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Wikipedia:Featured article candidates/Boise National Forest/archive2

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The following is an archived discussion of a featured article nomination. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the article's talk page or in Wikipedia talk:Featured article candidates. No further edits should be made to this page.

The article was promoted by Laser brain via FACBot (talk) 21:15, 6 May 2016 [1].

Boise National Forest

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Nominator(s): Fredlyfish4 (talk) 02:49, 18 January 2016 (UTC)[reply]

This is my second nomination of this article for FA status. The first was a year ago, and after taking it to GA status, I'm renominating it. I think this article comprehensively covers numerous aspects about this national forest in Idaho. Fredlyfish4 (talk) 02:49, 18 January 2016 (UTC)[reply]

Source review by Imzadi1979

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I'll go ahead and give this a basic source review after meandering here from my own nomination:

  • A key hallmark of FA status can be summed up in one word: consistency, and with citations, I'll probably mention that a lot. First example: "United States Geological Survey" but you have "U.S. Forest Service". I don't think either is wrong, but it's odd to have one spelled out fully, but the other is partially abbreviated. Further down, in note 16, the former gets abbreviated down to just "USGS", and it should be spelled out in whatever fashion to match. So in short, you should audit how you're going to spell out agency names and apply a consistent rule across all of the footnotes.
  • Back to note 16, you have an access date defined, but no URL, which triggers an error message. (It might be one of the error messages that's hidden by default, but it's there all the same for those of us who have them all enabled.) The access date does not display without a URL defined, and it would be meaningless if it could be displayed anyway.
    • Also, and this is a bit of a personal preference, but maps have authors, which can be the same organization as the publisher. I personally list the USGS in both positions in the template and include the place of publication (Reston, VA) for map citations. It's also my experience that map scales with numbers of 5 digits or more have commas inserted (1:24,000) to ease parsing the number.
  • Note 17, etc, shouldn't have the publisher wikilinked after it was in the very first note. You may need to bypass a source-specific template and use {{cite web}} directly to customize the output to avoid an unneeded wikilink.
  • In note 45, "New York, NY" the state abbreviation is normally not needed when New York is the place of publication for a book.
  • In sequential notes (53–54), you have "Rocky Mountain Research Station, U.S. Forest Service" and just "Rocky Mountain Research Station" as the publisher. Especially if you can wikilink the first one, you could use the shorter form alone
  • In note 63, etc, "Incident Information System" sounds to me like the name of a website/work, and I'm left wondering whose system that is, i.e. who's the publisher?
  • I corrected it to "InciWeb" and added a wikilink. It's an interagency service in the U.S. government.
  • For the map in note 79, I'd spell out the series name as you did in note 16.

The sources are all appropriate for the article, so the only quibbles I have are related to the formatting, not their quality or reliability on first blush. Imzadi 1979 → 12:04, 18 January 2016 (UTC)[reply]

I've made all of these corrections. Fredlyfish4 (talk) 20:01, 19 January 2016 (UTC)[reply]

Comments from Brianboulton

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This is my first sight of the article – I missed the previous FAC. I've read that review, and it seems that prose quality was the principal reason why it was archived. So I've been looking particularly at the prose. Hmmm. I've got as far as the end of the "Management" section, and found quite a few issues. These are all fixable, but will require some attention, and I'd obviously like to look at the rest. In the meantime, please consider the following:

  • Lead: "in addition to" is not appropriate wording, as the facts that follow it are quite separate from the land cover details. I suggest something like "...spruce-fir forests; there are 9,600 miles (15,400 km) of streams and rivers, and 15,400 acres (6,200 ha) of lakes and reservoirs."
  • Done.
  • Also in lead: by "through the mid-twentieth century" I assume you mean "until the mid-twentieth century". This is important, because in British English, "through" means "during the duration of" rather than "up to", as in "he lived through the war years".
  • Done.
  • Done.
  • "The most important known placer deposit of niobium and tantalum in the United States is located in Bear Valley." Needs a citation.
  • Done. Though the last three sentences in that paragraph are all covered by the same page of the same source.
  • "The President was given the authority..." Clarify you mean the U.S. president.
  • Done.
  • This seems like unnecessary detail in this article: "The original Payette National Forest had been established on June 3, 1905 as Payette Forest Reserve".
  • I think it is necessary since it shows when the forest was first protected. I moved it and reworded that section so it makes more sense.
  • Over-use of the word "establiahed" in the latter part of the US Forestry section. Try some synonyms, e.g. "formed", "set up", "founded" etc
  • Done.
  • I think the rather clumsy formation "and a district ranger who manages the ranger district" could be replaced by "and is managed by a district ranger"
  • Done.
  • Is it necesssary to name the "top forest official" – and that title sounds a little informal for an encyclopaedia?
  • Removed.
  • This is very clumsy: "There have been 2,648,273 acres (10,717.18 km2) of Idaho proclaimed to be part of Boise National Forest, however the forest manages only about 2,203,703 acres (891,807 ha)." Apart from the awkward wording and inappropriate comma, why is the first figure given an equivalence in km2 and the second in hectares?
  • I reworked this.
  • I'm afraid my head started to spin when I tried to follow the details in the second part of the Management section. Is all this detail necessary? If so, is this the best way of presenting it? Perhaps a table – I don't know, but you may lose readers in this morass of detail.
  • I'm not sure it would really fit into a table. I do think it is necessary to include the sentences about the two wilderness areas since they are quite large areas, but the rest could perhaps just be removed. Fredlyfish4 (talk) 22:15, 19 January 2016 (UTC)[reply]

I'll return later with my comments on the rest. Brianboulton (talk) 17:26, 18 January 2016 (UTC)[reply]

Continuing: Sorry for the delay:

Geog and geology
  • "which extend even further north and east..." I don't see a need for "even further"
  • Done.
  • "are referred to as the Trinity Mountains" – is this a formal alternate name or some sort of local usage? Some clarification needed.
  • Reworded to eliminate "referred" and indicate it is a subrange. This is an official name supported by the GNIS reference at the end of the sentence.
  • "The forest borders parts of seven reservoirs, however the Forest Service does not own or manage any of the dams." Inappropriate comma and dodgy "however". Perhaps revise: "The forest borders parts of seven reservoirs, none of which are owned or managed by the Forest Service". This could merge with the next sentence if you replace "Rather, it..." with "which".
  • Done.
  • What are "acre feet"? An explanatory note would help.
  • Linked
Climate
  • Just a comment: bearing in mind Idaho's location in the North-west of the States, I'm a little surprised that its climate is affected by moisture from the Gulf of Mexico, which seems very distant.
  • I removed "Gulf of Mexico" because it does seem odd and overly specific but not impossible
  • I assume the snowfall figures are annual averages?
  • Clarified.
Natural resources
  • Can we somehow avoid "ecoregion" occuring three times in the first line of the section?
  • I think the third can be removed, but think the first two link to ecoregion and distinguish between the batholith itself and its eponymous ecoregion.
  • "the presence of frequent non-lethal fires" − I think "occurence" rather than presence. How about: "the frequent occurence of non-lethal fires"?
  • Agreed and changed
  • You have "Douglas fir occasionally occur" (plural verb form) but later "Douglas fir dominates" (singular verb form). Consistency needed – the latter is preferable and in more general use.
  • Done
  • Overuse of "dominates/dominated" – five in quick succession. "Is predominant", or some other variant, would make a change.
  • Changed a few
  • "Boise National Forest is directed to "control the establishment..." – who does the directing?
  • Higher level regional and/or national level Forest Service management, which I revised to
  • "Habitat in Boise National Forest supports..." – "Habitat" is not a mass noun, so it should be "Habitats"
  • Done
  • "including 36 accidental species, or those that are not normally found in the region but have been observed on at least one occasion". A little unclear; I suggest "including 36 "accidental" species – those not normally found in the region but have been observed on at least one occasion".
  • Done
  • "Deadwood Lookout is now maintained as a cabin that can be rented by the public" – this information is given in more detail in the next section, and doesn't need to appear here.
  • Removed
Recreation
  • (third line): "as on" surely just "on"?
  • Clarified to most difficult sections on these rivers since there's rafting on others as well

This is a meticulously researched article, nicely put together. Most of my points are minor quibbles or merely suggestions. I have also made a few tweaks to the text. I'll be happy to support when the above points are addressed. Brianboulton (talk) 15:56, 25 January 2016 (UTC)[reply]

Support: My concerns have been properly addressed and I'll be happy to see the article promoted, subject to image clearance. I hope other editors will read and review. Brianboulton (talk) 21:48, 27 January 2016 (UTC)[reply]

Comments by Dudley

  • The units used are inconsistent - acres and hectares in the lead, acres and sq km in the infobox. For such a large area, I think square miles and km would be more meaningful to readers.
  • The Forest Service uses acres, and on other U.S. protected area articles areas of such large protected areas are consistently listed as acres/square km, so I changed everything to that.
  • "known populations of Sacajawea's bitterroot". Perhaps "known populations of the flowering plant Sacajawea's bitterroot".
  • Done. I didn't mean for it to appear that way as I had mentioned previous resource extraction activities in that paragraph.
  • I think the lead should spell out the management objectives. You specify recreation, presumably also forestry and conservation, but does one objective take priority?
  • Done
  • The link "last [[ice age]]" is not very useful. [[last glacial maximum|last ice age]] would be more helpful.
  • Done
  • "human habitation up to 10–15,000 years" What does this mean? Any time between now and 15,000 years ago? I would leave out "up to".
  • Done
  • "A change of climate around 7000 years ago dried up much of the Great Basin, forcing the Shoshone people northward into the mountainous areas of central Idaho.[6]:3" This is unclear. did the Shoshone move into or out of Boise?
  • Clarified
  • What is the "3" after ref 6 and other similar superscript numbers? Nothing happens when I click on them.
  • That is using the {{rp}} template, which indicates the page number of that document that supports that statement. I only use it for the two excessively long documents (references 1 and 6) as a cleaner yet still accurate method of citing those documents rather than having them appear 10+ times in the references.
  • I do not see the point of that. It is far more helpful to readers to have the page number in the reference as page=. The article only has 78 references whereas some articles have over 300. However, that is up to you. Dudley Miles (talk) 11:14, 10 March 2016 (UTC)[reply]
  • "Most of what is now Boise National Forest was sparsely inhabited by Native Americans, however several archaeological sites, including campsites, rock shelters, burial grounds, and pictographs have been found along rivers in the area." I am not sure why "however", which implies a contrast. Maybe replace with "and".
  • Done
  • "at the now eponymous Grimes Creek" The word "now" is not needed.
  • Done
  • "forest reserves in the U.S. Department of the Interior" Forest reserves in the department? it does not sound right. Ditto reserves "part of" the Dept of Agriculture. Maybe "came under".
  • Changed to "administered by" and "transferred to"
  • In "Capacity (MW)" what does MW mean? (Amount of electricity the reservoir produces in megawatts? If so, this should be explained.)
  • Seems a little odd to explain this, sort of like needing explain hectares and miles, but I linked to electricity generation (Capacity) and watts (MW)
  • Yes it seems obvious now but I was confused by both columns having the same heading, "Capacity" and assumed they were both units of the same thing. You might change the first one to "Volume" and the second to "Generating capacity", with MW in the units row below. Also, you are inconsistent whether acre-feet is hypenenated. Dudley Miles (talk) 11:14, 10 March 2016 (UTC)[reply]

Further comments by Dudley

  • "which is a level III ecoregion" Could level III be linked to explain what it means?
    • Linked to the US ecoregion article that states they are just smaller regions within larger ones.
  • "These non-forested areas are those dominated by grasses, forbs, or shrubs. I am not sure what "those" means in this context.
    • Combined with previous sentence so its clear they go together.
  • "grand fir is predominant and western larch is found in early successional areas" Successional to what?
    • Reworded so that it says one of the first trees to become established. I don't have info on exactly which species come before.
  • "Understories are also made of mountain maple" This is a bit confusing. Which forest type is it? "also made of" sounds clumsy.
    • Combined with the previous sentence so that it is clear they go together and replaced "made of" with "consist"
  • "Treeless riparian primarily consist of willows along with thinleaf alder," How is it treeless if it has willow and alder?
    • Reworded so that it is riparian areas within largely treeless habitats.
  • "Scenic roads" Are all the roads in this section open to all types of vehicle?
    • Expanded to say they are paved highways open to roadworthy vehicles.
  • A first class article, but I do not think you should use the rp template. 1. There will be other readers who like me did not understand it. 2. The documentation at Template:Rp says "This template should not be used unless necessary". 3. With only a modest 72 references it is not necessary. Dudley Miles (talk) 17:06, 13 April 2016 (UTC)[reply]
  • "Intermountain region." Could this be linked?

Comments by Checkingfax

  • I did some cleanup. Check the history for details. For one thing, I changed 300px to upright=1.8 for the map per MOS:IMAGES. If it is too big, ratchet 1.8, or remove the spec altogether, but do not go back to a hardcoded size. Cheers! {{u|Checkingfax}} {Talk} 02:55, 29 March 2016 (UTC)[reply]


Comments by Singora Singora (talk) 11:53, 29 March 2016 (UTC)[reply]

  • 1. CasLiber has asked me to take a look at this, so I'll go through it bit by bit.
  • 2. A while back I wrote Buçaco Forest, an article about a small forest in central Portugal. It's not quite finished, but is structured along similar lines to Boise Forest.

Presentation

  • 3. The guy above me has inserted a CLEAR tag above the History header. This is wrong and makes a mess of presentation. Compare the article's appearance with and without this tag to see what I mean.
  • I agree.
  • 4. Do you need to source content in the infobox?
  • The coordinates and areas definitely should have references. The establishment date can probably go without one, but there's no reason why infobox content should have sources.
  • 5. Compare your map with the one I coded for Buçaco Forest. Mine is better. Clicking on your map takes me to an empty image. This is of no use whatsoever to your audience / target market. Do what I did: use Photoshop to add a red marker, and size it so that it's slightly smaller than the red dot generated by the infobox template. See also the maps for Yellowstone National Park and Zion National Park.
  • I'm not sure I would say much better, but I was trying to create one like you did and couldn't get it quite right. Feel free to try if you want. The maps for those two parks are nice and recent additions (their previous map was the same as the one currently on this page), but I can't make anything like them.

Introduction / Summary

  • 6. RE: Boise National Forest is a federally protected area that covers. "that covers" -> "covering".
  • Done
  • 7. RE: it is managed by the U.S. Forest Service in the U.S. Department of Agriculture as four units. The Wiki page for the U.S. Forest Service tells us it's a division of the Department of Agriculture, so do you really need to have this info here? It's wordy and you end up using "U.S." twice in the same sentence. Look at this featured article's second sentence: Shoshone National Forest.
  • Removed the USDA part, but can't add anything about a presidential proclamation like in Shoshone as I'm not sure if it's creation was a direct result of a proclamation.
  • 8. RE: The Idaho Batholith underlays most of Boise National Forest, forming the forest's Boise, Salmon River, and West mountain ranges, and the forest reaches. "West mountain ranges, and the forest" -> "West mountain ranges; the forest".
  • Done
  • 9. "Common land cover types include" -> "Common land cover includes".
  • Done
  • 10. "Boise National Forest contains 75 percent of the known populations of the flowering plant Sacajawea's bitterroot, a species endemic to Idaho" -> "Boise National Forest contains 75 percent of the known populations of Sacajawea's bitterroot, a flowering plant endemic to Idaho".
  • Done
  • 11. "The Shoshone people occupied what is now Boise National Forest before European settlers arrived in the early 1800s" -> "The Shoshone people occupied the forest before European settlers arrived in the early 1800s".
  • Done
  • 12. "Recreation opportunities and facilities in Boise National Forest include " -> "Recreation opportunities and facilities include". It's obvious you're talking about the forest.
  • Done
  • 13. I'll add more feedback later.

Wednesday Singora (talk) 15:49, 30 March 2016 (UTC)[reply]

  • 14. Let's look at the History section.
  • 15. The first sentence is pretty grim: "The first people entered Idaho near the end of the last ice age in the late Pleistocene; there is evidence of human habitation 10–15,000 years ago at Wilson Butte Cave, which was temporarily occupied by people hunting bison on the Snake River Plain". Your source is ref #5.
  • 16. For starters, you've repeated the word "people".
  • 17. You need a colon instead of a semi-colon as the second clause develops or adds to the first.
  • 18. Lastly, the sentence is stylistically and factually incorrect. Saying "the last ice age in the late Pleistocene" is silly. Obviously the last ice age was in the Pleistocene, but you don't even need to mention the Pleistocene since it's an epoch dating back more than 2.5 million years. I see your source for this is actually ref #6: "Near the end of the Ice Age or Pleistocene geological epoch, some 13,000 years ago ...". See how they've used the word "or". Ref #5 tells us: "The first unmistakable evidence of human occupation of Wilson Butte Cave dates from about 10,000 years ago. Ruth Gruhn, the archaeologist who excavated the cave, also uncovered cultural material that she believes shows that people used the cave as early as 15,000 years ago", adding that "Other archaeologists, however, are less convinced that Wilson Butte Cave was occupied before 10,000 BP". Note also that this evidence pertains only to human habitation in the forest - it's not the same as what you're written: "The first people entered Idaho". Finally, your claim that the cave was "temporarily occupied" doesn't reconcile with "The excavation shows that Wilson Butte Cave was largely abandoned by 400 BP, after the bison largely disappeared from the area".
  • 19. How about: "Archaeological evidence indicates that human habitation in the forest began towards the end of the last ice age: bone fragments about 10,000 years old have been found in Wilson Butte Cave, a rocky bubble on a bed of ancient lava believed to have been occupied by indigenous people until as recently as the 17th century". You could change "indigenous people" to "bison hunters" or "indigenous bison-hunting people". Ref #6 uses the terms "Plateau people" and "Snake Indians". Remember that only Ruth Gruhn believes occupation dates back 15K years. The consensus is 10K.
  • 20. Or: "Evidence indicates that human habitation in the forest began towards the end of the last ice age: bone fragments around 10,000 years old have been found in Wilson Butte Cave, an archaeological site believed to have been occupied until 400 years ago by (indigenous) people formerly known as Snake Indians". Getting in the Snake Indian blurb might be useful since it leads nicely to the Shoshoni.
  • 21 Or: "Excavations at Wilson Butte Cave suggest human occupation at Boise Forest began around 10,000 years ago: bone fragments unearthed in the cave indicate it was settled towards the end of the last ice age, before being abandoned about 400 BP.

Thurday Singora (talk) 06:08, 31 March 2016 (UTC)[reply]

  • 22. Map added. Have I got it right? If not, I've kept the PSD. For some reason the infobox template isn't generating the red marker. Just noticed that markers aren't generated for Yellowstone National Park and Zion National Park, so maybe this template only works with a blank map. I'll do more this evening. Quick update: with Buçaco Forest the on-page marker is generated with percentages rather than geo-coordinates. I'm pretty sure now we can do the same for Boise and, perhaps, Yellowstone and Zion.

Saturday Singora (talk) 15:16, 2 April 2016 (UTC)[reply]

  • 23. Map marker added to inofox. The marker is generated with X & Y parameters (rather than map_locator fields used by the Bucaco Forest template) and sits neatly on top of the larger red dot added with Photoshop. I see you have another featured article, Sawtooth National Forest, so you could now easily re-jig the map as per Boise.
  • Thanks
  • 24. Delete "on a bed of ancient lava". It's implied by the blurb re: inflationary caves & Snake River Plain.

Note to Admin Singora (talk) 06:39, 8 April 2016 (UTC) I see now this article is at the bottom of the FAC list. Please don't archive it. I promised CasLiber I'll review it, and I will; I won't let the nominator down. I'll try to complete the review over the weekend.[reply]

If you want to make grammar and other minor edits like some of your comments above while you review, go for it. I'll review any changes you make to be sure you didn't inadvertently change the meaning. If you would rather just leave comments, that's fine too. Fredlyfish4 (talk) 13:44, 8 April 2016 (UTC)[reply]

Sunday Singora (talk) 22:06, 10 April 2016 (UTC)[reply]

  • 25. OK - I'll pick out a few obvious examples of repetition you'll need to address:
    • 25.1 "Elevations in the forest range from 2,800 feet (850 m) in the North Fork Payette River Canyon to 9,730 feet (2,970 m) at the top of Steel Mountain, an elevation gain of 6,930 feet (2,110 m)"
      • Removed second elevation
    • 25.2 "The Boise Mountains cover much of the southern portion of the forest and contain the forest's highest point, Steel Mountain, but the range's highest point, Two Point Mountain, lies outside of the forest's boundary", followed immediately by "The Trinity Mountains are a subrange in southeastern part of the Boise Mountains that reach their highest point at 9,451 feet (2,881 m) on Trinity Mountain". You seem to have a "highest point" fetish!
      • No. Changed the second one to peak, but parallelism is more important in the first sentence.
    • 25.3 "The forest borders parts of seven reservoirs, none of which are owned or managed by the Forest Service, which provides access to and recreation opportunities at the reservoirs". Logic: are the recreation opportunities you refer to a consequence of the reservoirs not being managed by the Forest Service? Re-write and drop the repetition.
      • I think this sentence has been rewritten by other users a couple times, but here goes another...
    • 25.4 "The largest natural lake in the forest is Warm Lake, and there several other smaller natural lakes"
      • Removed the second natural, though it could be perceived to alter the meaning.
    • 25.5 "Average annual snowfall ranges from 55 inches (140 cm) in drier areas and at lower elevations to 70 inches (180 cm) in wetter areas and higher elevations"
      • Changed second areas to locations.
    • 25.6 "In addition to species listed or proposed for listing as threatened or endangered under the Endangered Species Act, the Forest Service maintains an independent listing of sensitive species for which it is directed to develop and implement management practices to ensure that species do not become threatened or endangered because of Forest Service actions". How many times does the word "species" appear in this sentence? I make it four. How many did you count?
      • None of them can be removed without drastically altering the meaning. I mean maybe the first one, but it would have to be replaced by "plants, animals, fungi, algae, etc." "Endangered Species Act" is a law and cannot be shortened. "Sensitive species" is a specific Forest Service designation. The last "species" is part of a quote.
    • 25.7 "The forests are primarily coniferous evergreens, dominated by ponderosa pine, lodgepole pine, and Douglas fir at lower elevations and Engelmann spruce, subalpine fir, and whitebark pine at higher elevations"
      • Changed to "...dominated by Douglas fir and ponderosa and lodgepole pines at lower elevations and Engelmann spruce, subalpine fir, and whitebark pine at higher elevations." Both elevations help to maintain parallelism.
    • 25.8 "In 2013 revenues from recreation and special use fees totaled $454,635, while expenses totaled US$352,550". Do you know what a synonym is?
  • Changed this, but parallelism is important too.
  • 26. In the FLORA section, every paragraph except the last discusses elevation. Could you not divide this section into two or three smaller sections (high and low elevations, for example) in order not to keep repeating the word "elevation"? It's VERY repetitive at present and hard to read.
  • Almost every section discusses elevation just like it discusses climate and other factors (such as aspect, slope, latitude) that are critical to determining the vegetation communities found at a specific site. It cannot simply be divided into high/low elevation because that would be arbitrary, and as the section explains, there's a lot of overlap among communities depending on elevation. There aren't synonyms that you can use to replace elevation without changing the meaning. What I did do is move the last two paragraphs after the first so that the first paragraph remains an overview of the forest's vegetation, the second about plants of special concern, and the last about invasives. I then created a subsection with the rest of the content going into the details about the communities. I also restricted the use of elevation to when it is not accompanied by specific numerical ranges except during the first occurrence, which acts as an example.
  • 27. This sentence has four refs: "The forest's management indicator species is bull trout because they are sensitive to habitat changes and depend on specific habitat conditions". Are they all needed? Why so many for such a simple sentence?
  • Down to one
  • 28. This one also has four refs: "Grizzly bears have become locally extinct, and plans for their reintroduction to central Idaho have been proposed since the 1990s but have not progressed"
  • Removed two
  • 29. Why not divide the first two paragraphs of the RECREATION section into non-motorized and motorized activities.
  • Similar to the high/low elevation in the flora section, that division is not that simple and can get into the debate of what is considered motorized use of forest lands (particularlly wilderness and bicycles). I reorganized and added a waterways section instead.
  • 30. You have consecutive sentences starting with "The Ponderosa Pine Byway".
  • Revised to "This route" in the second sentence
  • 31 You have several errors where something like this "An estimated 76 percent of Boise National Forest is forest, which according to the Forest Service is considered to be land that is capable of supporting trees on at least 50 percent of its area" could be re-written like this "An estimated 76 percent of Boise National Forest is forest, which according to the Forest Service is considered (to be) land that is capable of supporting trees on at least 50 percent of its area" or even this "An estimated 76 percent of Boise National Forest is forest, which according to the Forest Service is considered (to be) land (that is) capable of supporting trees on at least 50 percent of its area". There's a lot of redundancy and repetition in this article.
  • Done
  • 32. Do you know how to use footnotes? I think big chunks of this article would function better as notes. Parts of the FIRE ECOLOGY section, for example, are pretty hard going; some of the MANAGEMENT blurb is also quite intense.
  • The second management paragraph I transferred into a table, which fits it much better than a footnote or paragraph. Someone had suggested that previously, but I couldn't visualize it correctly until now. I split the end of the first fire management paragraph that include examples of fires into a separate paragraph and revised the similar section of prescribed burns in the following paragraph. Fredlyfish4 (talk) 23:14, 11 April 2016 (UTC)[reply]

Thursday Singora (talk) 22:03, 14 April 2016 (UTC)[reply]

  • 33. Originally you had: "The largest natural lake in the forest is Warm Lake, and there several other smaller natural lakes".
    • 33.1. You now have: "The largest natural lake in the forest is Warm Lake, and there several other smaller lakes, particularly in the Trinity and West mountains. Most of these lakes are tarns created by alpine glaciers during the Pleistocene".
    • 33.2. These two sentences use the word lake three times, not counting the name, Warm Lake.
    • 33.3. So, how about:
    • 33.4. There are lots of natural lakes in the forest, most of which are tarns created by alpine glaciers during the Pleistocene. The largest, Warm Lake, is 26 miles (42 km) east of Cascade in Valley County; many of the smaller lakes are in the Trinity and West mountains.
      • Changed to a version of this.
    • 33.5. Or:
    • 33.6. Most of the forest's natural lakes are tarns created by alpine glaciers during the Pleistocene: the largest, Warm Lake, is 26 miles (42 km) east of Cascade in Valley County; many of the smaller lakes are in the Trinity and West mountains.
    • 33.7. The above sentences are only slightly longer than yours but contain more information (ie, 26 miles east ...) and less repetition.
    • 33.8. You could even try:
    • 33.9. Natural lakes, most of which are tarns created by alpine glaciers during the Pleistocene, can be found throughout (much of) the forest, particularly in the Trinity and West mountains. The largest, Warm Lake, is 26 miles (42 km) east of Cascade in Valley County and a popular destination for camping, fishing, and hunting.
      • Saying something is "popular" is often very subjective and always needs a source. I've had several people bring that up in the past, so I stay away from it.
      • My text was just an example. I copied it from the Warm Lake article. The text is supported by a source. Check it and see. Note that the archived PDF seems not to support OCR (optical character recognition), so you'll need to search the original for accuracy. I see the word "popular" used five times in the PDF.Singora (talk) 10:35, 16 April 2016 (UTC)[reply]
  • 34. You talk a lot about "parallelism". I see little evidence of parallelism in the PhD theses and academic journals I read. Go through the article again and see if you can combine sentences to strip out more repetition.
  • 35. You've changed things to: "The Forest Service provides access to and recreation opportunities at the seven reservoirs it borders, although it does not own or manage any of them". What purpose does "any of" serve? Look for more examples of redundancy.
    • Removed "any of"
  • 36. The structure looks better! The new table is good, but looks a bit uncomfortable alongside that VERY BIG map. Why is it so big? Would it not work better as the image for the infobox? I think you should move it.

Tuesday Singora (talk) 19:42, 19 April 2016 (UTC)[reply]
OK - I'll go through this one last time. If I spot less than 10 problems I'll support; if I find more I'll let you find someone else to offer further opinions / feedback..

  • 37. "Trappers and fur traders that were descendants of Europeans" -> "Trappers and fur traders of European descent" or "Trappers and fur traders descended from Europeans".
    • Done.
  • 38. "In 1898 the forest's first gold dredge was built in Placerville and was followed by several others". The second "was" is redundant. Think: the man is tall and he is strong -> the main is tall and strong.
    • Done.
  • 39. "A shortage of Mercury during World War II led the mines in the Stibnite area to become the second largest producer of mercury in the country and the largest producer of tungsten"
    • 39.1. "Following a shortage of metals during WWII, mines in the Stibnite area became the country's largest producer of tungsten and second largest source of mercury"
    • 39.2. "Following increased demand for metals during WWII, mines in the Stibnite area became the country's largest producer of tungsten and second largest source of mercury"
    • 39.3. Both examples above mean pretty much the same thing and drop the repetition of mercury and producer.
      • Changed this to 39.1, but kept mercury instead of metals. I know you really would rather do without the repetition, but it's more accurate this way.
  • 40. I'm sure this is accurate, but it means nothing to me "The U.S. President was given the authority to establish forest reserves administered by the U.S. Department of the Interior by the Forest Reserve Act of 1891. With the passage of the Transfer Act of 1905, forest reserves were transferred to the U.S. Department of Agriculture in the newly created U.S. Forest Service"
    • It describes what enabled the forest's creation and is directly connected to the preceding and following sentences.
  • 41. This is messy "All four rivers are tributaries of the Snake River, which itself is a tributary of the Columbia River, which flows into the Pacific Ocean"
    • Changed to "...Snake River, which itself is a tributary of the Columbia River in the Pacific basin."
  • 42. "Daily high temperatures range from 9 to 29 °F (−13 to −2 °C) in winter to 80 to 90 °F (27 to 32 °C) in summer, when lower elevations can experience conditions over 100 °F (38 °C)."
    • 42.1 when -> while
      • Done.
  • 43 "but when cold air masses do enter the area, they sometimes stagnate in the Snake and Salmon river valleys, enabling very cold temperatures to persist"
    • 43.1. Surely enabling -> causing??
      • Yeah, I think that's better.
  • 44. "Only about two dozen populations of the plant are known to exist, and three-quarters of the populations are in Boise National Forest"
    • 44.1. Only about two dozen populations of the plant are known to exist, and three-quarters of these are in Boise National Forest
    • 44.1. Only about two dozen populations of the plant are known to exist, three-quarters of which are in Boise National Forest
      • Done.
  • 45. I really can't see the point of adding this "The forest contains habitat capable of supporting Ute lady's tresses and Idaho pepperweed, plants listed as threatened under the Endangered Species Act, but has no known populations of them"
    • They're directed by the ESA to manage for potential habitat of threatened or endangered species, which is why it's relevant. I do see why you may think it's unnecessary, so I'm going to remove it. But it could also alternatively be expanded upon as I stated.
  • 46. This looks like an error:
    • 46.1. "The forests are primarily coniferous evergreens, dominated by Douglas fir and ponderosa and lodgepole pines at lower elevations"
    • 46.2. Followed in the next paragraph by ....
    • 46.3. "Douglas fir occasionally occurs in these forests alongside ponderosa pine, particularly at higher elevations"
    • 46.4. If it's not a mistake, it's something many users might find confusing.
      • It's not inaccurate, but definitely could be confusing. Changed to "Due to the occurrence of frequent non-lethal fires, ponderosa pine dominates these forests alongside Douglas fir."
  • 47. You say "In cool, moist areas ranging from 4,800 feet (1,500 m) to 6,800 feet (2,100 m), Douglas fir is predominant". Surely this is a higher elevation.
    • 47.1. But you've already said "The forests are primarily coniferous evergreens, dominated by Douglas fir ... at lower elevations"
      • It's hard to put a definition on lower elevation, or what would be considered a low elevation forest in any particular place due to variation in local climate. But I would say an arbitrary boundary would be around 6500 feet for low/high elevation. The lowest elevation in the forest may be 2800 feet, but areas that low are uncommon. Furthermore, forests occur nearly to the forest's maximum elevation of 9800 feet, but this itself is relatively low compared to the 10, 11, or 12000-foot elevations in adjacent forests (and large valleys with floors of 6500 feet). So, it's accurate as is.
  • 48. Grammar "Habitats in Boise National Forest supports"
    • Fixed

. Conclusion
I still find parts of the Management, Flora and Vegetation Communities sections confusing. As I've said already, I think the Flora section should be re-structured.

Coordinator note - Fredlyfish4, has this had a recent image review? If not, please request one at WT:FAC. --Laser brain (talk) 15:56, 26 April 2016 (UTC)[reply]

Image review by David Fuchs

edit
  • Went through the images; all are PD per age, self-creation, or USG-personnel. No issues with sourcing or proper license tags (there are Flickr tagged images under CC-by-SA but the PD-US tag seems appropriate and superceding). Der Wohltemperierte Fuchs(talk) 15:07, 3 May 2016 (UTC)[reply]
The above discussion is preserved as an archive. Please do not modify it. No further edits should be made to this page.
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