Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Gastropods/Archive 3

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Archive page 3: Messages from 2010

2005 taxonomy

Needs to be implemented in a way that works with the taxobox code. Stuff like Cladobranchia (what a mess in the taxobox!) or Littorinimorpha (italicization of family-group names... come again?!) is unhelpful to the non-expert reader and an eyesore to the expert reader.

Also, as soon as a subtaxon has an article, please move the taxon authors to the taxobox and delete them elsewhere (except in complicated homonymy cases etc). I speak from experience: it's vandal/unreliable-source bait. Cases where in 3 successive taxon articles (family, genus, species for example) 3 different author/date combinations are used are not acutally rare, and cases where two successive taxon articles disagree are disturbingly commonplace. In some amphibian genera, author/date does not match between genus and species page in 20% of the species or so. In some fish genera, there is 100% disagreement. Having the taxonomic authority in one place - in the taxobox where it belongs - cuts down maintenance work a whole fricking lot.

Now, as far as I can see the B&R (2005) taxa are "Linnean" (insofar as type genera are used, not phylogenetic delimitors). This would be good, because (and personally I think this'll be the PhyloCode's downfall) cladistic delimitors depend on unknowns (is the "last common ancestor" a species, a population, an individual?) and with such a systematically uncertain but well-fossilizing group, a type-based nomenclature is far easier to handle even though purists would consider it "unclean".

And since this is not botany (i.e., we're free to mix'n'match taxonomy schemes if all taxa are validly published), what keeps us from ranking e.g. Caenogastropoda as a subclass, as proposed by Cox in 1959? Only the opistobranchs would be a bit tricky, but the advantage of having a well-known and taxonomically confusing group is this: almost everything has been tried one way or another, and reliable sources exist for many, many taxon-rnak combinations. So we are free to use those that together create an accurate representation of phylogeny.

E.g.: "Subclass Heterobranchia" - "(unranked) Opisthobranchia" - wherein "Order Cephalaspidea" etc as basal/inertae sedis vs "Superorder Nudipleura" - "Order Nudibranchia" have all been used in the taxonomic literature. So, I think that everything can be solved simply by taking the available corpus of taxonomic works and adapting them to B&R (2005). Dexiarchia/Cladobranchia will require a bit of fiddling, but altogether a solution that does not mess up the taxoboxes is feasible. After all, B&R (2005) intended their classification as a working baseline for original research rather than a "definite" revision (like the APG II), and this makes its use kinda shaky for Wikipedia...

We have had a similar situation for Passeriformes, and I found that with a bit of research into the taxonomic history of presumed clades (ever since Darwin & Haeckel, the aim has been to eliminate paraphyly and polyphyly from taxonomy) a classification can be established that a) only uses validly described taxa, b) can at every level/rank be validated with a RS, c) adequately represents the known phylogenetic relationships, d) is flexible enough (at least if commented on in the article text) to deal with phylogenetic uncertainties regardless of which way these might resolve (that is extremely important), and e) works smoothly with the taxobox code.

The advantage "Linnean" taxa have in this respect is this: as they are tied to a name-bearing type rather than a phylogenetic hypothesis. That is, they can be expanded and shrunk at leisure, if phylogenetic hypotheses change. And in the case of gastropods, there is still a lot to change. Dysmorodrepanis (talk) 19:28, 6 October 2009 (UTC)

No problem, write an adaptation, publish it in reviewed journal and we will use it. Otherwise we must respect Wikipedia:No original research. --Snek01 (talk) 21:12, 6 October 2009 (UTC)
Ditto. Daniel Cavallari (talk) 21:43, 6 October 2009 (UTC)
Yup, I agree also. Invertzoo (talk) 15:59, 24 February 2010 (UTC)

Malacologist

Hello, I have started list at Malacologist, because it is not possible (according to the guideline) to add a red link of an malacologist's name to disambiguation page without some other blue link. Now you have blue link malacologist so you can add any names to disambig pages also. Fell free to continuously expand the list itself also. --Snek01 (talk) 21:43, 7 October 2009 (UTC)

This is a really good idea! Thank you Snek for thinking of it and for setting it up so well! I changed the title to List of malacologists because it appears to be a list article, see [1]. Best wishes, Invertzoo (talk) 19:11, 8 October 2009 (UTC)

Aldabra banded snail

The topic discussed in this article is of great importance in my opinion. It needs to be heavily edited though, as per MOS. I did some fixes, but there is much to be done, and the article can be reasonably expanded. Please, see reference (1), and help me out if you can. Regrettably, I don't have the time to do it myself right now.--Daniel Cavallari (talk) 12:07, 21 October 2009 (UTC)

Formal issues are corrected now. (Maybe tweaking of text would be fine.) --Snek01 (talk) 12:49, 21 October 2009 (UTC)

"I have failed to get an image of this species (although I got an image of other Rhachistia species). It is probably in the source:

But I have no this source. --Snek01 (talk) 11:09, 23 October 2009 (UTC)

WOW!!! This article was added as DYK three days after its creation although it usually takes from 7 to 10 days! This really is high importance article. --Snek01 (talk) 19:18, 23 October 2009 (UTC)

True! Must be because of the global warming issue... --Daniel Cavallari (talk) 01:07, 24 October 2009 (UTC)

White abalone

There is much consistent, public domain information form this source: NOAA - White abalone Which can be used in this article. I went ahead and copy-pasted some of the content, reorganizing it according to our standards. A major rewriting would do no harm (or should I say necessary), however, and I hope you can help me with that. We may have a future GA coming out of this. --Daniel Cavallari (talk) 23:38, 21 October 2009 (UTC)

Eustrombus gigas under GA revision

This article is currently under GA review. All help would be necessary if it is to become a GA soon! Please help me out if you can. --Daniel Cavallari (talk) 16:52, 23 October 2009 (UTC)

Byne's disease at GAN

hi all, I am reviewing the above article for GAN. Fascinating read. However, not a subject I am very familiar with. I posted this to just check that other shell enthusiasts and experts were happy that nothing major had been left out. Looking good. Casliber (talk · contribs) 05:06, 15 November 2009 (UTC)

Thank you! Let's work together then. --Daniel Cavallari (talk) 17:38, 15 November 2009 (UTC)

Popular pages

Popular pages toolserver is offering to update traffic statistics for project articles, so I have submitted a request to include Gastropods. The toolserver will automatically update a page located at Wikipedia:Wikiproject Gastropods/Popular Pages beginning in a month or so. --Geronimo20 (talk) 23:12, 16 November 2009 (UTC)

Portal nomination

Feel free to leave comments on Wikipedia:Featured portal candidates/Portal:Gastropods. --Snek01 (talk) 21:21, 17 November 2009 (UTC)

Nembrotha milleri article created

Hi everyone. I just made the Nembrotha milleri article. It is my first ever article on wikipedia. I am new here and somewhat new to wikipedia so I am posting here so that members of the Gastropods project can point me in the right direction as regards to quality and how you all like to organise everything if I get it wrong. Although I am newish to wikipedia editing I know quite a lot about nudibranchs and have many good quality images of my own to upload. I notice that there aren't that many nudibranch pages up here. I will get to making some. Is here the appropriate place for project talk between members? Antarctic-adventurer (talk) 01:37, 8 December 2009 (UTC)

Update: I created another nudibranch page, Chromodoris dianae and uploaded 2 images I took myself. Antarctic-adventurer (talk) 13:40, 8 December 2009 (UTC)
Welcome to the WikiProject Gastropods. We're short-handed and we can certainly use your help. I looked at Nembrotha milleri and it looks good. You got the taxonomy right and you give an adequate description. But one big remark. The Sea Slug Forum is the main resource for nudibranches (together with scientific papers, but these may be "paywalled"). It may be difficult to rephrase the descriptions in the Sea Slug Forum, but borrowing the exact wording is considered a copyvio. I know, facts are facts, but still try to rephrase the description and then it will be perfect. If you have questions, you can always ask me or User:Invertzoo or User:Snek01. Cheers. JoJan (talk) 18:12, 8 December 2009 (UTC)
Thanks JoJan for the reply and the welcome to the group. I realise that using the exact wording is considered a copyright breach and is very bad practice, which is why I tried to take the information that the source gave and re-word it somewhat. I will have to pay especial attention to that in order to ensure quality. Thanks for the advice. I also have several good reference works on nudibranchs which I will use. Who are the users mainly responsible for taking care of the nudibranch pages? My knowledge of other gastropods is somewhat more limited, but since there are thousands and thousands of nudis, there is enough work to keep everyone busy for some time to come. I will use individual user talk pages for questions or discussions. I see there seems to be the apporpriate place? Antarctic-adventurer (talk) 20:24, 8 December 2009 (UTC)
Hi and a very big Welcome to you, Antarctic-adventurer! It's really great to have another gastropod person on board!
Yes, this talk page is definitely the best place to ask any general questions. If you do have a question or comment about the content of one particular article, and if you do end up putting a note onto that article's talk page, please also leave us a very short note with the link here, otherwise, well... It can sometimes be months (or even years) before anyone happens to notice that a message has appeared on a certain talk page of an article! There is (generally speaking) no centralized way that we are automatically informed of that. We currently have nearly 6,000 articles, and because of time constraints, we don't go through them all (and their talk pages) systematically on a regular basis, so it is extremely easy to overlook new messages on individual talk pages.
As for the copyvio thing (which is a very important consideration) the best way to make new articles from existing information is to read what the online source or book has to say, make sure you understand it, and then write it yourself from scratch. Just tinkering with someone else's prose, or rewording it, is almost always not enough to prevent it being plagiarism and a copyvio. Unless of course the rewording you do is so extreme that it amounts to a rewriting.
As yet there are no editors whose special task it is to keep an eye on the nudibranch articles, although a couple of us try to keep an eye on all new gastropod articles as best as we can. We do however have a relatively new editor from the Cape Town area of South Africa who has been, and still is, creating a lot of nudibranch articles (on the "branchs" of his part of the world) with his own photos, and that is User:Seascapeza. His talk page is here [3].
By the way, we also have access to a lot of nice nudibranch images that not yet incorporated into an article. Many people upload images to Wikimedia Commons and then the images just sit and wait for someone to use them.
All very best wishes to you, Invertzoo (talk) 22:24, 8 December 2009 (UTC)
Great thanks for that valuable advice Invertzoo. There is a lot of useful information here. I will bear the copyvio point close in mind and I will read up carefully this Project page. Good to know that there are many nudibranch photos already in the commons. My speciality is in dintinguishing similar looking species, (not always easy from a photo). I will see if I can make use of them.
I will post a short note on this page when I create a new species page and make sure they are linked up to the Genus/Family pages. I will also note all newly created articles on my user page as a record.
There don't seem to be that many active members in this Project, less than a dozen, so everyone has their work cut out! I'll do what I can as and when I have time. Antarctic-adventurer (talk) 02:09, 9 December 2009 (UTC)

New nudibranchs

Nembrotha purpureolineata v.s Nembrotha rutilans

I noticed that there are two separate articles for what has now been agreed to be one species.

[Ref: Pola, M., Cervera, J.L. and Gosliner, T.M. 2008. Revision of the Indo-Pacific genus Nembrotha (Nudibranchia: Dorididae: Polyceridae), with description of two new species. Scientia Marina 72(1): 145-183.]

According to this paper, Nembrotha rutilans has been reclassified as Nembrotha purpureolineata. Consequently, shouldn't we amalgamate the two pages under the heading Nembrotha purpureolineata and redirect search enquiries for N. rutilans there? I am happy to do it but want to check first with those in the group with more knowledge than I. When a new peer-reviewed article reclassifying a species is published, what is the general procedure here at wiki? Do we follow the latest verified taxonomy? Thanks Antarctic-adventurer (talk) 20:30, 9 December 2009 (UTC)

Sure, you are right. Be bold and do it. Also add newly described species (or other taxa) to List of gastropods described in the 2000s. Mention important taxonomy changes at Taxonomy of the Gastropoda (Bouchet & Rocroi, 2005)#Changes since 2005. Thanks. --Snek01 (talk) 21:27, 9 December 2009 (UTC)
OK I went ahead and made the changes. N. rutilans now re-directs to Nembrotha purpureolineata. I also cleaned up the N. purpureolineata article quite a bit, fixed the refs, added some photos and slightly expanded it. Took a surprisingly long time! Antarctic-adventurer (talk) 15:09, 10 December 2009 (UTC)
New article on Taringa halgerda nudibranch and Taringa (gastropod)

I created a page for the nudibranch Taringa halgerda and also one for its genus Taringa (gastropod). Perhaps someone could take a quick look and make sure I have got the taxonomy correct. Antarctic-adventurer (talk) 04:13, 10 December 2009 (UTC)

Corrected to Discodorididae. If not sure with taxonomy then reference the source you used and you can add template {{check}}. --Snek01 (talk) 00:25, 11 December 2009 (UTC)
Expanded Nembrotha chamberlaini page

I added high resolution photo I took, expanded the stub by adding description and ecology sections, added and tidied references and attributed binomial authority. Antarctic-adventurer (talk) 16:42, 10 December 2009 (UTC)

Very good, but no need to announce. We'll see our members edits. There is also a robot trying to detect new articles [[4]]. --Snek01 (talk) 00:25, 11 December 2009 (UTC)
Forgive my ignorance but where can I see the latest member edits for the gastropod Project? Is the bit link you sent sufficient? Antarctic-adventurer (talk) 23:48, 11 December 2009 (UTC)
I thought that gastropod members sometimes check out what other projects members are doing at "User contributions". --Snek01 (talk) 15:11, 12 December 2009 (UTC)
Oh I see. Individually going there. I thought you were talking about a special update list for the gastropod members only. ;) Antarctic-adventurer (talk) 16:55, 12 December 2009 (UTC)

Semicassis granulata

Just to let everyone in the Project know that this gastropod article is currently being worked on by a team of three students from a high school in North Carolina, in an attempt to bring it up to Good Article status. For more info see the page here: [5]. Snek and I are watching the process, trying to leave helpful comments on the review part of the talk page and trying to confine ourselves to doing minor edits only, so that the students have a fair chance to do their work and get graded without us "taking over" completely. Best to all, Invertzoo (talk) 23:00, 14 December 2009 (UTC)

This article is going wrong. Sources are not directly supporting facts in the article and thus are unreliable. --Snek01 (talk) 23:52, 7 January 2010 (UTC)
Yes I have tried to let both the students and the teacher know there were, and still are, many very serious problems with this article that would not be apparent to someone who was casually reading it without checking the sources. This school project will be finished on Monday 18th and then we can try to clean this article up ourselves. Invertzoo (talk) 15:26, 14 January 2010 (UTC)

Nudibranch genus articles in the Superfamily Doridoidea

Just to let everyone know, I have added articles for all genera in the Superfamily Doridoidea. There should now be a complete list of all nudibranch species within this Superfamily. Due to the large number of taxonomic revisions however, there may be some names that are used which are no longer relevant or have been reassigned. If you find a species that isn't listed, check to see if it hasn't actually been given a new assignment or isn't just a synonym of an already existing species before adding it. Thanks Antarctic-adventurer (talk) 19:44, 19 December 2009 (UTC)

*Update*. All genera now added for the Superfamily Phyllidioidea. All species for this Superfamily should be listed.--Antarctic-adventurer (talk) 17:01, 21 December 2009 (UTC)

Pageview stats

After a recent request, I added WikiProject Gastropods to the list of projects to compile monthly pageview stats for. The data is the same used by http://stats.grok.se/en/ but the program is different, and includes the aggregate views from all redirects to each page. The stats are at Wikipedia:WikiProject Gastropods/Popular pages.

The page will be updated monthly with new data. The edits aren't marked as bot edits, so they will show up in watchlists. You can view more results, request a new project be added to the list, or request a configuration change for this project using the toolserver tool. If you have any comments or suggestions, please let me know. Thanks! Mr.Z-man 06:34, 2 January 2010 (UTC)

Proposed split of List of marine molluscs of South Africa

See discussion page. Comments and suggestions requested. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Pbsouthwood (talk • contribs) 16:47, 4 January 2010 (UTC)

Our most frequently-consulted articles need improving. Can you help?

Now we have this very useful listing Wikipedia:WikiProject Gastropods/Popular pages, we can finally see at a glance which of our articles are the most often consulted. Of the top 40 on this list, many need improving. While it is true that two of the top 40 already have GA status and 3 have B status, nonetheless many of the rest are quite weak one way or the other. If there is anything at all you can do to fix up any one or more of these articles, to make them stronger, please go ahead. Even if you have neither the time or the inclination to do that, I think it's also worth just looking through this listing, I think you will be surprised to see what is high on the list. Best wishes to all and many thanks, Invertzoo (talk) 22:46, 6 January 2010 (UTC)

Conflicting info in the Gastropoda article

Can we sort this out?

Right now under Distribution it says: "Gastropods have a worldwide distribution, in the seas and oceans (about 30,000 species), in brackish water, in freshwater (about 5,000 species) and on land (about 30,000 species) , from the near Arctic and Antarctic zones to the tropics."

But under Habitat it says: "Some of the more familiar and better-known gastropods are terrestrial (the land snails and slugs), but more than two thirds of all named species live in a marine environment."

It would be great if one of us can find a good reliable source for this kind of info. Thanks and best wishes, Invertzoo (talk) 00:26, 9 January 2010 (UTC)

WikiProject Algae

WikiProject Algae was started as a meeting space on Wikipedia for improving the taxonomic representations of the groups of organisms called algae. Please join other editors at the talk page (Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Algae) to discuss a higher level taxonomy for algae to be used on Wikipedia.

The taxonomies used on Wikipedia algae articles are a mixture of ancient to modern random phyla/classes that are often inconsistent from one article to the next (and sometimes within the same sentence of an article). Editors have adopted hypothesized taxonomies from single articles in the literature, taxonomies that have been out of favor for over 100 years, and some taxoboxes use taxonomies from two different sources.

I think that a taxonomy that is supported in tertiary sources (textbooks), with added insight from the technical literature (review articles, well-cited research), could create some order to allow editors with a wide range of knowledge to edit these articles. Please discuss the proposed taxonomy at the project talk page.

Bring your gastropod: lunch will be served. --68.127.232.132 (talk) 19:37, 11 January 2010 (UTC)

Oh, this is actually so nice to hear (or should I say read?)! I'm pleased to know that we now have a wikiproject dedicated to Algae. That's a very important topic that is in dire need for better coverage. Let me know if you need any help.--Daniel Cavallari (talk) 06:46, 12 January 2010 (UTC)
Yum! Our gastropods will be delighted to graze on your algae! Thanks! Sadly I known almost nothing about alga taxonomy so can't make any intelligent suggestions. Invertzoo (talk) 23:22, 15 January 2010 (UTC)

WikiProject Gastropods - Popular pages

If this list (Wikipedia:WikiProject Gastropods/Popular pages) is correct it would seem that our most popular article Pearl has an importance rating set to "Low". So do many other pages in the top 50. Surely they should be re-evaluated? Antarctic-adventurer (talk) 21:05, 14 January 2010 (UTC)

Yes it is true that many of our most-often-consulted articles have (or did have) rather low importance ratings. On some of them I recently upgraded the importance a rung or two, but that won't show up until next month when the statistics are redone. As for the article Pearl, it is in fact primarily about bivalves, not gastropods. There are a few gastropods mentioned in it, which is why I gave it the gastropod project tag, but I don't know if it is reasonable to give it high importance or not. I am happy to hear people's opinions on this question. Perhaps we should rate it high for now simply because at the present time there is no Project Bivalves or Project Molluscs to help take care of it? I guess that Project Gemology and Jewelry do help keep an eye on it as best as they can from their perspective, but I suppose we should try to do whatever we can too, even though it is not exactly "our baby". Invertzoo (talk) 00:24, 15 January 2010 (UTC)
Anyone else got any comments on this question? Invertzoo (talk) 00:25, 15 January 2010 (UTC)
Now you mention it of course pearls are not gastropods but bivalves. I just hastily assumed that the list was just limited to gastropods. I guess then it probably doesn't warrant a "high" importance rating in that case, since that article is not primarily about gastropods. Thanks Antarctic-adventurer (talk) 17:16, 23 February 2010 (UTC)

Semicassis granulata

A beautiful article. Kudos to all who made it so. Anna Frodesiak (talk) 13:03, 15 January 2010 (UTC) Okay, nobody's buying that. I was just trying to be encouraging. Anna Frodesiak (talk) 14:25, 15 January 2010 (UTC)

Actually as of the end of Friday 15th January, the AP Bio project seems to be over, and so now this article is currently in the process of undergoing extensive examination and clean up. If anyone can help at all with this it would be very much appreciated. It's a bit daunting trying to do it all myself and I would really be grateful for assistance. Virtually of the included information that cites sources needs to be checked carefully against the source, because a lot of the citing was a bit hit or miss. Also some of the sources cited are too amateurish to be valuable/reliable. It is of course OK to rewrite whole sections from scratch if they need it. Thanks to anyone who can help, best, Invertzoo (talk) 20:00, 17 January 2010 (UTC)

WP 1.0 bot announcement

This message is being sent to each WikiProject that participates in the WP 1.0 assessment system. On Saturday, January 23, 2010, the WP 1.0 bot will be upgraded. Your project does not need to take any action, but the appearance of your project's summary table will change. The upgrade will make many new, optional features available to all WikiProjects. Additional information is available at the WP 1.0 project homepage. — Carl (CBM · talk) 03:21, 22 January 2010 (UTC)

A lightning talk at Wikipedia Day NYC today

Hi gang, I will be giving a 5 minute update on the progress of our Project at the Wikipedia Day Party (Wikipedia is 9 years old now!) Wikipedia Day NYC [6] at NYU this afternoon. Best, Invertzoo (talk) 17:59, 24 January 2010 (UTC)

Done. Give me a day or two and I will get the presentation up on my website. Invertzoo (talk) 00:16, 25 January 2010 (UTC)

Important WikiProject Notice

 Done Anna Frodesiak (talk) 05:29, 27 January 2010 (UTC)

Thanks Anna! Invertzoo (talk) 15:55, 24 February 2010 (UTC)

Conus species... and Comitas species

I have prepared a few hundred stubs. A sample is here. All of the articles will be identical except for the name and auth. Please feel free to edit the page and add any info that will apply to all species of this genus. I will then apply the changes to the articles and put them into the main space. Thanks. Anna Frodesiak (talk) 05:35, 27 January 2010 (UTC)

Also, please observe the spelling of mollusc and set it right. I don't know which to pick. Even these articles spell it both ways: clade Patellogastropoda
clade Vetigastropoda
clade Cocculiniformia
clade Neritimorpha
clade Caenogastropoda
clade Heterobranchia
Anna Frodesiak (talk) 05:42, 27 January 2010 (UTC)

I have abandoned the plan to make Conus stubs, as the list has grown to a few thousand species and subspecies.
For matters about the big Conus list, please feel free to comment here. Anna Frodesiak (talk) 07:01, 28 January 2010 (UTC)


Mollusk or mollusc?: Hi Anna. Mollusk is the correct spelling in the USA, whereas Mollusc is the correct spelling in British English i.e. most of the other English-speaking countries. "Mollusk" should certainly be used for species that are endemic to the USA. Mollusc should be used for species that are restricted to the British Isles and other areas that speak only British English. As for all the other articles, if I am writing them I usually use mollusk, but that is just me because I live in the US. The important thing here on WP is to be consistent in using British English or US English within one article. The Latin name is "Mollusca" of course. Thanks, Invertzoo (talk) 15:36, 29 January 2010 (UTC)

Discussion copied here from Anna's talk page

Because it was thought to be relevant to the project as a whole: Invertzoo (talk) 16:16, 3 February 2010 (UTC)

The synonym problem seems daunting and serious. Isn't there some sort of global data bank for gastropods? Where does Wikipedia currently place as such a resource? Anna Frodesiak (talk) 00:34, 2 February 2010 (UTC)
No, there is no global data bank for gastropods or anything even remotely like that. There are (and always have been) far more families of gastropods than there are experts to sort out the taxonomy and nomenclature of them, especially at the species level. Dr. Gary Rosenberg at ANSP hopes to be able to create something like a global database for all marine mollusks worldwide over the next 15 or 20 years assuming he devotes a significant part of the rest of his career to that. Currently in the online database "Malacolog", Gary has the Western Atlantic marine mollusks in fairly good shape, and the Western Atlantic gastropods in excellent shape, datawise. (Of course some other malacologists will disagree with various aspects of Gary's listings, because many of the decisions you have to make about which species are "real" or not, are judgement calls rather than an exact science. You can make a case for saying that "Physics is easy, Biology is hard!"!!!) Anyway, Project Gastropods definitely has the potential to be a useful resource on gastropods worldwide, especially since we attract a lot of good photographic contributions, but since we will probably never be able to get many professionals to contribute their insights and knowledge of the literature, I suspect that it will be most useful to amateurs. The gastropod coverage is already quite useful in a lot of ways. I know Snek is working on improving the family articles, which are really a key feature of the project. Invertzoo (talk) 19:38, 2 February 2010 (UTC)
As for stubs made from a reliable list, I agree that a good sample makes sense.
Yes, one carefully-checked sample, and also a good solid citation based on data from a good source for the species list in the first place. Invertzoo (talk) 19:38, 2 February 2010 (UTC)
You say that you want stubs to be "good" before hitting the main space. What do you mean? Do you prefer more bare-bones, accurate stubs upon which people can build, or fewer, but more substantial articles?
I meant that stubs can be bare-bones but need to be accurate, and formatted correctly, with all the basics in place. Substantial fuller articles are really nice also. Some people prefer making quick stubs, and other people prefer writing longer articles. It is important that all of us do mostly what we like to do on Wikipedia because it is a volunteer thing, and therefore it is crucial to keep morale up. If people are not enjoying what they are doing then they will do less and less and then give up, sooner or later. You and I can talk ourselves into doing some stuff that we would perhaps rather not do, but most people who contribute will just go ahead and do whatever it is they like to do and that's fine. Overall I don't mind terribly much whether right now Project Gastropods gets a lot more new stubs or a few more much better longer articles, or something in between. However I do have ideas about what would be good to try to do now to the extent that we have a choice.
I wish there were more than just half a dozen people working this project. There are only 6,000 of the 70,000 articles needed. Is there some sort of plan for this?
A lot of the time it's even less than 6 people who are really active on the project. Sure it would be great to have more people active, as long as they would all work in some degree of harmony. As time goes by we seem to be attracting more and more new people. I personally do what I can to actively recruit new members by watching for new people creating snail-related articles, and then welcoming them to Wikipedia, inviting them to the project and welcoming them if they do join... but obviously not all of them are going to have lots of time and willingness to work hard. But you know, until quite recently the whole of Wikipedia was developing almost purely on a random "catch as catch can" basis and shockingly... that was working quite well!
I do think that our project has reached critical mass and needs some organizing and pulling together. The first step in that direction was creating stubs for all the families and higher taxa, and that is done now, mostly thanks to you, and that's really great! The next step in that same kind of direction is cleaning up all of the pre-existing stubs, which Daniel Cavallari and I have been working on virtually every day for months and months now. A huge number of the stubs were bot-generated in 2007 and were really in below-minimal state, never having been touched by a human after they were created in an extreme shorthand form.
Actually we don't yet have 6,000 species articles. We have maybe 5,000 species articles, 500 articles on the genera, families, superfamilies, clades and informal groups, and maybe another 500 on gastropod anatomical features, gastropod organ systems, biographical stubs of malacologists who named gastropod taxa, gastropods as food, snail shells as cultural or religious items, and so on. These supporting articles are just as important as the species articles, in some ways a lot of them are actually much more essential than species articles. Invertzoo (talk) 19:38, 2 February 2010 (UTC)
I am a very systematic, "macro" kind of person. I keep thinking that we should find some clever way to assess and address the entire gastropod class. If you have any suggestions, please let me know how I can help. Thank you for the guidance. Anna Frodesiak (talk) 00:34, 2 February 2010 (UTC)
As for right now this moment, from my point of view I think the rather boring routine cleaning up the preexisting stubs and articles, cleaning up in the most basic simple ways, is currently absolutely the most essential task to increase the quality of the project. No-one is going to be very impressed that we currently have 6,000 articles, or that in a couple of years time maybe we will have stubs on 30,0000 topics, if half of the articles are messy, with out of date taxonomy, erratic data full of small errors, many omissions, sloppy formatting etc, and the information unsupported by proper sources.
I do feel for example that any new stubs that are built around an image are very valuable, because an image carries so much information even if it doesn't have much accompanying text, (assuming of course that the creature was correctly identified in the first place, which is a big assumption!)
As for a master plan as to what needs doing after the basic article clean-up is finished and assuming you don't really fancy helping with that (?). And after Snek finishes tuning up and adding to the family articles. Yes, I will think about ideas for the next big step forward, and get back to you with ideas I come up with.
One problem is that some small parts of the class Gastropoda are reasonably well known to science, and other quite large parts are hardly known at all, and there is absolutely nothing we can do about that, we have to work with what knowledge is available. Another problem is that most of us simply can't get constant access to a professional malacological library, and so we cannot freely use books and papers we need to get the information we need. We are limited in what we can do, compared with what we would like to be able to do. Invertzoo (talk) 19:38, 2 February 2010 (UTC)

The discussion between Anna and me is continuing on her talk page. It will probably mostly now be about what she could do next, but anyone else is welcome to join in either here or there if they are interested. If our discussion again touches on the project as a whole in a relevant and interesting way, I will copy another thread onto this page. Invertzoo (talk) 23:58, 3 February 2010 (UTC)

Continuing discussion copied from Anna's page: Next step in master plan?
Missing genera stubs created from checked family articles?

I am thinking if you can ask Snek which family articles he has already cleaned up, in terms of which genus articles now have a good list of genera from a reputable and cited source, well then, you could zero in on those families and create genus stubs for any genera that don't already have an article. That would be really useful and helpful in the long run.

You see, a lot of new people come in to WP and create new species stubs without creating a corresponding genus stub, leaving the genus red linked. When that occurs, it means that people using our project subsequently can't navigate their way down through the Tree of Life structure from class Gastropoda all the way down to (or all the way up from) that species level, because the genus article is missing. That means that there is a hole in the structure.

In terms of a master plan, taxonomically speaking, it is excellent in many ways to make sure the structure is complete from the top down (from class Gastropoda down). One does this by examining each level in turn, and creating missing articles as stubs where they are needed. I mean it makes more sense that way, and will ultimately be more useful that way.

However most new people just want to come in and create species articles on the species they encounter in the area in which they live. Of course that is fine too and we are very grateful for their contributions. But once we have an almost complete number of genus articles in place, then most of the time a new species stub will automatically link itself to the corresponding genus article, and all will be well.

When creating a genus stub article, an important part of that is the list of species within that genus. Right now most of those lists (in our current genus articles) are very incomplete... and that is OK for the time being. But if you do start in on creating genus articles stubs, which seems like a good idea, we will have to decide what is the best way of handling the species lists in these new genus stubs? Should you list only those species for which there are already blue links? And if not, then where will you obtain proper reliable sourced lists of species within each genus? I am not yet sure what the answer should be to those questions.

Anyway, that is my first set of ideas, genus stubs created from family articles that are now deemed good enough. Assuming Snek already has some family articles with genera lists that he feels are reliable. If there is anything I said that you don't really understand, please ask. Invertzoo (talk) 22:00, 2 February 2010 (UTC)

Thank you so much for the replies. I am very busy on this end at the moment and will get back to wiki ASAP. From what I've read, it sounds like a good plan. I will write to Snek for advice on good genera articles with reliable species lists. Chat soon. I really appreciate you taking the time to address these matters! Anna Frodesiak (talk) 00:49, 6 February 2010 (UTC)
My pleasure. I appreciate your asking questions that force me to think about these issues! Invertzoo (talk) 00:57, 7 February 2010 (UTC) Anna Frodesiak (talk) 03:56, 19 February 2010 (UTC)

Statistics from NCBI

Today (3 February 2010) is in NCBI database:

  • 4500 species of gastropods http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/sites/entrez?db=taxonomy&cmd=search&term=Gastropoda[SubTree]%20AND%20species[Rank]%20NOT%20uncultured[Properties]%20NOT%20unspecified[Properties]
  • 1452 genera of gastropods http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/sites/entrez?db=taxonomy&cmd=search&term=Gastropoda[SubTree]%20AND%20genus[Rank]%20NOT%20uncultured[Properties]%20NOT%20unspecified[Properties]
  • 506 higher taxa of gastropods http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/sites/entrez?db=taxonomy&cmd=search&term=Gastropoda[SubTree]%20AND%20%22above%20species%20level%22[Properties]%20NOT%20genus[Rank]%20NOT%20uncultured[Properties]%20NOT%20unspecified[Properties]
  • Altogether 8227 taxonomy records (including subspecies) [7]

This statistics is for overview only. Taxonomic placement needs to be verified always, but reference(s) for 4500 species are useful. --Snek01 (talk) 22:11, 3 February 2010 (UTC)

Category:Digenea

Category:Digenea was started, which is useful, because all digeneans have its gastropod host. All of them should have articles and parasite-host wikilinks (if host is known). --Snek01 (talk) 20:16, 17 February 2010 (UTC)

Do not trust unreferenced species lists

In our articles, the lists of species that are currently unreferenced are unreliable because they are likely to contain synonyms and possibly other errors. Examples of lists like this are:

--Snek01 (talk) 19:34, 18 February 2010 (UTC) Prose and heading tweaked by Invertzoo (talk) 22:21, 18 February 2010 (UTC)

Good genera list

It is probably best for me to avoid creating genus articles, as I will have problems sorting out species lists. Perhaps a good plan, per the discussion above, is for Snek or others to list some good genus articles, with well-referenced species lists here in this thread. I can then make a stub in one of my sandboxes for people to check over, and then make the species articles for the red links. Then I can go over them and dig for photos, additional information and references, etc. Does this sound like a good plan?

(Also, sorry for being so hasty in making that last batch of stubs. Snek was out of town, and I got impatient. Now I see him wasting his time fixing my mistakes.) Anna Frodesiak (talk) 04:32, 19 February 2010 (UTC)

Conus, still

I still have that Conus species list sitting in User:Anna_Frodesiak/Blue_sandbox. It is formatted, seems to contain around the right amount of known species (so probably doesn't contain too many synonyms), and is from a good source emailed to me by JoJan. (I don't know the original source. Perhaps JoJan could say.)

  • I've added the sources to your list JoJan (talk) 16:57, 19 February 2010 (UTC)

He also recommended that I go to Database of Western Atlantic Marine Mollusca at [10] and hit the button "Show synonyms" to eliminate a lot of synonyms from the list. Trouble is, it gives a list of only 140. When I click "show next 140", it doesn't. What am I doing wrong here?

  • If you go to [11]] and click on "Conidae", you'll get a few more species. I've added them to your list.

Anyway, about the list in my sandbox, it took me an hour to do. Can it be verified and then placed in the Conus article at some point? Anna Frodesiak (talk) 04:47, 19 February 2010 (UTC)

  • Such a list is almost never complete. But such as it is now, it comes close. I think you can proceed. JoJan (talk) 16:57, 19 February 2010 (UTC)
Just so that I'm clear, can this list now replace the one at Conus? Anna Frodesiak (talk) 08:40, 20 February 2010 (UTC)
Yes, even if it is not the final list it is better than the former one. JoJan (talk) 09:03, 20 February 2010 (UTC)
Whoa. I see about 30 blue species links at Conus and only about 20 at the big list at User:Anna_Frodesiak/Blue_sandbox. Please advise. Anna Frodesiak (talk) 08:47, 20 February 2010 (UTC)
It's because some synonyms have been treated as accepted names : e.g. Conus lignarius (blue link in Conus) is a synonym of the accepted name Conus furvus (red link in Conus). You have to check first all the blue links in Conus with the list in your sandbox and make redirects from the synonym to the accepted name.JoJan (talk) 09:03, 20 February 2010 (UTC)

Okay. I guess step one is to enter the names of all the blue link species at Conus into a site like WoRMS to see if it is the accepted name. Could you recommend the best site for this? Anna Frodesiak (talk) 09:30, 20 February 2010 (UTC)

This is a list of all the blue links listed at Conus. According to [12], the following appear as accepted species names, except for those indicated. Please note Conus mcgintyi and Conus macgintyi, which may be the same. (Both are identical Wiki articles.)

* Conus kermadecensis Iredale, 1912 accepted as Conus lischkeanus Weinkauff, 1875 redirected

* Conus lignarius accepted as Conus furvus Reeve, 1843 Moved

* Conus macarae Bernardi, 1857 accepted as Conus voluminalis Reeve, 1843

* Conus magdalenae Kiener, 1845 accepted as Conus floccatus G. B. Sowerby II, 1841

Anna Frodesiak (talk) 09:58, 20 February 2010 (UTC)

I've completed the list with all known accepted names of Conus. The species marked with nomen dubium (doubtful name) should be extracted from the list and put in a separate list. And don't forget, when making the articles, there are a lot of photos available on the Commons Commons:Category:Conus. JoJan (talk) 13:30, 22 February 2010 (UTC)
Thank you for all your hard work. I've got to sort out a bit of software to make the articles, then I will work on the photos. What's the final word on the list currently at Conus and the list above? Anna Frodesiak (talk) 13:44, 22 February 2010 (UTC)
I've transferred already this list to the article Conus (and forget about the list above, the accepted names should be included in the new list). I've also mentioned the large number of synonyms for Conus, some of which are still being treated as a valid name in wikipedia. I'll going to bring the necessary changes to those articles. JoJan (talk) 17:32, 22 February 2010 (UTC)

Do you still want me to move the nomem dubiums in Conus to a separate section within Conus? Anna Frodesiak (talk) 01:45, 23 February 2010 (UTC)

Have you really used all 21 references (that JoJan placed as non-inline references) to compile the list? If not used at all, it belongs to "Further reading" section. If really used, then it it useless until properly reformated to inline references. Why haven't you directly used the list from WoRMS since start (it seems as the most easy way)? Have you an experience that there used to be errors in WoRMS? Do your work properly to be useful for readers. For me that list is not useful. Not yet. Maybe it needs only a small work, maybe huge; I do not know, because I will not check thousands of names in this genus one by one. --Snek01 (talk) 14:43, 23 February 2010 (UTC)

JoJan made the list, not me, and compiled it, and checked it. He did all the work. I just formatted it. JoJan spent hours and hours working on it. Anna Frodesiak (talk) 14:46, 23 February 2010 (UTC) Anna Frodesiak (talk) 14:52, 23 February 2010 (UTC)
Hi Anna, Not to complain but I noticed just now that there are a number of small errors in the Cone snail species list. These need to be fixed before the stubs are generated:
  • Conus aculeiformis Reeve, 1844 in 1843-65, the last bit "in 1843-65" is rather an odd notation
  • Conus alainallaryi, there is an extra "<" before Bozzetti & Monnier, 2009
  • Conus algoensis, the authority should be Sowerby not Soweby. It would also be nice to know which Sowerby.
  • Conus bairstowi Sowerby, 1889. It would be nice to know which Sowerby
  • Conus crotchi i Reeve, 1849, has an extra "i" floating in it
  • Conus dorreensis P?ron, 1807, what is supposed to be here instead of the "?"
  • Conus elegans Sowerby Iii, 1895, what is "Iii"? Is that II or III?
  • Conus fantasmalis Rolán, 1990, the author and date needs to be in small type here anyway
  • Conus flavescens Sowerby Ii, 1834, is this supposed to be Sowerby II?
  • Conus franciscoi Rolán & Röckel, 2000, the author and date needs to be in small type here anyway
  • Conus gubernator Hwass in Jean Guillaume Bruguière, 1792. Every time you have Jean Guillaume Bruguière in this list it can be just Bruguière.
  • Conus jucundus Sowerby Iii, 1887. Is this supposed to be Sowerby III?
  • Conus laterculatus Sowerby Iii, 1870. Is this supposed to be Sowerby III?
  • Conus lynceus Sowerby, 1857. It would be nice to know which Sowerby.
  • Conus madagascariensis Sowerby Ii, 1858. Is this Sowerby II?
  • Conus melvilli Sowerby Iii, 1879. Is this Sowerby III?
  • Conus proximus Sowerby Ii, 1859. IS this Sowerby II?

There may possibly be many others that I did not notice because I went through the list of more than 600 rather quickly. By the way, we should decide in general if we want Sowerby I to be written as G.B. Sowerby I, Sowerby II to be G.B. Sowerby II and so on.

Best, Invertzoo (talk) 21:13, 24 February 2010 (UTC)
 Done You posted the same list at User_talk:Anna_Frodesiak#Conus_species_list.2C_small_errors where I acknowledged completion and commented. Anna Frodesiak (talk) 17:00, 25 February 2010 (UTC)

Differences in Conus lists

I have checked ALL differences with actual wikipedia article and WoRMS:

additinal to wiki:

to add to wiki:

duplicites in WoRMS (just listed here to avoid problems):

  • Species Conus boavistensis Rolán & Fernandes, 1990 : accepted by WoRMS ([28]) versus Conus boavistensis Rolán, 1990: it should be Conus boavistensis Rolán & Fernandez in Rolán, 1990 ([29])
  • Species Conus pseudocuneolus Röckel, Rolán, & Monteiro, 1980 versus incorrect typography in authorities : deleted the comma

to remove from wiki:

Solve these potentially problematic names. Start well referenced articles for them first. Then feel free to proceed with other names (because hey are referenced by at least one source in WoRMS). --Snek01 (talk) 14:08, 24 February 2010 (UTC)

I've gone with the comb through the whole list, adding a few names and deleting a few remaining synonyms. Such a list is never finished but now it must come close. Anyway, through a concerted effort, this article has grown to an acceptable size. Cone snails are well known to the public at large and deserve our attention to this article. JoJan (talk) 15:52, 25 February 2010 (UTC)
A great effort and a great result. Please let me know when the species list at Conus cannot be further improved so I can copy it to User:Anna Frodesiak/Green sandbox in preparation for the new stubs. Thanks. Anna Frodesiak (talk) 16:12, 25 February 2010 (UTC)
Let's wait if Susan or Michal have any more remarks. If not, you can go ahead. JoJan (talk) 16:32, 25 February 2010 (UTC)

No, there are still errors that I have pointed to. anabathrum, pauperculus, maybe more? Who knows? JoJan only wrote that he made few and few changes. From my point of view is JoJan very irresponsible and it will take very long time to change my mind. Despite that I believe, that the list will be correct in few days. List is still unreferenced with inline citations. There is no choice and there is need per Wikipedia:Citing sources and per Wikipedia:Verifiability:

  • option 1: Reference list with inline citations and then you can start these stubs with included {{unreferenced}} template.
  • option 2: Keep the list unreferenced but you have to reference all stubs during creation.
  • option 3: (optimal) reference both list and stubs.

--Snek01 (talk) 22:10, 25 February 2010 (UTC)

The Conus sample stub, here

Is here. Please feel free to tweak it. Anna Frodesiak (talk) 14:08, 23 February 2010 (UTC)

I added in some info and made a few other tweaks. I encourage others to take a look at this sample, as it will be used to generate 500 new stubs. Anything that needs correcting or adding should be done now, not afterwards, which would be terribly time-consuming! Thanks to all, Invertzoo (talk) 15:33, 24 February 2010 (UTC)
No need to add category:Venomous animals, because whole Category:Conidae is in Category:Venomous animals. --Snek01 (talk) 17:10, 24 February 2010 (UTC)

Heterobranchia or Gastropod stub preferred?

Hi Snek, quick question. Sometimes I come across pages which say: "This Heterobranchia-related article is a stub. You can help Wikipedia by expanding it." and sometimes ones with "gastropod related stub". For new articles I create I add "gastropod-related stub". However, if I come across gastropod articles that have a "Heterobranchia" stub, should I change them to "gastropod stub" instead or just leave them? Antarctic-adventurer (talk) 17:42, 23 February 2010 (UTC)

I do not know. I know nobody, for whom are detailed stub types of gastropods useful Wikipedia:WikiProject Gastropods#Stub types. Stub system should be useful Wikipedia:WikiProject Stub sorting#Project goals but it is not useful meantime, because there is nobody, who is trying de-stubbing any part of gastropod articles. My opinion is like this:
  • Useful and necessary stub types: Gastropod-stub, Paleo-gastropod-stub.
  • Useful for better sorting of stub types: FAMILY-stub
  • Not-useful stub types: Sorbeoconcha-stub, Heterobranchia-stub, Pulmonata-stub, Basommatophora-stub, Stylommatophora-stub. I consider it not useful because of difficult (and unstable) taxonomy. Even name of stub type is too long and difficult!
  • Feel free to start a new stub type for any large family.
  • Feel free to continue using gastropod-stub for every article. But there is no need to change detailed stub types to general gastropod-stub. (There can be stub-redirects if more people will have the same opinion as me.)

--Snek01 (talk) 20:08, 23 February 2010 (UTC)


I agree with Snek on this issue! I have been meaning to suggest something similar for quite a while. Invertzoo (talk) 15:35, 24 February 2010 (UTC)

The Conidae and Conus articles

Hi folks. Yesterday JoJan pointed out to me that we had at that point two articles that overlapped a great deal, the Conus article and an article on Cone snail. I took a careful look at them both.

I saw that the Cone snail article was actually supposed to be the family article, but it dated from the time when the only genus in Conidae was Conus, and thus it had become an article exclusively about Conus. It had ended up with more info about that genus than the genus article had!

JoJan "moved" the title of Cone snail to Conidae yesterday evening, and this morning, NYC time, I worked hard to clean up both articles and move info around from one to the other. I think the articles work much better as they are now. I am sure they both need a lot more work, so please anyone who has a spare moment, do go and take a look at them.

I would also suggest that whenever we are doing a big blitz on one genus, we also routinely check the family article and any other closely related articles (such as articles under a common name), to make sure that everything is pretty much OK there too.

Best to all, Invertzoo (talk) 15:50, 24 February 2010 (UTC)

In case you didn't notice, I suggested at Conus talk, that we move all the text above the long lists, otherwise readers may not know it's there. Anna Frodesiak (talk) 05:11, 25 February 2010 (UTC)

Request for comment

Please read notes at User:Anna Frodesiak/Green sandbox Anna Frodesiak (talk) 05:13, 25 February 2010 (UTC)

Species lists and sources for Conus, and all other genera - important!

It seems clear to me now that a species list on Wikipedia should be derived from only one published source, with separate sourced additions used if and when necessary. This is copied from the Conus talk page:


I should point out in general that Conus is an extremely messy genus full of unresolved synonymy, mainly because so many shell collectors love the cones as beautiful shells. Shell collectors found them fascinating in centuries past, and still do now. Some of the more serious collectors have often thought that they have found a new species when in fact what they have is a local variant in form or color. There are a few less rigorous publications out there that still allow unqualified people to publish new species descriptions, and as a result, a lot of new synonyms have been introduced to the literature, which is not helpful, and actually does science a disservice. As a result of so many names having been created, many of which are or may be synonyms, it becomes a matter of one expert scientists's individual opinion against another as to which cone species are actually legitimate, taxonomically speaking.

As a result of this problem, on Wikipedia for this species list, and actually any species list within a genus article, because of Wikipedia's guideline "no original research", it seems quite clear to me that we need to use a list that is taken from one reference only, and not a synthesis.

That is to say that we should not use a combined and integrated list which is derived from more than one published list. However, we can easily add extra species (like the Conus species described in recent years in the publication Visaya) as a separate section at the bottom of the list, giving a reference for those extra species, and also with a written note explaining where they were derived from.

I would gladly hear other opinions on this question. Invertzoo (talk) 16:51, 25 February 2010 (UTC)

Now you tell us?? Ha ha Anna Frodesiak (talk) 17:02, 25 February 2010 (UTC)
I apologize for coming out with this idea rather late in the game for this particular article and its over 600 descendant stubs, but I have been thinking about this issue at the back of my mind for a long time and struggling with the pros and cons of it. The Conus work that is going on now forced me to make up my mind on it. What exactly counts as original research is a tricky issue sometimes on Wikipedia. I believe I am correct on this, but of course I am willing to listen to others who disagree with me.
If we derive a list from one reliable source (and if it is really necessary then have additional supplementary lists from another source or sources), it will be quite clear what information is from where, and it will make it easier in the future to replace a list with another list, if another expert works on the genus and radically revises the synonomies. That happens all the time in zoology. Invertzoo (talk) 20:42, 25 February 2010 (UTC)

Every wikipedia article and every list is synthesis. There is no need one reference only (but it would be practical sometimes). The only need is to source it with inline citations. (Unreferenced informations may be deleted). --Snek01 (talk) 22:23, 25 February 2010 (UTC)

Yes, but when we present a species list, especially in an article that has been carefully worked on, there is some kind of implication (perhaps) that we are endorsing the list as a list of valid species. Therefore you are right, ideally for all lists, everything that is included must be carefully sourced, using high-quality sources that are up-to-date. Invertzoo (talk) 14:32, 26 February 2010 (UTC)
Such a list is never the final list. It is always a work in progress. But the solution is rather simple. At the beginning of the list one mentions from where the list has been derived from. For Conus, this source is WoRMS, a professional website that includes the most recent changes. Any additional instalments should be properly referenced with an inline reference. This way, everyone can trace the origin. JoJan (talk) 09:11, 26 February 2010 (UTC)
Yes I like this suggestion and this system. A basic list should be from one source, that source should be clearly stated at the top of the list. Then is up to anyone who adds species to a list like this which is taken from one source, to provide inline citations for the species they are adding. But inexperienced contributors to the project need to be careful and vigilant, because there are many lists online that look good, but contain numerous synonyms, and even several misspelled versions of the same name. Names must not be added to a list just because they have been found somewhere. Lists that come from shell dealers and similar sources are particularly suspect. I think maybe we need to have a note to this effect on the project page somewhere, because inexperienced people don't even really know about the problem of synonyms. Thanks everyone, Invertzoo (talk) 14:24, 26 February 2010 (UTC)
And yes, this should be made a policy on the project page. JoJan (talk) 14:37, 26 February 2010 (UTC)
I did just want to ask Snek now if he meant that each and every name on a list should have an inline citation? That would protect the list against well-meaning people coming in and naively adding names without a citation. I mean those could easily be spotted and removed if everything had a citation, but new names would be harder for us to spot if most of the list had no individual citations. On the other hand, it is more work to make every name have a citation, and perhaps it looks more cluttered too. Invertzoo (talk) 14:57, 26 February 2010 (UTC)
JoJan wrote: "Any additional instalments should be properly referenced ...". This is only limited view. There is also need to know, that any additional removals should be properly referenced. --Snek01 (talk) 15:28, 26 February 2010 (UTC)
Do you mean that if you remove species from a list, you should also leave a notation on the article page at the foot of the list saying which ones were removed and why, along with a citation? Invertzoo (talk) 16:06, 26 February 2010 (UTC)
Yes. It is need to say which ones were removed. Example: You can not take a list of American presidents, add a White House as a source, and then remove some of them without notice even with good intentions. --Snek01 (talk) 17:06, 28 February 2010 (UTC)
I agree with you. Invertzoo (talk) 19:24, 2 March 2010 (UTC)

Listing trustworthy and "other" sites... here

Please JoJan, Snek, and any other interested parties, read the thread below and please add information or sites to, the list of online gastropod resources that we are compiling on one of Anna's subpages, along with notes on what each site is good for (or not.) Thanks! Invertzoo (talk) 16:04, 26 February 2010 (UTC)

Copied from Invertzoo's talk page:


Per this discussion, I would love a list of sites to avoid as sources, or even better, a few sites that I should stick to. Best, Anna Frodesiak (talk) 14:54, 26 February 2010 (UTC)

Yes I think that is a very good idea, not only for you, but for anyone else too. Maybe once it is done it could be posted on the project page. It could also be updated over time as new good website sources appear. I think we should go ahead and do this, Snek and JoJan and I can work on it. Why don't we put it together at first on a subpage? I would include the Paleobiology Database, Malacolog, WoRMS, Nomenclator Zoologicus, and we can perhaps say a few words about each one. Invertzoo (talk) 15:10, 26 February 2010 (UTC)
Good plan. I started it here and will include the above sites. We can move it when done. Thanks! Anna Frodesiak (talk) 15:15, 26 February 2010 (UTC)
I added some more links that I use or have found. I made comments on what I thought of their reliability but left most of them in the "yet to be assessed" category. Someone with more experience than I can decide what they think. Antarctic-adventurer (talk) 08:01, 27 February 2010 (UTC)

Input on planned Conus stubs [30]

Please all the project members, read the linked page over, and give your input on the planned over 600 bot-generated Conus stubs. Careful planning now will save a lot of work later on. Thanks, Invertzoo (talk) 17:08, 27 February 2010 (UTC)

WoRMS data download [31]

Hello Gastropod team:

Let me introduce myself. I had been helping Anna create stubs using data files. I got interested in the reference site that was used for these stubs, WoRMS. I noticed that their site allows two ways to access their database:

  1. Access database download: This can be requested by writing a letter to them.
  2. Web services: The web service is free for anyone to use.

I wrote a software program to bump the Conus list with the web service and created User:Ganeshk/sandbox/Conus page. I was thinking this output can be used to create Wikipedia articles based on CSV data. Please let me know if you find the information useful.

Regards, Ganeshk (talk) 03:48, 9 March 2010 (UTC)

Hello, that will be very good (because it contains URL). 1) But Kingdom/Phylum/Class/Order will not be used in generating articles. All ranks above family level will be according to the existing families articles, that are already on wikipedia. 2) I would like to suggest this: Let's test it on smaller group of species. (I have randomly chosen few species of Pyropelta [32] ). Feel free to generate these 7 articles. Or if this way is effective for large taxa only, then generate directly into article namespace the Conus article of the first species to be sure that is is fine. Thank you. --Snek01 (talk) 10:57, 9 March 2010 (UTC)
Michal, Thanks for the feedback. I have downloaded the data here, User:Ganeshk/sandbox/Pyropelta. The program will download the information and allow editors to use it in the actual articles. It is not designed to update article namespace directly. Yes, the url is very helpful. The Kingdom/Phyllum/Class/Order will be useful when creating new article stubs. Regards, Ganeshk (talk) 13:03, 9 March 2010 (UTC)
Thank you Ganeshk. This looks very good. Anna Frodesiak (talk) 13:37, 9 March 2010 (UTC)
Did you notice that in the database download for Conus there are species names that are ranked as "unaccepted" ? e.g. Conus australis Lamarck, 1810 is a synonym of Conus teramachii (Kuroda, 1956). I haven't checked the whole list but there may be others. I suppose it may be possible to exclude the word "unaccepted" from your Status column. JoJan (talk) 19:47, 9 March 2010 (UTC)
We are pulling whatever is listed on WoRMS [33]. I am not sure why you would want to exclude something. It is left to user's discretion on what to do with the downloaded information. Regards, Ganeshk (talk) 23:55, 9 March 2010 (UTC)
The CSV data is available at User:Ganeshk/sandbox/Conus data file (without nomem dubum lines). The content between the <syntaxhighlight lang=""> tags can be copied to a text file and opened in MS Excel or OpenOffice Calc. Regards, Ganeshk (talk) 13:41, 10 March 2010 (UTC)
Few typos in authorities, for example: Bruguière. --Snek01 (talk) 22:26, 10 March 2010 (UTC)
I have fixed the typos now. I had to write the file in unicode format to handle those special characters. I had also noticed some species names that were not found on WoRMS (Aphia ID=0), here is the list:
  • Conus pfluegeri : A synonym of Conus jaspideus Gmelin 1791 [34]
  • Conus platensis : Conus platensis Frenguelli, 1946 is accepted by Malacolog [35] but not in WoRMS or CLEMAM
  • Conus tranversianus : Conus traversianus E. A. Smith 1875 seems to be accepted [36] in Checklist of the living Conidae, but not found in WoRMS or CLEMAM
  • Conus tuberculosus : Conus tuberculosus Tomlin 1937 seems to be accepted [37] in Checklist of the living Conidae, but not found in WoRMS or CLEMAM
Do they belong in the Conus article? Regards, Ganeshk (talk) 01:37, 11 March 2010 (UTC)
Reply above. JoJan (talk) 09:27, 11 March 2010 (UTC)

WoRMS reference templates

On a related note to the post above, I had created two new templates that can be used to easily reference WoRMS records. They are {{WRMS}} and {{WRMS species}}. You can see them working in my sandbox, Julia exquisita. The templates need the Aphia ID (the computer system running at WoRMS) as input. Aphia ID is one of fields downloaded by the program in the above post. Please let me know if you have any questions regarding these templates. Regards, Ganeshk (talk) 13:26, 9 March 2010 (UTC)

I changed order like this: webpags, server page. Then usually should be used access date. --Snek01 (talk) 10:26, 13 March 2010 (UTC)

Conus sample stub

I have added a sample Conus stub article here. Please review. Regards, Ganeshk (talk) 01:16, 13 March 2010 (UTC)

All right.
  • After reference there should be accesdate. Like this:
{{WRMS species | 141435 | ''Abra nitida'' (O.F. Müller, 1776)}}, accessed 13 March 2010.

generating:

Abra nitida (O.F. Müller, 1776). Retrieved through: World Register of Marine Species., accessed 13 March 2010.

  • I have a tip for improvemement, but it is not mandatory. There is not possible to make wikilink to authority automatically, so alternative method can be used: there can be replaced some authorities with wikilink directly in the data file:
Linnaeus -> [[Carl Linnaeus|Linnaeus]]

prior to generating article. But only for those authorities, that you are sure. But it will be also good without wikilinks. --Snek01 (talk) 10:40, 13 March 2010 (UTC)

I made some changes in markup (removed brackets in template - brackets are directly in data file - and removed unnecessary spaces) and I have also updated the generated sample. --Snek01 (talk) 19:34, 13 March 2010 (UTC)

I have added a new field, accessdate to the template. I have updated the sample stub to include the date as a parameter. It is a lot of work to link the Authority. My preference would be not to do it. Regards, Ganeshk (talk) 20:52, 13 March 2010 (UTC)
That is complication for you (and for the one who will generate articles from WoRMS data) when you added accessdate to the template (for the reason that I do not understand). I am fine with everything now. Good work. --Snek01 (talk) 23:15, 13 March 2010 (UTC)
Good suggestion. I have now hard-coded the access date in the stub code so that I don't have to add it to the data file. I will change it on the date of the bot run. Regards, Ganeshk (talk) 01:29, 14 March 2010 (UTC)
Speaking of the person who will generate the articles, my blocking issues may prohibit me from doing this. If Ganeshk is willing, I think he would be the quicker and safer choice. I hope this is okay with everyone. I will do my best to find images afterward, and help juice up individual articles. Sorry to let you down, but I'm a bit of a fifth wheel on this one anyway. Anna Frodesiak (talk) 23:47, 13 March 2010 (UTC)
No problem. I can run this batch. I will need to request for a bot-approval once the stub sample is approved by this project. Regards, Ganeshk (talk) 01:29, 14 March 2010 (UTC)
We have two more unresolved issues. If these are resolved, we can move this project to the next phase. Please review and comment. Regards, Ganeshk (talk) 23:15, 15 March 2010 (UTC)
Thanks for the feedback. All the pending issues have been resolved. I have filed a bot approval request. Regards, Ganeshk (talk) 00:41, 17 March 2010 (UTC)
One of the bot reviewers asked if it was possible to remove the empty sections from the stub sample. Can we remove them? Here is how it will look, Conus abbreviatus. Regards, Ganeshk (talk) 22:27, 17 March 2010 (UTC)
Can we find a reference for the second line about Conus being venomous? That will help address one of the issues raised at the bot page. Regards, Ganeshk (talk) 23:10, 17 March 2010 (UTC)
As far as the only one reviewer does not like sections, I support sections because even empty sections are a common parts of articles. Sections are helpful for expansion. Removing them will neither help to wikipedians nor improve quality for reader. - On the other hand, I think that sentence about venom is not necessary (because it is not species specific). --Snek01 (talk) 01:18, 18 March 2010 (UTC)
I agree. The article with sections looks more structured than the one without. Having them in place will reduce the effort for the team when they add the locality and other information. Regards, Ganeshk (talk) 21:52, 18 March 2010 (UTC)

Bot trial

Hello. I was allowed to complete a bot trial and create 20 Conus articles. Can the Gastropod team please check each of the articles and comment about the accuracy of the content at the bot page? I also want the team to advise on why Conus anabathrum shows up fine when I queried using web services, User:Ganeshk/sandbox/Conus anabathrum. But when searched online, it shows up as in quarantaine, unverified (screenshot). Thanks. Ganeshk (talk) 04:43, 20 March 2010 (UTC)

I'm sorry I couldn't attend to this matter sooner, but I must ask you a question (better later than never, it is). Several species in WoRMs have their synonyms listed in their respective pages. Shouldn't the bot add such information to the taxoboxes as well?--Daniel Cavallari (talk) 06:15, 20 March 2010 (UTC)
Daniel, do you have an example of how the synonyms should be listed on the Taxobox? Regards, Ganeshk (talk) 18:25, 20 March 2010 (UTC)
Found one, Conus textile. Let me check if we can pull this information as well. Thanks. Ganeshk (talk) 18:28, 20 March 2010 (UTC)
It's done. See Conus ammiralis for example. Regards, Ganeshk (talk) 22:12, 20 March 2010 (UTC)
FYI, I wrote an e-mail to the WoRMS website (info@marinespecies.org) about the discrepancy in Conus anabathrum. Here is what I had sent:
Hello:

I am an editor on the English Wikipedia helping out WikiProject Gastropods create missing 
Gastropod species articles in the Conus genus. We found the Aphia web services on your website 
very easy to work with. I wrote a Visual Basic program to read the web services and download 
the information. The downloaded information is used to create Wikipedia articles using WoRMS 
as the reference site. While doing this I noticed, Conus anabathrum shows up "in quarantaine, unverified" 
when queried through the web site search (http://www.marinespecies.org/aphia.php?p=taxdetails&id=420200).
It shows up as "accepted" when queried through web services. Can you please explain why these two query 
options are not in sync. Any help you can provide with this is greatly appreciated. 

Here is the species article on Wikipedia,

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Conus_anabathrum

Here is the discussion about the robot program that will create the missing articles,

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Bots/Requests_for_approval/Ganeshbot_4

Best regards,

Ganesh Krishnamurthy
User:Ganeshk on English Wikipedia

Regards, Ganeshk (talk) 22:41, 20 March 2010 (UTC)

Xenobot Mk V to tag and/or auto-assess unassessed articles

A request has been made to tag & auto-assess articles in the scope of the project and/or auto-assess the project's unassessed articles.

Xenobot Mk V (talk · contribs) looks for a {{stub}} template on the article, or inherits the class from other projects (see here for further details).

If there are any questions or objections regarding this process, please make them known. The task will commence after 72 hours if there are none.

Regards, SunCreator (talk) 00:27, 18 March 2010 (UTC)

PS. To do this task a Category list page (example) is required which includes a list of Categories that are covered by WikiProject Gastropods. I will create this list prior to the bot run. Regards, SunCreator (talk) 00:33, 18 March 2010 (UTC)
Category list updated. Regards, SunCreator (talk) 20:32, 18 March 2010 (UTC)
Request submitted. See request here. Regards, SunCreator (talk) 14:39, 20 March 2010 (UTC)

Akera bullata

Would an expert care to take a look at Akera bullata. My main concern is the synonyms. I was hoping someone with expertise would be able to know whether the synonyms mentioned are indeed the same species and not something else. I will redirect all of the species suggested for now (I will not redirect the genus by themselves to Akera in the case that they might have other species and other organisms contained within them. Cheers!Calaka (talk) 09:23, 20 March 2010 (UTC)

Thanks for the new article! I fixed it up a little. I would recommend that you leave all of the synonyms as they are for now, and not turn any of them into redirects. Only an true expert on the nomenclature of this species could give an opinion as to whether these names do in fact refer to this species and this genus. Thanks for your work! Invertzoo (talk) 14:41, 21 March 2010 (UTC)
Ack! Sorry I should not have rushed into things as I made redirects soon after I made the article (I must have changed my mind soon after I wrote the above!). But in future, unless I am absolutely certain, I will refrain from adding redirects. Cheers and thank you for the reply!Calaka (talk) 07:53, 22 March 2010 (UTC)

Conus list at WoRMS

I did a like search for Conus on the WoRMS site and downloaded all the accepted species to User:Ganeshk/sandbox/Conus full file. Can someone please check the list and see if it can be used to create the stubs? It has about 100 additional species than the list at Conus. Thanks. Ganeshk (talk) 02:57, 21 March 2010 (UTC)

User:Ganeshk/sandbox/Conus page is unfiltered. I found some listed without Authority and as subspecies (Conus algoensis algoensis for example). How do you handle these? Please let me know if you need me to filter the list to exclude subspecies. Regards, Ganeshk (talk) 03:02, 21 March 2010 (UTC)
I have not been following the whole entire process of the Conus planning in detail over the last month or two, but I am confused. I thought we had already been through the process of cleaning up the WoRMS list? I thought we already eliminated all the subspecies? Have we started remaking the Conus list from scratch again? In any case, yes, we do not want (currently) to include any subspecies. Invertzoo (talk) 13:56, 21 March 2010 (UTC)
This was an automated download that will be useful in the future (for making lists for other genus). I wanted to make sure we did not miss anything. I can still use the original list at Conus. Thanks. Ganeshk (talk) 14:01, 21 March 2010 (UTC)
I have removed the subspecies now. Total is 623. We can go back to this list at a later time to find red links. Regards, Ganeshk (talk) 14:36, 21 March 2010 (UTC)
OK. I still don't exactly understand the process that is going on but I am sure it will become clearer to me in time. Invertzoo (talk) 17:17, 21 March 2010 (UTC)

219 articles new to the project!

The bot Xenobot Mk V found us 219 articles on gastropods that did not have the project template and therefore were not counted in the project totals. They are listed here. Many of these articles were created by Graham Bould and have not been touched since the copyright clean up. They all need a lot of updating and standardization work. Some are not gastropod articles and need the template removing. A number of them are Conus names that do not yet have an article, but now have a talk page!!! I am not sure how that happened. Help with any part of this clean up work would be welcome. Invertzoo (talk) 18:04, 21 March 2010 (UTC)

Removed the tags from the remaining four articles in Category:Delos. Not sure how that came to be a Gastropod category. Regards, SunCreator (talk) 18:38, 21 March 2010 (UTC)
Worked out it was suppose to be Category:Delos (genus). My mistake. Regards, SunCreator (talk) 19:05, 21 March 2010 (UTC)
The Conus pages are from the bot trial above(woops not that bot). The articles have been deleted since yesterday but I guess they will be recreated so perhaps the project template tags still apply. Regards, SunCreator (talk) 19:07, 21 March 2010 (UTC)
The missing articles were created by unauthorized bot account, See ANI incident. They were later deleted by an admin. Regards, Ganeshk (talk) 20:18, 21 March 2010 (UTC)
Thanks for that. Funny timing that the day this happens, we are project tagging by another bot. Regards, SunCreator (talk) 20:45, 21 March 2010 (UTC)
I'll be working on these articles ASAP.--Daniel Cavallari (talk) 23:10, 21 March 2010 (UTC)
I already cleaned up the first 17 of them. Invertzoo (talk) 01:42, 22 March 2010 (UTC)
Daniel has done many more then that. He's working from A-Z and your working Z-A. Hopefully you'll meet in the middle! There are only 39 unassessed articles left, although there maybe more then 39 as some are auto stubs. Regards, SunCreator (talk) 01:48, 22 March 2010 (UTC)

Did you know...

Some inspiration to make a catching "Did you know..." mollusc-related article: "A name is a name is a name...". --Snek01 (talk) 00:16, 25 March 2010 (UTC)

Yes, this is a cool article. Invertzoo (talk) 00:08, 27 March 2010 (UTC)

Conus stubs

The bot is running now creating the missing stubs. Please keep a watch. I will post a summary once it is done. Thanks. Ganeshk (talk) 18:27, 27 March 2010 (UTC)

 Done The bot is done creating the stubs. Here is summary:
  • 559 new stubs created [38]
  • 50 existing articles skipped
  • 14 Conus species still need to be created. They are missing on the main Conus page. Please verify this list and let me know if these can be created too.
  1. Conus araneosus : accepted as sensu Lightfoot, 1786
  2. Conus augur : accepted as sensu Lightfoot, 1786
  3. Conus australis : accepted as (Holten, 1802)  Done by Snek01
  4. Conus burryae: should be Conus floridanus burryae Clench, 1942 , a junior synonym of Conus anabathrum Crosse, 1865
  5. Conus buxeus : accepted as (Röding, 1798)
  6. Conus desidiosus : accepted as A. Adams, 1855  Done
  7. Conus jaspideus : accepted as Gmelin, 1791  Done
  8. Conus magus : accepted as Linnaeus, 1758  Done
  9. Conus mappa : accepted as sensu Lightfoot, 1786
  10. Conus nocturnus : accepted as sensu Lightfoot, 1786
  11. Conus nodulosus : accepted as G. B. Sowerby III, 1864  Done
  12. Conus olgiatii: accepted as Bozzetti, 2007  Done
  13. Conus quercinus : accepted as Lightfoot, 1786
  14. Conus traversianus :undecided; Conus tranversianus seems to be a senior synonym of Conus traversianus OBIS; however, most other databases seem to prefer the name Conus traversianus. I've sent an email to WoRMS explaining the problem.  Done
Thanks. Ganeshk (talk) 20:34, 27 March 2010 (UTC)
I've added the missing species to the species list in Conus. Others gave a problem because of multiple authorities for the same name, only one of which was the right one. JoJan (talk) 12:32, 28 March 2010 (UTC)
Thanks JoJan. I have created 5 more articles. I have marked them with a {{done}}. Thanks. Ganeshk (talk) 17:03, 28 March 2010 (UTC)

Doubtful photo on Commons

This photo Commons:File:WLA hmns Conus dusaveli.jpg is named Conus dusaveli. It belongs to the collection of the Houston Museum of Natural Science. This cone actually looks quite differently, as shown by Conus biodiversity website. Is there anyone able to identify the photo on the Commons ? JoJan (talk) 18:00, 28 March 2010 (UTC)

JoJan, this is absolutely not a Conus, not even Conoidea. I'm pretty sure this is Pterynotus (Pterynotus) pinnatus, a Muricidae. Check out this weblink Gastropods.com--Daniel Cavallari (talk) 19:54, 28 March 2010 (UTC)
 Done Pterynotus pinnatus. --Snek01 (talk) 20:28, 28 March 2010 (UTC)

New list of marine molluscs

I've just recently found an excellent free-access source about marine molluscs of Western Australia. These two PDFs should provide enough information for a very good and relatively complete new List. If you find yourself interested in starting this new article, please feel free to do so. I don't have enough time myself to start an article this big, but I'll help if need be.--Daniel Cavallari (talk) 20:16, 29 March 2010 (UTC)


Taylor & Glover (2004) - A survey of the benthic molluscs of the Dampier Archipelago, Western Australia

Taylor & Glover (2004) - Diversity and distribution of subtidal benthic molluscs from the Dampier Archipelago, Western Australia; results of the 1999 dredge survey (DA2/99)

Conidae stubs

The bot is currently creating stubs for all genera under the family, Conidae. There are 924 species in total. I am not sure how many of them are new. I will post a summary after the bot run. Please keep a watch and alert me incase of any issues. Thanks. Ganeshk (talk) 01:41, 30 March 2010 (UTC)

In case of any issues, leaving a message on the bot talk page will stop the bot run. Thanks. Ganeshk (talk) 01:45, 30 March 2010 (UTC)
The bot is stopped now. I noticed Columbarium subcontractum is showing under genus, Columbarium. Is that okay? Regards, Ganeshk (talk) 01:56, 30 March 2010 (UTC) articles deleted
 Doing... I filtered out the families other than Conidae from the list and running the bot now. I will cleanup the above once I am done. There are 673 species in this run. Regards, Ganeshk (talk) 02:01, 30 March 2010 (UTC)
 Done bot created 630 new articles. See list of articles. Regards, Ganeshk (talk) 03:27, 30 March 2010 (UTC)
Initial checking : Bactrocythara agachada mentions Mangeliinae as genus instead as subfamily; the genus of course should be Bactrocythara. This problem doesn't present itself at Bactrocythara asarca. Can the bot check the whole list for similar cases ? JoJan (talk) 08:27, 30 March 2010 (UTC)
JoJan, Thanks for checking. Bactrocythara agachada was the only species that had this problem. I have fixed it. I had the bot check all species under Conidae and it found no similar cases. Thanks. Ganeshk (talk) 11:09, 30 March 2010 (UTC)

Conus traversianus

I've just received confirmation by a taxonomic expert at WoRMS that Conus traversianus is the accepted name and not Conus tranversianus (see discussion above : Conus stubs). The article can now be created by the bot. JoJan (talk) 08:18, 30 March 2010 (UTC)

 Done. See Conus traversianus. Regards, Ganeshk (talk) 11:23, 30 March 2010 (UTC)

Bot status

Wondering what the GastroBot is upto? :) User:Ganeshbot/Animalia will stay updated with the bot's progress. Regards, Ganeshk (talk) 04:03, 31 March 2010 (UTC)

Turrid?

Turrid is redirecting to Turridae. But shouldn't it redirect to Conoidea?[1] If so, could someone add common names to Conoidea, please? --Snek01 (talk) 13:11, 2 April 2010 (UTC)

  1. ^ Tucker J. K. (2004). "Catalog of Recent and fossil turrids (Mollusca: Gastropoda)". Zootaxa 682: 1–1295. preview
A "turrid" is the common name for any member of the family Turridae, so I think the redirect is still good. What happened is that in 2005, a few subfamilies that used to be in the Turridae were taken out, elevated into families and moved into the superfamily Conoidea. I am assuming that those families should no longer strictly be referred to as "turrids", even thought they were called that for a long time.
Those families (Clavatulidae, Drilliidae, Pseudomelatomidae, and Strictispiridae) have not yet been given common names, at least not as far as I know. Of course they could simply be called Clavatulids, Drilliids, Pseudomelatomids and Strictispirids. Assuming this classification stays stable for a while, I am assuming that they will be called that. I don't think they will have what you might call "shell collectors' common names" because in these families the shells are too small and too confusing to be of much interest to the average shell collector. Invertzoo (talk) 14:22, 2 April 2010 (UTC)

WoRMS database

WoRMS has an option to request for the database. The data will be a lot more complete than what is available through web services. We will have access to links, notes, distribution and more. Can someone from the project write the letter to WoRMS and have the CD delivered to them monthly? The file can be copied over to a location where I can dowload it for creating the species stubs. That will save a lot of effort for me. Please let me know your thoughts. Thanks. Ganeshk (talk) 03:24, 4 April 2010 (UTC)

Unlike OBIS, WoRMS uses Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 3.0 License which is compatible with Wikipedia. Regards, Ganeshk (talk) 05:03, 4 April 2010 (UTC)

Turridae

 Done Ganeshk (talk) 01:48, 6 April 2010 (UTC)

Here is the Turridae stub template. Sample article created, Asperdaphne bitorquata. Can the project please verify and approve it? Thanks. Ganeshk (talk) 04:14, 30 March 2010 (UTC)

I redirected {{turridae-stub}} to the {{gastropod-stub}} and used it in the stub template. It needs to created at some point (after the stub list goes above 65 articles). Regards, Ganeshk (talk) 11:19, 30 March 2010 (UTC)
There are 800 species under the family, Turridae. There are 415 of them under Conidae. 168 of them under Drilliidae. Like with Conidae bot run, I will skip the Conidae and Drilliidae in this run. Regards, Ganeshk (talk) 11:34, 30 March 2010 (UTC)
The Turridae are the largest family in the Mollusca with about 4,000 species, many of which are only known from single specimens. This should make us proceed with caution. I propose that we deal essentially with the subfamilies instead of the whole family at once. This splits up the family in sizable and manageable chunks we can check. For this reason I just created the article Cochlespirinae. This way, the taxobox can also include the subfamily. And we must also keep in mind that Turridae in WoRMS includes a number of genera that aren't classified in any subfamily. JoJan (talk) 15:45, 30 March 2010 (UTC)
Okay. Let's deal with one subfamily at a time. I will work on Cochlespirinae next. Thanks. Ganeshk (talk) 00:27, 31 March 2010 (UTC)

Cochlespirinae

The bot is creating species under the subfamily, Cochlespirinae. Ganeshk (talk) 23:51, 31 March 2010 (UTC)

 Done with 165 edits Regards, Ganeshk (talk) 00:07, 1 April 2010 (UTC)

Crassispirinae

 Doing... Ganeshk (talk) 16:17, 4 April 2010 (UTC)

 Done with 338 edits. Regards, Ganeshk (talk) 01:49, 5 April 2010 (UTC)

Turrinae

 Doing... Ganeshk (talk) 01:26, 6 April 2010 (UTC)

 Done with 4 edits + 206 edits Ganeshk (talk) 01:31, 6 April 2010 (UTC)

Zonulispirinae

 Doing... Ganeshk (talk) 01:34, 6 April 2010 (UTC)

 Done with 52 edits Ganeshk (talk) 01:42, 6 April 2010 (UTC)

Genera list

I use the genera list in the family article on Wikipedia (for example, Turridae) to download the species list from WoRMS. How complete are these? Will it be a good idea to automate the genera download as well? Thanks. Ganeshk (talk) 11:53, 30 March 2010 (UTC)

I have no idea how complete are genera of Turridae on wikipedia. But when starting articles of species from WoRMS, then it seems logical for me to start all of its species from WoRMS from the certain (sub)family. (If another method will be used, then it will happen, that some informations from WoRMS will stay unused.) If there will be something additional and incorrect on WoRMS, then we will discover it sooner or later. But usually there are additional correct genera on WoRMS, that are missing on wikipedia. --Snek01 (talk) 01:06, 1 April 2010 (UTC)
I think, that automated genera download is not good, because we - humans - are not able to check any list at all. You can apply some semi-automatic process and start some articles for genera that are needed, but as an user. Bot can not decide even if such genus article should be started or not. Copy and paste a list of species is not a problem for me, especially when articles about species are started already. I think, that fully automated process on this would bring more difficulties. --Snek01 (talk) 01:06, 1 April 2010 (UTC)
We could however discuss the idea of having the bot create a few genus stubs, the genus stubs that are needed for many of the species stubs that it already created. Otherwise I will have to do all that by hand. In fact maybe code can be written to allow the bot to create genus stubs for all gastropod genera that are currently red-linked? Do people think that is a good idea or not?
Actually there are probably many of the smaller tasks that Daniel and I are currently doing by hand that can be automated instead. Invertzoo (talk) 14:43, 2 April 2010 (UTC)
If creating all genera articles at the same time, then it is rather good. If so, then they should be done for genera containing at least 2 species. / There is also possibility for example to create articles into some certain user namespace, who will alter them and move to wikipedia namespace. Feel free to try it anyhow in any coverage if you like. I will not discourage from it. You/we will see results. Hopefully every results (except of incorrect information) will be fine. (If it will be applied also in land and freshwater species, I will join.) --Snek01 (talk) 23:49, 4 April 2010 (UTC)

OBIS database

I noticed that OBIS lets you download many databases. I downloaded the "Academy of Natural Sciences OBIS Mollusc Database" and stored it here (Excel file). Can you look at this Excel file and let me know if we can use it for creating species stubs? Thanks. Ganeshk (talk) 03:17, 4 April 2010 (UTC)

Problem. The data is copyrighted and cannot be used here. See http://clade.acnatsci.org/clade_media/terms.html. Regards, Ganeshk (talk) 05:01, 4 April 2010 (UTC)
May be we can convince Gary Rosenberg on the benefits of releasing OBIS content on Creative Commons. Regards, Ganeshk (talk) 14:59, 4 April 2010 (UTC)
I do know Gary, and he is a very nice person, but I think it is very unlikely that the ANSP would ever agree to releasing all of their data freely. They are pretty strict on that. Invertzoo (talk) 12:57, 5 April 2010 (UTC)

Conoidea families

I have checked families and subfamilies of Conoidea on WoRMS (except of Conidae itself) and also Cancellarioidea/Cancellariiidae. These are my results: --Snek01 (talk) 00:07, 2 April 2010 (UTC)

Clavatulidae

THIS ONE SHOULD BE DONE RATHER FIRST. Clavatulidae is a sole family, not Clavatulinae.

Clavatulidae has no genera listed. Ganeshk (talk) 15:59, 4 April 2010 (UTC)

Is this family okay?

This should be added like this example:

.../Conoidea/Clavatulidae/Benthoclionella

Intro sentence:

is a species of sea snail, a marine gastropod mollusk in the family Clavatulidae.

--Snek01 (talk) 22:26, 4 April 2010 (UTC)

 Done with 120 edits. Regards, Ganeshk (talk) 02:13, 5 April 2010 (UTC)
{{Clavatulidae-stub}} needs to be created. Regards, Ganeshk (talk) 03:48, 5 April 2010 (UTC)

Drilliidae

Drilliidae OK

homonyms: Clavus (gastropod), Kylix (gastropod), Spirotropis (gastropod).


Crassopleura Monterosato, 1884 is in family Drilliidae, it is not the subfamily.

 Doing... Ganeshk (talk) 02:56, 6 April 2010 (UTC)
 Done with 374 edits. Ganeshk (talk) 11:52, 6 April 2010 (UTC)

Pseudomelatomidae

Pseudomelatomidae OK

 Done with 16 edits Ganeshk (talk) 23:18, 6 April 2010 (UTC)

Strictispiridae

Strictispiridae OK

 Done with 16 edits Ganeshk (talk) 23:18, 6 April 2010 (UTC)

Terebridae

Terebridae OK There are not distinguished subfamilies Terebrinae and Pervicaciinae, but it does not matter. Subfamilies can be added later, if they will be needed. --Snek01 (talk) 14:53, 6 April 2010 (UTC)

I think "auger snails" is good for the common name. Invertzoo (talk) 12:21, 6 April 2010 (UTC)
 Done with 430 edits. -- Ganeshk (talk) 00:49, 8 April 2010 (UTC)
 Question: The following species did not have authority listed on WoRMS. Is that a problem?
-- Ganeshk (talk) 00:52, 8 April 2010 (UTC)

Turridae

Turridae

But: Species from Daphnellinae [39] have to be placed as Conidae/Raphitominae. This should be done rather first than other Turridae.

Not placed into subfamily. These 7 genera need to be checked what family do they really belong to.

  • Genus Acanthodaphne Bonfitto & Morassi, 2006: recent genus; accepted by WoRMS; not known by Sealife base or Catalogue of Life
  • Genus Bathyclionella Kobelt, 1905: accepted by Nomenclator Zoologicus; belonging to Turridae, according to WoRMS; not known by Sealife base or Catalogue of Life
  • Genus Cymakra Gardner, 1937 : two accepted species belonging to Conidae; two synonyms belonging to Turridae [40]
  • Genus Hemilienardia Boettger, 1895 : two accepted species belonging to Conidae; two synonyms belonging to Turridae [41]
  • Genus Stenodrillia Korobkov, 1955 (empty) : accepted by WoRMS; not known by Sealife base or Catalogue of Life
  • Genus Surcula H. Adams & A. Adams, 1853 : not an accepted genus; it consists solely of synonyms: Sealife base
  • Genus Vitricythara Fargo, 1953(empty): accepted, but placed in the Conidae [42]

Others seems to be OK, but see above.

 Done Ganeshk (talk) 01:54, 6 April 2010 (UTC)

Daphnellinae

 Done with 597 edits. Ganeshk (talk) 00:30, 6 April 2010 (UTC)

Cancellariidae

Cancellariidae OK

But there are not distinguished subfamilies, but it does not matter. Subfamilies can be added later, if they will be needed. --Snek01 (talk) 14:54, 6 April 2010 (UTC)

I think "nutmeg snails" is better than "nutmeg shells". Shell collectors tend to focus only on the shell, and it is true that a beachcomber usually only finds the shell of the animal washed up, but the shell is after all only the skeleton of the snail, therefore I think in general it is better to use "snail" in the common name rather than "shell". Otherwise people get the idea that the shell IS the species, which is incorrect. If you prefer you can put "nutmeg snails or nutmeg shells". Invertzoo (talk) 12:39, 6 April 2010 (UTC)
 Done with 365 edits. Ganeshk (talk) 13:01, 7 April 2010 (UTC)

I think, they can be started, but first I have to ask: does anybody know taxonomy related works from last 5 years that changes taxonomy of these families? --Snek01 (talk) 00:07, 2 April 2010 (UTC)

Higher traffic

Article "gastropod" gain traffic 5505 in February 2010 http://stats.grok.se/en/201002/gastropod and higher traffic 26757 in March 2010 http://stats.grok.se/en/201003/gastropod. That is 5x higher! This is not caused by an bot creation activity, because Ganeshbot started its make some articles on 20 March. This rapid traffic gain only this article. Hmmm... mystery. --Snek01 (talk) 22:52, 4 April 2010 (UTC)

Curious indeed! To be honest I can't imagine why. Anyway, good for us! --Daniel Cavallari (talk) 23:00, 4 April 2010 (UTC)
Check snails also. In Feb [43] 2 days at 2K or more, then in March [44] 19 days at 2K or more! Regards, SunCreator (talk) 23:29, 4 April 2010 (UTC)
That is fine. Portal:Gastropods had always had traffic under 500. It have received great traffic 5511 http://stats.grok.se/en/201003/Portal%3AGastropods in March 2010, that is 11x higher. --Snek01 (talk) 11:25, 7 April 2010 (UTC)
We will have to check to see if these increased numbers continue. If so then it seems we are succeeding in drawing more public interest to the gastropods as a group, and perhaps to nature in general. I do feel that Project Gastropods on Wikipedia is currently poised on the brink of becoming a major presence worldwide, a major resource for English-speaking people who have some interest in gastropods, especially for amateur shell collectors/naturalists, and also professionals, at least in areas that are not their particular speciality.
I think it is just starting to register on the consciousness of interested people that this project exists and is useful. However, with the current enormous increase in new stubs created by Ganeshbot, we do need to start fleshing out stubs with photos and additional information, so that we have more than a huge but bare-bones structure. We also need an increasingly large number of GENUS stubs creating. I will be away for 3 weeks starting next week, so I will not be able to do much, if anything, during that time, but I very much look forward to seeing our progress as the Project develops over the next 6 months! These are exciting times! Invertzoo (talk) 12:44, 8 April 2010 (UTC)
They truly are, Susan. And this calls for the urgency of attaining our first Featured Article. It is important not only for the credibility of our project, but to draw a massive amount of attention! We should also see to it that more C-class articles become B-class, and more starts become C's (an easier task, I believe). Focusing ourselves on High importance articles may be the key to optimize the process.--Daniel Cavallari (talk) 13:44, 8 April 2010 (UTC)
All these are excellent suggestions. I personally am very much looking forward to completing the lengthy process of checking and cleaning up all of the old stubs because then I will have more time to devote to other aspects of improvement. Even though Daniel and I are close to meeting up in the alphabet, at which time it will seem as if we are done with this task, I also want to go through the stubs Daniel has already been through, all the way to Z, in order to clean up more things, like expanding many of the first sentences, etc. Invertzoo (talk) 20:30, 8 April 2010 (UTC)

Online resources for information on gastropods

I have formatted the draft page here User:Anna_Frodesiak/Pink sandbox. If you think the colours are too much, please remove them or swap them for other colours. In fact, please feel free to format it any way you see fit. Then perhaps it can become a subpage of the project. Thanks. Anna Frodesiak (talk) 03:12, 9 April 2010 (UTC)

Excellent! → Wikipedia:WikiProject Gastropods/Links. --Snek01 (talk) 11:25, 9 April 2010 (UTC)

I have also a subpage User:Snek01/Taxonomy for overview, organizing taxonomy and notes about (in)completeness. Feel free to add your notes directly to certain families if you find it useful. --Snek01 (talk) 11:25, 9 April 2010 (UTC)

Online resources for information on gastropods is now located at Wikipedia:WikiProject Gastropods/Links. Anna Frodesiak
(talk) 13:51, 9 April 2010 (UTC)
A link to this subpage somewhere on the Wikipedia:WikiProject Gastropods page is probably in order to assist editors in the creation or expansion of articles. Anna Frodesiak (talk) 14:09, 9 April 2010 (UTC)

Overhaul of Wikipedia:WikiProject Gastropods

I've been thinking of a structural overhaul of the project page. Nothing too major. May I propose something in one of my sandboxes? Anna Frodesiak (talk) 12:12, 11 April 2010 (UTC)

Thanks, I would certainly be interested in seeing your suggestions! Invertzoo (talk) 01:10, 12 April 2010 (UTC)

Buccinoidea

 Done -- Ganeshk (talk) 02:13, 19 April 2010 (UTC)

I was going to go alphabetical on the Suborder, Neogastropoda. Buccinoidea is next. Please complete the intro sentences and verify these families. Thanks.

Buccinidae

Sounds good to me. Invertzoo (talk) 12:14, 8 April 2010 (UTC)

Can be done. But additionally genus Busycon Bolten, 1798 and genus Busycotypus Wenz, 1943 will be done in Buccinidae/Busyconinae. --Snek01 (talk) 16:00, 13 April 2010 (UTC)

Buccinidae genera with 66 edits.
Buccinidae with 433 edits.
 Done Genera and species done with with 499 edits. -- Ganeshk (talk) 13:17, 17 April 2010 (UTC)

Buccinoidea incertae sedis

 Question: is this a valid family?

See Steye janasaraiarum Faber, 2004

No, this is not a valid family. Buccinoidea incertae sedis means that this taxon belongs somewhere in the Buccinoidea, but as yet no-one has been able to determine where exactly it should be placed. Incertae sedis means "of uncertain placement". Invertzoo (talk) 12:13, 8 April 2010 (UTC)

This can be done as superfamilia Buccinoidea; familia incertae sedis; genus Steye. Category:Incertae sedis can be added to this "special" one. --Snek01 (talk) 16:00, 13 April 2010 (UTC)

Deferred to humans. :) Ganeshk (talk) 02:13, 19 April 2010 (UTC)

Buccinulidae

Intro sentence as in Buccinidae.

Someone needs to check to see if this family is actually listed in Bouchet & Rocroi. We don't have this family listed in our main article on the B&R taxonomy. (It is also worth remembering that WoRMS is not infallible in general, there are mistakes in it.) Invertzoo (talk) 12:29, 8 April 2010 (UTC)

It is listed in Bouchet & Rocroi (Malacologia 47 pages 39 and 254) as a tribe, in fact. It is tribe Buccinulini, under subfamily Buccininae.--Daniel Cavallari (talk) 15:24, 12 April 2010 (UTC)

This can be done as

Buccinulinae as Buccinidae/Buccininae/tribus Buccinulini

Prosiphiinae as Buccinidae/Buccininae/tribus Prosiphonini

other three genera as Buccinidae/Buccininae

--Snek01 (talk) 16:00, 13 April 2010 (UTC)

 Done with 17 edits. --Ganeshk (talk) 02:13, 19 April 2010 (UTC)

Colubrariidae

... is a species of sea snail, a marine gastropod mollusk in the family Colubrariidae.

Invertzoo (talk) 12:19, 8 April 2010 (UTC)

Can be done.

 Done with 18 edits. Ganeshk (talk) 03:04, 18 April 2010 (UTC)

Columbellidae

Sounds good to me. Invertzoo (talk) 12:15, 8 April 2010 (UTC)

Can be done. But at least this into subfamilies:

Columbella to Columbellidae/Columbellinae

Pyrene and Anachis to Columbellidae/Atiliinae

--Snek01 (talk) 16:00, 13 April 2010 (UTC)

 Done with 238 edits. I will add the subfamily changes as tasks I will come back to in the future. Ganeshk (talk) 03:04, 18 April 2010 (UTC)

Fasciolariidae

Tweaked the prose to say "snails" rather than "shells" and to streamline it. Invertzoo (talk) 12:16, 8 April 2010 (UTC)

Can be done. But at least this into subfamilies:

Fasciolaria to Fasciolariidae/Fasciolariinae

Fusinus and Fusus to Fasciolariidae/Fusininae

Peristernia and Latirus to Fasciolariidae/Peristerniinae

--Snek01 (talk) 16:00, 13 April 2010 (UTC)

 Done with 628 edits. --Ganeshk (talk) 18:41, 18 April 2010 (UTC)

Melongenidae

Tweaked a little. Sounds good to me. Invertzoo (talk) 12:22, 8 April 2010 (UTC)

It can be done except of genus Busycon and except of genus Busycotypus. --Snek01 (talk) 13:40, 12 April 2010 (UTC)

 Done with 14 edits. --Ganeshk (talk) 02:55, 13 April 2010 (UTC)

I think that intro is incorrect, because Busycon is in Buccinidae. --Snek01 (talk) 11:10, 14 April 2010 (UTC)

 Done Intro has been fixed. --Ganeshk (talk) 02:52, 15 April 2010 (UTC)

Nassariidae

Tweaked a bit, sounds good to me. Invertzoo (talk) 12:24, 8 April 2010 (UTC)

This family can be done. But genus Bullia should be in Nassariidae/Bullinae. --Snek01 (talk) 08:01, 13 April 2010 (UTC)

 Done with 167 edits. Ganeshk (talk) 21:24, 18 April 2010 (UTC)

Regards, Ganeshk (talk) 01:48, 8 April 2010 (UTC)

But please check them all with Snek first before going ahead with these, because Snek is currently the one who is developing and checking our family articles here on Wikipedia. Invertzoo (talk) 20:21, 8 April 2010 (UTC)

Subgeneric classification of Deroceras

I notice that Snek01 has recently included a subgeneric classification in the article on the genus Deroceras and in some of the articles on Deroceras species. The most recent and authoritative monograph dealing with this genus is Wiktor (2000). In it Wiktor rejects earlier attempts (including his own) at a subgeneric classification because there appear to be so many convergences and reversals: "the high number of species could not be divided into unambiguous groups". The only exception was that he split off Liolytopelte as a subgenus because of its distinctive hard plate within the penis; all other species were included in the subgenus Deroceras. The species making up Liolytopelte are bureschi, caucasicum, kandaharensis, moldavicum, occidentalis and trabzonensis.

Snek01 has instead also included the subgenera Plathystimulus and Agriolimax. Is there an argument for this, or were you simply following practice prior to Wiktor (2000)? If the former, I would like to see a citation supporting this treatment. If the latter, I would propose changing things either so as not to deal at all with subgenera or including only s.g. Deroceras and Liolytopelte. One advantage is that this taxonomy is likely to be stable. In any case the current treatment is rather inconsistent: for instance D. fatrense and D. praecox are clearly very closely related to D. rodnae, so should also be in Plathystimulus. --Jmchutchinson (talk) 11:09, 14 April 2010 (UTC)

Thank you for update. I was following Wiktor (1989). I have updated it. What about the publication year? Should it be rather Wiktor 1999? --Snek01 (talk) 21:02, 16 April 2010 (UTC)
Thanks for doing this. I have the Wiktor monograph itself in front of me and both the cover and the first page state 2000. Perhaps the online abstract that you have linked to was created the year before, maybe in the expectation that the full work would also appear that year. The formatting of the abstract is similar but not identical to that of the abstract in the monograph, but the wording is, at least at first glance, the same. But I suppose that another possibility is that the issue came out early and the abstract updates the true date of publication. However, Wiktor (2004) cites his monograph as Wiktor (2000), so that seems the best policy to follow. Tricky! (Jmchutchinson (talk) 14:49, 19 April 2010 (UTC))

Chilodontidae

Chilodontidae (gastropods) vs. Chilodontidae (fishes). Follow: Wikipedia_talk:WikiProject_Fishes#Chilodontidae. --Snek01 (talk) 12:23, 19 April 2010 (UTC)

WoRMS response

I got a response from WoRMS that I would like to share with you:

(transliterated personal communication, that is not allowed on wikipedia without permission from source): Project Manager Data Centre of WoRMS sees nice that wikipedia uses and that wikipedia consider WoRMS as 'trustworthy'. They probably will not improve other data import/export services. He is interested how wikipedia will keep in sync with WoRMS, that is often updated.

They have added "Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia" to the WoRMS user list. I would like to get your feedback on Ward's question, "...if you have plans to keep the Wikipedia pages in sync with the WoRMS information and how will you do this?". Regards, Ganeshk (talk) 23:55, 20 April 2010 (UTC)

I do not know what will be in a year of in two years or later. My opinion is that, I have no plans to keep Wikipedia pages completely in sync with the WoRMS, because even now we improve/alter taxonomy from WoRMS. WoRMS serves for wikipedia mainly as a source, that the species exist. Wikipedia have a goal to be better than WoRMS. There are few main types of changes:
  • I think, that it would be useful in the future to check, if there exist wikipedia articles, that are considered as synonyms on WoRMS.
  • Newly discovered and newly added species at WoRMS can be added to wikipedia as usual by the Bot in suitable irregular or regular intervals.
  • Updating the whole taxonomy, if needed and how, is a question for the future. --Snek01 (talk) 00:32, 21 April 2010 (UTC)

Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 License content

Maybe this is old news, but the site Zoologische Mededelingen has a CC-BY-3.0 licence for all their articles. See: http://dpc.uba.uva.nl/cgi/t/text/text-idx?c=zoomed;cc=zoomed;sid=233cf96e72e622027b93189b0d1d85b3;rgn=main;tpl=home.tpl I found a some articles on Gastropods (click on the 2007 issues for instance, the top one). This one also has a lot of pictures: http://dpc.uba.uva.nl/cgi/t/text/text-idx?c=zoomed;sid=233cf96e72e622027b93189b0d1d85b3;rgn=main;idno=m8202a34;view=text. Maybe usefull? Ruigeroeland (talk) 10:40, 21 April 2010 (UTC)

Wikimedia Commons has media related to Images from Zoologische Mededelingen.
Hello, yes, thank you. I have "discovered" that source because I focus on getting such infomations and I am glad that this information have spread into public. ;) I am using this mainly for land (and freshwater in the future) gastropods, but marine became unused yet. Other gastropod related sources can be found at my user page User:Snek01#Journals and I will like to see other recomendations from you. In real the situation is like this: there are so many free new, older and old resources for images and texts, but not enough human power to incorporate it to wikipedia despite the fact, that incorporating these texts into wikipedia is very easy - example: Gulella systemanaturae or not so easy, but very useful and effective: List of non-marine molluscs of Dominica. --Snek01 (talk) 14:01, 21 April 2010 (UTC)
Ah, yes, we at the Lepidoptera wikiproject have the same problem, not enough people to do the work. Anyway: keep up the good work and I will let you know if I find anything useful in future. Ruigeroeland (talk) 06:49, 22 April 2010 (UTC)

5000 new stubs

yum-yum...

The bot just crossed the 5000 mark. Reason to celebrate, but a long way to go. Regards, Ganeshk (talk) 13:19, 17 April 2010 (UTC)

We have already celebrated 10000 gastropod articles recently. Another celebration ... ? OK, hurray!, but we have already eaten all carambolas. --Snek01 (talk) 21:14, 17 April 2010 (UTC)
Aww! Oh, no carambolas then =(! And I do like them so much! Congratulations to everyone!--Daniel Cavallari (talk) 22:13, 17 April 2010 (UTC)
Patron of sciences see this your effort and then you will have an honor to create also genus Ganesa [45] soon. LOL --Snek01 (talk) 14:32, 19 April 2010 (UTC)
Great find. I would be delighted to create that genus. :) --Ganeshk (talk) 22:01, 19 April 2010 (UTC)
Ganesa is done. My thanks to Patron of sciences. :) Ganeshk (talk) 12:06, 22 April 2010 (UTC)

Eustrombus gigas listed as GA

I'm proud and extremely happy to announce that Eustrombus gigas has been listed as one of the Natural Sciences good articles, under the GA criteria. Our 5th GA so far! Hurray, project gastropods! Thanks to Snek and Invertzoo, whose help was most valuable, and stablished the basis of this article's current success. I hope this will bring even more attention to this very important subject. --Daniel Cavallari (talk) 15:58, 18 April 2010 (UTC)

Well done Daniel! That is great for you, and great for the Project! I really hope more of our articles can be upgraded to GA over the next few months. Best wishes, Invertzoo (talk) 00:08, 23 April 2010 (UTC)

Muricoidea

Muricoidea is next. Please add intro sentences for these. Thanks. Ganeshk (talk) 02:39, 21 April 2010 (UTC)

Babyloniidae

 Done

Costellariidae

 Done with 396 edits. --Ganeshk (talk) 14:59, 24 April 2010 (UTC)

Cystiscidae

 Done with 208 edits. --Ganeshk (talk) 20:04, 24 April 2010 (UTC)

Harpidae

 Done with 53 edits. — Ganeshk (talk) 04:04, 26 April 2010 (UTC)

Marginellidae

 Done with 316 edits. --Ganeshk (talk) 22:24, 24 April 2010 (UTC)

Mitridae

 Done with 363 edits. --Ganeshk (talk) 00:18, 25 April 2010 (UTC)

Muricidae

 Done with 1713 edits. --Ganeshk (talk) 10:11, 25 April 2010 (UTC)

Photinae

  • Found this on WoRMS. It is not listed here.

Import that one species as Buccinidae/Pisaniinae. --Snek01 (talk) 01:23, 22 April 2010 (UTC)

 Done

Pleioptygmatidae

 Not done WoRMS has no species listed for this family. — Ganeshk (talk) 21:01, 25 April 2010 (UTC)

Strepsiduridae

 Not done WoRMS has no species listed for this family. — Ganeshk (talk) 21:02, 25 April 2010 (UTC)

Turbinellidae

 Done

Volutidae

 Done

Volutomitridae

 Done
The bot just crossed the 10,000 mark. The total number of new stubs is now, 10,686. -- Ganeshk (talk) 10:13, 25 April 2010 (UTC)
 Done rest of families with 436 edits. Harpidae is pending. — Ganeshk (talk) 03:36, 26 April 2010 (UTC)

ITIS

 Question: How does Integrated Taxonomic Information System (ITIS) rate as a datasource? I found that some of their information is public domain. They provide a variety of ways to access their database. — Ganeshk (talk) 00:48, 28 April 2010 (UTC)

I have added ITIS to Wikipedia:WikiProject Gastropods/Links with comments right now. --Snek01 (talk) 08:41, 28 April 2010 (UTC)
Thanks Snek. I will skip it. — Ganeshk (talk) 00:39, 29 April 2010 (UTC)

Signpost article page hit statistics

In case you are curious. Anna Frodesiak (talk) 23:42, 28 April 2010 (UTC)

Olivoidea and Pseudolivoidea

Olivoidea and Pseudolivoidea are next. Please verify the intro sentences. Thanks. — Ganeshk (talk) 11:41, 26 April 2010 (UTC)

Olivellidae

 Done

Olividae

 Done

Pseudolividae

 Done

Ptychatractidae

 Done

I have checked articles and the taxonomy for all of these 4 families, it is very consistent. --Snek01 (talk) 13:04, 28 April 2010 (UTC)

 Done Olivoidea with 444 edits. — Ganeshk (talk) 02:49, 29 April 2010 (UTC)
 Done Pseudolivoidea with 62 edits. Clade Neogastropoda is done. — Ganeshk (talk) 03:11, 30 April 2010 (UTC)

Gastropod at work

I was at the Doctor's office and found this snail used for decoration. Hope you find it interesting. — Ganeshk (talk) 03:56, 30 April 2010 (UTC)

My amateur observation, the snail seems to have 4 eyes. :) — Ganeshk (talk) 04:01, 30 April 2010 (UTC)
This must surely be an alien snail. LOL JoJan (talk) 08:17, 30 April 2010 (UTC)
Do they really work also? Oh, I see, they manufactured the green vase. I see they are very fast, they moved between every shot. --Snek01 (talk) 21:07, 30 April 2010 (UTC)
I suppose the second set of "eyes" might be supposed to be the lower sensory tentacles in a retracted state, although they are in the wrong position. It's face is altogether a bit too mammalian. It is however very decorative! I like it! People seem to want to make snail eyespots face forward, but really they point straight up. A land snail can't focus or anything, it can only see the difference between dark and light. Anyway, it's a very nice piece of pottery! Very pretty! Invertzoo (talk) 00:28, 1 May 2010 (UTC)

Edit check

 Question: Is this categorization good? — Ganeshk (talk) 22:53, 3 May 2010 (UTC)

This is useless, because this category is not possible to reasonably reduce under 200 records. Per guideline: "Categories should be useful for readers to find and navigate sets of related articles." I have added a preventive warning and template {{Allincluded}} into the category Category:Turridae. I have also added this preventive warning to some stub categeories, because we do no need too much chaotically desorganized stub types. --Snek01 (talk) 00:18, 4 May 2010 (UTC)
Can you talk to User:Nono64 about this? He is making hundreds of these changes. — Ganeshk (talk) 00:38, 4 May 2010 (UTC)

New user

A new user needs a welcome and advise on B&R 2005. Thanks. — Ganeshk (talk) 11:02, 5 May 2010 (UTC)

An taxonomic "mistake" of a newbie corrected. Advice is in edit summary, he/she will see it. --Snek01 (talk) 11:53, 5 May 2010 (UTC)

Data for 4256 marine species

Free (CC-BY-2.5) data for 4256 marine (mainly Atlantic) species containing minimum recorded depth, maximum recorded depth and maximum recorded shell length (mm) are available at:

This should be imported for example like this: 

Description

The maximum recorded shell length is xxxx mm.

Habitat

Minimum recorded depth is yyyy m. Maximum recorded depth is zzzz m.

This de facto means that we have available these three types of data from (2009). "Malacolog 4.1.1: A Database of Western Atlantic Marine Mollusca". If there will be released in similar way in an open content journal also other datasets (for example from "A Biotic Database of Indo-Pacific Marine Mollusks" as discussed above #OBIS database), then we will have available also other datasets in the future. --Snek01 (talk) 20:38, 5 May 2010 (UTC)

Tools

Popular pages

  • Here is a list of Top 100 popular pages under this project. You can change the list options at the bottom of the page.

Recognized content

Cleanup listing

Article alerts

Article watchlist

Talk watchlist


— Ganeshk (talk) 23:40, 27 April 2010 (UTC)

The recognized content page is ready now. — Ganeshk (talk) 12:02, 12 May 2010 (UTC)

Project page redesign

I copied the design from the Elements project and created User:Ganeshk/Gastropods. Please let me know your feedback. — Ganeshk (talk) 04:22, 13 May 2010 (UTC)

Every design is a matter of taste. I prefer style and organizing of the project in the same way as wikipedia articles and also guidelines. Every other non-standard "improvement" is not necessary and may became redundant. Maybe it could be better for reading, but people will have difficulties with editing the project page(s) containing additional template(s) with combination with (sub)pages. Certain design is also similar to other related wikiprojects and provide overview "all in one". --Snek01 (talk) 10:23, 13 May 2010 (UTC)

But I would welcome help with Portal with "Topics" section. There is minor style problem. --Snek01 (talk) 10:23, 13 May 2010 (UTC)

WoRMS full download

I am not sure how useful this is going to be. I noticed that it takes a lot of human effort to update the synonyms on articles and references to WoRMS. So thought this would help with the effort. I took all Gastropod species (recursive search under Category:Gastropod families) and bumped them against WoRMS database. I then filtered the list to only the ones that had a Aphia ID. And we have this page, Wikipedia:WikiProject Gastropods/WoRMS database. When you are updating an existing article, check this master page to see if it has any additonal information that may be useful. You can also use "What links here" menu option on the actual article to check if the master page is linked to it. If it does, then copy and paste the information to the actual article. Please let me know your feedback. Regards, Ganeshk (talk) 01:28, 22 March 2010 (UTC)

Yes I think this will be useful to us, thanks Ganeshk. Invertzoo (talk) 01:46, 22 March 2010 (UTC)
Unaccepted taxa checked from start to Conus leopardus and doing. --Snek01 (talk) 23:30, 16 April 2010 (UTC)
Great. I am glad you found some use for this. --Ganeshk (talk) 01:10, 17 April 2010 (UTC)
 Done I have checked all "Unaccepted" taxa and it is all right now. Some taxa listed as "Unaccepted" on WoRMS exist on wikipedia for various reasons: completelly different taxon, species of "unaccepted" genus still exist on WoRMS and were not moved to another gneus, and so on.

Except of Peringia and Peringia ulvae (different synonymy on WoRMS) and I do not know what to do with Tonna perdix. --Snek01 (talk) 14:17, 19 May 2010 (UTC)

Categories at Commons

Share you opinion at Commons:Deletion requests/Category:Apertural views, please. --Snek01 (talk) 11:16, 18 May 2010 (UTC)

Gastropoda and Snail

Just wanted to remind everyone in the Project that these two articles are our two most often consulted (Gastropoda almost 4000 a day, Snail gets 2500 views a day) and both of them need a lot of work, especially Snail. Anything that anyone feels like adding to these two articles would be very valuable! Invertzoo (talk) 21:54, 19 May 2010 (UTC)

More effective importing

All existing possibly problematic articles on wikipedia have been checked [46] and now there can be all missing records from WoRMS imported into wikipedia if they have corresponding article about its family on wikipedia (taxonomy of the Gastropoda (Bouchet & Rocroi, 2005) and changes in the taxonomy of gastropods since 2005). Intro sentences will be:

(Information if the species is "sea snail" of "sea slug" is in its family article.)

I do not need much more detailed intro, also per Ganeshk's message [47]. If somebody wants detailed intro, inform to Ganeshk for all unimported families prior they will be imported; you can also use User:Snek01/Taxonomy for suggesting better intros for certain families.

Anyway, when all families will be done, then bot will/should automatically add new records that are continuously appearing on WoRMS with universal intro sentence like this:

--Snek01 (talk) 15:48, 19 May 2010 (UTC)

New species additions can be monitored if we can get the monthly data downloads from WoRMS. There are 31718 gastropod species on WoRMS (http://www.marinespecies.org/aphia.php?p=taxlist&pid=101&rComp=>=&tRank=220). We still have a lot of work to do. — Ganeshk (talk) 21:38, 19 May 2010 (UTC)
That 31718 is including synonyms. I think, that number of gastropod SPECIES on WoRMS is about less than 19.000 per http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=User_talk%3ASnek01&action=historysubmit&diff=359071732&oldid=359045573 --Snek01 (talk) 19:35, 25 May 2010 (UTC)

Yes, get the monthly updates, please. WoRMS is changing quite quickly so we need them. Adapt such method so we can 1) finish importing existing records as soon as possible approximately in a month; 2) import monthly new species (but check if they does not exist as some synonym on wikipedia already); 3) Any other updating activity may be fine. --Snek01 (talk) 20:09, 25 May 2010 (UTC)

They want senior staff to request it. Quoting from the request letter, "What is your position in your organization? We prefer senior, well-established or permanent staff to make requests, and take responsibility for this agreement, even if on behalf of others." I was hoping either you, Susan or Daniel to request it and send me a copy. I think your malacologist credentials will lend more authority to the request. — Ganeshk (talk) 21:32, 25 May 2010 (UTC)
Thanks to Michal's encouragement over e-mail, I have sent out the request for the database download. I will post here once I get a response. — Ganeshk (talk) 03:01, 26 May 2010 (UTC)
I have good news. WoRMS has approved my database download request. I will work on the program to make use of it per Snek01's request above. — Ganeshk (talk) 14:48, 28 May 2010 (UTC)
That is indeed good news! Invertzoo (talk) 20:12, 5 June 2010 (UTC)

What does a "genus" article typically do?

Do we have any example "genus" articles? I'm being asked what contains would go into a "genus" article, such that it could make a good article or more, it's not easy to find living animal genus" articles as an example. Perhaps Gastropods have some? Regards, SunCreator (talk) 00:23, 28 May 2010 (UTC)

Another milestone

WP Gastropods has hit another milestone, it just crossed 20,000 articles. — Ganeshk (talk) 13:34, 6 June 2010 (UTC)

Woo Hoo! Fantastic! Hard to believe. We are getting up there where we need to be. This will make things so much easier for everyone: if we create an image or come across good info about a species (or genus) we can just slot it in where it belongs without having to start an article from scratch. Many thanks Ganesh. Invertzoo (talk) 00:43, 7 June 2010 (UTC)

Clades on Taxoboxes

This will need discussion, see Talk:Cypraeidae#Intermediary_Taxa. I feel the current implementation of unranked clades is not suitable for reading by software programs. — Ganeshk (talk) 13:40, 6 June 2010 (UTC)

I wrote a reply on that talk page, as you will see. Yes, I am sure that unranked clades are very difficult for a standardized software program. Unranked clades are also a big nuisance in databases, and in physically organizing a large museum collection of fossil gastropods, as we are currently doing at AMNH. However, taxonomy must reflect phylogeny, that is one basic biological rule. The tree of life is a messy structure. It does not have neat ranks like the army. The closer we get to biological truth about organisms, the messier things get; that's biology for you! It's crazy, but I love it. Invertzoo (talk) 01:15, 7 June 2010 (UTC)

Bot generated stub articles

As most of you know, we have being doing phenomenally well with acquiring new stub articles in Project Gastropods, thanks to User:Ganeshk and his bot Ganeshbot. We now have well over 19,000 articles! As of a few days ago, one of our members who was working with Ganesh took an unexpected break, and thus we need other people to help out with the process of feeding the "pipeline" so that the generation of new stub articles can continue. If you feel you can help out at all, please contact Ganesh directly or contact me. Many thanks, Invertzoo (talk) 14:20, 1 June 2010 (UTC)

hmmm... It is an Invertzoo's misunderstanding/misinterpretation. All instructions for the Ganeshbot are in the section above: #More effective importing. --Snek01 (talk) 20:59, 12 June 2010 (UTC)

Two new Good Articles?

Hi everyone. I just wanted to say that there are two gastropod articles that I think could quite easily be brought up to GA status, without very much work:

  • One is Kanab Ambersnail, which was GA for a while a few years ago and even has notes on the talk page about what needs fixing to bring it up to GA again (!)
  • The other is the genus article Marginella, which is already quite impressive-looking.

If you go take a look at either of them, please go ahead and tweak the article a bit or add to it a bit while you are there. Thanks and good wishes, Invertzoo (talk) 12:59, 8 June 2010 (UTC)

Ah that's true! Kanab Ambersnail is an excellent article indeed. I'll be working on it ASAP. As for Marginella, I still think that more work needs to be done. From a taxonomical point of view, mentioning the type species in a genus article is strictly necessary. If I'm not mistaken, the type species for Marginella is Voluta glabella L. (now known as Marginella glabella according to WoRMS). Also, shouldn't the type species of a given genus be illustrated in the taxobox? --Daniel Cavallari (talk) 18:49, 9 June 2010 (UTC)
Very good points Daniel. Yes you are right: ideally the taxobox for a genus should indeed show an image of the type species. In some cases, at the present time, we will not be able to easily obtain an image of the type species, but where that can be done, that would be excellent. Invertzoo (talk) 13:10, 10 June 2010 (UTC)

Snails in the news

BBC News: Snails yield drug addiction clue. — Ganeshk (talk) 17:05, 28 May 2010 (UTC)

Thanks, an interesting paper! Invertzoo (talk) 22:32, 15 June 2010 (UTC)

Templates for external links

Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Tree of life#Templates for external links. --Snek01 (talk) 17:20, 20 June 2010 (UTC)

Bio articles for B & R

Would be great if someone created bio articles for Philippe Bouchet and Jean-Pierre Rocroi. — Ganeshk (talk) 12:08, 3 June 2010 (UTC)

Yes, this would be a good idea. I changed the red links in your message to the full names to make it easier for anyone who feels like researching either of them. I had a quick look with Google and there seems to be more online about Bouchet than there is about Rocroi. Invertzoo (talk) 19:59, 5 June 2010 (UTC) Just now I added their names to the List of malacologists as red links. Invertzoo (talk) 00:40, 7 June 2010 (UTC)
I just now did a quick stub for Bouchet. I would be grateful if someone would clean it up and/or add to it, thanks. Invertzoo (talk) 17:26, 12 June 2010 (UTC)
I started an article on Rocroi, but could find almost no information on him online. If anyone can add to the article, please do! Invertzoo (talk) 00:58, 6 July 2010 (UTC)

World Congress of Malacology this July in Phuket

I will be there. Also anyone else from WikiProject Gastropods? --Edmund Sackbauer (talk) 13:08, 25 June 2010 (UTC)

Not me, no such luck, but it sounds great. Invertzoo (talk) 20:25, 27 June 2010 (UTC)
If you get the chance, maybe you can say a hello for me to Paula Mikkelsen and Rudiger Bieler (I worked for Paula for a number of years)). Tell them Susan Hewitt says hello, and if you like, you can explain that you know me from Wikipedia. Invertzoo (talk) 13:23, 29 June 2010 (UTC)
Oh well, that's too far away from my homeland... I wish I could go there! --Daniel Cavallari (talk) 21:37, 27 June 2010 (UTC)

Split of Category:Muricidae and Category:Muricidae stubs

I'm curious as to the warnings on the Muricidae and Muricidae stubs list. I heavily disagree with the assessment that an 1800-article category is "more conveient" than splitting categories in a logical fashion. Why would these categories not benefit from a split according to subfamilies? (and, if still overlarge, from a split by lower taxon to be decided as needed) Dawynn (talk) 14:02, 30 June 2010 (UTC)

This is similar to my comment at Wikipedia:WikiProject_Stub_sorting/Proposals/2010/April#Category:Conidae_stubs. Every gastropod family has its category and if there are many stubs in certain category, then there is also category for stubs of certain category. There are already many stub types based on family name. And such stub-type names are more or less universally applied for gastropods. We - as wikiproject gastropods members - do not need detailed stub types, because it is difficult to maintain them and we do not need them. - The category Muricidae has many articles, because nobody have found it useful splitting in a different way. There are not enough people interesting in gastropods, so we do not make unnecessary changes of categories, because taxonomy can change (and it will certainly change somehow) faster, than we could react for this. The purpose of this project is not doing neverending categorization and recategozation. My recommendation is: if you are not expert in taxonomy of Muricidae (and this applies also to other families), do not recategorize them without reason. --Snek01 (talk) 15:07, 30 June 2010 (UTC)
The subfamilies of Muricidae have been changed numerous times in the last 15 years. Experts just can't seem to agree at all on how this huge and complex family should be subdivided. If we were to go ahead and divide it one way, then in just a couple of years we will have to change the stub types for the whole lot all over again. I do tend to agree it is better to leave it as one category for the foreseeable future. Invertzoo (talk) 00:27, 6 July 2010 (UTC)

Astounding source of shell pictures

The author Jan Delsing, from www.biolib.cz, has uploaded an extensive gallery of shell pictures under public domain. We should upload all of those and use them in our articles. There are thousands of pictures, so I believe a bot would be useful! I have uploaded some of those already. --Daniel Cavallari (talk) 14:46, 11 July 2010 (UTC)

I've also uploaded more than three hundred of these photos and I'm continuing to do so. As these photos come under public domain, they can only be uploaded to the en.wikipedia and not to the Commons. Mind however, check the species name every time, as synonyms are sometimes being used. Many of the species aren't mentioned in WoRMS and a search in other databases is necessary in many cases. If a bot could do the trick, that would be wonderful. But I doubt if it could do the job we do manually. JoJan (talk) 15:46, 11 July 2010 (UTC)
JoJan, Can you please clarify this statement, "As these photos come under public domain, they can only be uploaded to the en.wikipedia and not to the Commons"? I am of the understanding that Commons is the right place for these. Public use pictures can be useful not only for en.wikipedia but other language Wikipedias. — Ganeshk (talk) 16:17, 11 July 2010 (UTC)
You can only upload to the Commons pictures under PD-Art and PD-Old, i.e. the author must be dead for over 70 years. The license "Public Domain" is being interpreted in different ways in different countries. For example, in the Netherlands an author retains his moral rights even under the license "Public Domain". Therefore, a Public Domain is never completely free in such countries. Luckily, the license "Public Domain" is completely free in the United States (cfr. PD-Gov) and therefore these photos can be uploaded to the en.wikipedia. If other wikipedias want to use these photos, they have to check the legislation of their country. If allowed, then they can upload these photos to their own wikipedia. Otherwise, they can't use them. JoJan (talk) 17:06, 11 July 2010 (UTC)
Interesting...did not know that. Thanks. — Ganeshk (talk) 02:33, 12 July 2010 (UTC)
That JoJan's explanation is nonsense. Normally use template http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Template:PD-author for such images. See Commons:Category:Images by Jan Delsing. And see Commons:Commons:Batch uploading/Mollusca by Jan Delsing. You can also notice, that nobody takes care of Batch uploading of them for more than 6 months. --Snek01 (talk) 00:21, 15 July 2010 (UTC)
Late response : my explanation was completely right. The license box in the upload form of the Commons only allows two PD-licenses : PD-Old and PD-Art. However, Snek 01 has pointed out that the box for the OTRS also allows specialized tags, such as PD-author|author name : "{{PD-author|author}} – for works released into the public domain by non-Wikimedia users. Some further explanation should be given such as a link to the author's website where they explicitly state that they release the work into the public domain (e.g. {{PD-author|[http://www.sitename.com author]}})."
However some legal questions remain : {{Template:PD-Netherlands}} (where the author lives) states that the author must be 70 years dead. ::Furthermore the {{Template : PD-Czech Republic}} (where the site is based) is not even allowed.
Anyway, since the Commons allows me the opportunity to upload PD-author photos to the Commons, I'll do so in the future in the interest of everyone. And I have done so already for quite a number of photos. —Preceding unsigned comment added by JoJan (talk • contribs) 17:43, 22 July 2010 (UTC)

Identification requested

I'm in the process of uploading photos from the above mentioned website. I've succeeded so far (sometimes after a long search) in finding the accepted names for the synonyms mentioned by the author Jan Delsing. But this time I'm stuck. The images [48] and [49] show Conus fulvobullatus, a synonym of Conus magus. But it doesn't even come close in its resemblance to Conus magus. Another possibility could be Pionoconus magus fulvobullatus [50]. Pioconus seems to be a subgenus of Conus. But even here the resemblance doesn't match. Does anyone have a clue which conus this may be ? JoJan (talk) 15:03, 14 July 2010 (UTC)

Many species of cones are notorious hard to ID. You have to know the species of an area really well to even hazard a guess on some material, particularly when all you have in hand is an image rather than actual shell itself. One thing that is worth saying is that color in cones can be extremely variable and is often of no taxonomic significance. Invertzoo (talk) 00:31, 23 July 2010 (UTC)

Automatic taxobox

There is an ongoing discussion about automating taxonomy generation. I tried the concept on Xenophora solarioides. Please edit the article and check out the top section, you will notice the taxobox template has been replaced with a smaller {{Automatic Taxobox}} template. There are couple of things that need fixing (hopefully will be resolved soon), kingdom and superfamily are not getting displayed. Overall I think it will make the process much more streamlined and easy to maintain. Please add your thoughts here or share it on the template talk page. — Ganeshk (talk) 04:13, 15 July 2010 (UTC)

Issue with the Kingdom and Superfamily has been fixed. There is still some discussion pending on how unranked clades are displayed. — Ganeshk (talk) 12:11, 16 July 2010 (UTC)

A note on terminology in articles

I believe I have mentioned this once before, but here goes again. Please everyone, let's try to remember that we are not writing a Gastropod Encyclopedia, or even a Zoology Encyclopedia. It's a general encyclopedia. The prose in our articles is supposed to be accessible and intelligible to a general reader. That means we should try to avoid using the most opaque pieces of jargon, and explain the more difficult terms one by one as you go along. I know this is difficult for many of us who are not native English speakers, but we can try. Thanks, Invertzoo (talk) 00:35, 6 July 2010 (UTC)

I agree. I am a non-science person who simply enjoys reading these articles to learn more. One thing that I find is that for terms like "rhinophore sheath"... I am continually having to search for the definition, even if I have seen the phrase a few times, and it occurs frequently in the nudibranchs articles at least. It would be helpful if we can make technical terms like this, hyperlink to their wikipedia page, so that the above becomes "rhinophore sheath" and is quicker to find the meaning. (I fix this when I notice it is missing.) Thanks for all the hard work that has gone into this project! Fallendarling (talk) 02:16, 19 July 2010 (UTC)
Yes, Fallendarling makes a very good point. Please do try to blue link every piece of terminology that an ordinary person would not understand. And Fallendarling, thanks so much for blue linking terminology when you come across it! best, Invertzoo (talk) 20:14, 5 August 2010 (UTC)

A move?

I am thinking of moving Changes in the taxonomy of gastropods since 2005 to A [a typo!] List of changes in the taxonomy of gastropods since 2005, since it is essentially a list article. Please let me know if anyone has objections or other input. Thanks. Invertzoo (talk) 22:04, 27 July 2010 (UTC)

Please skip the A, List of changes in the taxonomy of gastropods since 2005. — Ganeshk (talk) 00:26, 28 July 2010 (UTC) The "A" was a typo, sorry. Invertzoo (talk) 12:50, 5 August 2010 (UTC)
No objections here!--Daniel Cavallari (talk) 11:21, 28 July 2010 (UTC)
Original name is fine and short and renaming is no needed. By the way, it is not a list, it only looks like a list. Then we could rename article Helix pomatia to List of facts about Helix pomatia. --Snek01 (talk) 11:57, 29 July 2010 (UTC)

Well, that's a matter of opinion. Invertzoo (talk) 12:50, 5 August 2010 (UTC)

And if you want the article title to be as short as possible, then the title "Changes in gastropod taxonomy since 2005" is considerable shorter. Invertzoo (talk) 20:50, 6 August 2010 (UTC)

Yes, it can be. The name is because of compatibility with other articles (Taxonomy of the Gastropoda (Bouchet & Rocroi, 2005), Taxonomy of the Gastropoda (Ponder & Lindberg, 1997), Taxonomy of the Lepidoptera) containing "taxonomy of". Keep it as descriptive, short as possible, not unreasonably long, but also compatible with other ones is a good strategy. If there is any reason for change, then also "Changes in the taxonomy of the Gastropoda since 2005" is acceptable. --Snek01 (talk) 16:30, 7 August 2010 (UTC)

Video

Hello friends of the gastropod,

I have a video of a sea snail (I'm sure y'all could give it the proper genus/species, it's from the Sea of Cortez) roaming around a mud flat, foot out, presumably feeding. Is that something that would be helpful to this project?

QFL 24-7 bla ¤ cntrb ¤ kids ¤ pics ¤ vids 01:04, 28 July 2010 (UTC)

But of course it would be useful! And it would be a pleasure to identify the genus and species, too. Do you intend to upload the video in english wikipedia? If you do so, then please let us know. Thank you! --Daniel Cavallari (talk) 11:20, 28 July 2010 (UTC)

Here it is... from my notes on this field trip, my best guess for the big one is Natica chemnitzii and Cerithium stercusmuscaram for the small ones. Thoughts? Also, which page(s) would this be good for? QFL 24-7 bla ¤ cntrb ¤ kids ¤ pics ¤ vids 13:44, 28 July 2010 (UTC)

I may be able to identify the species because I collected in the Sea of Cortez years ago, I have the relevant books, and I also have friends who know the fauna there pretty well. But right now I cannot seems to access the video, but perhaps it will be better when I try later? In any case I am sure the video will be useful for several articles. Invertzoo (talk) 21:14, 29 July 2010 (UTC)
I can't seem to view this video or any other of this editor's videos. Anyone want to hazard a guess as to why? Can other people view it OK? I am on a Mac, could that be relevant? Invertzoo (talk) 13:10, 7 August 2010 (UTC)
I see I do need to download a plug-in because I am using OS X. I had one go at making it work this evening but without success, I will try again tomorrow. Invertzoo (talk) 23:28, 7 August 2010 (UTC)
If someone knows how to load this file onto Commons, I can view it just fine if it is on Commons, but not on WIkipedia. Invertzoo (talk) 19:40, 8 August 2010 (UTC)

DYK hooks for August 2010

Two DYK hooks: List of non-marine molluscs of Afghanistan and combined hook Indoplanorbis exustus + Schistosoma spindale have received high number of page views Wikipedia:DYKSTATS#August_2010. Both had 6.700 views. People even wanted to know what the fluke (wikilinked to Trematoda) is http://stats.grok.se/en/201008/Trematoda, although it was not DYK hook article. --Snek01 (talk) 00:10, 11 August 2010 (UTC)

Very good work Michal! Two very interesting articles. Invertzoo (talk) 21:59, 12 August 2010 (UTC)

Littorinimorpha (4190 species)

Neogastropoda is done. So Littorinimorpha is next. How important are the intro sentence changes? The bot process will be much faster if I create all the articles with the standard sentence, "...is a species of sea snail, marine gastropod mollusk in the family...". Please comment.

I just wanted to say that it is better to say "a marine gastropod mollusk" than just "marine gastropod mollusk" I am not sure when the "a" got dropped out? I do think some of the families already created have this missing. Perhaps that could be fixed? As for keeping the intro sentence simple and the same for all, I do understand it would be very, very much faster, but it would also mean that thousands of articles would have an absolutely identical intro, which makes them seem a little uninformative, and boring for a reader. I think in particular the micromollusk families would benefit from being described as "a species of minute marine gastropod mollusk or micromollusk". It's also nice to be able to saw "small" or large" where applicable I think. Anyway that's my opinion for what it's worth. Thanks and best wishes, Invertzoo (talk) 00:23, 1 May 2010 (UTC)

Thanks for the response. I will continue to add the intro changes then. I have fixed about 5700 articles with "a" in the intro sentence. — Ganeshk (talk) 01:43, 2 May 2010 (UTC)

Please verify the super families below. Thanks. — Ganeshk (talk) 03:31, 30 April 2010 (UTC)

Calyptraeoidea

Calyptraeidae

... is a species of sea snail, a marine gastropod mollusk in the family Calyptraeidae, the slipper snails or slipper limpets, cup-and-saucer snails, and Chinese hat snails.

{{waiting}} Can be imported. Taxonomy is OK. --Snek01 (talk) 18:06, 12 May 2010 (UTC)

 Done with 47 edits. — Ganeshk (talk) 03:22, 4 June 2010 (UTC)

Capuloidea

Capulidae

... is a species of small sea snail, a marine gastropod mollusk in the family Capulidae, the cap snails.

 Done Capulidae, Cingulopsidae, Cypraeidae and Eatoniellidae with 300 edits. — Ganeshk (talk) 23:59, 5 June 2010 (UTC)

Cingulopsoidea

Cingulopsidae

.... is a species of minute sea snail, a marine gastropod mollusk in the family Cingulopsidae.

 Done Capulidae, Cingulopsidae, Cypraeidae and Eatoniellidae with 300 edits. — Ganeshk (talk) 23:59, 5 June 2010 (UTC)

Eatoniellidae

.... is a species of minute sea snail, a marine gastropod mollusk in the family Eatoniellidae, the eatoniellids.

 Done Capulidae, Cingulopsidae, Cypraeidae and Eatoniellidae with 300 edits. — Ganeshk (talk) 23:59, 5 June 2010 (UTC)

Rastodentidae

.... is a species of minute sea snail, a marine gastropod mollusk in the family Rastodentidae.

 Not done No species list on WoRMS. — Ganeshk (talk) 17:02, 5 June 2010 (UTC)

Cypraeoidea

Cypraeidae

.... is a species of sea snail, a cowry, a marine gastropod mollusk in the family Cypraeidae, the cowries.

 Done Capulidae, Cingulopsidae, Cypraeidae and Eatoniellidae with 300 edits. — Ganeshk (talk) 23:59, 5 June 2010 (UTC)

Ovulidae

.... is a species of sea snail, a marine gastropod mollusk in the family Ovulidae, the ovulids, cowry allies or false cowries.

 Done with 273 edits. — Ganeshk (talk) 13:15, 6 June 2010 (UTC)

Pediculariidae

.... is a species of small sea snail, a marine gastropod mollusk in the family Pediculariidae, one of the families of cowry allies.

 Done Pediculariidae and Ficidae with 31 edits. — Ganeshk (talk) 02:58, 7 June 2010 (UTC)

Ficoidea

Ficidae

.... is a species of sea snail, a marine gastropod mollusk in the family Ficidae, the fig shells.

 Done Pediculariidae and Ficidae with 31 edits. — Ganeshk (talk) 02:58, 7 June 2010 (UTC)

Littorinoidea

Annulariidae

 Question: Annulariidae has been redirected to Pomatiidae. Is that correct?

That is correct per taxonomy of Bouchet & Rocroi 2005 and there are no records on WoRMS of this, because they are land snails. --Snek01 (talk) 18:35, 25 May 2010 (UTC)

 Not done No species list on WoRMS. — Ganeshk (talk) 02:24, 7 June 2010 (UTC)

Littorinidae

.... is a species of small sea snail, a marine gastropod mollusk in the family Littorinidae, the winkles or periwinkles.

 Done with 221 edits. — Ganeshk (talk) 02:58, 7 June 2010 (UTC)

{{waiting}} all above can be imported. See also User:Snek01/Taxonomy#Clade_Littorinimorpha for overview. --Snek01 (talk) 19:11, 25 May 2010 (UTC)

Pelycidiidae

Pickworthiidae

Pomatiidae

.... is a species of small operculate land snail, a terrestrial gastropod mollusk in the family Pomatiidae.

 Not done No species list on WoRMS. — Ganeshk (talk) 18:07, 7 August 2010 (UTC)

Skeneopsidae

Zerotulidae

Naticoidea

Naticidae

... is a species of predatory sea snail, a marine gastropod mollusk in the family Naticidae, the moon snails.

 Done with 202 edits. — Ganeshk (talk) 02:14, 18 June 2010 (UTC)

Pterotracheoidea

Atlantidae

... is a species of sea snail, a holoplanktonic marine gastropod mollusk in the family Atlantidae.

--Snek01 (talk) 23:38, 8 August 2010 (UTC)

 Done with 173 edits. — Ganeshk (talk) 02:09, 16 August 2010 (UTC)

Carinariidae

... is a species of sea gastropod, a holoplanktonic marine gastropod mollusk in the family Carinariidae.

--Snek01 (talk) 23:53, 8 August 2010 (UTC)

 Done with 173 edits. — Ganeshk (talk) 02:09, 16 August 2010 (UTC)

Pterotracheidae

Pterotracheaidae

... is a species of sea gastropod, a holoplanktonic marine gastropod mollusk in the family Pterotracheidae.

--Snek01 (talk) 23:53, 8 August 2010 (UTC)

 Not done Not found on WoRMS link. — Ganeshk (talk) 02:12, 16 August 2010 (UTC)
They are under spelling with "a" http://www.marinespecies.org/aphia.php?p=taxdetails&id=225072 --Snek01 (talk) 11:32, 20 August 2010 (UTC)

Rissooidea

Anabathridae

Assimineidae

.... is a species of minute operculate snail, a gastropod mollusk or micromollusk in the family Assimineidae.

 Done with 29 edits. — Ganeshk (talk) 18:55, 7 August 2010 (UTC)

Barleeidae

Bithyniidae

... is a species of small freshwater snail with an operculum, and aquatic gastropod mollusk in the family Bithyniidae.

 Done with 173 edits. — Ganeshk (talk) 02:10, 16 August 2010 (UTC)

Caecidae

.... is a species of minute sea snail, a marine gastropod mollusk or micromollusk in the family Caecidae.

 Done with 111 edits. — Ganeshk (talk) 03:49, 10 August 2010 (UTC)

Calopiidae

Cochliopidae

Elachisinidae

Emblandidae

Epigridae

Falsicingulidae

Hydrobiidae

.... is a species of very small aquatic snail, an operculate gastropod mollusk in the family Hydrobiidae.

 Done with 111 edits. — Ganeshk (talk) 03:49, 10 August 2010 (UTC)

Hydrococcidae

Iravadiidae

Pomatiopsidae

Rissoidae

.... is a species of minute sea snail, a marine gastropod mollusk or micromollusk in the family Rissoidae.

 Done with 581 edits. — Ganeshk (talk) 03:49, 10 August 2010 (UTC)

Tornidae

Truncatellidae

... is a species of very small somewhat amphibious land snail with a gill and an operculum, a semi-terrestrial gastropod mollusk or micromollusk in the family Truncatellidae, the truncatella snails or looping snails. These tiny snails live in damp habitat (under rotting vegetation) that is very close to the edge of the sea; they can tolerate being washed with saltwater during especially high tides. These snails are sometimes listed as land snails and at other times they are listed as marine snails.

 Done with 173 edits. — Ganeshk (talk) 02:10, 16 August 2010 (UTC)

Stromboidea

Aporrhaidae

... is a species of medium-sized sea snail, a marine gastropod mollusk in the family Aporrhaidae, the pelican's foot snails or pelican's foot shells.

Seems OK to me. I added a size mention. Invertzoo (talk) 15:35, 22 June 2010 (UTC)

 Done with 189 edits. — Ganeshk (talk) 04:05, 10 July 2010 (UTC)

Haloceratidae

Rostellariidae

Seraphsidae

Strombidae

... is a species of sea snail, a marine gastropod mollusk in the family Strombidae, the true conchs.

Seems OK to me. Invertzoo (talk) 15:36, 22 June 2010 (UTC)

 Done with 60 edits. — Ganeshk (talk) 22:22, 27 June 2010 (UTC)

Struthiolariidae

... is a species of sea snail, a marine gastropod mollusk in the family Struthiolariidae, the ostrich-foot shells.

 Done with 173 edits. — Ganeshk (talk) 02:10, 16 August 2010 (UTC)

Tonnoidea

Bursidae

... is a species of sea snail, a marine gastropod mollusk in the family Bursidae, the frog shells.

  • Also seems good to me. Invertzoo (talk) 22:30, 15 June 2010 (UTC)

 Done with 78 edits. — Ganeshk (talk) 21:34, 19 June 2010 (UTC)

Cassidae

.... is a species of large sea snail, a marine gastropod mollusk in the family Cassidae, the helmet snails and bonnet snails.

 Done with 173 edits. — Ganeshk (talk) 02:10, 16 August 2010 (UTC)

Laubierinidae

Personidae

... is a species of medium-sized sea snail, a marine gastropod mollusk in the family Personidae, the Distortio snails.

In the family article for Personidae it should say:

This family used to be grouped under the family Ranellidae until separated by Beu, 1988.

Ref: Beu, Alan J. "Taxonomy of the families Ranellidae (=Cymatiidae) & Bursidae, Part 5. Early history of the families with four new genera and recognition of the family Personidae." In, J. A. Grant-Mackie, K. Masuda, K. Mori & K. Ogasawara (Eds.), Professor Tamio Kotaka Commemorative Volume on Molluscan Paleontology. Publ: Saito Ho-on Kai Museum of Natural History; Sendai 980, Japan, 1988 (in English).

 Done with 173 edits. — Ganeshk (talk) 02:11, 16 August 2010 (UTC)

Pisanianuridae

Ranellidae

... is a species of predatory sea snail, a marine gastropod mollusk in the family Ranellidae, the triton snails, triton shells or tritons.

Seems OK, tweaked it a bit. Invertzoo (talk) 15:37, 22 June 2010 (UTC)

 Done with 206 edits. — Ganeshk (talk) 02:19, 28 June 2010 (UTC)

Tonnidae

... is a species of large sea snail, a marine gastropod mollusk in the family Tonnidae, the tun shells.

Added the word "large", seems OK now, thanks Ganesh, Invertzoo (talk) 20:38, 7 July 2010 (UTC) Invertzoo (talk) 20:38, 7 July 2010 (UTC)

 Done with 189 edits. — Ganeshk (talk) 04:05, 10 July 2010 (UTC)

Vanikoroidea

Hipponicidae

.... is a species of small limpet-like sea snail, a marine gastropod mollusk in the family Hipponicidae, the hoof snails.

 Done with 173 edits. — Ganeshk (talk) 02:11, 16 August 2010 (UTC)

Vanikoridae

.... is a species of very small sea snail, a marine gastropod mollusk in the family Vanikoridae.

 Done with 173 edits. — Ganeshk (talk) 02:11, 16 August 2010 (UTC)

Velutinoidea

Triviidae

... is a species of small sea snail, a marine gastropod mollusc in the family Triviidae, the false cowries or trivias.

I think this is OK now. I am not 100% sure that false cowry is a good name for this family as Ovulidae are sometimes called false cowries. Invertzoo (talk) 21:57, 24 June 2010 (UTC)

 Done with 189 edits. — Ganeshk (talk) 04:05, 10 July 2010 (UTC)

Velutinidae

.... is a species of small sea snail with a transparent internal shell, a marine gastropod mollusk in the family Velutinidae. Because the shell is mostly internal, the snail resembles a sea slug in general appearance.

The family article should say: "This family of snails were previously known as the Lamellariidae. They are related to the Triviidae.

 Done with 173 edits. — Ganeshk (talk) 02:11, 16 August 2010 (UTC)

ClockC to do: Lamellariidae http://www.marinespecies.org/aphia.php?p=taxdetails&id=142 should be imported as Velutinidae/Lamellariinae. --Snek01 (talk) 15:22, 19 August 2010 (UTC)

Vermetoidea

Sakarahellidae

Vermetidae

... is a species of sea snail, a marine gastropod mollusk in the family Vermetidae, the worm snails or worm shells.

Seems OK, tweaked a bit. Invertzoo (talk) 15:38, 22 June 2010 (UTC)

 Done with 189 edits. — Ganeshk (talk) 04:05, 10 July 2010 (UTC)

Xenophoroidea

Xenophoridae

... is a species of large sea snail, a marine gastropod mollusk in the family Xenophoridae, the carrier shells.

Added size. Seems OK. Invertzoo (talk) 15:39, 22 June 2010 (UTC)

 Done with 189 edits. — Ganeshk (talk) 04:05, 10 July 2010 (UTC)

I am have added intro sentences for a few families. I will complete the rest slowly. — Ganeshk (talk) 14:40, 1 May 2010 (UTC)

ClockC waiting for project input

Today I added a number of new intro sentences for additional families. Thanks so much Ganesh for all your work, Invertzoo (talk) 20:12, 5 August 2010 (UTC)

Bot update

Per the discussion here, Ganeshbot was running without a proper approval. The bot will remain suspended until I can get another bot approval request submitted and approved. Sorry. — Ganeshk (talk) 00:00, 19 August 2010 (UTC)

I have submitted a new bot approval request, Wikipedia:Bots/Requests for approval/Ganeshbot 5. I request Gastropod project members to participate in the discussion. — Ganeshk (talk) 01:50, 19 August 2010 (UTC)

Phalium articles

The following was posted by User:JaRoad on the bot talk page. Can the project members please respond to it? Thanks. — Ganeshk (talk) 22:08, 15 August 2010 (UTC)

Are you sure about all these Phalium species articles you are creating? Many are tied in WoRMS to a single out-of-print book by amature shell collectors, and the taxonomic "expert" for the clade on WoRMS is also an amature. I think you are making a big mistake creating these articles with a bot, as they should be researched and the taxonomic status of the species should be verified by an expert. This has not happened. (JaRoad (talk) 22:00, 15 August 2010 (UTC))

The same user has asked a question at the bot approval page. — Ganeshk (talk) 22:48, 15 August 2010 (UTC)
The user has reported the problem on the ANI page. — Ganeshk (talk) 01:53, 16 August 2010 (UTC)
Cassis spinosa may be what the user is referring to. It links to a 17th century reference. Please post your thoughts. Thanks. — Ganeshk (talk) 03:09, 16 August 2010 (UTC)
Here is a correction that the user made. — Ganeshk (talk) 03:31, 16 August 2010 (UTC)
User:JaRoad raises some valid questions. I will try to answer them.
  1. The Ganeshbot only performs its function after approval by the community in Wikipedia:WikiProject Gastropods. This bot is neutral in its tasks and is not to be blamed.
  2. As to the validity of names of species, that is another matter. This is best left to the taxonomic experts and researchers in the field. We are not to judge their works, as this would constitute "original research", a breach of one of the basic rules of Wikipedia. This doesn't mean that were not allowed to raise an eyebrow sometimes. I've done so twice in the past and sent an email to WoRMS. Each time I got a friendly reply from an eminent malacologist (one in France, the other in the USA) with a solution to my question. That's to way to proceed.
  3. As to the Phalium page in WoRMS ([51]), copied by Ganeshbot, I can't see a problem. That page was formulated and last changed in April 2009 by Dr. Serge Gofås, an eminent malacologist (at the Muséum National d'Histoire Naturelle in Paris) with a long list of publications in scientific journals. I would hardly call him an "amateur" (or "amature" as you spell it)
  4. The Cassis spinosa page in WoRMS was written by Dr. Edward Vanden Berghe (professional profile : [52]), again certainly not an amateur. And there is nothing wrong with Gronovius,the original author of the species, living in the 18th century. Gronovius originally named this species Buccinum spinosum, but this name was later rejected (ref.: [53]), hence the parentheses around his name. I must admit, the last entry was made by Dr. Vanden Berghe in 2002 and since then there may have been changes. JoJan (talk) 08:02, 16 August 2010 (UTC)
User:JaRoad brings up a good point about Velutina velutina. The bot created the article with the sentence (based on Invertzoo's suggestion), "Because the shell is mostly internal, the snail resembles a sea slug in general appearance". The WoRMS page for the snail has pictures showing an external shell. — Ganeshk (talk) 12:01, 18 August 2010 (UTC)


Might I make a suggestion? Select 20 or so bot-created articles at random, and fact-check the name and taxonomy. Anna Frodesiak (talk) 23:28, 18 August 2010 (UTC)


Yes, the situation is pretty much as JoJan and Ganesh report it. When you have a bot generating many stub articles, it is true that some of the stubs are going to need subsequent tweaking (major or minor) at some point, and yes WoRMS is by no means infallible, but overall the general results of this bot work have been beneficial for the Gastropod Project. It is advantageous for us to have stub articles on so many species; it is then very easy to add images, add more info, and if and when necessary to update the nomenclature. About Velutina, almost all the genera in the family do have internal shells and do resemble sea slugs, and even in this genus the shell is mostly enveloped by the mantle, so the animal still does resemble a sea slug. In any case, yes, we do have to use published opinions as the basis for our species lists, we cannot use opinions from specialists unless the info is published and as long as we can get access to it. Most of us do not have regular access to a professional library and so we do the best we can. Invertzoo (talk) 00:18, 19 August 2010 (UTC)
Fair enough. You already know how I feel about stubs. If I had it my way, I would create the remaining 80,000 bare-bones stubs tomorrow. But, if quality control is being questioned, agree with JoJan and Snek01 et al on what percentage of defective taxoboxes etc. is acceptable. Then do what a factory does: take a random sample here and there and check the product's integrity. Calculate the percentage of defectives and take it from there. Best, Anna Frodesiak (talk) 00:44, 19 August 2010 (UTC)
Of course the above is just a friendly suggestion. Anna Frodesiak (talk) 05:17, 19 August 2010 (UTC)

That was mistake in Velutina articles made by a human. We need to avoid such generalized introductory sentences that would cause similar mistake in the future. Shorter sentences are also fine. --Snek01 (talk) 12:48, 19 August 2010 (UTC)

No, the thing is, the introductory sentence was not a mistake. The live animal of Velutina still does resemble a sea slug because the mantle covers the shell in life as it does in Trivia [54]. And in all the other genera in the family Velutinidae [(see here), the shell is even more internal than that. The bot permission issue is a real issue and is currently being sorted out. The quality of the stubs however is not really an issue at all. The stubs are fine for the time being. First we need to consider some important questions: Who is this JaRoad? He started on Wikipedia a few days ago on 15th Aug, has made now about 30 edits in total and yet seems to know a lot about the inner workings. What the heck is going on here? Is this person a trouble maker? Is this new account a sockpuppet account? Could it be a sockpuppet account of a banned user? Please people, take a look at the talk page of that account and read the person's postings there which seems to be rather combative and involve misrepresenting facts. Just asking... We need to know a lot more about a user before we start taking advice so seriously. Invertzoo (talk) 13:13, 19 August 2010 (UTC)

Oh fearsome user raised a concern about some articles and reported a bot operating with out permission. Rather than accept the offer to name family experts the user can communicate concerns directly with, let's accuse the editor of being a bad speller and a sock puppet of a banned user! No wonder you have only 6 editors with that welcome mat. Not only not a banned editor, I've edited with you, Invertzoo, and you, JoJan for a few years. Your behavior in this, both of you, is unpleasant. You used to write articles and work with others. Also, you both know the bot rules. Raise the sock puppet rallying cry, and do your best to attack anyone who tries to make slugs and snail stubs on wikipedia better than they are by raising an issue.

Stay 6, you're welcome to each other, but 2 of your members, I warn you, are discussing the problems with me as if they're about creating an encyclopedia. —Preceding unsigned comment added by JaRoad (talk • contribs) 02:55, 20 August 2010 (UTC)

I am traveling all day today and will be out of touch both today and most of tomorrow. Sorry. Invertzoo (talk) 13:29, 19 August 2010 (UTC)
Here are the Phalium stubs that the bot created in the last run. — Ganeshk (talk) 12:35, 20 August 2010 (UTC)
  1. Phalium areolum
  2. Phalium bisulcatum
  3. Phalium faurotis
  4. Phalium fimbriata
  5. Phalium glaucum
  6. Phalium labiatum
  7. Phalium saburon
  8. Phalium torquata
  9. Phalium undulatum -- redirected to Semicassis undulata for which this is a synonym (change at WoRMS on 20 August 2010) JoJan (talk) 05:22, 21 August 2010 (UTC)
  10. Phalium vibex


As for JaRoad's offer to let us communicate directly with experts that he is in contact with, experts on certain gastropod families, that's a very nice offer, and we might be able to take advantage of it, if JaRoad decides he wants to help us with all this. However, any expert opinions we use to change species or genus names, or add any other technical info, these really do have to be published opinions that we can back up with a citation to a reliable published reference, no matter how renown the expert is. One difficulty in malacology is that the class Gastropoda is still not very well understood, and because of this, different experts in different parts of the world frequently disagree about taxonomy, nomenclature and so on. Best to all, Invertzoo (talk) 18:16, 21 August 2010 (UTC)

Alternative proposal

I think, after reading pages of discussions over a coujple of year about bots creating species articles, that there is a better way to do this. Namely a bot or a number of bots with a central requesting location. Human editors request bare bones species articles from a data base, and the bot or various bots for different data bases respond with fully formatted articles with taxoboxes, intro species-in genus or family opening sentence, categories, stub categories, and authorities, all wiki-linked, references with the database and a talk page with the wikiproject template.

If others think this is a good idea would someone post at the community location and the wiki organism projects and set up a central location for discussion and suggest a central location for posting requests? I think other bots exist that already have access and code to various species databases. I can't post as my computer is in the shop, and current device iis not familiar with me.

JaRoad (talk) 01:54, 22 August 2010 (UTC)

You have described exact way, how it is being done already. --Snek01 (talk) 18:20, 22 August 2010 (UTC)
Really? Then gastropod members wrote these 15000 articles? Why are there so many synonyms? It seems my question about family experts would be answered already, whoever selected the species list is that family expert. It seems, above, that the bot is just pulling all species in a family, thoush, not that editors are telling the bot which to choose. Maybe you can link me to the original conversation where gastropodmembers discussed how to go abour th is, so I can see what you're doing, and, again, see who is responsible for the problematic articles. This information is not clear from above. JaRoad (talk) 18:26, 22 August 2010 (UTC)
Really. If there is something what is not up to date, then the reason is, that the one used the source, that was not up to date. This is universal and valid explanation. It is very probable, that I am the one, who can be found to be "responsible" for such articles. I often update my articles and also other ones, when a new reference became available. This is so and it will so forever, because taxonomy and human knowledge is always changing. --Snek01 (talk) 19:09, 22 August 2010 (UTC)

By the way, according to policies of wikipedia, it does not matter, that there are synonyms. It is because, the principle of wikipedia is "Verifiability, not truth." Maybe it is will a surprise for you, that articles on wikipedia does not need to be the truth. But in real, we are actively fighting against synonyms. (For example all synonyms to be thought be synonyms on wikipedia in March 2010, were thought to be fixed in May 2010). You can be sure, that all synonyms will be sooner or later identified and fixed. We even have a tool for looking for them (see above section "Unaccepted status"). I will show you an example:

  • User1 will start article Helix pomatia with text "Helix pomatia is a snail."
  • Another User2 will tart an article Roman snail with text "Roman snail is a snail."

Consider, that both articles are truth. The articles are being improved and some day will somebody add to one of them: "The common name of Helix pomatia is Roman snail." Then will articles be merged easily.

This is the way, how all synonyms will be fixed CERTAINLY. We are trying to use the most recent resources, but CERTAINLY something what will we write this years will not be taxonomically all right next year. Taxonomy is NOT the main thing in biology, but in wikipedia it is quite important, because the name of the article depends on it. If you will write something what is perfect, then the taxonomy can change tomorrow. So do not criticize that taxonomy is not up to date. Feel free to make it up to date by yourself or help us to update it rather (for example you can add the new source into external links section at least. That is an absolute minimum what you can do.) There is no other way. --Snek01 (talk) 20:21, 22 August 2010 (UTC)


I don't know what you're talking about here or what of mine yoiu think you are answering. In addition yor comment that th is is what you are doing is not shown above. The bot operators lists a family, someone writes an introductory sentence, and the bot spits out 111 articles from that family in the database. I suggest a bot be created to answer a request for individual articles. A writer wants to write these articles and the bot creates their stujbs from a database: Bositra buchi, Ophiopinna elegans, Proteroctopus ribeti, Dollocaris ingens. JaRoad (talk) 20:48, 22 August 2010 (UTC)

Yes, that could be theoretically possible. Feel free to add your request to Wikipedia:Bot requests. Not here. Maybe somebody will do it or maybe not. --Snek01 (talk) 22:54, 22 August 2010 (UTC)

Unaccepted status

I ran a comparison of all the bot-created articles with WoRMS to find out if there are more Phalium undulatum cases out there. Please review the Wikipedia:WikiProject Gastropods/Unaccepted page. It will be good to do this comparison periodically (every six months?). — Ganeshk (talk) 21:08, 21 August 2010 (UTC)

In my opinion this is very bad. A google search that I did showed the Wikipedia article as the top return on one of the six species I originally checked. I consider Wikipedia gastropod articles to generally be a reliable source of information for amatures. If a bot has created 15000 articles and 100s of them are bad, this concerns me greatly. I wish it concerned other Wikipedia writers more than it does. JaRoad (talk) 23:47, 21 August 2010 (UTC)
JaRoad, this does not mean the bot creates bad articles. The species had an accepted status when the bot created the article. WoRMS constantly updates their database with changes. This will be an ongoing process of keeping up with their changes. I hope that clarifies. — Ganeshk (talk) 00:24, 22 August 2010 (UTC)
Please note there are false positives in the list. Species with subgenus names are showing up as unaccepted. Please use the WoRMS link on the actual article to make sure the species has an unaccepted status. For example, Chicoreus nobilis [55]. — Ganeshk (talk)
I updated the list; this time I used the WoRMS ID number from each article to do the compare. This list will be more accurate. Please review the Wikipedia:WikiProject Gastropods/Unaccepted page. — Ganeshk (talk) 12:06, 25 August 2010 (UTC)

Gastropod related DYK hooks

Hello, feel free to share your opinion at Wikipedia_talk:Did_you_know#Tarebia_granifera. --Snek01 (talk) 15:46, 23 August 2010 (UTC)

Taxobox rank inclusion

Its not OK: [56]. Taxonomy above superfamily is also important. 20.000 gastropod articles uses it. --Snek01 (talk) 17:37, 25 August 2010 (UTC)

Per the taxobox guidelines though, the box should not include too much above the immediate ranks above that talked about in the article. Thus for Crikey it can include additional levels between family and genus. But the upper clades between Superfamily and order are not immediately relevant to the genus, hence the removal from the taxobox. I do understand that the taxonomy is Important, but the taxobox is just a listing of the taxonomy, and does not effect the placement in categories or actual relationships. --Kevmin § 21:29, 25 August 2010 (UTC)
I thought that you will say that. I respect your opinion, but then share this opinion at Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Gastropods, please. Because it has no meaning if all wikiproject gastropods members will add something and another wikipedian will remove it. Have a nice day. --Snek01 (talk) 21:40, 25 August 2010 (UTC)
(Note: Move here per Snek01s request.) Im interested in discussion as to the need for the levels between Class and Superfamily on articles about taxa levels below superfamily. The guidelines on Taxoboxes generally advocate including only major levels in the box excepting minor levels in between the article level and the next major rank for example subfamilies between a genus and family for a genus level article. --Kevmin § 05:58, 26 August 2010 (UTC)

The reason why all ranks are applied in all taxoboxes of all gastropods is, that they use taxonomy based on clades. (There is no neverending number of clades; all clades are listed at {{Gastropoda taxonomy}} and their number ranges very irregularly from one to maximally seven.) Clades have no major and minor levels defined. So when minor levels are not defined, we can not identify them to reduce them. We have no mechanism (even theoretical mechanism) how to reduce them. That is why all of them are used. / They are also used in all good articles and in all DYK hook articles and elsewhere. / If you want to know my personal opinion also, then I can not orientate in articles without those clades, because I do not know taxonomy of all ~600 families or superfamilies by heart. --Snek01 (talk) 10:06, 26 August 2010 (UTC)

Hi there Kevmin! How nice of you to bring this discussion here into project Gastropods! Thank you for your initiative. I'd like to introduce a few comments in the matter, but first I have some questions. I'm an experienced editor, though not that much. First and foremost, is the omission of higher taxonomic ranks an usual MOS procedure? --Daniel Cavallari (talk) 11:36, 26 August 2010 (UTC)
As I noted with the intial posts the general rule is to only include major ranks order, family etc., sot its not a complete omission but a guideline to prevent taxoboxes from getting unwieldy do to the inclusion of all applied ranks that an article falls under. As shown with my edit to Crikey steveirwini I didnt remove all the upper levels, but restricted the shown 0nes to major ranks. Im not sure that the clades are needed for genus and species level articles to be honest. IF people are interestd in teh higher taxonomy they will click one of the upper rank links and read up on the levels.--Kevmin § 00:31, 27 August 2010 (UTC)
Between class rank and family rank is a rank order. This is major rank. Always some of those clades do represent some taxon at the order level. We have to keep it to provide basal information (the purpose of wikipedia is providing information, not to hiding them). If someone would remove taxon representing major rank, he/she would do it against guideline for taxoboxes. Kevmin is not sure, but I am sure that clades are needed for genus and species level articles. From Crikey steveirwini was surely removed major rank, that is important to understand how the species is classified.
Template:Taxobox#Classification says: "Taxoboxes should include all major ranks above the taxon described in the article, plus minor ranks that are important to understanding the classification of the taxon described in the article, or which are discussed in the article. Other minor ranks should be omitted."
I am a malacologist but I do not understand classification, when clades between class and superfamily are not written. They are important for me. Do you know why all gastropod articles have clades included? Those people who have written them considered them important.
There is always discussed in the article some of those clades. For example in Crikey steveirwini article there is written that is is a pulmonate, so the rank Pulmonata should be also included in the taxobox per the guideline.
There is also another view: articles about gastropods should have some universal and unified style, unified way, etc. We can presume, that there should be unified way how to write taxoboxes for all gastropods. When number of clades ranges from one to seven and when we have no universal way how to reduce them, then the only way is to keep them all. Keeping all clades is completelly within the spirit of the guideline. --Snek01 (talk) 09:04, 27 August 2010 (UTC)
I very much agree with Snek on this point. The gastropod class is a truly enormous one which varies tremendously from some very ancient lineages that have not evolved much over time (true limpets), all the way up to ones that have diverged significantly many times in the fairly recent geological past (some land snails). If I am told only the family name and then class Gastropoda, most of the time that means almost nothing to me. Without all the clades I have no idea at all where the family fits into the overall taxonomy of gastropods. And that means that the taxobox is virtually useless without that information. If I don't have the clades to look at, all I know is that its a snail or slug... and I certainly don't need a taxobox if that is all it can tell me. The clade information is absolutely essential when dealing with gastropods. This may not be at all true in other animal groups, but it is true here. Thanks very much for your interest, best wishes, Invertzoo (talk) 19:32, 28 August 2010 (UTC)
I second everything Invertzoo said. Unless this is a standard MOS procedure, then there is no reason to ommit such vital piece of information from the gastropod articles. And even if it is standard per MOS, then this subject needs to be further discussed, and that's why I asked you that, Kevmin. From my POV, the gastropod taxoboxes should stay as they are, at least for now. Best, Daniel Cavallari (talk) 20:24, 28 August 2010 (UTC)

Neck

Do gastropods have neck? AnimalBase uses this term for gastropods. If so then I will add the word neck between quotation marks. The sentence usually look s like this: « The head and "neck" is black. » Is there any better terminology for this? --Snek01 (talk) 17:45, 26 August 2010 (UTC)

Tricky. This question has been asked about American football players.
Seriously though, if a species has colour/marking differences between head/body and "neck" area, then one needs to refer to the neck. Just my opinion. Anna Frodesiak (talk) 01:39, 27 August 2010 (UTC)
Yes, this term is often used for the area behind the head in snails (sort of where the genital pore usually is in pulmonate land snails). Of course slugs and snails do not have a well-defined narrowing like a human neck between the head and the rest of the body, but still it is a way of referring to the part of the body that is behind the head. When some kinds of snail stretch out their head very far and turn it from side to side, sometimes it does look more as if the snail really does have a neck. Best, Invertzoo (talk) 19:04, 28 August 2010 (UTC)
OK, thanks. --Snek01 (talk) 11:21, 29 August 2010 (UTC)

UK/US spelling differences, including mollusks/molluscs

About American spelling and British spelling, including the use of the word mollusks/molluscs:

(Copied from User:Snek01's talk page)

I just wanted to say that the USA spelling is "mollusks", therefore articles that are about endemic species of US mollusks, and similar articles (or lists) of the mollusks of territories of the United States (such as Puerto Rico, Guam, United States Virgin Islands etc), should use American English, and thus should have the word mollusk spelled the US way.

Articles about the fauna of Britain, Canada, Australia, New Zealand, South Africa, etc (all the countries in the old empire of Britain) should use British English, and thus should use the spelling "mollusc".

I did not yet "move" the titles of List of non-marine molluscs of Puerto Rico and List of non-marine molluscs of the United States. I do understand that if we make that change, these titles will not be standardized with the names of the other lists we have, but nonetheless this is something we probably should discuss. Glad to hear comments on this here. Best wishes to all, Invertzoo (talk) 17:59, 1 September 2010 (UTC)

I prefer unified title names. That is very easy to answer this. Per Wikipedia:Article titles#National varieties of English and per Wikipedia:Manual of Style#National varieties of English there is really possible to use either molluscs or mollusks. Term Mollusca is not preferred because it is not English. But per Wikipedia:Manual of Style#National varieties of English "An article title on a topic that has strong ties to a particular English-speaking nation should use the variety of English appropriate for that nation". All molluscs are among the most underestimated themes and so it has no strong ties to any nation (maybe it has weak ties or no ties). I do not care if for example Ganeshbot uses universally the word "mollusk" for every article in in introductory sentence. It does not matter that some other articles uses term molluscs in their introductory sentence. But it really matter in universally applied lists. I can even accept opposite spelling variant, but the only request is to have it unified. This proposal is the most strange proposal against standardization of modern encyclopedia. --Snek01 (talk) 18:35, 1 September 2010 (UTC)
It is very unfortunate that this word is spelled differently by the two different cultures. It complicates our choices. Of course it is not a bad idea to keep titles of articles standard if possible, but I wanted other users to weigh in on both of these two questions and give their opinions:
1. Do we try to match the spelling within an article to the national spelling of the country in question? Thus an article which is on mollusks of the US, or is on one species which is endemic to the US, would presumably have all American spelling of every word that has a US spelling, including "mollusk". Yes or no?
2. Do we leave all of the titles standardized as they currently are with "mollusc"? If so then this would mean that the title of some articles will have the word "molluscs" whereas the text will have "mollusks" all the way through. Yes or not on this one?
Best wishes, Invertzoo (talk) 16:08, 2 September 2010 (UTC)
1) Personally I don't have preferences for mollusc or mollusk. The MOS prescribes : ""An article title on a topic that has strong ties to a particular English-speaking nation should use the variety of English appropriate for that nation"". This may be true for a land snail endemic to the USA, but what if it is found across Canada (spelling mollusc ?), the USA (spelling mollusk ?) and Mexico (what spelling here ?). What about sea snails without a connection to any English speaking country ? Personally, I would leave the choice to the writer, except for species endemic to the USA or Britain (and no other country).
2) Titles shouldn't contain the word mollusc or mollusk, but should contain only the scientific name. Headings is another matter. And, in my opinion, both word varieties should be avoided in headings. JoJan (talk) 11:55, 3 September 2010 (UTC)


I am sorry, I think I did not make clear what I was trying to say: I am talking about all of the spelling issues not just that one word. Yes, JoJan is quite right that this question absolutely does not apply to the great majority of articles that we have now and will have in the future, in which the only related issue is that we should be careful that the use of British or American English spelling of words is kept consistent throughout each article, especially over time, as more edits are made by people with different backgrounds who may not be aware of all the spelling differences involved. So although this is not a major issue for us, I think it is worth working out what our guidelines should be in the not inconsiderable number of cases where these issues do apply.
I am hoping we can set guidelines for the Project that may be able to carry us from now into the future. Here is the situation: we currently have roughly 70 faunal list articles, the number of which is rapidly increasing (these are very valuable and are mostly created by Snek). It is my argument that these do indeed by MoS "have a strong tie" to a country, in that they are lists of the non-marine molluscan fauna of one country, or one island, or one State or Region, or one National Park within one country. All of these lists currently have the word "molluscs" in their title, even for the lists of USA and Puerto Rico, because at some point more or less by default, "mollusc" and "molluscs" became the Project's standardized usage in titles of articles, something that is perfectly OK with me, but something that was never discussed here. In addition, the Project has hundreds of individual species articles about endemic species of land and freshwater snails which have extremely restricted ranges (including large numbers of those species within the USA, including of course the Hawaiian islands). Large numbers of the articles on these snails have titles that are the common names many of which are taken from geographical place names in the USA. The questions are:
1. If we continue to keep the titles of all of the faunal lists standardized by using the British spelling "molluscs", must we also write the text of those lists using British English spelling, even if the article is a list of the fauna of an American territory? Is it OK to have the title say "molluscs" and the text say "mollusk"?
2. If the article is a species article about an American endemic species, should we try to use American spelling, not only of mollusk but of all other words (color/colour and so on) ?
3. The same question in reverse for an endemic land snail species from for example the island of Jamaica, or the list of Jamaican non-marine molluscs. In Jamaica, British English is used, so should we try to use British English in the text of that list and those articles?
I know these are not earth-shattering issues, but it would be nice to have guidelines for them at this point in time, if we can do that. I hope I have made the issues clear here. Let me know if you don't follow what I am saying. Thanks. Invertzoo (talk) 17:52, 3 September 2010 (UTC)


P.S. Once we get some guidelines worked out, we can put them on the Project page so anyone can consult them. I say that because a lot of people aren't aware of the two spellings of mollusk/mollusc or don't know their significance, and also aren't really aware of all the many other differences in spelling between British and American English (a MoS issue). Invertzoo (talk) 18:04, 3 September 2010 (UTC)
I go along with the opinion of InvertZoo for snails that are endemic in English speaking countries. But what about other countries such as China, Congo or Cameroon, just to name a few (even if such faunal lists don't exist yet), where there is no link to British or American English ? I think, in such case, the creator of the list should be consistent and use only one language variety (even if this may be difficult for a non-native speaker). JoJan (talk) 19:23, 3 September 2010 (UTC)
Yes, I agree : for all other articles only the consistency of usage is important. Invertzoo (talk) 03:10, 4 September 2010 (UTC)

I am sure, that all English speakers understand both terms (try to ask somebody and you will see). For example Encyclopædia Britannica that claims to use British English, uses term "mollusk"(!). There is not end of scientific debate which one is correct. Even if some part of the World uses one form more often than other one, it does not mean that the other form is incorrect. Unification is necessary (and very practical) in Wikipedia, so if there is used term "molluscs" in article titles, it will stay uniformly as it is. Result:

  • 1) keep and use term "mollusc" in all titles of lists
  • 2) use term mollusks/molluscs in texts as you wish, but do not change it (both are very easily universally understandable)

I am sure that everybody will agree with these two points, including Invertzoo, that has Editcountitis disorder and should heal herself. Invertzoo, you will not be changing one sign in articles. Correcting/re-correcting one word that is included in all articles within the project is not the purpose of this project. This crazy proposal is nice for theoretical basis, but it is highly anti-efficient and harmful for real function of the PROJECT. Try to lead the project with visionary vision, or at least logically and reasonably. --Snek01 (talk) 00:22, 4 September 2010 (UTC)


Ouch. Please assume Good Faith, and practice Civility by avoiding the use of "ad hominem" attacks. I am not suggesting changing the word in every article, I am encouraging the project members to come up with a simple guideline for the issue of US/UK spelling in general. You have given your suggestion, JoJan his. We will see if anyone else comes up with a suggestion. Invertzoo (talk) 03:10, 4 September 2010 (UTC)

Smeagolidae

Hallo everybody! I've expanded a bit the aforenamed article but found a problem with breathing mechanism. These slugs are known to be upper intertidal. They are also in habit of burrowing in moist gravel and gliding above the substrata. Seems to me that means they do this under the water and hence are able to breathe with dissolved oxygen. Nethertheless air-breathing is mentioned in the stub by Snek01. Looking through availible article by Frank Climo (see the link in the article) I revealed some aspects of lung morphology but couldn't find any direct evidence for any type. The evidence might be in the text but I assume of being inattentive or not educated to recognize it. Could anybody help me in this? Mithril (talk) 23:41, 7 September 2010 (UTC)

I'm also not sure if I should rename the article into smth like "Smeagol (gastropod)" since the family is monogeneric. We've such rule on this in the Russian Wikipedia. Mithril (talk) 23:41, 7 September 2010 (UTC)

I am not familiar with this interesting Tasmanian genus. However my guess is that if this genus does indeed belong in the Otinoidea, then probably it does breathe air. Since it inhabits the upper intertidal zone, it probably is active at low tide when that zone is exposed to the air, as is the case in a number of other marine pulmonates. I imagine that it may burrow in gravel to prepare for becoming inactive. I don't know if it can glide around a lot under water or perhaps the description may mean that it glides over the substrate when it is exposed to the air, like the Onchidiidae. Thanks for the newly expanded article! Invertzoo (talk) 01:40, 8 September 2010 (UTC)
Yes the Climo (1980) paper does not seem to indicate whether the mantle cavity is usually filled with air, or secondarily adapted to absorb oxygen from seawater. In fact the paper does not have much info on the living animal at all. Invertzoo (talk) 01:47, 8 September 2010 (UTC)
Thanks a lot for both answers. I began to edit the article after expanding the russian one. However I "hesitate" too much while writing in English so the russian article is four times longer I guess. Can anybody get Haszprunar's & Huber's paper or Tillier's & Ponder's one? My university subsription to old "John Wiley and Sons" and "Oxford Journals" is rather scanty. Mithril (talk) 02:49, 8 September 2010 (UTC)
Thanks a lot. This book is appropriate without saying. However I suppose there're only four primary research papers. I'll try to get them via Resource Request. Mithril (talk) 10:35, 9 September 2010 (UTC)

chromosomal number

I've found some suspect data in land snails articles (e.g. in Hygromiidae). In these articles haploid choromosomal number range is mentioned with reference to Barker's Gastropods on Land. I've no ability to look through all the book but I found similar ranges in the appendix from the table used for cladistic analysis (page 127). As far as I understood the data in the articles was taken from that table. Using formula "In this family, the number of haploid chromosomes varies from 26 to 30." is a mistake in that case since table was evidently made with generalisation of primary data (accurate within 5 chromosomes). E. g., if members of family A-idae had 26 haploid chromosomes and never 25, 27 or 28 they yet would be placed into category with 26–30 chromosomes. The correct formula should be like "the number of haploid chromosomes lies betweeen 26 and 30". But that sounds a bit mathematically. Mithril (talk) 11:11, 9 September 2010 (UTC)

Yes, you are right. It was my mistake. You are better in English than me. Thanks. --Snek01 (talk) 13:58, 9 September 2010 (UTC)
Level of my language doesn't matter. I'm just not sure that chromosomal numbers with such accuracy are important enough to be mentioned in the encyclopedia. Mithril (talk) 14:19, 9 September 2010 (UTC)
If you would ask such question at Wikipedia:WikiProject Genetics, they would think that you were joking. Yes, genetics of gastropods is important. Nice example is Biomphalaria glabrata#Genetics. In the encyclopedia of universal knowledge is genetics of gastropods important in the same way as human genetics or as genetics of any other organism. Unfortunately genetics of majority of gastropods is still unknown. --Snek01 (talk) 22:32, 10 September 2010 (UTC)
I do not mean chromosomal number isn't important at all. I'm in some doubt about importance of the accuracy. I believe you won't argue about the importance of a phrase like "Hygromiidae have chromosomes" or "Hygromiidae have several chromosomes" with ref to that secondary research where chomosomal number range of that certain family are mentioned (accurate within 5 chromosomes) only in the table for cladistic analysis. A person interested in genetics of snails wouldn't be contented with it. Mithril (talk) 07:20, 11 September 2010 (UTC)

Corrected. --Snek01 (talk) 22:13, 13 September 2010 (UTC)

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