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The following is an archived discussion of a featured article nomination. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the article's talk page or in Wikipedia talk:Featured article candidates. No further edits should be made to this page.

The article was promoted by Karanacs 03:42, 14 July 2011 [1].

White-bellied Sea Eagle

[edit]

White-bellied Sea Eagle (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views)

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Nominator(s): Casliber (talk · contribs) 02:04, 28 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Hi all, this was a Wikiproject Birds collaboration for April 2011, which I have carried on with till here. It got an exhausive GA review by J Milburn, and I feel it is within striking distance of FA status and believe I can deal with any queries promptly. It is a wikicup nomination. Have at it, Casliber (talk · contribs) 02:04, 28 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Media is unproblematic, though a link to the base image of File:Haliaeetus leucogaster distr.png, if there is one, would be helpful. J Milburn (talk) 11:47, 28 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Support. As well as dealing with the many niggles I raised in the GAC, Cas has managed to expand the article so that it does not feel so Australia-centric. I have nothing further to add. J Milburn (talk) 11:47, 28 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]

I'm going to withdraw my support for now, as Sasata raises a very valid point about the possibility of including a number of other sources. J Milburn (talk) 09:04, 29 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Gone through all extra sources apart one about a record of it eating a prickly toadfish which I can't get fulltext of. Given its consumption of a wide variety of prey, I don't think it is essential but would be nice to add if I can get. But you might want to delay revising your support until I deal with more bits and pieces below...Casliber (talk · contribs) 08:08, 2 July 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Support. The article's looking great. J Milburn (talk) 20:39, 10 July 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Sources comments

  • Grewal citation should be standardised for multiple authors
done Casliber (talk · contribs) 08:40, 29 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]
  • No citations to del Hoyo et al
gah! you're right! that book was added before I began buffing the article, and the only inline ref was lacking a page number, and I didn't use it anyway, so (belatedly) removed. Casliber (talk · contribs) 08:42, 29 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]
  • Perhaps indicate that 1980 is not the original publication date for Liddell & Scott
done Casliber (talk · contribs) 08:47, 29 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]
  • Correct format of citation 6 (Schreiber & Weitzel)
took me a while to figure that one...done now Casliber (talk · contribs) 09:06, 29 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]
  • Consistency required Retrieved v. retrieved
appears (frustratingly) to be a template problem - not sure what's going on there. Casliber (talk · contribs) 09:06, 29 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]
  • Consistency of publisher location required (Kennedy v. Liddell & Scott)
added Oxford Casliber (talk · contribs) 08:48, 29 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Otherwise sources & citations look fine. Brianboulton (talk) 12:52, 28 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Additional source comments after edit conflict

  • FN 8: can omit university name from the italicized portion
removed Casliber (talk · contribs) 09:02, 29 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]
  • Debus entry should include page numbers
fixed Casliber (talk · contribs) 09:08, 29 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]
  • Dove or Dove Publications? EMU or Emu? Check for consistency
conformed.. Casliber (talk · contribs) 08:51, 29 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Two more source comments

  • I noticed that several multi-paged journal articles only give the first page #
  • How about changing the subheading "Cited texts" to the more accurate "Cited literature"? Sasata (talk) 22:36, 28 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]
sounds good. done. Casliber (talk · contribs) 09:03, 29 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Literature review by Sasata (talk) 22:42, 28 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]

  • I found several recent articles (post-2002) from a Web of Knowledge search that weren't used in this article. Will post these to the article talk page so as not to take up too much room here. Sasata (talk) 22:42, 28 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]
all processed/checked apart from one I can't get. Casliber (talk · contribs) 14:09, 3 July 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Comments by Sasata

  • "It is opportunistic, and also consumes carrion and a wide variety of animals." Why "also"? Doesn't the first part of the sentence imply the second?
yep. reworded to "Opportunistic, it consumes carrion and a wide variety of animals." - wasn't too keen on the "and" actually Casliber (talk · contribs) 12:52, 8 July 2011 (UTC)[reply]
  • why link India and Australia, but not Tasmania? (lead)
linked Casliber (talk · contribs) 12:52, 8 July 2011 (UTC)[reply]
linked Casliber (talk · contribs) 12:52, 8 July 2011 (UTC)[reply]
  • lead seems a touch thin for the length of the article
agree - just added a note on immature plumage but hard to figure out the next-most important fact to add. Casliber (talk · contribs) 21:51, 8 July 2011 (UTC)[reply]
  • two "first described" in the first two sentences of Taxonomy
trimmed and join so sequence is clear Casliber (talk · contribs) 22:57, 8 July 2011 (UTC)[reply]
  • link Java, Captain Cook, specific name, genetic divergence, mitochondrial (DNA), New Guinea, molecular, allozyme, plumage
done Casliber (talk · contribs) 21:51, 8 July 2011 (UTC)[reply]
  • "dark-head" no hyphen required
oops. removed Casliber (talk · contribs)
  • "This species pair has at every age at least some" seems a bit awkward to express it like this
reworded to "Both these species have at least some dark colouration in their tails" - age bit is redundant on second reading. Casliber (talk · contribs) 22:11, 8 July 2011 (UTC)[reply]
  • "They are relatively abundant in Hong Kong, where the population increased from 39 to 57 birds between 2002 and 2009." I don't understand how about 50 birds can be considered relatively abundant compared to a global population of 10-100 thousand?
HK is really tiny (~1000 sq. km), the range of this critter is huge - Australian and southern Asian coastline. Casliber (talk · contribs) 22:11, 8 July 2011 (UTC)[reply]
  • "A review of average egg-shell thickness between 1947 and 1993 to evaluate the impact of the pesticide DDT on egg breakage found that the shells of White-bellied Sea Eagle eggs had thinned by 6%, which was not thought likely to result in more breakage overall although individual clutches would have been more affected." Too much info stuffed in here awkwardly.
It's easy to forget that many people aren't familiar with DDT - I added an intro sentence, and split a long sentence. Do you think that helps enough or shall I revisit? Casliber (talk · contribs) 22:42, 8 July 2011 (UTC)[reply]
  • I tweaked the wording a bit, please check. Still having trouble with this sentence:" "This was not thought likely to result in more breakage overall although individual clutches would have been more affected." ... needs something, I don't know what Sasata (talk) 03:05, 9 July 2011 (UTC)[reply]
  • I reworded it to, "This average level of thinning was not thought likely to result in significantly more breakage overall, however individual clutches that had been even thinner might have broken. ". The idea is that statistically 6% won't result in more breakage, but that the 6% is an average, hence some might have thinned more (and broken). Tricky point to get across... Casliber (talk · contribs) 20:59, 9 July 2011 (UTC)[reply]
  • link habitat destruction, Murray River, Threatened Species Protection Act 1995, Darwin (Northern Territory)
linked Casliber (talk · contribs) 22:31, 8 July 2011 (UTC)[reply]
  • "… is listed as vulnerable" elsewhere this is capitalized
oops. got it now Casliber (talk · contribs) 22:31, 8 July 2011 (UTC)[reply]
  • "The community held localities around Booderee National Park to be connected with it." I cannot parse this sentence easily… "held" is synonymous here with "considered", correct?
yes
works fine for me Casliber (talk · contribs) 06:14, 9 July 2011 (UTC)[reply]
  • there are five instances of "known as" in two paragraphs of "Cultural significance", perhaps reword a couple
reworded 3 Casliber (talk · contribs) 22:35, 8 July 2011 (UTC)[reply]
capped second one Casliber (talk · contribs) 22:35, 8 July 2011 (UTC)[reply]

PS: The cite doi template has been recording page ranges from start page, fixed them now. Some articles are only single page short notes though. Casliber (talk · contribs) 13:04, 9 July 2011 (UTC)[reply]

General comments by Carcharoth (talk) 01:24, 30 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Partial support (of the cultural aspects section), following the changes discussed below. Will leave others to review the rest of the article, which looks fine to me in terms of copyediting and readability, but is getting closer scrutiny from others as regards the content (and has been looked at by WikiProject Birds editors in any case). Apologies for not having time to review the whole article. Carcharoth (talk) 11:02, 3 July 2011 (UTC)[reply]
I enjoyed reading an earlier bird FAC that I commented on, so thought I'd read through this one and see what my initial impressions were. My first thoughts are that the zoology parts of the article are excellent and very informative. The concern I had was from the final sentence of the lead: "The White-bellied Sea Eagle is revered by indigenous people in many parts of Australia and the Solomon Islands, and is the subject of various folk tales." That focus on Australia struck me as strange, given that the range is given earlier in the lead as including the coasts of India and Sri Lanka (and parts of the Malay Archipelago), and I wondered whether there was stuff about cultural influences outside Australia in the main body of the article that should be included in the lead (the answer seems to be 'probably').

I then started to read the 'Cultural significance' section more closely, and that struck me as a bit of a scattered collection of facts with no unifying narrative and an undue emphasis on Australia (possibly due to existing bias in the available sources - I noted this before I realised above that some attempts had been made to address this after the GA nomination, so possibly more still is needed here to avoid undue focus on Australia). Hopefully there is something on the aspects of sea-eagles in general, even if not this one, in the mythologies other than those in Australia (I've looked, but it seems a keyword to differentiate between sea eagles in the mythologies of the subcontinent and sea eagles in the mythologies of North American Indians is needed).

One (specific) comment: the sentence on the Malay magnate seems to have been placed where it is to go with the other "nest" sentence, but the general structure of the section appear to be geographical, so it might make more sense grouped with the other "Malay" sentences. Failing that, some date context is needed, as it is not immediately obvious that you are going from a nest observed in Australia in 2010 and 2011 to an observation tower built much earlier (presumably) as the magnate in question died in 1964 - the obvious question that the article leaves unanswered is when this tower was built.

In general, some of the stuff mentioned in the 'Cultural significance' section also comes across as trivial and/or WP:RECENTISM (the bit about the EagleCam attracting 'statewide attention' in particular seems aimed at Australian readers), but would be a logical endpoint for the article if the Malay magnate sentence were given a year and moved to the third paragraph of this section (the one including the Malaysia material). Carcharoth (talk) 01:21, 30 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Agree with alot of this - one of the frustrating things about cultural material is the piecemeal nature of the information available. Regarding the tower in Malaysia, I couldn't find a building date from that source, but will have a look to see if I can find that elsewhere. Regarding the notability of the EagleCam, the park it is in is one of Sydney's biggest and most notable parks, and one has to also remember that very few ornithological items ever make the news, they are generally deemed not notable enough. This one did, and this camera has been a fixture there for over three years now, so I figured that was pretty significant for a bird-related story. Casliber (talk · contribs) 05:28, 30 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Damn - no dates on google anywhere - I moved it so all Malay material together. I'll see what else I can find and recalibrate lead as summary of salient points of section with appropriate weighting. Give me a bit of time....Casliber (talk · contribs) 08:17, 30 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]
I found the Sanger (1995) reference while looking as well. A similar story is related in one of those Journal of the Bombay Natural History Society articles. This obituary might also help (it also mentions the story). It is also mentioned here. There are also some hits on Google Books (see here). The Illustrated London News report (see here and search for 'Loke') gives a year of 1949 for the observations made from that tower. I also looked at some of the other cultural stuff, and it might seem less piecemeal and more encyclopedic if you give more of the history. For example, when was the 10,000 Singapore dollar banknote issued? From Singapore Bird Series currency notes (see link at bottom), it was 1 February 1980 (you probably also want to add a link from this bird article to that article). Similarly, when did this bird become the emblem of the Malaysian state of Selangor? When did this bird become the emblem of the Manly-Warringah Sea Eagles rugby league team? Carcharoth (talk) 21:51, 30 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Aha. thanks for that. Will get to it. Got most, but yet to realign lead and body of text. See answer below to Ucucha. Tolkien never described Gwaihir as white did he...? Casliber (talk · contribs) 00:41, 1 July 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Support. Ucucha 22:36, 8 July 2011 (UTC) Comments from Ucucha:[reply]

agree - just removed any locality from lead Casliber (talk · contribs) 13:27, 2 July 2011 (UTC)[reply]
  • The map shows this species occurring in the Solomon Islands (the country), where the article says Sanford's Sea Eagle occurs.
Aaah, that's why there is that paler blue circle - adjusted map caption accordingly Casliber (talk · contribs) 13:35, 2 July 2011 (UTC)[reply]
  • Sanford's and White-bellied are called a superspecies in the lead and a species pair in the "Taxonomy" section. Those are not necessarily mutually exclusive terms, but it's better to be consistent, and "species pair" redirects to cryptic species, which I don't think is appropriate.
superspecies done Casliber (talk · contribs) 08:19, 2 July 2011 (UTC)[reply]
  • "The talons, bill, and eyes are dark as in all Gondwanan sea eagles"—I couldn't find this in the cited reference (Wink et al., 1996). I'm not sure the word "Gondwanan" is a good choice here, since those eagles probably evolved long after the breakup of Gondwana; why not use "Southern Hemisphere" or so?
Ok, latter is plainer English too. Casliber (talk · contribs) 08:19, 2 July 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Thanks. Also, is the reference correct? Ucucha 13:14, 3 July 2011 (UTC)[reply]
duh! I shoulda realised - dark yellow..fixed now. nuts to my speed-reading...Casliber (talk · contribs) 14:08, 3 July 2011 (UTC)[reply]
cos I hate them sloppiness, fixed now. Casliber (talk · contribs) 08:19, 2 July 2011 (UTC)[reply]
  • "The White-bellied Sea Eagle is generally sedentary and territorial, although it may travel long distances. They have been reported travelling upriver to hunt for flying foxes (Pteropus)"—is this really accurately cited to Tarr (1962)?
Damn, something's gone awry there and a reference has dropped out. I'll update once found. Found it and added. Casliber (talk · contribs) 08:21, 2 July 2011 (UTC)[reply]
  • "(including one record of seizing the last species when unsuccessful in obtaining its prey)"—sounds awkward; probably better put it in a separate sentence
duly split now. Casliber (talk · contribs) 08:37, 2 July 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Unclear now whether the prey was the eagle's or the gannet's. Ucucha 13:14, 3 July 2011 (UTC)[reply]
  • "A study of the species in Jervis Bay showed increases in the numbers of immature and subadult birds in autumn, although it was unclear whether these were locally-fledged or (as was considered more likely) an influx of young birds born and raised elsewhere in Australia"—why is this not under "Breeding", together with the information about the breeding season?
I was intending on some notes on territoriality and seasonal movements in the beginning bit because it is focussing on outside breeding season more than the breeding season itself....it leaves a very small behaviour section if I move it out Casliber (talk · contribs) 08:29, 2 July 2011 (UTC)[reply]
  • "The White-bellied Sea Eagle is listed as marine and migratory"—what is the relevance of the "marine and migratory" part?
I have reworded it a little - it is the marine and migratory categories under those tow pages which make it a protected species nationally in Oz. Is a rewording sufficient (as both categories are linked on the national page), or do you think I should also link both original rulings on the wikipedia page? Casliber (talk · contribs)
  • Like Carcharoth, I think the "Cultural significance" section is rather piecemeal. Do we need all those names, for example? It obviously has names in the area where it occurs (the interwikis will give you a few more), but we don't normally list those except when they are otherwise relevant. The Aboriginal tribe that uses the same name for itself and for the eagle is quite interesting, for example.
@Ucucha and Carcharoth - I have reworked into three paras (1) australian indigenous beliefs (2) those beliefs elsewhere (3) more modern material. There is a nice covering phrase in the thesis for Australian beliefs, but none for elsewhere. I mean, it would be great if someone had pointed out its loud call had been written about in several folk tales (the Malay, Indian and Nissan stories), but none exists so I can't do the OR and tie it together. Have also tried looking for more extra-Australian material but without much success... :( Casliber (talk · contribs) 13:17, 2 July 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Thanks. Still, do we need all those names? Ucucha 13:14, 3 July 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Ok, I have removed the ones which were just isolated "the name of the bird is X" ones - I left the gulbi one as it is in Colebee as well, ditto Mak Mak. Listing Kuna-ngarrk-ngarrk helps show the Umbrawarra Gorge Nature Park (which is not far from where the Mak Mak are) is from a distinct source/story/people etc. The other four help flesh out the people/locales talking about the Sea Eagle and are good for flow. If I removed all them it'd sound more listy again. Casliber (talk · contribs)
  • Some refs need to be formatted: for example, current ref. 9 (to Baldwin 2010) should probably use {{cite thesis}}, refs. 26 and 33 repeat the name of the department (and are otherwise inconsistent), ref. 68 shouldn't have "Manly Sea Eagles Official Site" italicized, etcetera.
done first, one of the repeated ones is actually how they ask to be referenced on the bottom of the department web page, tweaked the other department one (note that state and federal gov'ts are different entities), the "Manly Sea Eagles Official Site" is the work= parameter of the cite web template, reduced it to "Official Site". Casliber (talk · contribs) 12:19, 2 July 2011 (UTC)[reply]
You don't need to fill in both |publisher= and |work=, and I think the latter is rarely needed in cite web. There are a few more like this; the ref to Birds Australia apparently has |publisher=Birds Australia|work=Birds Australia website; that's not helping anyone. Ucucha 13:14, 3 July 2011 (UTC)[reply]
ok, work parameters removed. Casliber (talk · contribs) 13:52, 3 July 2011 (UTC)[reply]
I left it in as I couldn't find the information elsewhere....and upon thinking about it there may be a good reason why it isn't elsewhere (i.e. not quite accurate), and then I realised much of it is in next sentence, so deleted it. Casliber (talk · contribs) 12:23, 2 July 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Ucucha 03:39, 2 July 2011 (UTC)[reply]

  • "Description" veers from singular in para 1 to plural in para 2
duly singularised Casliber (talk · contribs) 14:27, 3 July 2011 (UTC)[reply]
  • Should "coot" be bolded since it refers to a single species?
yup. done Casliber (talk · contribs) 14:27, 3 July 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Lead comments: I believe the lead is sufficiently well-written, and it appears to contain material from each of the major sections (a refreshing change of pace indeed!). However, there are a few questions that I think should be answered in the lead:

  • Are there any critters that prey upon this critter?
aaargh - even though it is blindingly obvious that it is an apex predator, finding a source which say just that is elusive :/ Casliber (talk · contribs) 03:48, 10 July 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Aargh indeed -- I know the frustration. If you happen to stumble upon a source for this fact, it would be a great addition, but we obviously can't invent facts, so don't fret over it too much. --Cryptic C62 · Talk 14:30, 10 July 2011 (UTC)[reply]
  • How big is this critter?
added stats of larger size. Casliber (talk · contribs) 03:48, 10 July 2011 (UTC)[reply]
  • How long have people known about this critter?
added Casliber (talk · contribs) 03:48, 10 July 2011 (UTC)[reply]

In any case, thanks for the good work thus far! --Cryptic C62 · Talk 03:04, 10 July 2011 (UTC)[reply]


The above discussion is preserved as an archive. Please do not modify it. No further edits should be made to this page.
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