Talk:Coconut crab
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| Missing image Cscr-featured.png Featured article star | Coconut crab is a featured article, which means it has been identified as one of the best articles produced by the Wikipedia community. If you see a way this page can be updated or improved without compromising previous work, feel free to contribute. |
The error is still on the front page. You might to fix the steal part. --Cyberman 00:15, 10 Feb 2005 (UTC) Ok it's fixed now. ^_^ --Cyberman 00:21, 10 Feb 2005 (UTC)
Only the other day someone at wikipedia:reference desk was mentioning that we don't have an article about the coconut crab. Amazing that this article came up in just 2 hours. Good work Chris! Jay 18:40, 12 Jul 2004 (UTC)
- Yeah! Great work! Mark Richards 22:48, 12 Jul 2004 (UTC)
- Thanks. I saw the question at the wikipedia:reference desk, including the photo found by Mark Richards. Thought it would be a waste to have such a nice photo with no article to go with. I'll be also checking some german links soon, which seem to have some additional info. -- Chris 73 | Talk 02:25, 13 Jul 2004 (UTC)
Added the statement about Christmas Island having the largest population based on this link: http://www.wilderness.org.au/campaigns/marine/christmas_island/save_ci/. Though this is not an authoratitive scientific source, I considered it reputable enough to use. Disclaimer: I grew up on Christmas Island and am fond of the place (and it's crabs). Congrats on the great work you've done on this article Chris -- Oska 06:09, Jul 13, 2004 (UTC)
- Thanks for your editing. Most of my sources are different webpages, and very few are peer reviewed scientific journals, so your source is just fine. Actually, I had the feeling that the habitat was not yet complete, and I was missing a few spots. Thanks for the update. Chris 73 | Talk 06:27, 13 Jul 2004 (UTC)
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A couple of comments
Nice article. Just a couple of comments:
- The bit about opening coconuts in the wild but not in captivity is fun, but the final piece (just why can't the crabs open them in captivity) is missing.
- The german bio could do with being created
- And the lung bit
I'm not a bio so don't want to myself :-) (William M. Connolley 16:30, 9 Oct 2004 (UTC))
- Oopening coconuts: Probably nobody knows. Maybe the crabs were too small, the coconuts too old or unripe, or the wrong coconuts, maybe they died not of hunger but e.g. lack of water, or - my preference - they were just scared shitless in the laboratory environment and too stressed to open coconuts.
- The german bio could do with being created Holger Rumpff? I'll see what I can do
- And the lung bit Not sure what you mean
- Thanks for the feedback. -- Chris 73 Talk 11:49, Oct 11, 2004 (UTC)
- This bit: The crabs cannot swim and will drown in water. The crab uses a special organ called a branchiostegal lung to breathe.
- Holger Rumpff: I searched the web and could not find any biographical information of him. The only thing I found was "This work is dedicated to the memory of Dr. Holger Rumpff, without whose enthusiasm ..." here (http://www.biolbull.org/cgi/content/full/200/3/305) and here (http://www.biolbull.org/cgi/content/full/200/3/321). Seems to be not very notable, so I unlinked his name in the main article, and probably won't create an article. If you find more and write an article, please feel free to link it again. Searching Google for "branchiostegal lung" OR "branchiostegal lungs" -wikipedia (http://www.google.com/search?num=100&hl=en&lr=&safe=off&q=%22branchiostegal+lung%22+OR+%22branchiostegal+lungs%22++-wikipedia&btnG=Search) brings up a few references, I may make a stub about that. -- Chris 73 Talk 14:23, Oct 11, 2004 (UTC)
He's called Rumpf (one 'f') in 2 german press articles, here http://www.diepresse.at/Artikel.aspx?channel=r&ressort=ra&id=457876 and here http://www.mdr.de/windrose/archiv/471738.html Worth looking into perhaps? Prater 22:04, 10 Feb 2005 (UTC)
Child's play
The Cultural paragraph on children playing with coconut crabs sounds like encouragement to engage in animal cruelty. Surely this is not the intent. If this is an actual common practice, can we at least say something factual like "children sometimes play" or even "children often play", rather than a permissive "children may play", so as not to condone the practice? (I'm no animal rights activist, but I see no point in appearing to recommend amusement by getting other creatures to harm themselves.) — Jeff Q 03:32, 10 Feb 2005 (UTC)
scary
this thing looks scary as hell Jawed 03:49, 10 Feb 2005 (UTC)
I think terrifying is nearer the mark. 3 feet? Good god. Ortchel
Sense of Smell
Did you guys read the recent article over at BBC (http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/sci/tech/4206077.stm)? I think it's worth including the new information on the creature's sense of smell, if you feel like it.
And by the way, good article! --Polyparadigm 04:52, 10 Feb 2005 (UTC)
- Looks great! Man, that was fast.--Polyparadigm 07:18, 10 Feb 2005 (UTC)
Size
These creatures are big, but how big? I did a little checking around, and found sizes ranging from 40 cm to over a meter, and weights from 3 kg to 17 kg. This is also a long-lived species, apparently, achieving maximum size after 40-60 years. If someone can confirm this info it would be good to include with the article. -- Mmm 16:08, Feb 10, 2005 (UTC)
- Saying 'from head to tail' is bad usage, because crabs don't have heads or tails. But I also think the size of one meter is reached only when measuring the other way: from claw to claw. Prater 17:28, 10 Feb 2005 (UTC)
"Coconut Crab"?
Why is "Coconut Crab" consistently capitalized, even in the title? Compare for example hermit crab. — Ливай | ☺ 21:20, 10 Feb 2005 (UTC)
- Compare fx "cat" :). I fixed it. Thue | talk 22:41, 10 Feb 2005 (UTC)
- Species names are capitalized. See Red-throated Diver, Black-crowned Night Heron, Australian Land Hermit Crab, Ecuadorian Hermit Crab, et al. It is hermit crab which is incorrect. it should be Hermit Crab. If you want to find the lengthy dialog on this decision, I can track it down. it occurred over a year ago. Kingturtle 23:16, 10 Feb 2005 (UTC)
- If you are referring to cats, wild species of the family Felidae are capitalized: Black-footed Cat, Flat-headed Cat, Canadian Lynx, Bengal Tiger, Indochinese Tiger, Clouded Leopard, etc. Breeds of domestic cats also utilize the same capitalization rule: Maine Coon, Turkish Angora, British Shorthair, Egyptian Mau to name but a few. All of these species are catagorized officially by scientific groups. But breed names are more tricky - and might not always fall into official catagorization. There may also be some instances outside of the scientific categorization of kinds of cats - and such instances won't follow the capitalization rule, such as Feral cat. I hope this helps. :) Kingturtle 01:30, 11 Feb 2005 (UTC)
- This is a highly contentious issue. If it were up to me, I'd say only birds should be capitalised, and as it says at: Wikipedia:Naming conventions (fauna) -- and see also the associated talk page. Wikipedia articles have gone crazy capitalising all species from Blue Whale to Dingo for some weird reason. If there was a vote on the issue I'd say "coconut crab" with small c's and "dingo" with a small d. Further debate should probably be on the Wikipedia:Naming conventions (fauna)'s talk page. --Pengo 08:09, 12 Feb 2005 (UTC)
- The symantical reason for the capital letters is simple. it distinguishes between a black bear (any bear that is black) and a Black Bear (a bear of the Ursus americanus species). Kingturtle 17:32, 12 Feb 2005 (UTC)
There is no good reason for capitalising species names, and absolutely no reason to capitalise hermit crab, since that refers to a group of animals, not to a single species. As far as I can see from the discussions, only ornithologists routinely use capital letters for species names (which they consider to be somehow official, i.e. tied to a particular scientific name); everyone else should be using lower case, except where appropriate for other reasons (e.g. Norway lobster). There is certainly no fixed list tying common names for crustaceans to scientific names, so the names cannot be considered in any way official. Since they are not proper nouns, therefore, they should not be capitalised in English. I suggest this article be re-named (or un-renamed) "Coconut crab". Stemonitis 15:24, 18 Feb 2005 (UTC)
WHY was this changed back from Coconut Crab to Coconut crab? The case has been stated exactly WHY this article should be Coconut Crab. Please explain the change to Coconut crab. Kingturtle 18:19, 2 Apr 2005 (UTC)
For the reasons stated above, and others too, not least consistency within the Crustacea; all crustacean articles are uncapitalised, as are many (most?) other arthropods. A while ago I looked at the crustacean articles and saw a huge mixture of capitalised and uncapitalised forms, perhaps with a majority uncapitalised (I can't honestly remember). I looked up the relevant style guides and discussions and discovered that outside of bird species names, there is no real consensus. I therefore picked what made sense to me, and made them consistent. If you want it to be "Coconut Crab" again, then you would have to capitalise all the other crustacean species as well (note that since hermit crab is a group, not a species, that rule needn't apply to it - that would need to be included in the discussion). I recently requested a couple of moves to lower case, for consistency's sake (e.g. American lobster), and they were approved by the community. I took that, and the silence following the change here as evidence of acceptance of my choice. Of course, if you know of any reason for the coconut crab to be treated specially, please say so. --Stemonitis 14:52, 4 Apr 2005 (UTC)
- I am in the camp that it should be Coconut Crab. Read my reasons above for this position. I'd be willing to take the time personally to make such changes to ALL articles that would need to be changed to make this consistant. Kingturtle 01:41, 5 Apr 2005 (UTC)
Another Name
The Coconut Crab is also known as "Bubble Crab".
- No references found online in connection with the coconut crab -- Chris 73 Talk 03:45, Feb 14, 2005 (UTC)
In Portuguese it is named "Caranguejo-de-Bôlha"(i.e Bubble's Crab) perhaps in another related languages is also.
'BBC Recommended' Website
If you are interested in the biology and conservation of the Coconut Crab then you may be interetsed in this 'BBC Recommended' website: www.coconutcrab.co.uk