Talk:Boundary Waters Canoe Area Wilderness

---

---

Delisting from Good Articles

I think that the writing in the Hiking section is bad, so I delisted the article from Good Articles. I didn't look at the other sections, but review is probably appropriate. --R27182818 05:35, 13 October 2006 (UTC)

Can you explain what you mean by "the writing is bad"? I've re-read the section, and it sounds fine to me. Of course, if you see a better way of re-writing the 6 sentence Hiking section, feel free. Looking at the criteria for Good Articles, I don't see how this article fails to meet them. Every article can be improved somehow, regardless of "Good Article" designation.

I have listed this article for review of its Good Article status. --BlueCanoe 17:03, 14 October 2006 (UTC)

Howdy. No offense intended, of course. The section reads like a list of hiking trails rather than a coherent paragraph. There's no topic sentence, and the order in which trails are written seems arbitrary. Why do people hike in the BWCAW? Speaking specifically to the guidelines, I think this section fails 1(a) and 1(b). --R27182818 20:01, 14 October 2006 (UTC)

Infobox

I added an infobox to this article in an effort to standardize all articles pertaining to Wildernesses. My acreage is different as I only include the area that is federally managed, not state.--MONGO 07:12, August 29, 2005 (UTC)

Ok. Is there any way to put some space between the infobox and surrounding text, as with images? I don't want to mess with the standardized Wilderness infobox formatting. BlueCanoe 01:12, August 31, 2005 (UTC)

I've been posting them in the upper right but like the pictures to also be available before one even scrolls down. I just took a peek at the article and it looks fine but it would be nice if the image was there as soon as you query the page. I'm trying to not step on anyone's toes so if the infobox seems too intrusive, maybe I can relocate it...other examples (i've put about a dozen in so far) can be seen here: Bob Marshall Wilderness, Popo Agie Wilderness, etc. The photo that was in the article is a great shot and belongs near the top but due to it's wide angle aspect, it didn't fit too well after I inserted the template. Perhaps I can tweak the template and make it narrower.--MONGO 02:37, August 31, 2005 (UTC)

Also another thought...maybe we can make the picture bigger and put it right after the first paragraph. Just so you know, I didn't create the template, I just modified it after a lot of tweaking so I'm not sure how to ensure run-on and the images don't crowd each other out. In some ways, the infobox is merely an attempt to standardize, and I plan on writing many more wilderness articles, just thought I would take the existing ones and attempt to group them.--MONGO 02:42, August 31, 2005 (UTC)

Thanks for your work, MONGO. I like the infobox idea, standardization, etc. I guess my question was more to do with how to add a little blank space between the text of the main article and the border of the infobox. An infobox "margin" I guess. It seems distracting to me to read text that runs into the side of the infobox. Maybe it's just my web browser? (Safari on Mac OS 10.3) I agree that the photo looks good at the top of the article, but that wasn't my main concern. BlueCanoe 18:22, September 6, 2005 (UTC)

I figured it out: adding style = "margin-left: 0.5em;" to the table tag at the top of the infobox HTML fixed the problem. This was suggested by the How to use tables wiki article. BlueCanoe 18:42, September 6, 2005 (UTC)

Well.I'm glad you found that because now I can use it in lots of other places. Good job. I'm no computer genious and my formatting isn't the best anyway.--MONGO 18:54, September 6, 2005 (UTC)

Nearest city

The "nearest city" category in the infobox has been edited and re-edited a number of times. Originally it was Duluth, Minnesota, then I believe Ely, Minnesota and Grand Marais, Minnesota. The WikiProject Protected areas guidelines suggest the nearest major or well known city, of which (in a global sense) Ely and Grand Marais are neither. Duluth shows up on a detailed map of the United States, but the nearest major city is Minneapolis, Minnesota. I reccomend leaving it as Duluth unless that city is deemed too small (via discussion in this space), in which case we change it to Minneapolis. -- BlueCanoe 02:11, 15 August 2006 (UTC)

I agree. Duluth is not too small, and Ely and GM are mentioned in the article as the gateways. Kablammo 02:18, 15 August 2006 (UTC)

Duluth is still pretty far away from BWCA...

Lets just remove that entry in the infobox. Does it really help the article? Ely and Gran Marais are mentioned in the text already. -Ravedave 03:41, 15 August 2006 (UTC)

It may be helpful to someone from another country (i.e. a global audience). And it is part of the WikiProject formatting guidelines. Having said that, it is probably one of the pieces of info of lesser importance. -- BlueCanoe 14:06, 15 August 2006 (UTC)

♦ Removing. I will put a comment in the code pointing potential re-adders here. --R27182818 (talk) 16:01, 21 January 2009 (UTC)

Ely is well known as the gateway to the BWCA. When one thinks of the BWCA, Ely comes to mind. It is full of BWCA outfitters, canoe renters, etc. If any city is associated most clearly with the BWCA, it is Ely. R69S (talk) 18:47, 21 January 2009 (UTC)

I agree that Ely is the municipality most closely associated with the BWCA, but to me it seems odd to even refer to a city in locating a wilderness area. If the purpose is to assist an unfamiliar reader in generally locating an area, then Duluth would be better. Given the continued (albeit very intermittent) changes in this field, simply blanking it may be best solution. After all, Ely, Grand Marais, Tofte, etc. are known to many simply as gateways to the BWCA; part of the notability of such communities is due to the BWCA, whereas the converse is not true. Kablammo (talk) 19:22, 21 January 2009 (UTC)

Organization

Would it not make sense to reorganize the first five parts of the existing text as follows:

Intro

Geography

Natural History

Geology

Forest ecology/flora

Fauna

Human History

Recreation

Reasons: Geography would flow into geology, and human history would flow into recreation. While someone looking for recreational activities would have to look further down the article to get there, I don't see that as a bad thing. Kablammo 18:30, 4 September 2006 (UTC)

I suppose the Intro should state when it was designated a wilderness and why. Geology would probably be limited to the explaining how the lakes were created...which I think was due to glacial action, but not sure. I see no problem with the reorganization as you suggest.--MONGO 19:44, 4 September 2006 (UTC)

I also see no problem with this reorganization scheme, although the Intro could be made a little more rigorous as MONGO suggested. -- BlueCanoe 23:11, 4 September 2006 (UTC)

Thank you. I also notified a few other principal contributors and will await hearing from them (and any others) before making changes. BlueCanoe, I think MONGO's comments on geology relate to the second paragraph of that subsection. While I have Heinselman's book I would gladly defer to your expertise in that area. Kablammo 23:54, 4 September 2006 (UTC)

MONGO, are you suggesting removing the bedrock geology information? After re-reading the section I think the first and last sentences can be made into a first paragraph dealing with the glacial formation of the lakes, and the bedrock info (sentences 2, 3) can be a second paragraph. But I think the general age and bedrock composition information should remain in the article. Geologically speaking, the Canadian Shield is a big deal, as are rocks of Precambrian age, and the BWCAW is one of the few places in the USA where those rocks are clearly exposed. -- BlueCanoe 00:31, 5 September 2006 (UTC)

Absolutely not...keep everything, just shoot for a Featured Article...make it all inclusive and perhaps by creating an outline now, everyone who has worked hard on this page can create an FA, which would be the first wilderness article to achieve that standing. Add sections on who mangaes the region, how the manage it, etc. Examine a few Protected areas FA's to help figure out priorities here.--MONGO 07:18, 5 September 2006 (UTC)

Yes, the intro should be two to three short paragraphs, the tree and animal species could be expanded, and more footnotes and references should be found if possible.--MONGO 07:22, 5 September 2006 (UTC)

Word. I revised and cited the Geology section, and it looks like revisions by others are also happening. I agree with MONGO's suggestion of edits with a vision towards greatness for this article. -- BlueCanoe 04:22, 6 September 2006 (UTC)

External links

I have repeatedly removed links to BoundaryWatersCanoeArea.com (www.boundarywaterscanoearea.com or www.bwca.cc), as this is a commercial website with a large amount of advertising. Other similar Boundary Waters-oriented commercial websites which, in my opinion, should not be linked to from Wikipedia, include CanoeCountry.com (aka www.bwcaw.com) and BWCA.com, which, although it contains less advertising, requires visitors to register to access content. For the Wikipedia guidelines on external links, see WP:EL. -- BlueCanoe 15:29, 9 September 2006 (UTC)

BWCA or BWCAW?

I propose that the abbreviation BWCA be changed to BWCAW throughout the article. I see the latter much more than the former. Google yields 133k hits for bwca canoe vs. 186k for bwcaw canoe. Thoughts? --R27182818 20:05, 14 October 2006 (UTC)

As long as the article remains internally consistent, I don't see a problem with either BWCA or BWCAW. I feel BWCA flows a little better absent those extra three syllables in "w", but BWCAW is more legally precise as it includes the "wilderness" designation. I think your Google hits are an argument for the two abbreviations' interchangability and co-existence, actually. -- BlueCanoe 21:42, 14 October 2006 (UTC)

OK. Barring further opinions or objections, I'll change it to BWCAW throughout in a few days. --R27182818 18:45, 22 October 2006 (UTC)

No objections, so I went ahead and did it. -- R27182818 01:21, 31 October 2006 (UTC)

Map

We need a map for this page. Anyone know of a good free use one? -Ravedave 16:05, 2 May 2007 (UTC)

Besides this ugly one I found way back Image:Northern_Minnesota_Parks_map.gif -Ravedave 16:09, 2 May 2007 (UTC)

Speaking of maps...anyone know why this area is a No-fly zone for the U.S.? Its the only natural area to have this distinction. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 67.85.173.44 (talk) 16:49, 11 November 2008 (UTC)

Image:Seliga.jpg

There's another photo added by this edit. I'm not sure what value it adds to the (already photo-heavy) article, but I hesitate to simply remove it without review. So... review requested. ;) --R27182818 (talk) 17:38, 28 September 2008 (UTC)

This was my last photo edit: [1], not the one above. The article is not photo heavy. The BWCA is very photogenic. Other articles would kill to have such photos. Moreover, Ely's Joe Seliga was an important part of the BWCA. Motorrad-67 (talk) 22:15, 28 September 2008 (UTC)

Some of the photos are not the best-- the dark one of the group on the river could go. The wood and canvas canoe is a nice image of the craft but the caption focuses too much on its maker than the subject of the article. I have no objection to this photo, but shorten the caption and leave out the identity of the maker. Kablammo (talk) 01:36, 29 September 2008 (UTC)

Commercial links

♦ Hi all, I'd like to open discussion regarding a couple of links added to the article recently: [2] and [3]. I'd reverted the addition of the first one, and currently the second one is in the article.

I'm still skeptical that these are appropriate, but this feeling seems to be based more on my impressions of the site rather than a principled invocation of WP policy. Therefore, I'd like to open a discussion regarding these links, preferably with reference to policy. I have posted on the adder's talk page requesting his/her input as well. Thanks! --R27182818 (talk) 18:53, 7 March 2009 (UTC)

Hi R27! Thanks for the talk invite. My feeling is that in looking at the links, the Fernberg Road entry point link is appropriate because it contains free information, as well as unique information (the photos of the entry points, elevation, size and depth of lakes). Yes, the site has an ad. However, there is another more commercial link on the BWCAW wiki which offers no free information at all. That would be the BWCA magazine link. That's strictly a commerical site with no free and unique information available to the link clicker. If we are discussing appropriate links, it's clear to me that a link with unique free info is superior to the other. I think your removal of the first link was warranted because that front page did not offer anything over the wiki except for perhaps the "facts" were a bit more concise. I feel that this new link does in fact add to the wiki and to users in providing a look at the most popular entry point area in the BWCAW. Again, if we are going to look at inapropriate links, I'd like to see a focus on sites that lack free and useful information as the foundation for that complaint.Northfork Mike (talk) 20:49, 8 March 2009 (UTC)

The link should be deleted (and I will do so). The site is a commercial one, and adds nothing beyond what is available on the official sites. (There is some nice photography, but there is no shortage of that on the internet.) The site has in-line links to product advertisements, linked from common terms in the text. Perhaps other links need pruning, but that does not mean this one should stay. Kablammo (talk) 00:13, 9 March 2009 (UTC)

On that note I am going to go ahead and remove the commercial link that offers no free information at all(the magazine link) just to make sure that we are keeping a standard. I am also going to suggest that the title of this discussion be changed to "commercial links" Northfork Mike (talk)