baird does specify it was described by Moore. I can try to track down mention of this species, although there are many, many species of Physonemus and some of these papers are not available online, so no promises I'll have any luck

  Again, appreciate the review, and can make the requested changes. I'm in agreement with your copyedits, the text definitely flows better now! Gasmasque (talk) 02:27, 3 November 2024 (UTC)

  I did successfully find the authority for Xystracanthus (Physonemus) grandis (Moore, 1929) and have updated the text to accommodate. I've also found a full copy of Karpinsky's 1924 description and will be uploading the figures and photos from that onto Commons. Expect the page to see some pretty significant revisions now that I've gotten ahold of a couple more papers! Gasmasque (talk) 19:28, 3 November 2024 (UTC)

The rating tool already gives the article a B, so I've updated it. A Cynical Idealist (talk) 00:37, 3 November 2024 (UTC)

I've added a good amount of additional information and corrected some of the weird misspeaking/mistakes that came about from screwy translations, and I would really appreciate if anyone fluent in French or Russian could check over the cited sources to look for further misinterpretation. The 1916, 1922, and 1924 descriptions are all in Russian, as is this 1926 source detailing the discovery of a segment of the tooth whorl. This article focusing on comparisons with the genus and Agassizodus/Campodus is in French, and in particular I wanted to ask @Amirani1746 for assistance fact-checking the content sourced from it. I've primarily had to rely on machine translation software (which is infamously of pretty dubious quality) for the Russian sources, unfortunately I do not know any fluent speakers interested in helping with the project. All of these publications are quite short, and as far as I can tell several of them re-iterate a lot of the exact same points. Again, huge thanks if anyone is able to help me out with this! Gasmasque (talk) 20:22, 19 November 2024 (UTC)

Gasmasque As French speaker, I'm intersted to translate the french source ! But above all, i need to acess it. Amirani1746 (talk) 20:34, 19 November 2024 (UTC)

I appreciate the interest! If the HathiTrust link decides not to work, I can send the paper via Google Drive as well. It's public domain in both the U.S. and E.U., so I've also uploaded the relevant figures to Commons. Gasmasque (talk) 20:43, 19 November 2024 (UTC)

Apologies, it seems Hathi may limit access to all works published after the 1890's outside of the U.S. Here's a link to the Google Drive Gasmasque (talk) 20:55, 19 November 2024 (UTC)

Given the supplemental material of "Cautionary tales on the use of proxies to estimate body size and form of extinct animals" says However, there is no guarantee the tooth whorl was helical, and indeed given the proposed similarities between Sarcoprion and Parahelicoprion (Merino-Rodo & Janvier, 1986) a shorter, more Sarcoprion tooth whorl seems more likely. If a Sarcoprion-like arrangement were inferred, Parahelicoprion likely reached similar sizes to Helicoprion (~7 m?). I think you can be a bit less cagey and more specific about this size estimate in the relevant section. Hemiauchenia (talk) 22:40, 19 November 2024 (UTC)

That whole section needs a bit of a rewrite in accordance with the supplementary material, I agree I may be a bit overly cautious to provide a specific number. I'll also adjust the section on the proposed whorl shape to lend more support to the idea that it possessed a short whorl as well. Gasmasque (talk) 06:38, 20 November 2024 (UTC)

I'm interested in touching up this article a bit and potentially trying to aim for a GA promotion. If anyone able to read Russian is willing to give the article and sources a look-over I would appreciate it, since I don't think it is appropriate or defensible to submit an article for GA review that's based in part on Translate. Outside of passing mentions I've not found any additional English-language sources since November, and content-wise I think the article is about as large as it reasonably can be. Gasmasque (talk) 16:18, 25 February 2025 (UTC)

Compsognathus

Ok, so I've been told to essentially assign the next old FA or GA fossil taxon article for which the people of this WikiProject will improve. Since I suppose I can be the one to give assignments from here on out, the next dinosaur genus is Compsognathus, which was promoted to FA on the 15th of March in 2007 and obviously has not been reassessed since. Have at it I suppose. PrimalMustelid (talk) 01:55, 27 December 2024 (UTC)

I worked on it some years ago, adding the taphonomy section and expanding the description and discovery sections. Systematics and paleobiology still need to be done. I am happy to join-in for this one but want to finish Massospondylus first, which will take some time. --Jens Lallensack (talk) 19:35, 30 December 2024 (UTC)

Massospondylus

My current work-in-progress – an old FA I did some significant work on back in 2012, with the approval of Firsfron, the original main author. My plan is to finish the job now and give it the same treatment as we did for Thescelosaurus – a full revision. Several important papers have been published on it since, so there is quite a bit to do.

I am listing it here already in case anyone has ideas or thoughts, or likes to join in for a collaboration (be welcome!). If this is not the case, I am prepared to finish the job myself, but would probably need some help on the way, especially with images, and, of course, reviews in the end to ensure FA-level quality. Jens Lallensack (talk) 19:47, 30 December 2024 (UTC)

Thanks, Jen. I recall the nice work you did more than a decade ago. I can see several updates are needed. I've been working on sauropodomorph paleontology for a couple of years, and may have some things to contribute here or elsewhere eventually. Firsfron of Ronchester 19:56, 31 December 2024 (UTC)

Excellent – I will ping you once we are done with the updates, and, if you then have time to take a look, would greatly appreciate your input and your thoughts on whether or not the revision is going into the right direction, particularly regarding length and level of detail. The FA standards have changed since this article was promoted; in particular, we are no longer supposed to completely avoid important but complicated technical details such as autapomorphies, as this may be considered an oversimplification of the topic, but of course it is hard to strike a balance. Thanks! --Jens Lallensack (talk) 20:35, 31 December 2024 (UTC)

• As we already talked about, I'll help with the images and otherwise provide a detailed review once it's ready. By coincidence, the Equatorial Minnesota blog (which I believe is run by a former editor) just published a post with a short summary of the taxonomic history of Maasospondylus and other "prosauropods":[2] FunkMonk (talk) 18:57, 1 January 2025 (UTC)

The article currently doesn't have any maps, but do you think any of these[3][4][5] could be used, Jens Lallensack? Perhaps with modifications? FunkMonk (talk) 02:02, 26 January 2025 (UTC)

Good idea! Maybe a map combined with a profile that also shows the biozones (in particular, the Massospondylus range zone). Will think about it when getting into the paleoecology section. At the moment I'm still working myself through the taxonomic history – it is quite complicated. The new part about the dubious taxa got a bit too long, so with a few more articles for some of the Nomina dubia I hope to be able to cut that down a bit. --Jens Lallensack (talk) 02:09, 26 January 2025 (UTC)

Let me know when Massospondylus is ready for review, and I'd be happy to give it a look. A Cynical Idealist (talk) 07:04, 11 February 2025 (UTC)

I will, thanks! --Jens Lallensack (talk) 09:02, 11 February 2025 (UTC)

Quetzalcoatlus

I've been working on this article on-and-off since October (partly because I was surprised it wasn't already GA/FA-standard), and I've gotten it to what I think is a solid state. It was bumped up to B-class after my last round of revisions, when it was just a C-class when I started. Will admit, I'm not entirely sure what my plan for the article is, though at the very least I do hope to push it to GA. Borophagus (talk) 20:17, 9 January 2025 (UTC)

Jens

Nice! I'm on it, making edits as I go (revert anything you don't like, please). I also leave some points/questions here (more to come):

• How can we make the assumption that Q. nothropi was solitary when there is only one specimen? I think this should read "Lawson speculated that Q. nothropi was solitary", to make clear it is not an uncontroversial fact.
• You should decide whether you abbreviate the genus (Q. northropi) or spell it out (Quetzalcoatlus northropi) and stick to it.
• He would then go on to become a doctoral student at the University of California, Berkeley. – Why is it relevant where he got his PhD from? Why do you pick this particular detail from his life, while you, for example, not mention that he became a paleontologist, which seems more to the point here?
• Further material from the same specimen was uncovered in the form of a humerus and the first two phalanges (digit bones) of the wing. – I am confused why these are listed separately from the other remains. Have they been discovered later? If so, it's not mentioned.
• Andres and Langston (2021) seems to be the main source for the article, but you only cite a single page of that work. Was that intended?
• Second paragraph in "Early history" is slightly confusing, as you first introduce the discovery of Q. lawsoni, then go back to Q. northropi, and then state that "a detailed description was underway" without making clear if that is referring to both species or only one of them. Also, the reader is left wondering what happened to the much more complete Q. lawsoni specimens – they were discovered, yet the following text is only about the very fragmentary Q. northropi. That could possibly be better explained. Did you had a look at Wittons 2013 book "Pterosaurs: Natural History, Evolution, Anatomy"? I don't have it at hand at the moment but I remember that he was discussing why Q. sp was left undescribed for so long. --Jens Lallensack (talk) 00:19, 10 January 2025 (UTC)

  Made some of the more minor changes now (missing wording, clarity, abbreviations, etc; will have to go back to it tomorrow, as my tablet is appalling for mobile editing). Many of the errors you've pointed out are leftovers from older edits, and I'm honestly not entirely sure how I missed them. I have Witton's book, but for some reason it never occurred to me to actually look at it. Will definitely go over the rest as soon as I'm able. Borophagus (talk) 00:56, 10 January 2025 (UTC)

• Seems you did not yet include Brown et al. 2021? [6] --Jens Lallensack (talk) 00:22, 11 January 2025 (UTC)

I didn't. Big oversight on my part — I consistently manage to forget it exists. I'll include some information from it in the morning. Borophagus (talk) 00:25, 11 January 2025 (UTC)

• A majority of estimates published since the 2000s have been substantially higher, around 200–250 kg – that's not really higher than the "30–440 kg" though?

Done.

• from the eight specimens of Q. lawsoni that preserve skull elements – The "Discovery" section only mentions three Q. lawsoni specimens, and has nothing about these apparently later discoveries.

Done.

• and one with a more semicircular sagittal crest and a shorter sagittal crest. – please double-check here

Done.

• the beak, formed from the fusion of the dentaries – but that's the lower beak only?

Changed. I removed that detail as I couldn't find an equivalent for the upper jaw (though I'll reinstate it if I can).

• so it is not clear how it ended – I think this is too unspecific; is it about the shape of the tip?

Indeed. Changed the wording.

• a slight cavity – what does that mean? Did you mean "slight depression"?

The paper was a bit vaguer than I would have liked. Reworded it (per the functional morphology paper) and I think it makes more sense now.

• was a small crest – do we really know it was small? In the skull reco it looks giant.

Changed.

• Terrestrial locomotion in Quetzalcoatlus likely involved a pacing gait, with the forelimb on one side of the body moving forwards (to avoid collision with the hindlimbs), followed by the hindlimbs, and vice versa on the opposite side. – This is not really comprehensible. I should be able to help with that, will take a look tomorrow.

I've attempted to clarify it, but still unsure of how much it makes sense.

• No information on how to distinguish this genus from other azhdarchids? --Jens Lallensack (talk) 01:04, 11 January 2025 (UTC)

Added a couple of diagnostic features for now. Borophagus (talk) 10:58, 11 January 2025 (UTC)

Lythronaxargestes

In The Palaeoartist's Handbook, Witton self-critiques many aspects of his terrestrial stalking image as being inaccurate. If there's a better image, I'd use it. Lythronaxargestes (talk | contribs) 04:29, 10 January 2025 (UTC)

One could argue that it is in itself of historical importance to include, as it was for years the illustration of the terrestrial stalker hypothesis. FunkMonk (talk) 05:32, 10 January 2025 (UTC)

Perhaps it could be moved to the history section or something, with an appropriate caption (though I'm not sure if a source for it being influential would available or not) and then a more up to date image could be placed in the actual section on its feeding strategies. It's definitely an important piece of palaeoart, but it probably shouldn't still be the posterboy today. LittleLazyLass (Talk | Contributions) 06:12, 10 January 2025 (UTC)

Wasn't able to find such a source, so I opted to move it and add a disclaimer noting its inaccuracy. As things stand, I imagine it sticks out like a sore thumb, so I'll have to sort that out (along with finding an alternative image). Borophagus (talk) 10:55, 10 January 2025 (UTC)

You don't state anywhere in the article that the terrestrial stalking hypothesis is now considered to be inaccurate, though? --Jens Lallensack (talk) 11:48, 10 January 2025 (UTC)

My bad! I meant that the image is inaccurate, not the actual hypothesis (working on a replacement image that depicts it at the moment, so I certainly don't mean to imply that it's invalid). Borophagus (talk) 13:18, 10 January 2025 (UTC)

Yeah, there has been little pushback against the hypothesis, a summary here:[7] As Darren Naish says about the image: "this life reconstruction of a foraging Quetzalcoatlus group accompanied Witton & Naish (2008). It’s a very dated image today and Mark probably won’t enjoy the fact that I’m sharing it (sorry Mark). But it’s significant in the story told here, since it was widely shared in news articles reporting our 2008 conclusions. It probably is, in fact, one of the most widely shared, most often reproduced, azhdarchid-themed images. Image: Mark Witton, from Witton & Naish (2008)." FunkMonk (talk) 00:42, 11 January 2025 (UTC)

This whole issue with the old terrestrial stalker image does leave me wondering about the history section as a whole. As is the initial history is covered, and the 2021 work is at least mentioned (though given it's a whole monograph with five papers collectively making up an SVP Memoir, I think more focus could be put on this as a landmark). But those two points in time aside, the Naish and Witton 2008 paper was the beginning of a big modernization in our understanding of azhdarchids as a whole, and though it's currently covered in the feeding section it feels like their part int he quetz story is surely a necessary of the research history of the taxon to note there as well. But I'm certain how well exactly you could quantify this impact and shift into actual citeable factual content instead of just the vibes I have from observing this impact ripple in real time. It's also worth noting the Memoir has a whole paper that focuses in large part on the history of discovery of Quetzalcoatlus and it doesn't appear to be used as a source at the moment; I might try and beef up the history section sometime next week if I get the time. LittleLazyLass (Talk | Contributions) 08:50, 11 January 2025 (UTC)

I do plan on writing a bit more on the monograph at some point soon, though at the moment my main focus has been copyedits and adding (some) information from that Memoir paper, which I completely overlooked. Probably not as rigorous as it could be, as I've never really been the best at writing history sections, so if you do have the time, I'd definitely appreciate it! Not sure what the best way to discuss the importance of the terrestrial stalking model would be. I did look at the functional morphology paper, to see if I could at least find a source for it being significant, but all that really says is, "Witton and Naish wrote about that model, but Langston came up with it at some point before 1980", which doesn't help at all. Will definitely have to do some digging to figure that out. Borophagus (talk) 11:15, 11 January 2025 (UTC)

For whatever it's worth, I did write a lot about ideas about azhdarchid biology at the Phosphatodraco FAC, including the terrestrial stalking hypothesis, which could maybe be adapted here. I personally don't think all sorts of disparate research history should be lumped together under history, but discussed in the relevant sections. FunkMonk (talk) 14:25, 11 January 2025 (UTC)

Yeah, that makes sense. I've just edited paleobiology section to include a lot of the information from the Phosphatodraco article, though I'll have to work at making it flow better (as there's now a tiny paragraph in the middle talking about the two species' differing niches). Borophagus (talk) 18:13, 11 January 2025 (UTC)

LittleLazyLass

I've started working on expanding the history section myself, hopefully that's not a bother. Started with expanding the coverage of the initial discovery. I'm imagining a following paragraph about Lawon's initial description and naming, and then another one or two where I swing back around to the additional excavations at Big Bend and the Q. lawsoni stuff. Then the subsequent research and eventual monograph can probably be a separate subsection. Hope to chip away at it over the next week or so. LittleLazyLass (Talk | Contributions) 20:42, 17 January 2025 (UTC)

That's very comprehensive now at least! I did a copy edit to the whole history section, and hope I didn't mess it up. I wonder if the paragraph on the memoir is way too detailed; it might have to be trimmed down considerably before bringing it to FAC. --Jens Lallensack (talk) 01:37, 23 January 2025 (UTC)

Appreciated, though I added back in one sentence I considered a considerable loss of important information. As far as I the Memoir paragraph goes, I can't say whether or not I'll have trouble at FAC, but I would defend it is as justified. The publication is an absolute landmark in the history of taxon and I think properly capturing the breadth and significance of the project is worthwhile. LittleLazyLass (Talk | Contributions) 02:23, 23 January 2025 (UTC)

The sentence you just added back-in is included twice. You should delete one of them. --Jens Lallensack (talk) 08:19, 23 January 2025 (UTC)

Image suggestions

• I'll do image suggestions/edits for now until the article is ready for review. If the DBogdanov restorations has inaccuracies, I can try to fix them (already gave it some modifications). FunkMonk (talk) 01:23, 23 January 2025 (UTC)
• Witton's newer skeletal[8] should be used either as part of this image, or cropped out as its own (it probably has more accurate proportions and pose). Then it may also be more appropriate for taxobox image. Headden's is still good to show known material either way.

Still think this skeletal would be good to use, it's the most accurate one we have, so perhaps use it under description and the "known material" one under discovery? FunkMonk (talk) 15:36, 12 February 2025 (UTC)

• This comparison of neck vertebrae would seem relevant under postcranium:[9]
• Is this a better photo of a mount?[10]
• This photo of supposed Moroccan material would make sense under "Reclassified or indeterminate fossils":[11]

Dunkleosteus77

• In the Size section, it only talks about wingspan. When it's on all-fours on the ground, how tall was it? Dunkleosteus77 (talk) 00:47, 24 January 2025 (UTC)

  Sorted. Haven't been able to find any shoulder-height estimates for Q. lawsoni in the literature, but I've included figures for Q. northropi. Will keep looking, though. Borophagus (talk) 21:10, 24 January 2025 (UTC)

Dinosaur Renaissance

This is maybe testing at what the boundaries of the intended use for this page is, but I noticed that this article on such an essential historical topic for palaeontology is tragically simplistic and has not changed to a notable degree in nearly 20 years. As much as I do tend to enjoy the historical aspects of dinosaur articles the most, I just don't see myself putting the time towards a big topic like this anytime soon, so I figured I might try throwing it out on this page and seeing if the spotlight attracts anybody who would be more up to the task. If not I understand though - I am putting out an open request for something I'm not willing to take on so I can't exactly expect others to do so. LittleLazyLass (Talk | Contributions) 00:29, 10 January 2025 (UTC)

Yeah, for this reason we say in the instructions that "It is expected that the nominator will act as the main author". We already experienced that in the old Dinosaur collaborations, where we voted for an article we would work on: people are usually not motivated to work on articles that were assigned to them. Compsognathus above might be another sad example of this, at least so far. There are just too many poor articles to choose from … --Jens Lallensack (talk) 00:51, 10 January 2025 (UTC)

Fair enough - I figured it would at least be worthwhile to bring attention to it since I was completely unaware of the state of the article and figure others might be too, but feel free to archive this if it's not considered appropriate for this page. Maybe it would've been better to post on the WikiProject main talk page or something. LittleLazyLass (Talk | Contributions) 06:10, 10 January 2025 (UTC)

It does not hurt to post it here, for sure. Maybe we could even create an "Open tasks" section in the WikiProject with a diverse selection of articles that really, really need attention, to give some inspiration especially for newbies, maybe each with a brief instruction how it could be improved. Maybe that could include one-sentence stubs as well as broader articles like this one. --Jens Lallensack (talk) 11:43, 10 January 2025 (UTC)

Could be something to look into, though I think maybe it's best to wait and see how this page pans out before trying to expand WikiProject organization further. LittleLazyLass (Talk | Contributions) 17:33, 10 January 2025 (UTC)

I agree with this idea a great deal. It would de-clutter the article workshop itself, which could be reserved for projects that several people are heavily invested in. The article workshop could serve more of a "polishing the details" function whereas broad page expansion could be relegated to the "Open tasks" section. I think clarifying that purpose for the article workshop would streamline the work that is done on here so open topics don't get stale for lack of interest. Just my two cents though. A Cynical Idealist (talk) 23:13, 10 January 2025 (UTC)

Turns out we already have such a thing: Wikipedia:WikiProject_Palaeontology#Articles_needed_or_needing_improvements. Obviously that needs update and cleanup … --Jens Lallensack (talk) 00:02, 11 January 2025 (UTC)

This is definitely something I would be interested in working on in the future. General topics like this are generally difficult to source in my experience (when compared with technical descriptions of fossils and taxonomy), so maybe having an open "citation bank" like was done for the nomination of Thescelosaurus above. A big barrier to entry for these big picture topics (at least for me personally) is the difficulty of gathering sources. A Cynical Idealist (talk) 23:10, 10 January 2025 (UTC)

Too much detail about tracks in Dilophosaurus?

I recently added a bit from the new Vertebrate Ichnology book to the ichnology section of the Dilophosaurus article, but then realised that it goes into pretty extreme detail about various back-and forth discussions in the literature and so on, whereas it should probably be a broader summary, since the tracks involved are only tentatively attributed to Dilophosaurus simply because it was one of the largest known theropods of the time. Discussion of possible tracks is an important part of the literature about Dilophosaurus, so such a section should be there either way, but since it's already a very long article (it was much expanded post-FAC because of the publication of its re-description), I'd like to ask what people think about that section and how it could be dealt with. It would also be a shame to completely lose some of the information that could maybe be moved to articles like Eubrontes instead. It's of course also possible that some think the current text is appropriate as is. FunkMonk (talk) 01:59, 18 January 2025 (UTC)

Yeah, 11333 words in the main body; most will argue that's too long. Regarding the tracks, I agree – "a theropod like Dilophosaurus" does not mean "probably Dilophosaurus itself". My suggestions:

• Reduce the "is Eubrontes a theropod?" discussion to just two sentences. It is really not pertinent to this article. The content should be moved to Eubrontes, I believe. Also note that Jim Farlow has done a lot of work on this question, including a whole book [12] and a comprehensive paper [13], none of which is even mentioned in the article.
• I would remove the 2005 conference abstract about the feather impressions. I think that citing conference abstracts is fine for relatively uncontroversial statements, but for something like this I think we give undue weight to a form of publication that is mostly not considered/cited in academics anyways.
• I would also considerably reduce the discussion on the crouching trace (again, two-three sentences max in my opinion). The info could be moved to St. George Dinosaur Discovery Site, which is the article on the tracksite. Note here that the authors used Dilophosaurus as model, but explicitly excluded the possibility that Dilophosaurus itself could have made them because the tracks are Hettangian in age. That should be made clear I think.
• The description of the "chicken yard hodge-podge" tracksite of Welles does not belong here either I think, at least not that detailed, as it is specific for a particular site without broader implications. We could either create an article on Dilophosauripus and move it there (the ichnogenus is still listed as "valid" in the 2025 book), or create an article on the tracksite. --Jens Lallensack (talk) 05:07, 18 January 2025 (UTC)

I'd probably recommend summarizing it (along with removals per Jens) and moving the full content to appropriate articles. I think it's relevant that it's connected directly or as a model to many trackways and worth emphasizing this with a section, but this doesn't need to be a comprehensive coverage of each subtopic. LittleLazyLass (Talk | Contributions) 05:41, 18 January 2025 (UTC)

Thanks, both, I'll go for cutting down and moving to specific articles. On a related note, I also since expanded the cultural significance section a good deal with stuff related to tracks and other things, which may have the same issues, if you have any thoughts on that. FunkMonk (talk) 05:59, 18 January 2025 (UTC)

Red rock hare

This article was recently brought to Good Article status, and I have some mind to bring it further, but my main concern is the case of fossil species. In this genus, Pronolagus, there are two extinct names, intermedius and humpatensis. The former is disused, and the latter has been described only once, in 2022. If Pronolagus is to be brought to Good Topics, it should be complete including extinct species, but I don't think there is enough information on either to make their own articles. My goal is to provide comprehensive information on these within the genus' article somehow. Reconrabbit 14:13, 1 February 2025 (UTC)

I think you can go for Good Topic, I don't see any issue. The Nomen oblitum does not need its own article; you just cover what can be said in the genus article. The other fossil species should have its own article. First description here. Contains plenty of information, no problem to bring that to GA, I believe. Make sure you include any subsequent publications that have additional coverage (just search for the 2022 first description in Google Scholar by entering the paper title, then click on "cited by 7" and it will list you all publications that have cited it since, you should look through those if possible). Even if there is no additional coverage, that does not prevent you from bringing it to GA. We even have FAs that were just based on their first descriptions when promoted, such as Perijá tapaculo. Yes, that's a bird, and I know that the WikiProject Mammals has more restrictive rules here, but those don't apply to extinct species. You are welcome to post the fossil species here when done if you need feedback before taking it to GAN. --Jens Lallensack (talk) 15:10, 1 February 2025 (UTC)

I see - I have had trouble finding the cited sources other than another 2024 work by Sen et al., did not know that Google Scholar had this feature. I may post the fossil species here, since I have hardly any experience writing about them. Thank you!! Reconrabbit 17:22, 1 February 2025 (UTC)

@Jens Lallensack, I believe I've made progress with Pronolagus humpatensis but have no clue how to proceed writing a description. What material is relevant? Reconrabbit 18:41, 20 February 2025 (UTC)

Hi, just real quick as I am quite short on time atm:

• What you have as "Background" we usually call "Taxonomy" or "History of discovery". Your current content of "Description" should be moved to Taxonomy. How it differed from extant members, that should be part of "Description"
• Ideally, if the sources allow it, start the description with some general information: Size, proportions (e.g., the paper says "muzzle short and robust"), maybe some useful background on the genus in general to give an idea how the animal looked like. Regarding the size, maybe include a measurement to be at least a bit more specific.
• You list the known fossils, but are these all from the same individuals and found at the same spot? (seems to be multiple individuals, should be made clear)
• State where the fossils are stored (which museum), and the specimen number of the holotype (Tc 2'90).
• "species name" should be "specific name", also link to article.
• You could better explain how this species is distinguished from other members of the genus. Particular attention was paid towards the diminished presence of the incisive foramen and narrowness of the anteroconid in the third lower premolar, which differ from all extant red rock hares. – Are these the only differences? Are these autapomorphies? You could make an attempt to better explain these (what is an anteroconid, for example).
• The features listed in "Diagnosis" in the paper are particularly important (but no need to include all of these features). You could also point out how it is distinguished from particular other species (Differential diagnosis).
• The "Description" section in the paper goes into more detail; that can help to better understand the features listed in Diagnosis, and can have more interesting information. From the "Description" section of the paper, just include what you think is interesting, without going into too much detail there.
• You should also discuss why this species can be assigned to Pronolagus. What is the argument here? Based on what features?
• The "Discussion" section of the paper is also important. Pay attention to background information that can help the reader to place the information into context.
• In general, try to give it more flesh, explain more. For example, you start the paleoecology with "The limestone breccias P. humpatensis is associated with", but you first should introduce these breccias, explain what this is, why they are relevant, and so on.
• Hope this helps. --Jens Lallensack (talk) 00:15, 21 February 2025 (UTC)

Thank you, this is all extremely helpful!! I'll do my best. Reconrabbit 01:24, 21 February 2025 (UTC)