Talk:Mascarene teal

GA review

The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

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This review is transcluded from Talk:Mascarene teal/GA1. The edit link for this section can be used to add comments to the review.

Nominator: FunkMonk (talk · contribs) 00:01, 11 November 2025 (UTC)

Reviewer: Jens Lallensack (talk · contribs) 21:31, 13 November 2025 (UTC)

Will get to it in the next few days! --Jens Lallensack (talk) 21:31, 13 November 2025 (UTC)

• Tree-hole, limb-bones, flight-capability: These should not have a hyphen. Sometimes there are several instances of this.

Removed these. Must admit I don't know when it's appropriate and when not... Any pointers? FunkMonk (talk) 02:18, 17 November 2025 (UTC)

You use them in compounds: "This bird is a tree-hole species", where "tree-hole species" is the compound. Outside of compounds, you don't use the hyphen ("this bird nests in tree holes"). --Jens Lallensack (talk) 10:02, 17 November 2025 (UTC)

• These authors suggested that though members of the same birds groups initially colonised both Mauritius and Réunion, many of them evolving flightlessness, these species disappeared from Réunion due to the volcanic eruption of Piton des Neiges between 300,000 and 180,000 years ago. Thereafter the island would have been recolonised by flighted species, for example Mascarene teals from Mauritius, with none of them having time to become flightless since. – When reading this, it is unclear where it is going and therefore difficult to follow. Maybe start with an introductory sentence stating that there were recently extinct flightless birds on Mauritius but none on Réunion (which you seem to imply)? You kind of assume that the reader already knows this.

The source actually introduces these points, so I summarised thus: "Cécile Mourer-Chauviré and colleagues noted that Réunion lacks the kinds of distinctive flightless birds found on Mauritius such as the dodo, and that since Réunion is 3 million years old, this would be long enough for birds to lose their flight ability to the extend that it can be detected in their skeletons." FunkMonk (talk) 03:01, 17 November 2025 (UTC)

• suggesting similarity with their ancestral group, which is termed "grey teals". What is an "ancestral group"? Some paraphyletic taxon? And what are "grey teals"? Is it the grey teal?

I read it as being the "species complex" it emerged from, with "grey teal" referring to multiple species, including the one you linked to. Here's what the source says, what do you think?: "Subfossil bones show the Mascarene Teal was closely related to Bernier’s Teal from Madagascar, and closer still to the Sunda Teal, both members of a group known as ‘grey teals’ – another case of dispersal from the Indo-Australasian east. The Madagascar bird has brown plumage, but Mauritian ducks were described as ‘grey teal’ in the only surviving description, also suggesting a greater similarity to the ancestral group than to the Malagasy species." FunkMonk (talk) 09:06, 17 November 2025 (UTC)

I do not see where they equate "grey teals" with "ancestral group". If those are synonyms, the authors would contradict themselves? To me, it reads as if the Sunda Teal is the "ancestral group". If in doubt, I would just remove this. --Jens Lallensack (talk) 10:02, 17 November 2025 (UTC)

As the source in this article says "both members of a group known as ‘grey teals’", it seems refers to more than one taxon in a group. Googling, it seems three related taxa have once been considered subspecies but now full species, per Avibase and others: "Anas [gibberifrons, albogularis or gracilis]". This source says "The Madagascar teal is the westernmost representative of the 'grey' teals. It is related to the grey teal (Anas gracilis), the chestnut teal (Anas castanea), Andaman teal (Anas albogularis) and Sunda or Indonesian teal (Anas gibberifrons). The New Zealand ‘brown’ teals (Campbell Islands teal Anas nesiotis, brown teal Anas chlorotis and the Auckland Island teal Anas aucklandica) were formerly considered close relatives." FunkMonk (talk) 23:12, 17 November 2025 (UTC)

Oh, there is actually a footnote to the part in the article that complicates the situation further (doubting the identity of the bones that were compared to), I'll see if I can make sense of it soon: "Livesey (1991), Young et al. (1997), Mourer et al. (1999, 2006); Bernier’s Teal is Anas bernieri and the Sunda Teal A. gibberifrons. A. theodori’s colour was noted by the crew of the President in 1681 (Barnwell 1950–54, Cheke 1987a); although the Madagascar species can look grey at a distance (Morris & Hawkins 1998, Roger Safford pers. comm.) the sailors would have been describing dead specimens seen close-up. Several forms formerly considered races of A. gibberifrons are now treated as full species (e.g. Young et al. 1997), so the bones used by Mourer et al. (1999) may have come from the Australian Grey Teal A. gracilis rather than A. gibberifrons as currently defined.". FunkMonk (talk) 23:31, 17 November 2025 (UTC)

I must confess I am even more confused at this point. As said, trimming it down to just the unequivocal parts is always an option, too. --Jens Lallensack (talk) 13:28, 18 November 2025 (UTC)

• account of two kinds of ducks on Réunion could be explained by the Aythya remains – you did not mention Aythya remains, only remains that were similar to Aythya.

Elaborated, better? "could be explained by the possible Aythya remains, which they considered similar enough to the extant Madagascar pochard (Aythya innotata) that it could be that species." FunkMonk (talk) 03:01, 17 November 2025 (UTC)

Yes, great. --Jens Lallensack (talk) 10:02, 17 November 2025 (UTC)

• In the "Extinction" section, you discuss things in chronologial order (the order in which the papers were published), but I found that hard to follow, as you jump between topics. You state that cats might have been responsible for the extinction, then talk about decline rates (again, you already discuss this earlier), and then go back into extinction causes (again cats, with secondary hunting and rats). I think it would make sense to discuss timing and rate of extinction first, and then, next paragraph, discuss extinction causes.

Spot check

• These authors suggested that though members of the same birds groups initially colonised both Mauritius and Réunion, many of them evolving flightlessness, these species disappeared from Réunion due to the volcanic eruption of Piton des Neiges between 300,000 and 180,000 years ago. – Checks out but it's on page 34, outside the page range you indicate.

Well-spotted, added the page. FunkMonk (talk) 02:18, 17 November 2025 (UTC)

• BirdLife International (2022) – Checks out. But: The taxonbox says Extinct (1696) (IUCN 3.1)[1], but in the text you indicate that the "1696" refers to farm ducks, so this seems to be contradictory.

Yeah, not sure what to do there, because I guess the taxobox has to follow the IUCN? Should I just state they still use it in the article body text, just to acknowledge the inconsistency? FunkMonk (talk) 02:18, 17 November 2025 (UTC)

I would definitely ensure up-to-date information and consistency. You could just replace the outdated year with the new one, citing the source. You could also add an explanatory footnote in addition if needed. If you think that it is controversial whether those sightings were farm ducks or not, I would provide both years, each with inline citation. You could also remove the year from the taxonbox entirely (but I don't think that's needed). --Jens Lallensack (talk) 10:02, 17 November 2025 (UTC)

I'm not sure the year can be really called outdated, that the 1696 account should be farmyard ducks is itself just a theory, and 1696 is extremely close to the 1698 date where it was explicitly declared extinct. So perhaps if the taxobox just said "ca 1696", citing both sources? And/or add in prose in the extinction section that the IUCN accepts the 1696 date? FunkMonk (talk) 23:12, 17 November 2025 (UTC)

• so that the ecosystems of these islands are severely damaged and hard to reconstruct. – I cannot find a discussion in the source about ecosystems being hard to reconstruct; I assume it is implied somewhere but could you give me a hint?

It's just paraphrasing the entire article, for example the start of page 31 and 32. In each case listed, the sources covers the difficulties in in conserving the species. Or is it the term "reconstruct" that might cause confusion, since it can also mean "reconstruct" in the sense of deducting how it was once like? Would it be better to say "conserve"? FunkMonk (talk) 02:18, 17 November 2025 (UTC)

Yeah, I thought it meant "deducting how it was once like"; if you mean something else, I suggest less ambiguous wording. --Jens Lallensack (talk) 10:02, 17 November 2025 (UTC)

Alright, changed to "conserve". Will do that too in other articles that use that paragraph. FunkMonk (talk) 23:12, 17 November 2025 (UTC)

That's all. Great work as usual. --Jens Lallensack (talk) 19:25, 16 November 2025 (UTC)

Everything has been addressed, and there isn't anything that should hold back promotion of this article. --Jens Lallensack (talk) 13:28, 18 November 2025 (UTC)

The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.