Talk:Sciuridae

2005 comment

I think is a bad article. The classification is a bad one. Current classification includes the Petauristinae among the Sciurinae and instead uses the subfamilies Sciurillinae, Ratufinae, Xerinae and Callosciurinae. Ucucha See Mammal Taxonomy 16:07, 28 Apr 2005 (UTC)

Disputed (2005)

I think the recent posting that "the factual accuracy of this article is disputed" is extreme. What's listed on the page is the most widely used taxonomic hypothesis. Recent molecular data do not support it and suggest that another hypothesis is required (such as what Ucucha lists above). This happens constantly with taxonomies. If we tag all articles where the taxonomy is disputed, those tags will go on almost every page that deals with biological organisms. --Aranae 15:08, May 27, 2005 (UTC)

Merge with Squirrel?

Shouldn't this article be merged with Squirrel? They seem to be about the same animal.220.76.15.231 (talk) 04:35, 4 July 2008 (UTC)

There does seem to be a difference: Sciuridae refers to the entire family Sciuridae, which also contains marmots, prairie dogs, chipmunks, and some other animals. "Squirrel" largely refers to those Sciuridae which live in trees, though there are quite some exceptions (such as Spermophilus species which are called "ground squirrels").

I do actually think the merge would be a good idea, though. "Squirrel" may be used with a slightly different meaning, but it is also often simply used for the family as a whole (i.e., including marmots, chipmunks, and others). Another problem is that "squirrel" as used in the squirrel article is not a scientific term; it refers to a rather random assemblage of Sciuridae. Ucucha 05:13, 4 July 2008 (UTC)

It seems to me that marmots and chipmunkss are not referred to as squirrels in everyday speech (although they are by we zoology types), and that there's no great problem having an article for the everyday meaning of the word (squirrel), and another for the scientific grouping to which the squirrels belong (sciuridae). So I'm happy enough with the status quo. Anaxial (talk) 16:56, 28 July 2008 (UTC)

There is a discussion of the possible merging of parts of the Squirrel article into this page and the clear cut purposing of the remaining squirrel article on the Squirrel article talk page. Comments from authors of this page and interested individuals would be appreciated.Davefoc (talk) 18:55, 16 February 2009 (UTC)

Merge?

Does anybody think the pages should be merged now? —innotata (Talk • Contribs) 00:02, 17 February 2010 (UTC)

I don't see much of a point in keeping them separate. Ucucha 00:39, 17 February 2010 (UTC)

Depends. For example, Is a woodchuck a squirrel or not? It depends what one means by squirrel, which is an English word. English words don't always correspond directly to an international, technical, Greek/Latin words. Look at the article porcupine, for example. I have a list of these I'm working on, and they don't all lend themselves to the same treatment. Sometimes Wikipedia has settled on a disambiguation page, sometimes on an umbrella article, or sometimes just as a note in the one main article, either predominantly or as sort of a footnote. In this case, the only thing keeping the two from being exact synonyms are the Marmots and the chipmunks, which not everyone agrees are understood by native speakers to be squirrels, although one option is to set the reader straight about that. Then there is the example of the scaly-tailed squirrels, which are to my mind at least pretty darn squirrely for a creature more closely related to a springhare than to any other existent animal. At least as squirrely as woodchucks, which no one I know calls or thinks of as part of the definition of squirrel around here. See Idiurus zenkeri, or look at the U-Mich animal diversity web page and see what you think: http://animaldiversity.ummz.umich.edu/site/accounts/pictures/Anomalurus.html, for example. Nature repeats itself sometimes. http://www.fieldmuseum.org/tanzania/species_swa.asp?ID=590 Chrisrus (talk) 06:35, 17 February 2010 (UTC)

• Support. I think they should certainly be merged. There is indeed some variation as to what the word "squirrel" means: some would say all Sciuridae are squirrels, while others would restrict the term to tree squirrels. Doesn't matter here though one way or the other, as there is already an article called Tree squirrel: if Squirrel is not the same as Sciuridae (which I would say it is), it must be the same as Tree squirrel (though in British usage there's no doubt that marmots, chipmunks and woodchucks are squirrels: they're ground squirrels). I see no reason to get bogged down with scaly-tailed squirrels or any other non-Sciuridae "squirrels" – those just happen to use the same word in their name, and they can stay in their own articles, as Egyptian Goose is not a goose. Richard New Forest (talk) 21:39, 17 February 2010 (UTC)

Great way to put it. —innotata (Talk • Contribs) 21:44, 17 February 2010 (UTC)

Where you live, if someone sees a marmot, they go "Hey, look at the squirrel!"? Here they only do that for tree or ground squirrels. Chrisrus (talk) 22:04, 17 February 2010 (UTC)

No, but do people call shovelers ducks, or flickers woodpeckers? No, but obviously they are. The only marmots in these plains are woodchucks. —innotata (Talk • Contribs) 22:09, 17 February 2010 (UTC)