I could get started by collecting sources, especially those that will be helpful for multiple articles, (incl listing what I have in hard copy (if not available online)). Would this be helpful, and if so, where should I put it? This page, on the project page, a sub page of that page...? --6th Happiness (talk) 02:29, 27 June 2009 (UTC)[reply]

That's a great idea 6th! Go ahead and create Wikipedia:WikiProject Rodents/References, try to include as much info as you would need for a proper {{cite x}} template and a description of what kind of info it is. --ΖαππερΝαππερ ^Babel_Alexandria 23:02, 29 June 2009 (UTC)[reply]

so i think it would be great if we agreed our first goal for this project. I personally would like to get all the main rodent articles up to GA, here is a list of candidates:

• Squirrel start-class (could be possibly be reclassified as B)
• Rat B-class
• Beaver B-class
• Pocket gopher start-class
• Mouse B-class
• Dormouse start-class
• Porcupine start-class (maybe picking either New World porcupine or Old World porcupine - both start-class)
• Capybara B-class

--ΖαππερΝαππερ ^Babel_Alexandria 00:28, 30 June 2009 (UTC)[reply]

I'd also like to suggest Gerbil (currently B-class). Like mouse and Fancy mouse (both also B-class) there are areas lacking references, or where references could be improved, and sections that currently read as a "how to".--6th Happiness (talk) 08:48, 30 June 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Wow, somebody gave Gerbil a B? That page is a disaster. That's pretty much true for all the pet rodent articles except for guinea pig and only thanks to a lot of work by some good editors who got it in that condition and have been tough with reverting changes. There needs to be a page for he Gerbillinae as a whole - something covering the diversity of gerbils (there are over 100 spp.). It seems like that should be at gerbil and all the pet gerbil material should be at a page for M. unguiculatus or even an article called pet gerbil. There just doesn't seem to be a way to keep every 9 year-old's pet fluffy out of these articles. I think something like beaver is going to have a much easier time getting to GA status. Pet rodents are going to be a struggle. --Aranae (talk) 12:46, 30 June 2009 (UTC)[reply]

i'm always torn between the article that desperately needs more work, and the one that just needs a little nudge to reach it's next step. the wikiProject council pages suggest that we try to an easily attainable goal first, in order to have a strong morale base and such... hmm... Gerbil or Beaver? Gerbil might take a month or more, but i think we could have Beaver nominated for a GA by the end of a week or two. --ΖαππερΝαππερ ^Babel_Alexandria 15:29, 30 June 2009 (UTC)[reply]

yeah, I wouldn't have given it a B either, but being fairly new to wiki editing, I wasn't sure if I was being tough or not in that assessment. I agree, Beaver will probably be easier to tackle first. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 6th Happiness (talk • contribs) 15:53, 30 June 2009 (UTC)[reply]

the fun part about improving articles is learning new information on a subject :) --ΖαππερΝαππερ ^Babel_Alexandria 17:18, 30 June 2009 (UTC)[reply]

I just noticed that our article on the Black Rat is quite unacceptably stubby for the about third most common rodent of the world. Could we get some WikiProject collaboration to improve it? Ucucha 19:16, 21 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Brazilian False Rice Rat has been nominated as a good article. In my opinion, the article is in great shape. Perhaps it could use a distribution map and the lede may be a bit technical at present, but I see no reason why it won't get there with minimal work. It will be nice to get another GA for this project. Contribute or comment if you are interested. --Aranae (talk) 12:42, 30 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]

If there are any people here who don't follow WP:MAMMAL, the thread I started at Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Mammals#Common names may be interesting.

Also, Lund's Amphibious Rat is now at peer review; any comments would be greatly appreciated. Ucucha 17:26, 11 October 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Looks good! I noticed that article references reference Hershkovitz's 1955 review of the genus Holochilus, and you mention Hershkovitz in the article, but I didn't see Hershkovitz's review itself. (If I missed it, apologies, I glanced quickly as I'm very busy atm). His 1955 review is digitalised here: http://www.archive.org/details/southamericanmar3724hers - search for magnus for relevant sections. Probably doesn't have much if any new info in it, but it makes the ref's more complete. --6th Happiness (talk) 00:33, 19 October 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks for your comment. Yes, I know, I have it and looked into it when preparing this article. It doesn't include any information mentioned elsewhere, is badly out of date and stained by Hershkovitz's somewhat eccentric theories, and I didn't need it to source anything in the article. I'll probably need to use it when I get to the articles on Holochilus, though. Ucucha 00:35, 19 October 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Ah, okay :-) --6th Happiness (talk) 00:41, 19 October 2009 (UTC)[reply]

It has now progressed to another title, Lundomys, and to FAC (see here). Input from other RODENT participants would be much appreciated. Ucucha 21:26, 31 October 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Lundomys is now an FA, and Pseudoryzomys has replaced it at FAC. Again, comments are welcome. Ucucha 21:44, 22 November 2009 (UTC)[reply]

I just created the project talk page banner ({{Rodent}}) and added an importance scale on the project page. It can undoubtedly be improved, so please do edit it. Ucucha 16:08, 16 October 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks for creating this! --6th Happiness (talk) 00:09, 19 October 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Pseudomys lorifex now recognised as a synonym for Pseudomys johnsoni.[1] T.carnifex (talk) 12:49, 23 October 2009 (UTC)[reply]

The current information on hamster classification verges on the nonsensical. The confusion seems to be due to the popularity of pet hamsters. Hamster fanciers really are no good at sticking a name to a single species and the names "Russian White," Dzhungarian," and Campbell's" seem to be applicable to every member of Phodopus. Can someone sort out the classification? I suspect there are a number of redundant hamster pages. It is far too confusing to me to handle, at least alone, and I'll likely need an admin to make changes to article names. Maybe Latin names will be necessary. If this can get sorted out it would be good to make a navigation template like that for the Gliridae. innotata (Talk | Contribs) 20:10, 18 November 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Rodents that are held as pets always seem to attract a lot of attention, but little that actually improves the articles.

If the common names are more confusing than enlightening, it may be a good idea to place the articles at the scientific names. Alternatively, we could switch to the MSW 3 common names, but I'm not sure whether these are in common enough use. To get a detailed grasp of the issues, you might want to create an overview of common names for each species like the one I made for a different group at User:Ucucha/Oryzomyini#Common names.

The {{Hamster}} template is in dire need of an upgrade to a more standard format. I'll see what I can do about that. Ucucha 03:06, 19 November 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Done; it's a standard navigation template now. Ucucha 03:27, 19 November 2009 (UTC)[reply]

There's been only one study of any notable size on cricetine evolution since Mammal Species of the World Volume 3. It's Neumann et al. (2006 - cited at Hamster). Although they indicated that Cricetulus is polyphyletic, C. migratorius at least will need to be placed in a separate genus, they took no formal action regarding taxonomy. Thus, as far as I can tell, MSW3 should probably be adopted here, with potential changes suggested by Xie and Smith (2008). The classification section currently in Hamster is essentially in agreement with MSW3 with two exceptions. MSW3 treat Cricetulus griseus and Cricetus hehringi as synonyms of Cricetulus barabensis and Cricetus cricetus respectively. As for common names, I think these animals have the opposite problem of many of the rodents we have recently discussed. They have an overabundance of common names. I think using the scientific names will become a tougher sell. I think MSW3 and IUCN are the best places to start, but I wouldn't be opposed to adopting a common name applied by the pet folks. I have no idea where one would look for that. Here are the species and their common names at those sources:

• Allocricetulus curtatus Mongolian Hamster (MSW3 & IUCN)
• Allocricetulus eversmanni Eversmann's Hamster (MSW3 & IUCN)
• Cansumys canus Gansu Hamster (MSW3 & IUCN)
• Cricetulus alticola Ladak Dwarf Hamster (MSW3 & IUCN [IUCN also lists Tibetan Dwarf Hamster])
  • Actually, IUCN lists "Ladakh Hamster", not "Ladak Dwarf Hamster", as MSW 3 does. Ucucha 23:53, 19 November 2009 (UTC)[reply]
• Cricetulus barabensis Striped Dwarf Hamster (MSW3 & IUCN) (includes C. griseus)
• Cricetulus kamensis Tibetan Dwarf Hamster (MSW3), Kam Dwarf Hamster (IUCN)
• Cricetulus longicaudatus Long-tailed Dwarf Hamster (MSW3 & IUCN)
• Cricetulus migratorius Gray Dwarf Hamster (MSW3 & IUCN [IUCN also lists Gray Hamster])
• Cricetulus sokolovi Sokolov's Dwarf Hamster (MSW3 & IUCN)
• Cricetus cricetus Common Hamster (MSW3 & IUCN [IUCN also lists Black-bellied Hamster]) (includes C. nehringi)
• Mesocricetus auratus Golden Hamster (MSW3 & IUCN)
• Mesocricetus brandti Brandt's Hamster (MSW3 & IUCN)
• Mesocricetus newtoni Romanian Hamster (MSW3 & IUCN)
• Mesocricetus raddei Ciscaucasian Hamster (MSW3 & IUCN)
• Phodopus campbelli Campbell's Desert Hamster (MSW3), Campbell's Hamster (IUCN)
• Phodopus roborovskii Roborovski's Desert Hamster (MSW3), Desert Hamster (IUCN), Roborowski's Hamster (IUCN)
• Phodopus sungorus Striped Desert Hamster (MSW3), Dzhungarian Hamster (IUCN)
• Tserskia triton Greater Long-tailed Hamster (MSW3 & IUCN)

Note that IUCN lists Cricetulus lama, the Lama Dwarf Hamster, and Cricetulus tibetanus, the Tibetan Dwarf Hamster, as distinct species citing the Mammals of China (Smith and Xie, 2008). --Aranae (talk) 23:35, 19 November 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Considering this list, I'd say that we'd best use these names in general, as IUCN and MSW are mostly in agreement. We'll have problems with Cricetulus alticola, C. kamensis, and the Phodopus species, though, for which various common names exist. I think we'd best avoid "Tibetan Dwarf Hamster", which has been used for both C. alticola and C. kamensis. C. alticola would then best be "Ladakh Hamster" on the basis of Google hits, and C. kamensis can be "Kam Dwarf Hamster" as the IUCN has it. For Phodopus, the MSW and IUCN names are all different and there are presumably various pet names, so we have several possibilities there. Google seems to favor the IUCN over the MSW names. Ucucha 23:53, 19 November 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Some notes: Ladak is a horribly incorrect spelling of a place name–use Ladakh. Kam is an awful description of distribution–Tibetan is better, as far as geography goes. (Kam is a jungle area near Tibet, to cut things short). I think we should also check for names used for multiple species, like Dzhungarian. For now, let's only set names if they unequivocally refer to one species. innotata (Talk | Contribs) 16:50, 21 November 2009 (UTC)[reply]

"I wouldn't be opposed to adopting a common name applied by the pet folks". These common names are the problem here. innotata (Talk | Contribs) 17:00, 21 November 2009 (UTC)[reply]

If there is a clear consensus for a certain common name for a pet, I don't see why we shouldn't prefer that name to the IUCN or MSW3 name, but it seems more likely that the pet names are only confusing, in which case we'd better use MSW or IUCN names. I'd rather say "Ladak" is a different (and uncommon) transcription, but I agree that "Ladakh Hamster" is the name we should use for C. alticola. I don't quite understand the latter part of your comment, as you seem to be arguing that we shouldn't use names that can refer to multiple species, even though you also say that we should use "Tibetan Dwarf Hamster", which has been used for different species in different sources. Ucucha 17:26, 21 November 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Sorry about the confusion over Tibetan species. The pet names I don't like are the ones like Russian Winter White and the like. To cut this short, I really give up on these hamsters! I'll sort out another, more manageable mess, but this is beyond me. innotata (Talk | Contribs) 18:26, 22 November 2009 (UTC)[reply]

I've just added a documentation page here; please do improve it. Note that the Template:Squirrels has been redirected to Template:Rodent, which may result in some duplication. —innotata (Talk • Contribs) 00:09, 10 January 2010 (UTC)[reply]

I added a little. Ucucha 14:27, 10 January 2010 (UTC)[reply]

where do flying squirrels live in louisiana —Preceding unsigned comment added by 67.33.110.108 (talk) 00:38, 10 January 2010 (UTC)[reply]

The southern flying squirrel (Glaucomys volans) has a distribution that generally spans all of Louisiana. You are most likely to find it in hardwood-pine forests, as the Mammalian Species account indicates. Ucucha 14:27, 10 January 2010 (UTC)[reply]

I think it is probably found in the whole state, including urban areas. —innotata (Talk • Contribs) 17:25, 10 January 2010 (UTC)[reply]

I recently read about this newly approved bot. Would it be a good idea to ask Coffee to add the {{Rodent}} banner to all articles in Category:Rodent stubs and its subcategories? Ucucha 14:27, 10 January 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Why not? —innotata (Talk • Contribs) 16:21, 10 January 2010 (UTC)[reply]

No reason really, just wanted other people's opinion before going ahead to ask for it. Ucucha 16:30, 10 January 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Me, Ucucha, and Aranae have been discussing the capitalisation of the names of rodents at User talk:Ucucha#Degu; Spermophilus, and have decided that it would be good to adopt some sort of standard for this WikiProject, for the sake of consistency. The main conclusion we have come to is that both are and will be used, with the major difference being context. I summed up my opinion in this matter:

I think that since the only opinions here are ours (here meaning mine, Ucucha's, and Aranae's)—don't care, really should be consistent—or else strong, strong support of lowercase, as at Talk:Indian giant squirrel, we should use sentence case for rodent articles. However, there are a few problems, as title case is used most frequently for certain groups of rodents: Australian ones and obscure ones, as Ucucha pointed out. So I think we should make a few exceptions.

Is this a good idea, adopting a standard of capitalisation? —innotata (Talk • Contribs) 01:42, 17 January 2010 (UTC)[reply]

I agree, there should indeed be a level of consistency, so I'm on-board in that respect. I just did a quick review of the literature at my disposal (all regarding Australian rodents, or other mammals) and found little convention. The two books, Dictionary of Australian and New Guinean Mammals and A Field Guide to the Mammals of Australia, both used title case for all common names. However, the journal articles I reviewed (three rodent papers published in Volume 27 of Wildlife Research) all used sentence case for common names when used in text (common names obviously weren't used in sub-headings). I would probably lean towards using title case, but I guess my preference might be influenced by what I'm familiar with (Australian rodents, which you pointed out already tend to use title case). At the end of the day, I guess I don't care a great deal either and will follow the consensus. T.carnifex (talk) 04:50, 17 January 2010 (UTC)[reply]

As I wrote at my talk page, I don't care much but have a slight preference for sentence case because that seems to be more widely used (cf. Talk:Indian giant squirrel and some other places where people assembled sources). In particular, title case is very rarely used in actual flowing prose, which is what we at Wikipedia primarily should be concerned about. I noted already that title case may be a bit more common in Australia, but it looks like journal articles do mostly use sentence case in prose, and Breed and Ford's book on Native mice and rats does use sentence case.

Therefore, I mildly favor using sentence case throughout Rodentia for article titles and in the text for well-established common names. On the other hand, I would prefer to continue using title case when mentioning common names like "Lund's Amphibious Rat" in Lundomys, as they have never been used in sentence case in the literature. Ucucha 07:25, 17 January 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Ucucha makes a god point in distinguishing between use in a checklist and use in the prose of text. MSW3 is often held up as the primary example of a text that applies capitalization, but the actual usage in a sentence is not consistently capitalized. There are very few examples of common names used in text, but for rodents, see page 1593: "The common name coypu is preferred to nutria, since nutria in Spanish means otter" (Woods and Kilpatrick, 2005). Even among the more frequently capitalized primates there is this quote from page 121 "it is not known whether these represent the living aye-aye or a separate, extinct species" (Groves, 2005). Neither of these are perfect examples (coypu vs. nutria is arguing about the words more than the species; aye-aye could be interpreted as a reference to a roup larger than a single species). The same does hold true for many field guides - the entry is capitalized, but usage in sentence is lowercase. That, however, is not true in all cases (see Kays and Wilson, 2002 Mammals of North America for an example). --Aranae (talk) 16:47, 17 January 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Menkhorst and Knight 2001 on Australian mammals also use title case, even for "Horse" (p. 210). So do The Kingdon Pocket Guide to African Mammals, Gurung and Singh's Mammals of the Indian Subcontinent, Payne et al.'s Mammals of Borneo, and Jameson and Peeters's Mammals of California, but not Emmons and Feer (Neotropical Rainforest Mammals) and Smithers' Mammals of Southern Africa. However, I think field guides like these are already on the periphery of real prose. Ucucha 16:55, 17 January 2010 (UTC)[reply]

There is a simple rule for this in science that can serve as a guideline. Animal names are generally considered common nouns as long as they are not standardized. For birds for example, there is a single standardized list of names, and hence, bird names are capitalized as proper nouns. For mammals, I am not aware of such a single standardize list, and lower case would be proscribed for that.

Personally, I think names of species should be capitalized and seen as proper nouns, as they are similar to names of places etc. However, that is a totally different discussion that I rather do not go into. I guess that it is just a matter of time till standardized lists will be made for more groups, so it will get there eventually. -- Kim van der Linde ^{at venus} 01:48, 18 January 2010 (UTC)[reply]

I don't entirely agree with this. It is a little more complicated. In fish, there are some semblances of official lists, and all of them use sentence case. —innotata (Talk • Contribs) 16:05, 18 January 2010 (UTC)[reply]

We are not using any such standardized list; rather, we use different sources for the common name, including MSW 3, the IUCN Red List, and Duff and Lawson's 2004 checklist of the mammals of the world, and usage in other sources to determine which common name to use (at least, that's my understanding, and I think it's a good situation). Ucucha 17:56, 18 January 2010 (UTC)[reply]

And hence you use lower caps. -- Kim van der Linde ^{at venus} 01:17, 19 January 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Really, I think you indicated it right, the semblance of official listS should be a clear indication that there is no single official list, so it makes sense. -- Kim van der Linde ^{at venus} 01:17, 19 January 2010 (UTC)[reply]

A good point here is that almost nobody uses title case for fish (and some other animals, too). The semblance I referred to is the database FishBase, which doesn't include a common name for every species—hence the "semblance". Looking at rodents, the idea of an official list for mammals seems absurd, as for the majority of mammal species would have to start from nothing. —innotata (Talk • Contribs) 15:51, 19 January 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Yup, if you really look, there is just one official list animals, and that is for birds. That makes an easy answer with regard to rodents. -- Kim van der Linde ^{at venus} 11:29, 20 January 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Starzynka (talk · contribs) has been creating very inadequate stubs (Apodemus epimelas for an example). I asked the user to stop and create more complete pages instead. Ucucha 18:27, 18 January 2010 (UTC)[reply]

I've been doing some cleanup and expansion, and adding expand tags, since this is not just a matter of very short stubs, these are almost useless articles. —innotata (Talk • Contribs) 15:22, 19 January 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Yes, the articles have no content that would not be the same as for any other mammal species. Polbot did much better than that. On a technicality, though, I don't think {{expand}} templates are terribly useful, as the stub templates already contain the same information. Ucucha 15:34, 19 January 2010 (UTC)[reply]