Talk:List of felids

Felinae main page

Hi ‎PresN : This list of felines is essentially a duplicate of the Felinae page, but strangely starts with defining the Felidae first. The Felinae page exists since 2005 with hundreds of contributions by more than 300 editors over all those years; it is widely linked within wikipedia, including wikidata and lots of other language pages. Since you copy-pasted large parts from both Felinae and Felidae pages without any WP:PATT, I would like to suggest the following:

1. move those parts from your list of felines to the Felinae page that are not yet there, like e.g. the maps in the table; and then
2. place a redirect in the list of felines to the Felinae page. BhagyaMani (talk) 05:15, 15 March 2019 (UTC)

It starts by defining Felidae because it's a list of the species in Felidae. As such, it includes both Felinae and Pantherinae, and is not a duplicate of Felinae. Merging this list into Felinae, therefore, would not be correct. Merging this list into Felidae would also not be correct as the list is too long- it would overwhelm that article; the subject is also different, as aside from some explanatory introduction, this is a descriptive list of species, not an article on a Family. I apologize for not attributing that the source of the lead was originally Felidae (I did not pull anything from Felinae) - I have now rectified this in the article history.

It appears that you do not believe that "List of X species" lists should exist on wikipedia. As this is not the only such list, I believe you should get consensus to that effect (at WP:ANIMALS or WP:TREEOFLIFE?) before attempting to remove this list.

PS: if you are interested in getting rid of duplicate articles, Big cat exists separate from Panthera. --PresN 06:05, 15 March 2019 (UTC)

If this is a list of Felidae species, the title should be 'list of felids'. Why did you title it 'list of felines'? -- BhagyaMani (talk) 06:29, 15 March 2019 (UTC)

It is unambiguously a list of felids, but feline is used two ways (I replied on my talk page in more detail). Generally the English Wikipedia articles use feline more narrowly. So the title is not wrong, but inconsistent with most cat articles.

I quite like these list articles. There are some good ones (e.g. List of fruit bats) and poor ones. I have a draft of one in my user space, which was based on a table produced by another editor.   Jts1882 | talk  07:55, 15 March 2019 (UTC)

I fully agree that the list of fruit bats page makes a lot of sense, giving a comprehensive overview, as there are so many more genera and more than 4x as many species as in the Felidae. But duplicated content from Felidae titled 'list of felines' is misleading, more confusing than clarifying, imo. -- BhagyaMani (talk) 08:32, 15 March 2019 (UTC)

The list presents the information in a different way that can be useful. For instance, the list prominently displays the range maps so you can see at a glance the relative distributions of the different species. The list could also add additional information on habitat, prey and behaviour. I think habitat and prey would be useful.   Jts1882 | talk  09:13, 15 March 2019 (UTC)

@PresN: Out of curiosity, did you use a search to gather the information to create the table. I noticed the earlier drafts have some json data which I'm guess comes from a search. I've recently become interested in the search system and its potential for alternative ways of exploring wikipedia. I have written a gadget for browsing the automatic taxonomy system used in the taxoboxes by using search through the API (see User:Jts1882/taxonomybrowser.js).   Jts1882 | talk  08:09, 15 March 2019 (UTC)

I actually hand-built the json, originally from reading the wikipedia articles, then updated by the IUCN 2017 revised taxonomy. I wrote a python script to convert it to wikitables. The idea was that if there were any changes needed to the format (adding a column, changing the default image size) then it would be easy to apply to the whole list and then keep for future lists- the fruit bat list, for example, has some inconsistencies throughout and the parrot list had a very hard time keeping up with requests at FLC (they are both about 3+ times the length of this list, though). I will definitely check out your gadget for future lists, though!

I'll move this list (and pointers) to List of felids today, too- thank you for the feedback. --PresN 12:19, 15 March 2019 (UTC)

@Jts1882: Now moved, and the first FLC reviewer asked for more columns as well (population counts, to be specific, though I'll look into habitat as well) so I'll be expanding this to make it more distinct from the information present at Felidae. Thank you very much for the feedback; as I stated, I plan on doing more lists like this in the future, so I'd really like to get the first one as a good model to continue on. Any feedback or thoughts for changes, no matter how large, would be greatly appreciated. --PresN 21:32, 15 March 2019 (UTC)

Suggestions

I have a few comments and suggestions on the formating and organisation.

1. The first column has the common name and the scientific name of the subspecies. So you get to the subspecies before the scientific name is given in the second column. I'd move the subspecies below the scientific name. I also would only collapse them when exceeding a certain number as the space is there for at least two or three.
2. There is a lot of space on the left and middle of the table. I would move the image of cat to the left (possibly under the common name) and have IUCN status on the far right (reduced in width or combined with population).
3. If adding additional information, I'd avoid having large number of columns as this will make the table wider and leave more space. Some information can by combined. For instance, habitat and prey could go together, the image of the animal with the common name, population counts with IUCN status. I've drafted a quick example below.

Genus Acinonyx (Brookes, 1828) – one species
Common name	Scientific name and subspecies	Range	Habitat and behaviour	IUCN Status and population
Cheetah	A. jubatus Schreber, 1775 Four subspecies A. j. hecki (Northwest African cheetah) A. j. jubatus (Southeast African cheetah) A. j. soemmeringii (Northeast African cheetah) A. j. venaticus (Asiatic cheetah)		Habitat: grasslands, savannas, dense vegetated areas, mountainous terrain, semi-desert, prairie, thick brush. Hunting:: preys mainly upon antelopes and gazelles, using stalk and chase strategy.	EVU IUCN Estimated population: 6700

I would also consider creating a template. With the table structure and formating handled by the template, it would be easier for editors to see the key information, e.g. in parameters |name1=, |image1=, |binomial1=,|subspecies=, |range1=, etc. In addition, the template would allow easier CSS styling using templatestyles.   Jts1882 | talk  13:03, 16 March 2019 (UTC)

I've knocked up a few draft templates. Initially I made one template with the intent of having each line with numerated variable (e.g. |species1=, |species2=, etc. (see {{Species table}}, which only handlees one species currently). Then a thought it might be better using a series of templates: {{Species table/start}} (to start the table and add headers), {{Species table/row}} (to be called once for each species), {{Species table/end}} (to close the table). The following table uses the latter method.   Jts1882 | talk  18:16, 16 March 2019 (UTC)

Genus Acinonyx – {{{authority-name}}}, {{{authority-year}}} – {{{species-count}}} species

Common name	Scientific name and subspecies	Range	Size and ecology	IUCN status and estimated population
{{{name}}} 180px|alt={{{image-alt}}}	A. jubatus {{{authority-name}}}, {{{authority-year}}} Four subspecies A. j. hecki (Northwest African cheetah) A. j. jubatus (Southeast African cheetah) A. j. soemmeringii (Northeast African cheetah) A. j. venaticus (Asiatic cheetah)	{{{range}}}	Size: {{{size}}} Habitat: Habitat: grasslands, savannas, dense vegetated areas, mountainous terrain, semi-desert, prairie, thick brush. Diet: Hunting:: preys mainly upon antelopes and gazelles, using stalk and chase strategy.	Estimated population: 6700 {{{direction}}}

I quite like these; I've modified the tables to use this format to check it out and I think it's a definite improvement- it better organizes the data (I was going to add another column for habitat but I think you're right that we should try to keep it to five-ish columns), and it also gets the animal image over to the left column as part of the primary identifier. Now I just need to actually fill in all the data for habitat/hunting, and add explicit cites for each row. I'm going to hold off on templatizing the tables until they're not changing so much, though I think the species table/row schema is the best option. --PresN 02:45, 17 March 2019 (UTC)

The templates system was just a suggestion and a rough draft. If you think it a good idea I'll try and make it a bit more flexible so it has more utility for other families. One possibility is matching the parameters with your JSON structure to help contruct new tables. If we can come up with a decent stucture, then it will be easy to fine tune and change the table output. There is some habitat, diet and other information in User:Jts1882/Cataloguing_cats#Cats_on_wikipedia. I created the first version of that cat table using data from a table created by a now inactive editor who took the multiple columns approach.   Jts1882 | talk  08:27, 17 March 2019 (UTC)

Grouping genera

While the cats are divided into two subfamilies and no tribes are currently defined (unless using Felinae sensu lato), there are some clearly defined lineages that have been solid in molecular studies for more than a decade. Some people think that these should be merged genera. So I think groupings like Acinonyx, Puma and Heptailurus would be better. Similarly for the bay cat and caracal lineages.   Jts1882 | talk  17:55, 19 March 2019 (UTC)

@Jts1882: Okay, so, to make sure I'm clear on it, you're saying that right now in the list the 14 genera are just listed underneath the 2 subfamilies in alphabetical order, and you think they should be clumped into the 8 lineages? That is, (Panthera and Neofelis) in the Panthera lineage, (Pardofelis and Catopuma) in the Bay Cat lineage, (Leptailurus and Caracal) in the Caracal lineage, (Leopardus) in the Ocelot lineage, (Lynx) in the Lynx lineage, (Acinonyx, Puma, and Herpailurus) in the Puma lineage, (Otocolobus and Prionailurus) in the Leopard Cat lineage, and (Felis) in the Domestic Cat lineage? I'm pulling those names from the Felidae article, which cites them to Johnson et al. (2006); are those the accepted names, or should I just number them like was done in the table recently injected into that article? --PresN 19:32, 19 March 2019 (UTC)

Edit- you'd think I'd learn to look at my own sources, the IUCN revised taxonomy I based the taxo structure on uses those names too. --PresN 19:34, 19 March 2019 (UTC)

Now done. --PresN 02:20, 23 March 2019 (UTC)

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Sortable list of felids?

It is hard to just compare all felids in a large sortable list, 'cause this List of ... article has been divided up into subfamilies and genus, so no sorting and straightforward comparison is possible in the list. Seems odd.

The article is a really awesome overview of felids, but it does seem to stray rather far from the ordinary MOS:LIST lists we see.

Would be good to figure out how we might have both the overview, and a decent sortable list of felids. N2e (talk) 13:11, 26 January 2022 (UTC)

What is there to sort by? The division by genus and subfamily, IMO, gives a much better overview of how they relate to each other. --SilverTiger12 (talk) 18:52, 26 January 2022 (UTC)

I can think of a number of things. I'm sure other editors and readers could think of others, which is why good list articles are generally sortable. Sort by body mass? or size? Continent/range? Even alphabetical sorts can be helpful to readers when they are thinking of a felid/cat they've heard of or read about and can't quite remember the full name.

As it is, the article looks as if it is written by, and aimed at, a more scientific and educated audience: an audience that cares first for scientific classification taxonomic arcana such as Subfamily and Genus, and only then all the many many characteristics that are of interest to a more general audience. N2e (talk) 04:46, 30 January 2022 (UTC)

That IS what a family is all about: classification, but NOT about weights or continents. – BhagyaMani (talk) 04:57, 30 January 2022 (UTC)

A large sortable table would be possible, but presents a number of problems:

• It would need more columns to include only one type of sortable data in each column (the table would be very wide).
• Sorting on geographical range could be useful, but how do you do this when many cats span several regions? The leopard is found in Africa and Asia, the jaguar and puma North and South America, and so on. Which do you sort on? A table using multirow spans would be a nightmare to construct and maintain and not too informative as finer detail is needed (e.g. palaearctic or tropical Asia).
• Habitat and diet would be difficult to present in a form where sorting was useful.
• Sorting on size is asking for trouble. The numbers are very unreliable (due to conflicting sources) and people love arguing over which cat is bigger than the other. We have constant edit wars over this in the big cat articles.
• Common name might be useful for finding a particular cat, but searching is better and can handle multiple common names.
• The subfamily and genus would certainly be useful, but that is how the article is currently organised
• The conservation status would be useful and the only feature where I think not being able to sort is a loss to the article.
• From a practical perspective, one big table would be difficult to maintain as you can't edit parts of a table

In short I see a number of practical difficulties and little to gain (apart from conservation status sorting). —  Jts1882 | talk  10:15, 30 January 2022 (UTC)

Lineages

Why are they not formally classified as tribes? 104.153.40.58 (talk) 03:52, 7 April 2023 (UTC)