Talk:Ghillie suit

August 2006‎

Just a question, the caption of the picture says a Marine is shown, yet when you click the picture, the box below it says "This image is a work of a U.S. Army soldier or employee, taken or made during the course of the person's official duties. PERSONAL DUTY OF KILLIN' A SIX PACK YO!! As a work of the U.S. federal government, the image is in the public domain". Furthermore, the logo in the box is of the "Deparptment of the Army." Should either the caption or the box be changed to eliminate confusion(and nit-picking from people like me)?

If it's a Marine in the picture, it's obviously not a picture of someone in the Army.

Edit: I also posted this in the discussion for the picture, but I put it here as well since the picture probably doesn't get many people looking at it's discussion page. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 74.67.252.251 (talk • contribs) 19:29, 27 August 2006

Times????

Making a ghillie suit from scratch is time consuming, and a detailed, high-quality suit can take hundreds of hours to manufacture and season for use.

Really 100's of hours???? I doubt it. Is there any basis to this? —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 220.237.166.156 (talk) 11:15, 8 May 2007 (UTC).

The second external link (ghillie suit blog) says from 5 to 40 hours. 84.227.30.70 (talk) 13:51, 12 September 2008 (UTC)

If you are making a Natural Ghillie (which is much more effective) it will take roughly 7 hours and will last generally a week (Based on my experince with the Australian bush) constant maintanence is required if you are covering vast amounts of space and the enviroment changes.--KyleIvory (talk) 07:04, 21 March 2010 (UTC)

alternate origin for the name

I have heard the claim that the "ghillie suit" was the creation of an Irish poacher named Gilley. According to the story, he was caught poaching at some point in the 1950s. The policeman was a Territorial Army reservist who recognized the ingenuity and utility of the camouflage suit, and let Gilley go free in exchange for Gilley teaching him how to make one. He in turn showed the suit to some visiting Royal Marines during a training exercise, who decided they would be just the thing for snipers, whereupon they became quite popular in various military establishments. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 69.41.40.21 (talk) on 11 May 2007 (UTC). -

I'm not certain on the origin of the "ghillie" name, but we know that the Scottish Lovat Scouts wore this sort of outfit while fighting the Boers during the Second Boer War (1899-1902). I added a cited statement to the article. -- Ctatkinson 18:53, 17 September 2007 (UTC)

In the book Shooter, which is a biography of a top ranked Marine Scout Sniper, Jack (the author) says that ghillie originated in Scotland. Land owners would use it either for observing the natural animals on their land, or catching poachers. Im pretty sure a marine scout sniper would know where it originated, so i would think that the article should be changed accordingly. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 151.199.196.129 (talk) 12:48, 8 October 2008 (UTC)

"Giolla" is a perfectly good (Irish) Gaelic word meaning "servant". —Preceding unsigned comment added by 67.188.108.24 (talk) 10:15, 10 January 2009 (UTC)

At a guess, then, the same word in (Scots) Gaelic gave rise to the word Ghillie which has come to mean, more or less, a hunting guide or gamekeeper. The very sort of chap who might have served in the Lovat scouts and re-made his deer stalking suit for hunting Boers instead. 213.121.242.7 (talk) 13:26, 1 June 2011 (UTC)

Inflammable vs. flammable

I corrected "flammable" to "inflammable," noting that "flammable" is an invention for the ignorant, used on warning labels of consumer products, and that it's inappropriate in an encyclopedia. Someone here undid my correction. Thoughts?

Flammability#Linguistics:_Flammable_vs._inflammable

The word “inflammable” came from Latin “'inflammāre” = “to set fire to,” where the prefix “'in-”' means “in” as in “inside”, rather than “not” as in “invisible” and “ineligible”. Nonetheless, “inflammable” is often erroneously thought to mean “non-flammable”. To avoid this safety hazard, “flammable”, despite not being the proper Latin-derived term, is now commonly used on warning labels when referring to physical combustibility.

Jeff Muscato (talk) 01:13, 13 March 2010 (UTC)

I'm not the one who changed it, and this is a couple of years after the fact, but this isn't Latin. 'Inflammable' is a word that seems to go against many other uses of the 'in-' prefix. Invulnerable means 'not' vulnerable, and even the Wiktionary has 'incombustible' listed as 'not combustible'. Yes, the original root word is the opposite, meaning 'can be set on fire', but it's one of those Latin leftovers that make people complain about how difficult English is. Yay zombie language. --StarChaser Tyger (talk) 11:48, 26 September 2012 (UTC)

References

Maybe just for a laugh?

We should change the last picture in an article to an empty forest and subtitle it "A U.S. Army sniper wearing a ghillie suit" — Preceding unsigned comment added by 67.163.58.231 (talk) 14:52, 22 July 2011 (UTC)

Names "ghillie suit","yowie suit" and "camo tent"

In the good old days, it did not matter if Wikipedia added less than common names to the introduction of an article because no one took Wikiepdia seriously. However today Wikipedia is taken far more seriously:

"ghillie suit" military -wikipeia (web then books)

• About 415,000 results; About 1,360

"yowie suit" military -wikipeia (web then books)

• About 8,440 results; About 85 results

"yowie suit" military -Wikipedia -ghillie

• About 842 results; 0 (one a novel by Christopher Cummings). -- it seems from my survey that this is a term more commonly used in Australia.

"camo tent" military -wikipedia (web then books)

• About 13,300 results ;About 31 results --Not one of them (in the first pages) describes a ghillie suit, instead they describe what one would expect from simple English a camouflaged tent.

So based on this survey I am going to remove "camo tent" and footnote the second term, because it is used in far less one percent of either unreliable or reliable sources. -- PBS (talk) 20:10, 14 December 2014 (UTC)

Altered the lead

I've changed the lead to remove the definitive statement that a ghillie suit <always> resembles "heavy foliage". In fact they are adapted to resemble whatever the immediate enviroment looks like, which may be snow, sand, grass, different types of scrub, forest undergrowth, etc. - not only "heavy foliage". Roger (Dodger67) (talk) 19:39, 1 March 2016 (UTC)

Common prank use

The article should mention that ghillie suits are commonly used by pranksters worldwide, which pose as a bush, to surprise and startle innocent walkers. Some also emulate bushes with pots, flowers and fruits. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 181.118.72.54 (talk) 12:27, 8 September 2023 (UTC)

A Commons file used on this page or its Wikidata item has been nominated for deletion

The following Wikimedia Commons file used on this page or its Wikidata item has been nominated for deletion:

• Special Cobra 2.jpg

Participate in the deletion discussion at the nomination page. —Community Tech bot (talk) 04:27, 9 February 2020 (UTC)

Featured picture scheduled for POTD

Hello! This is to let editors know that File:Wildlife Photographer Giles Laurent in a ghillie suit.jpg, a featured picture used in this article, has been selected as the English Wikipedia's picture of the day (POTD) for April 1, 2025. A preview of the POTD is displayed below and can be edited at Template:POTD/2025-04-01. For the greater benefit of readers, any potential improvements or maintenance that could benefit the quality of this article should be done before its scheduled appearance on the Main Page. If you have any concerns, please place a message at Wikipedia talk:Picture of the day. Thank you!  — Amakuru (talk) 11:12, 2 December 2024 (UTC)

Wildlife photographer wearing a ghillie suit. Some wild animals are very difficult to approach without disturbing them, which sometimes leads some wildlife photographers to wear a ghillie suit when they go in search of them. By remaining undetected, wildlife photographers can observe animal behaviour that would otherwise not be observable if the animal would have had knowledge of human presence.

Photograph credit: Giles Laurent

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