Wikipedia:WikiProject Palaeontology/Article workshop

Welcome to the Article workshop of the WikiProject Palaeontology, a place for collaborative article editing. Paleontology-related articles of any length and quality can be listed here – to obtain feedback for your latest work; to get help in developing an article or request copy edits; to bring an article up to B-class level or to prepare for a Good or Featured Article Nomination; to collaboratively rework our oldest good and featured articles; and more. Submissions here invite everyone to contribute with comments, edits, and/or content additions. It is expected that the nominator will act as the main author, taking the lead in developing the article and responding to comments. This workshop is a novel concept that aims to combine the traditional formats of WP:Peer Review and WP:Collaborations. Unlike the Peer Review, we will not only list comments on this page, but edit the article directly wherever possible. Unlike collaborations, we do not vote on which article to work on together, but rely on a main author who submits the article and feels responsible for taking it forward. The aim of the workshop is to make article work less daunting and more fun by sharing some of the workload. Articles can benefit from the combined skills of several contributors. It also invites everyone to contribute to the listed articles with quick edits or comments, or even substantial content contributions that can lead to spontaneous collaborations. Listed articles will be automatically archived after 100 days of inactivity. Archived articles may be re-submitted any time. History The current Article workshop has several predecessors. The Dinosaur collaboration started in 2006; a total of 29 collaborations took place, resulting in 14 "featured articles" and 7 "good articles". Its last successful collaboration was Brachiosaurus, which was promoted to "featured article" status in 2018. In 2019, the Palaeontology collaboration was initiated as a supplement, focusing on less complex articles. Its only collaboration was Acamptonectes, which was promoted to "featured article" status in 2021. The Paleo Peer Review was started in 2020, with a total of 43 articles receiving substantial comments, of which 6 were subsequently promoted to "good article" status and 3 to "featured article" status. The Article workshop itself was launched in October 2024 as a direct continuation of the Palaeo Peer Review in a revamped format. Click here to submit an article

Submissions

Where to go with Glacialisaurus?

So a while ago Augustios Paleo nominated Glacialisaurus for GAN but abandoned it mid-review (and doesn't seem to be active), so I took over it, without really knowing much about the subject or its sources, and it got promoted on the strange condition that I removed most of the description section, which I since re-added. So it certainly wasn't the best outcome, and I've since wondered if the resulting article was really up to snuff, and if it could be taken further and how. Any thoughts on anything about the article are welcome. FunkMonk (talk) 00:20, 26 October 2024 (UTC)

Interesting, I will look into it. There is much more sauropodomorph material from Antarctica, including at least one skull, but apparently belonging to other (new) taxa, but I don't think that is published already (all Field Museum material). I have photos of those, and of the Glacialisaurus holotype too; all of it was presented in a moving Antarctica exhibition that was in several museums in the US. Not sure how to incorporate that. --Jens Lallensack (talk) 01:21, 26 October 2024 (UTC)

I'm sure we can find room for images you have, a few of the ones in the article are kind of filler... Either way, good to have handy on Commons. FunkMonk (talk) 01:38, 26 October 2024 (UTC)

I uploaded what I have of that exhibition: [1]. --Jens Lallensack (talk) 03:00, 26 October 2024 (UTC)

Cool, didn't know they made a mount of that unnamed sauropodomorph! Will come in handy when it is named... I think this[2] couldbe a good taxobox image for Glacialisaurus, then the more schematic image there now can be moved into the description. FunkMonk (talk) 13:11, 26 October 2024 (UTC)

Now added, but the presence of that other taxon makes me wonder how safe the referral of a femur to Glacialisaurus, whose holotype is foot bones only, really is... FunkMonk (talk) 15:58, 26 October 2024 (UTC)

Cool! But with my comment above I was actually referring to content, not images. I think that the article, at the moment, lacks context. I would very briefly say something about the history of paleontological research in Antarctica, the discovery of the first dinosaur (Cryolophosaurus), and then the events leading to the discovery of Glacialisaurus. Then, I think we should also briefly discuss this new, undescribed material; here, we might have to scrape some news article and conference abstracts. But for an potential future FA, I would expect this sort of context, and I think that readers would really appreciate that, too. What do you think? --Jens Lallensack (talk) 17:43, 26 October 2024 (UTC)

Sure, I was thinking about taking it to FAC at some point (not in the immediate future), but collecting suggestions here as a start. FunkMonk (talk) 18:28, 26 October 2024 (UTC)

• I did a couple of edits for language and fixed some minor errors as I read through, but nothing major.
• The green "Hypothetical life restoration" does not show much detail and does not really add anything that the silhouette in the size comparison does not already show, in my opinion.

The uploader agreed to make a new version, he has improved a lot artistically since then. FunkMonk (talk) 15:59, 28 October 2024 (UTC)

• The description section is still a bit too technical and could use more explanations.
• Other than that, looks very good. Not much has been published since its description, but I agree that a lot can quickly become outdated when more sauropodomorph material from the locality is published. --Jens Lallensack (talk) 00:50, 28 October 2024 (UTC)

Strange, any further reason given for having to remove the description? The Morrison Man (talk) 17:20, 26 October 2024 (UTC)

Basically this:[3] Doesn't make much sense to me, but seems the reviewer was also using the oldest FAs as standards for description sections, which is not ideal... FunkMonk (talk) 18:28, 26 October 2024 (UTC)

Thescelosaurus

Hi, I don't really work on dinosaurs (Cenozoic placentals are my specialty), but since we have thrown around the idea of revamping old GA/FA dinosaur articles without throwing them into the FAR and GAR processes, it's worth bringing up articles that should be revamped and how they can be brought up to modern quality standards. As mentioned on the Discord server, we'll start with an easier dinosaur genus, so I selected Thescelosaurus, so go ham (note that I won't participate in dinosaur articles in general, I was just the one who started this idea). PrimalMustelid (talk) 00:59, 26 October 2024 (UTC)

I like this idea, and I have been wondering what ornithischians to work on, so I'll start, likely by revising the history section and then moving to classification. Paleobiology/ecology are the last sections I normally touch so any changes there shouldn't cause edit conflicts. IJReid ^{{{T - C - D - R}}} 17:38, 26 October 2024 (UTC)

I am also on board. I can do the description section then, if nobody else wants to take that. --Jens Lallensack (talk) 18:35, 26 October 2024 (UTC)

One thing I am running into is that I have been adding citations as I go, but the current reference names are hard to follow. I think I may revise this so that every citation is "[firstauthorsurname][year]" for consistency. IJReid ^{{{T - C - D - R}}} 01:31, 27 October 2024 (UTC)

Yes, I agree, these reference names are confusing, and author+year makes clear what source it is and avoids mistakes. One additional think we could do, if it helps, is to move all full citations down to the references section, where we can put them in order (this appears to become standard in the future anyways as the upcoming page number feature requires it). It might help to keep an overview, but please do whatever you deem best. --Jens Lallensack (talk) 16:35, 27 October 2024 (UTC)

Having finished revising the discovery and classification sections, I can bring down the citations I've used quite easily to references, so I will do that. I will leave the other sections untouched though (apart from where there are duplicate references). IJReid ^{{{T - C - D - R}}} 17:40, 27 October 2024 (UTC)

Great work, thanks! We probably need to add more subsections and brake up longer paragraphs; I can do a copy edit once I got time. I'm slow with the "Description" section but I'm on it. --Jens Lallensack (talk) 15:33, 28 October 2024 (UTC)

@IJReid:@Jens Lallensack: I've rewritten the lede in my sandbox. Its much longer, but I suspect it may be too long, so if there's any parts that seem superfluous or overly detailed, I'd like to get some feedback before I update the page. Draft here A Cynical Idealist (talk) 00:40, 3 November 2024 (UTC)

It doesn't look too bad. There is some space for adjustments I think, like moving the paleoenvironment paragraph to the end, and some fiddling with phrasing, but the only issue I see is the synthetic comments on things like size compared to a human, or being alive for 3 mya, which isn't in the article body and it a bit of a stretch to directly add. IJReid ^{{{T - C - D - R}}} 01:58, 3 November 2024 (UTC)

I should say, further refinements can be done after adding it into the article, which I think could be done at its current state. IJReid ^{{{T - C - D - R}}} 01:58, 3 November 2024 (UTC)

I think the draft is too long. It should be three paragraphs. I recommend using recent dinosaur FAs of similar size as a template, such as Ankylosaurus and Brachiosaurus. --Jens Lallensack (talk) 08:16, 3 November 2024 (UTC)

Also, try to keep it as simple. The lead has to be as accessible as possible. For example, "extinct genus of thescelosaurid neornithischian dinosaur of the Late Cretaceous period in Laramidia (North America)" violates MOS:Seaofblue ("thescelosaurid neornithischian dinosaur") and it's just too many terms, I would remove the "thescelosaurid" here. Also, we don't need to have "Laramidia" here, it's just another term that is not pertinent for the lead and only confuses. --Jens Lallensack (talk) 11:44, 3 November 2024 (UTC)

Thanks for the feedback. I've made the specific adjustments suggested pertaining to WP:SYNTH and MOS:Seaofblue and also removed one of the paragraphs and split up/consolidated the information a little bit. I'll go ahead and post it to the article, but I plan to do a little more refining of the word choice and phrasing to try and keep the sentences more simple. A Cynical Idealist (talk) 06:07, 4 November 2024 (UTC)

One curiosity I have at this point is what to do about T. edmontonensis and T. infernalis in the taxonbox. Both are considered undiagnostic in reviews, but not synonyms of other species, so should they be listed as undiagnostic? There are similar things done in Mosasaurus and Diplodocus and Iguanodon. IJReid ^{{{T - C - D - R}}} 19:55, 4 November 2024 (UTC)

Since we list synonyms, I see no reason not to list those species too. Should we just add "(nomen dubium)" as done in the Iguanodon article? --Jens Lallensack (talk) 20:22, 4 November 2024 (UTC)

I tried doing that, and it looks okay but I'm not the most happy with how the linebreaks end up happening. But it does work. IJReid ^{{{T - C - D - R}}} 21:20, 4 November 2024 (UTC)

I think it looks better if we just remove the linebreaks (I just did), what do you think? --Jens Lallensack (talk) 21:24, 4 November 2024 (UTC)

To me removing the linebreaks only changes one thing, where the nomen dubium of infernalis is split to a new line. Probably monitor width differences. If its a net positive for others and net neutral for me, I think we can keep it this way. Only way to get it all one line for me would be replacing the nomen dubium with a footnote, but that feels like unnecessary effort for minimal improvement. IJReid ^{{{T - C - D - R}}} 06:28, 5 November 2024 (UTC)

Citation Bank

To start, I wanted to try and take a quick survey of literature published in the past decade that could probably be relevant here (just going quick and dirty with titles for now):

• The phylogenetic nomenclature of ornithischian dinosaurs | Madzia et al. (2021)
• Dental microwear texture analysis reveals a likely dietary shift within Late Cretaceous ornithopod dinosaurs | Kubo et al. (2023)
• Evolutionary Trends in the Jaw Adductor Mechanics of Ornithischian Dinosaurs | Nabavizadeh (2016)
• A new phylogeny of cerapodan dinosaurs | Dieudonné et al. (2021)
• A comprehensive phylogenetic analysis on early ornithischian evolution | Fonseca et al. (2024)
• TAKING COUNT: A Census of Dinosaur Fossils Recovered From the Hell Creek and Lance Formations (Maastrichtian). | Stein (2016)
• The systematic relationships and biogeographic history of ornithischian dinosaurs | Boyd (2015)
• The Paleontology, Geology and Taphonomy of the Tooth Draw Deposit; Hell Creek Formation (Maastrictian), Butte County, South Dakota. | Stein (2022)
• A new semi-fossorial thescelosaurine dinosaur from the Cenomanian-age Mussentuchit Member of the Cedar Mountain Formation, Utah | Avrahami et al. (2024)
• Anatomy of the neornithischian dinosaur Parksosaurus warreni (Parks, 1926) from the Upper Cretaceous (lower Maastrichtian) Horseshoe Canyon Formation of Alberta, Canada | Sues et al. (2023)
• Neuroanatomy of the late Cretaceous Thescelosaurus neglectus (Neornithischia: Thescelosauridae) reveals novel ecological specialisations within Dinosauria | Button & Zanno (2023)
• Forelimb motion and orientation in the ornithischian dinosaurs Styracosaurus and Thescelosaurus, and its implications for locomotion and other behavior | Senter & MacKey (2023)
• The cranial anatomy of the neornithischian dinosaur Thescelosaurus neglectus | Boyd (2014)
• The Paleobiology, Paleoecology, and Evolution of Thescelosauridae (Ornithischia) from Alberta, Canada | Thesis by Michael Naylor Hudgins; not sure if citeable but might be a nice reference point while researching
• Dental assessment of Stegoceras validum (Ornithischia: Pachycephalosauridae) and Thescelosaurus neglectus (Ornithischia: Thescelosauridae): paleoecological inferences | Hudgins et al. (2022), adapted from above thesis

Can format these all into proper citations later. LittleLazyLass (Talk | Contributions) 01:32, 26 October 2024 (UTC)

Yes, that's useful for a start, and incorporating these should be our first goal. --Jens Lallensack (talk) 18:45, 26 October 2024 (UTC)

Coord note: We are at least two people now (IJReid and myself) who want to put some significant work into this. If anyone else likes to join, you are more than welcome – just let us know on what section you like to work on so that we can coordinate! You can also just pick one paper from the list above and add the relevant information (if any) to the article, or contribute with more minor edits. Thanks! --Jens Lallensack (talk) 18:45, 26 October 2024 (UTC)

Images

I'm thinking of maybe contributing for now with image uploads and image editing. I noticed we don't really have any images of individual bone elements apart from skulls, but the original PD description has a lot of illustrations:[4] So I'll upload some of them, perhaps someone has requests for particular images. Or know other free papers we could upload images from) On restorations, I already removed weird osteoderms from some, but some text in the article indicates the presence of special scales on the legs, and that feathers may have been unlikely, anyone know more about this, in case restorations need modifications? FunkMonk (talk) 18:56, 26 October 2024 (UTC)

The 2014 PeerJ description of the skull by Boyd should have many good images to pull from, Button & Zanno 2023 has free images as well, together those should be good to illustrate the skull and sense-related details like posture. The leg scales comes from the Tanis site, so really now much can be said since none of it is published. The scales on the neck were from Morris 1976, but now known to be crocodilian. Theres also images in Senter and Mackey that are freely-licensed. IJReid ^{{{T - C - D - R}}} 19:47, 26 October 2024 (UTC)

Thanks, speaking of, seems Leandra Walters revised their restoration design from this[5] to this[6] less feathered version (but same colouration), which has some unusual scales on the leg, I wonder if that's based on the Tanis leg? FunkMonk (talk) 20:11, 26 October 2024 (UTC)

No real way to know at this point. Of additional note, theres photos at the USNM online collections that can be used. But it is important to be careful, some are labelled CC0 [7] while others are labelled as "Usage statement: Not determined" [8] which we cannot use. IJReid ^{{{T - C - D - R}}} 02:25, 27 October 2024 (UTC)

Dracopristis

Article was brought to GA by Fossiladder13, but I'm strongly inclined to say it could still use significant work. What would the best course of action here be? There has been a not insignificant amount of information published in the couple of years since, and a good amount of information of paleoecology/paleobiology and classification which was available at the time which is not present. Gasmasque (talk) 05:50, 26 October 2024 (UTC)

If that information is added and the rest is also given a good lookover, maybe it could go to FA? Best course of action for new research is to add it regardless. The Morrison Man (talk) 17:19, 26 October 2024 (UTC)

This seems to be reasonably well-written but also overly simplistic and short and needs significant expansion. For example, a description section does not really exist, and the article does not state how the genus can be distinguished from other genera. I don't think it meets the GA criteria at the moment as it does not cover some key points. Gasmasque, were you thinking about improving it, or was your idea to delist (reassess) it? --Jens Lallensack (talk) 18:05, 26 October 2024 (UTC)

I'm not sure, I would be more than happy to help expand the article, but I don't know within what timeframe. It would probably be best to talk with @Fossiladder13: about the current and future state of it, and again I would be more than glad to provide references/help expand if need be. As it stands right now I agree the article is very lacking, and iirc was written very shortly after the taxon's description. Gasmasque (talk) 01:16, 27 October 2024 (UTC)

Yeah, I agree with this statement. The article is pretty lacking for a good article, and I would be more than happy to help expand it to meet the requirements. I am not sure how it qualified for GA looking back in hindsight. Fossiladder13 (talk) 04:53, 27 October 2024 (UTC)

I would also be happy to help out if needed, though I first need to focus on that collaboration above. The GA criteria are not particularly demanding, so if it is just about reaching those, it may not require too much work I think. I guess we need a coordinator/main author though, so that we get it moving and everybody knows what to work on. --Jens Lallensack (talk) 16:49, 27 October 2024 (UTC)

I think that a next step could be to split the "Discovery and description" section into two distinct sections, one for "Discovery and naming" and the other "Description". I tried to do that, but I am not sure what reference refers to what since all cites are just attached to the end of the paragraph. We had better, more specific referencing earlier; @Fossiladder13: can we revert that again? --Jens Lallensack (talk) 16:56, 27 October 2024 (UTC)

I apologize for that, I assumed that doing that would remove some of the clutter the article had, it should be undone now. Fossiladder13 (talk) 17:04, 27 October 2024 (UTC)

No issue, and thanks. I just made a copy edit of your recent changes, please revert anything that doesn't seem right. Next, the lead needs work: It should not contain information that is not repeated in the body ("The fish had 12 rows" – I can only find that in the lead, but again I'm not sure which of the many sources supports this). If all info is stated in the body, the sources can be removed from the lead entirely. Finally, the lead should be expanded, to properly summarise the entire article. Do you remember what source you used for "The fish had 12 rows of teeth"? --Jens Lallensack (talk) 23:31, 27 October 2024 (UTC)

I had been working on a rewrite/expansion of the article myself as well, and am going to move it to a sandbox to avoid edit conflicts. Once I get that into a more reasonable state I would be glad to share the draft with both of you and see where to proceed from there. The 2024 description of Glikmanius careforum and Troglocladodus has provided both some useable images and new classification information that I'm going to add. Gasmasque (talk) 00:57, 28 October 2024 (UTC)

Excellent, I will wait with further edits, then. For my part, I would be most happy if you just boldly change as much as you deem best, without caring too much about preserving existing text – that's the best way to really level it up – if Fossiladder13 agrees? --Jens Lallensack (talk) 01:10, 28 October 2024 (UTC)

Totally, thank you both for helping out with this. BTW, @Gasmasque sorry for the ping, but I have a draft of dracopristis that you can use Draft:Dracopristis Fossiladder13 (talk) 01:14, 28 October 2024 (UTC)

Also Jens, the Firstpost article is where the 12 rows of teeth came from. Fossiladder13 (talk) 01:20, 28 October 2024 (UTC)

I've been working so far under my old Paredestus article draft, but would be glad to switch over to your draft to continue work! Gasmasque (talk) 01:24, 28 October 2024 (UTC)

Going to continue working on this article, I have a couple of hours to kill to expand the description and classification sections. I know @EvolutionIncarnate has expressed interest in creating and uploading a rendered skeletal diagram for this taxon, which would be hugely appreciated! I'll let y'all know when I'm done editing, I'll be working in a sandbox since I may move/chop up some paragraphs. Gasmasque (talk) 19:28, 31 October 2024 (UTC)

I've just massively overhauled the article. @Fossiladder13 @Jens Lallensack please feel free to adjust or add as you see fit, there is definitely still room for improvement. I really don't mean to co-opt the article or anything, but I've done what I can to make sure it is at least relatively comprehensive and well-organized. Gasmasque (talk) 17:54, 20 November 2024 (UTC)

Very nice edits, thank you for helping out with the page, I’ll see what I can help improve. Fossiladder13 (talk) 18:27, 20 November 2024 (UTC)

The description section in particular may still be a bit barebones. The 2021 paper goes into very extensive detail regarding the anatomy of the animal, to the point I'm not sure if a lot of it would be all that meaningful for a lay audience. There's definitely a sweet spot between too much and too little, but I think a good amount more could be added in that area in particular. I may create more user-generated images relevant to Dracopristis itself, given the complete lack of fossil images on Commons, but it would have to be something I'm careful about to avoid copying figures given in papers 1-1. As far as I'm aware there are no CC licensed sources providing images or illustrations of the taxon, but do update me if one exists/is published. Gasmasque (talk) 19:02, 20 November 2024 (UTC)

Triassic-Jurassic extinction event

I recently unsuccessfully nominated Triassic-Jurassic extinction event for the Featured List. A number of those who identified problems with the article are in this group, and I'm wondering if we can get its flaws resolved and renominate it once the two-week wait period between nominations expires. The consensus seemed to be that the article was rich in information and that the main problem was the lack of readability for a general reader, as while I am very good at adding information, my prose is very technical and not the most engaging, and I'm wondering if I can get some assistance from other WikiProject Palaeontology editors in making it more readable for an average Joe. Anteosaurus magnificus (talk) 07:07, 31 October 2024 (UTC)

Jens

Will have a detailed look when I got the time, but in general I think this is what we need:

• a background section. This should very briefly introduce mass extinctions, say how large this one was compared to the others etc. Then, I would say briefly something about the fauna/flora and events preceeding this mass extinction (PT extonction, Carnian Palluvial episode etc.). It should be especially easy to read and understand.

• technical language: introduce/explain difficult terms and concepts at first mention, or replace with plainer wording where you don't loose pecision.

• A FAC also need to be very comprehensive. I don't see anything about research history? --Jens Lallensack (talk) 09:13, 31 October 2024 (UTC)

I have just added a fairly barebones paragraph-long section on the research history of the TJME (that can be built on easily), discussing the ancient, dogmatic, uniformitarian theories about gradual climate change and sea level fall being the culprit, to talking about the asteroid impact craze of the 1980s and 1990s when the Cretaceous-Palaeogene extinction event was found to be caused by the Chicxulub impact and everybody was going around attributing every mass extinction to some impact event, to the development of the modern day consensus that the TJME was caused by the activity of the Central Atlantic Magmatic Province. Anteosaurus magnificus (talk) 19:19, 31 October 2024 (UTC)

Looks good content-wise, but this new section, too, needs to be made more accessible to the general public. Let me know if you need further help with that. --Jens Lallensack (talk) 20:31, 2 November 2024 (UTC)

Yes, I'd appreciate if someone with better prose could help with altering the wording to be more readable for the general public. When authoring Wikipedia article, I'm already trying to write at a level lower than what I typically write at in any academic or professional writing I do, and my baseline knowledge is so far from the general public's that I'm not sure how to convey information accessibly; whenever I'm at public outreach events for palaeontology and get asked something, I regularly end up having to explain something twice or thrice even though the first explanation was already "dumbed down" to what I thought was a very basic level. Anteosaurus magnificus (talk) 23:41, 3 November 2024 (UTC)

I tried to edit the lead and the history section accordingly. Will try do some more when time allows. Some more things I noted:

• We should not provide citations in the lead (exceptions may apply), since everything is supposed to be cited in the main body. It's like the abstract of a paper, where we also don't have citations.
• Plants, crocodylomorphs, dinosaurs, pterosaurs and mammals were left largely untouched,[4][5][6] allowing the dinosaurs, pterosaurs, and crocodylomorphs to become the dominant land animals for the next 135 million years. – This is repetitive and inaccurate (Crocodylomorphs were not really the dominant land animals, for example). Can we remove this?
• The lead only says something about the extinction of archosauromorphs but nothing about the marine roam, for example, so this seems quite incomplete. --Jens Lallensack (talk) 23:53, 5 November 2024 (UTC)

Regarding taking it straight back to FAC in two weeks, I'd recommend instead taking it through WP:GAN first, even most experienced FAC nominators continue doing that, it's the safest step towards FAC. FunkMonk (talk) 09:28, 31 October 2024 (UTC)

Parahelicoprion

I've worked on this article for the last month(ish) or so and have gotten it into what I consider a decent state, thanks to some help from a few other editors. If anyone would be willing to provide a content assessment/further feedback it would be appreciated, I'm trying to get this one up to B-class. Not promoting to GA until I get access to/English translations of a few extremely obscure sources, but for the time being this is about as far as I think I can go content-wise. I'm especially looking for fluent/intermediate Russian speakers, since most of the relevant sources are in Russian and I've had to rely on a combination of machine translation and very unenthused acquaintances to figure anything out. Gasmasque (talk) 20:13, 2 November 2024 (UTC)

• Looking very good. I did copy edits of the entire article [9]; as always, feel free to revert anything you do not like.
• The characteristics of this whorl are unique to fishes of the order Eugeneodontida, – this somehow implies that taxa outside Eugeneodontida also have whorls, is this the case?
• Later sources have reported a holotype specimen spanning 25 cm (10 in) across and consisting of six tooth crowns,[9][13][24] based on a reconstructed cast of the material photographed by ichthyologist Svend Erik Bendix-Almgreen during the 1970s – should say "incorrectly reported", because a reconstructed cast is never a holotype, right?
• I probably messed this up in my copy edit, but you use both "Denticles" and "serrations"; I guess you use "serrations" when you talk about them collectively?
• The Artinskian deposits of Krasnoufimsk, or the Arta Beds – In the lead, you call them "Artinskian Beds"
• We usually have the section on size (here "Estimated length") in the "Description" section. Consider moving it up, because at the moment, size is mentioned earlier but the reader does not know at this point that the genus was particularly large, this information comes a bit late.
• "... might have been over 30 meters (100 ft) in lengths - perhaps the largest fish of all time", – just checking, does the original quote indeed include the conversion to feet, has the typo "lenghts", and does not use a proper ndash?
• a claim made based on extrapolating size from the preserved section of the whorl. – I am not sure this adds anything; of course the estimate is based on preserved fossils, I don't think this needs to be mentioned?
• authors Dagmar Merino-Rodo and Phillipe Janvier – why "authors" instead of "paleontologists"? Does this mean they are non-academics (and even if, we should still call them paleontologists if they publish academic papers).
• "... unless it (Parahelicoprion) was an animal with a gigantic head or outlandishly oversized teeth, it had to have been a monster, at least 100 feet long and maybe more." – in case you added "(Parahelicoprion)" to this quote yourself (?), it needs to be in square brackets instead to indicate this.
• Physonemus grandis? (Moore) – In the taxonbox; do we have a year to add here? --Jens Lallensack (talk) 21:37, 2 November 2024 (UTC)

  Thank you so much for this!

  • Several other groups of extinct fish, including Onychodus, some acanthodians and the iniopterygians also had tooth whorls, although these were often "parasyphyseal" and paired and were unrelated to those of eugeneodonts
  • I agree incorrectly would be right here, both Zangerl's 1981 handbook and the description of P. mariosuarezi make no note of the fact that the material is a cast, despite Bendix-Almgreen saying so and them attributing the figure to being drawn from his photograph. Side note, either this exact specimen or another model of it is/was recently on display at the Moscow Paleontological Museum, and I've already tagged the talk page asking any Russian editors if they could photograph it or its label. Said label may have information that clears up when and why this reconstructed cast was made
  • Serrations is the term used for the large number of curved indentations in clerci, and denticles is used for the three at the base of the "wing" on mariosuarezi. Since the two structures are homologous I see no issue with the same term being used for both
  • Arta Beds seems to be a mostly historic term now that more specific formations are defined, although the 2010 Handbook of Paleoichthyology continues to list P. clerci as originating from the "Arta Beds". I'll update the lead, but Arta in this case is meant to be synonymous with Artinskian-aged. The description of Artiodus from the Divya Formation notes P. clerci as being from its same formation, so it may be worth changing the lead to say Divya Formation. I'm keeping it as "Arta Beds" for now, but do let me know what you think
  • If I'm being quite honest the "estimated length" section was a bit of an afterthought. I was genuinely shocked when I found out there were actual (reputable, may I add) sources saying such nonsense, which I had previously assumed was relegated to mid-2010s internet blogs and lying Wiki editors. I can move the section to "Description", which would be in accordance with the similar situation regarding Walking with Dinosaur's Liopleurodon "estimate". I'm still giving it its own section and not integrating it into the section about known material, if that's alright, since I worry of giving undue weight
  • The passage in Perrine's book does indeed have strange grammar, misspell "length", and state 100 ft as equivalent to 30 m. It is not, however, a directly quote from Lund (only something he "calculated") as I had written before, and I've changed the text to accommodate. That misattribution is purely a mistake on my part
  • They are paleontologists, I can change that
  • Can change to square brackets. This quote is real by the way, along with a similar passage about Edestus giganteus. Lund was cited as one of the primary scientific advisors for this book, too, although not explicitly for the Parahelicoprion line
  • Neither Baird nor Karpinsky (nor Obruchev's 1952 summary of the Edestidae) provide the date for Physonemus grandis, although Baird does specify it was described by Moore. I can try to track down mention of this species, although there are many, many species of Physonemus and some of these papers are not available online, so no promises I'll have any luck

  Again, appreciate the review, and can make the requested changes. I'm in agreement with your copyedits, the text definitely flows better now! Gasmasque (talk) 02:27, 3 November 2024 (UTC)

  I did successfully find the authority for Xystracanthus (Physonemus) grandis (Moore, 1929) and have updated the text to accommodate. I've also found a full copy of Karpinsky's 1924 description and will be uploading the figures and photos from that onto Commons. Expect the page to see some pretty significant revisions now that I've gotten ahold of a couple more papers! Gasmasque (talk) 19:28, 3 November 2024 (UTC)

The rating tool already gives the article a B, so I've updated it. A Cynical Idealist (talk) 00:37, 3 November 2024 (UTC)

I've added a good amount of additional information and corrected some of the weird misspeaking/mistakes that came about from screwy translations, and I would really appreciate if anyone fluent in French or Russian could check over the cited sources to look for further misinterpretation. The 1916, 1922, and 1924 descriptions are all in Russian, as is this 1926 source detailing the discovery of a segment of the tooth whorl. This article focusing on comparisons with the genus and Agassizodus/Campodus is in French, and in particular I wanted to ask @Amirani1746 for assistance fact-checking the content sourced from it. I've primarily had to rely on machine translation software (which is infamously of pretty dubious quality) for the Russian sources, unfortunately I do not know any fluent speakers interested in helping with the project. All of these publications are quite short, and as far as I can tell several of them re-iterate a lot of the exact same points. Again, huge thanks if anyone is able to help me out with this! Gasmasque (talk) 20:22, 19 November 2024 (UTC)

Gasmasque As French speaker, I'm intersted to translate the french source ! But above all, i need to acess it. Amirani1746 (talk) 20:34, 19 November 2024 (UTC)

I appreciate the interest! If the HathiTrust link decides not to work, I can send the paper via Google Drive as well. It's public domain in both the U.S. and E.U., so I've also uploaded the relevant figures to Commons. Gasmasque (talk) 20:43, 19 November 2024 (UTC)

Apologies, it seems Hathi may limit access to all works published after the 1890's outside of the U.S. Here's a link to the Google Drive Gasmasque (talk) 20:55, 19 November 2024 (UTC)

Given the supplemental material of "Cautionary tales on the use of proxies to estimate body size and form of extinct animals" says However, there is no guarantee the tooth whorl was helical, and indeed given the proposed similarities between Sarcoprion and Parahelicoprion (Merino-Rodo & Janvier, 1986) a shorter, more Sarcoprion tooth whorl seems more likely. If a Sarcoprion-like arrangement were inferred, Parahelicoprion likely reached similar sizes to Helicoprion (~7 m?). I think you can be a bit less cagey and more specific about this size estimate in the relevant section. Hemiauchenia (talk) 22:40, 19 November 2024 (UTC)

That whole section needs a bit of a rewrite in accordance with the supplementary material, I agree I may be a bit overly cautious to provide a specific number. I'll also adjust the section on the proposed whorl shape to lend more support to the idea that it possessed a short whorl as well. Gasmasque (talk) 06:38, 20 November 2024 (UTC)