Talk:Flowering plant

Lead section needs work

The lead section is too "technical." I get the feeling that the target audience and the authors are biologists, not written for the general population. Decades ago I could identify every wildflower in the Sierra National Forest but I still don't know what an angiosperm is after reading the lead section. I suspect the reason is people are using lazy links rather than plain English to make their descriptions, but I don't know since I generally don't follow those damn blue rabbit hole links.

I suggest a sentence or two of examples of what is and what isn't an angiosperm that normal people could relate to, such as grasses, pine trees, pecan trees, which all have flowers but what does flowering mean here anyway? And not mean.
Possibly even better, or in conjunction with, —would be taking hard effort to write good plain prose, which again: is difficult. In general, inline links should be used for supplemental information not the replacement of (time consuming) explanatory writing. You guys all know this.
--Doug Bashford 2607:FB91:1F01:411A:484F:EEFF:FE7C:1EE9 (talk) 19:07, 15 February 2022 (UTC)

Come on then, give us your suggestions. Plantsurfer 19:40, 15 February 2022 (UTC)

I've given it a go; any text is at best "a starter for 10", but I do agree with the suggestion that all technical and taxon article should begin by being simple and welcoming. Chiswick Chap (talk) 09:44, 1 May 2023 (UTC)

Phylogenies

Is it really necessary to include the 2009 APG III phylogeny? Plantsurfer 14:27, 11 March 2023 (UTC)

No. I've removed it, and the 2010 tree, so we have just the APG IV (still useful as we have the more detailed tree just below) alongside the fully-resolved Guo 2021 tree. Chiswick Chap (talk) 09:27, 1 May 2023 (UTC)

"Diversity" image

The lead image of 12 of over 300,000 species indicates that all angiosperms are ... insect-pollinated herbs. This doesn't accurately reflect the diversity of the group. Even if we're ignoring "basal" groups like Amborella, which would certainly emphasize the diversity, we should include a woody plant and a wind-pollinated one (I guess a grass is the obvious choice) for morphological diversity. Or perhaps we should have one each of Amborellales, Nymphaeales, Austrobaileyales, magnoliids, Chloranthales, monocots, Ceratophyllales, and eudicots to represent the phylogenetic diversity. Chiswick Chap (talk) 08:59, 1 May 2023 (UTC)

What the reader needs to know ...

Plantsurfer, I think we're starting to get this article into shape, by which I mean, that it is starting to give the ordinary reader some inkling of what a flowering plant actually is, how varied different species are, and how they work in ecological, evolutionary, and physiological terms. The whole thing read as if someone thought the article ought to be about academic botany c. 1923 (or possibly 1823), so it's advancing towards the 21st century. It's still terribly heavy on taxonomy, classification, systematics, and phylo...(reader falls asleep). I'm just wondering, too, why we still have long chunks on anatomy, followed (much later) by chunks on physiology --- perhaps we can merge those into a discussion of how a plant functions. I'm also getting rid of the uncited stuff (including refs to whole books with no page numbers, hmm), so perhaps merging structure and function will help there too. Thoughts? Chiswick Chap (talk) 13:44, 8 May 2023 (UTC)

Chiswick Chap, I agree, it should be boiled down to essentials. Perhaps the Vascular anatomy section could go, retaining only the point about vessels vs tracheid, which could go into the distinguishing features table. Reproductive anatomy should go into reproduction and the whole thing reduced in complexity, preserving only the essentials that distinguish flowering plants from others. The basics of plant physiological functions are covered elsewhere in articles on e.g. stomata, transpiration, photosynthesis etc. Only where they are angisoperm-specific should they be considered for inclusion here. Plantsurfer 14:17, 8 May 2023 (UTC)

OK, I'll have a go at doing those things. Chiswick Chap (talk) 14:20, 8 May 2023 (UTC)

Then there's Fossil history. I don't see why that section needs to be so detailed, when the heavy lifting should in principle be covered by Evolutionary history of plants, another article which is such a thick soup of jumbled information that it is hard to follow. Plantsurfer 14:26, 8 May 2023 (UTC)

Yeah it's way OTT. On the case now.... And yes, that other article is a total shambles, I won't add to it. I'll shove the Fossil history of flowering plants in a new article and summarize it here. Chiswick Chap (talk) 15:09, 8 May 2023 (UTC)

That should work. I had a look at dealing with it but decided to get a life. You're clearly made of stronger stuff! Plantsurfer 15:25, 8 May 2023 (UTC)

Many thanks. I've just cut about a quarter of the old text, and the article is a deal better for it. Now that things are a bit more in shape, maybe you'd glance over it and say if anything obvious is missing, or if anything else needs to be removed? Chiswick Chap (talk) 15:31, 8 May 2023 (UTC)

will do. Plantsurfer 15:35, 8 May 2023 (UTC)

@Chiswick Chap and Plantsurfer: is there any reason why the article doesn't follow the general pattern of Wikipedia:WikiProject Plants/Template? I would certainly expect some kind of description to come first, explaining what angiosperms/flowering plants actually are, rather than starting with diversity. Peter coxhead (talk) 09:49, 27 May 2023 (UTC)

Yes, you're right. There is no reason except that its current state results from hacking out a lot of inadequate material. It clearly still needs work, but it also needs the attention of people with the requisite time and energy. Plantsurfer 10:59, 27 May 2023 (UTC)

Other shambolic articles

• Evolutionary history of plants, 155kBytes of random accretion. 12k of that is an almost linkless student essay on coevolution with fungal parasites, which seems grossly misplaced. I'll chop that bit now.
• Floral biology, which contained the term "entomologiques", what could that have been Google-translated from I wonder. Whole article seems close to redundant, maybe merge?
• Anthecology "or pollination biology", cited mainly to Herbert G. Baker 1983; do we need that as well? Sounds like it should be a redirect, perhaps with a one-sentence merge somewhere.
• Pollinator-mediated selection (student-created, March 2021), do we need this as well as Pollination syndrome? There's plainly much overlap.

I suspect there are several others. Feel free to add to the list, and to comment on what we should do about these specimens. Chiswick Chap (talk) 10:39, 9 May 2023 (UTC)

The new speciesbox pictures and text looks messy, compared to the original image.

I felt that the old image was more attractive than the way the speciesbox has been made to look now. Originally it was a tidier image, attractive to look at too. If you scrolled over the flowering plants link anywhere you'd originally see a very pleasant image showcasing a lot of different attractive flowers in a uniform grid format. I'm not sure when this edit occurred, but somewhere down the line the speciesbox was altered to cram in lots of individual picture files and species names. The result is a messy and cluttered looking speciesbox that doesn't look good.

This was the old speciesbox image: https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/a/a5/Flower_poster_2.jpg/800px-Flower_poster_2.jpg

The original image was tidy, uniformed and pleasant to look at, which is a stark contrast to the current messy, uneven pictures. I feel as though it should be changed back. Although the multiple photos used currently do show a lot of diversity, it just doesn't look professional or pleasant on the eye in my honest opinion.

I'm going to prepose the original picture is reinstated. JarroNevsbaru (talk) 22:30, 26 May 2023 (UTC)

Oppose. Looking attractive is not the purpose, though I feel it looks tidy and well-organised. The task is to give an idea of what a flowering plant is, and the old image gave an unbalanced, unsystematic, and actually cramped and illegible view. The current system is broader, clearer, and more representative of the diversity of the group. In a word, it is more encyclopedic. We can discuss adjusting it, but going back is, well, just going backwards. Chiswick Chap (talk) 04:23, 27 May 2023 (UTC)

Comment. The old image is, I agree, cramped and illegible. I do prefer the approach of the new set of images, but I think the content needs more work. The images don't really show the diversity of angiosperms as organisms, but only of parts of them, particularly flowers. For "oak tree", for example, why not an image of an oak tree? Peter coxhead (talk) 07:07, 27 May 2023 (UTC)

OK, we can work on it, but a whole-organism image (which'll show no detail) is obviously less distinctive than a flowering plant's flowers and fruits, the things that distinguish it from all other groups. Chiswick Chap (talk) 08:20, 27 May 2023 (UTC)

If the idea is just to show the diversity of flowers and fruit, then fine, but the caption should say this. However, a feature of angiosperm diversity is the range from very small annuals to large trees, very different from any other extant group. Peter coxhead (talk) 09:53, 27 May 2023 (UTC)

Could we instead possibly try to find a way of making the utilized images line up? The spaces between images on each row do not line up and it makes it appear messy. I feel some uniformity and equality in the image sizes within the speciesbox would go a long way to give a more professional look to the article. I believe if every image used was the same size the borders between each image could be uniform and line up correctly. JarroNevsbaru (talk) 13:54, 27 May 2023 (UTC)

That may be your personal aesthetic. I'll see if I can crop some of the images. Chiswick Chap (talk) 14:10, 27 May 2023 (UTC)

Support. The original image isn't perfect and certainly better images could be made, but I think it provided a good taxonomic and morphological overview of angiosperms while being easy on the eyes. The current set of images is too uneven with the differing image heights and captions, is somehow based entirely on temperate Northern Hemisphere taxa with not a single tropical/Southern Hemisphere representative, and I'm not entirely sure why they're grouped by substrate, pollination strategy, and growth form as opposed to taxonomy (although all at least belong to separate taxonomic groups). Most other image grids for higher-order taxa on Wikipedia are more concerned with taxonomic diversity than life history traits.

However, if there's enough support for a new image grid, I'd suggest a grid of 3 columns and 4-6 rows (akin to the current images for mammal); one row being the ANA grade, one row being the magnoliids, 1-2 rows being the monocots, and 1-2 being the eudicots. Geekgecko (talk) 20:19, 10 June 2023 (UTC)

Conservation is certainly an 'interaction with humans'

An editor has seen fit to split out the conservation sub-section, with the rubric "I am lifting this up to main level heading and added "threats". I think otherwise it is too hidden under the euphemistic "interactions with humans". Also some of the threats could be from other things. e.g. climate change is caused by humans but the effects of climate change are not really "interactions with humans". If needed, could discuss on talk page?)". A bold move. Well, we are obliged by the WP:NPOV policy – not just a guideline – to be scrupulously neutral, in headings as well as in text, no "euphemistic" about it. It's far from "hidden", it's a boldfaced section heading, right there in the Table of Contents and in the text too. Conservation is 100% human activity; the threats it deals with are both caused by humans, whether directly by spraying pesticides or hunting, or (slightly) indirectly by destroying habitat and trashing the climate, resulting in human-caused damage to plants and their environment. Further, the article is about 'Flowering plant', which is a taxon; that involves describing the taxon's biology, i.e. its features, diversity, and evolution; and on the side, non-taxon detail, the ways that humans have made use of these plants, or done harm to them. The article recently passed formal review with this simple, clear, and logical structure, including this plainly subsidiary section. I'll put it back now. Chiswick Chap (talk) 09:42, 3 February 2024 (UTC)

Well, there is always two sides of each argument, so here is mine: I think "threats" ought to appear in a section heading (currently it isn't, only "conservation" is) and also threats should be a main level heading. Threats often come from human actions of course but can also be non-human, e.g. certain diseases which are not due to humans. See e.g. the article Decline in amphibian populations which says "Research from 2007 and 2018 indicated that the reemergence of varieties of chytrid fungi may account for a substantial fraction of the overall decline.". Same for koalas which get a certain disease which is not caused by humans (chlamydia). So if the info on "threats" is inside of "interactions with humans" this limits the content that can be put there. Therefore I think it's better to have "threats and conservation" in one section but not below "human interactions". Or otherwise separate out "threats" from "conservation" in two different sections, and putting "threats" outside of the "human interactions" section. NB: I made the same change also to the bird article last week. I came to these pages from the article biodiversity loss which I am linking with relevant life form articles. Pinging User:InformationToKnowledge. EMsmile (talk) 08:59, 5 February 2024 (UTC)

For transparency purposes: I've just initiated a similar discussion at koala. It might be that a section on "threats" is more relevant for wild animals than for plants, I am not sure. For comparison, the article on dolphin does have a section on "threats" but not one on "conservation". EMsmile (talk) 10:26, 5 February 2024 (UTC)

Pinging User:InformationToKnowledge, do you have an opinion on this? EMsmile (talk) 09:24, 6 March 2024 (UTC)

Ahem, we should not be soliciting input on that sort of topic in this way: this page is not a forum for discussing Koalas and Dolphins — the discussion on those should be on a WikiProject page, not here, and everybody on that project should be invited to join in equally. I do feel that emphasising "threats" in each and every taxon article would be grossly unbalanced; Wikipedia works by separating topics into discrete articles, and cross-referencing those articles (taxa, threats, culture, economics, ...) with embedded, "further", or "main" links. From the point of view of a taxon article, all human-related stuff is a subtopic, and it should remain so, per WP:COATRACK if nothing else; it can also be called WP:UNDUE and described as infringing WP:Balance. Chiswick Chap (talk) 09:49, 6 March 2024 (UTC)

Regarding your first sentence, I have replied to that on my talk page. (this is not WP:CAN if this is what you were referring to). I can see your point but I also think this creates "silos" and makes it harder for readers to see the bigger picture. Good idea about discussing this in a central place on a WikiProject page. Which WikiProject would be the most suitable one? It should be one about wildlife in general, i.e. for plants and animals? Do you have one in mind? EMsmile (talk) 10:35, 6 March 2024 (UTC)

No, I have named three policies involved, but canvassing isn't one of the three. In a way it comes close because, as I also just said, it isn't appropriate to discuss a project policy on one or more taxon pages, forming a semi-private discussion group on a project-wide issue. More than one project may be involved here, clearly. Chiswick Chap (talk) 10:39, 6 March 2024 (UTC)

So which project page do you want me to post to then? EMsmile (talk) 10:51, 6 March 2024 (UTC)

As it covers animals,plants and other groups, WP:Tree of Life seems apppropriate. —  Jts1882 | talk  11:25, 6 March 2024 (UTC)

Thanks for finding the right WikiProject for me, much appreciated. I have just posted there and copied some of these talk page posts across so that we don't have to repeat what we've already said. Hope everyone is OK with this. Looking forward to a fruitful, friendly and positive discussion here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia_talk:WikiProject_Tree_of_Life#Proposal_about_%22threats%22_in_the_standard_outline EMsmile (talk) 10:30, 7 March 2024 (UTC)

Well, the discussion at WikiProject Tree of Life fissled out and didn't reach much of a conclusion. Basically what was said there is: anything is possible, there are no hard and fast rules. And it's all article specific. Therefore let's get back to this discussion here. I still think that lumping everything together into "interaction with humans" is not suitable and makes it harder for people to find what they are looking for. - So I still think the edit that I made here and which was reverted would have actually been a good improvement. - But I won't, and will just wait and see if over time perhaps others might also prefer that structure to the current one. EMsmile (talk) 18:57, 19 March 2024 (UTC)