Talk:Squirrel (disambiguation)

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Squirrel (animal)[edit]

Someone, somewhere in the world, punches s-q-u-i-r-r-e-l into wikipedia search. He hits this page. How do we best direct them to the best place?

Possibilities:

Tree squirrels
Ground Squirrels, animals who are commonly called so only, excluding the larger ones which tend not to be called or even thought of as "squirrels" at all, marmots, woodchucks, or prairie dogs.
Ground Squirrel as Taxonomically defined, including grounds squirrels not commonly called "squirrels" in English.
Flying squirrels
West African Scaly-tailed Squirrels

Are there more "false squirrels"?

getting the facts[edit]

I’ve been trying to understand the situation. The way I read [1], there are five basic kinds of rodent, only two of which contain animals that, rightly or wrongly, are called “squirrels”. Both of these suborders, the sciuromorpha, and the Anomaluromorpha.

It’s important to note that , while both of these groups contain “squirrels”, they also contain other rodents which no one calls “squirrels”, such as mountain beavers in the former and spring hares in the latter.

By following down those two lines, we can eliminate these groups devoid of “squirrels”. Have we found two groups with nothing but squirrels in them? With this web site, we can go no further down the Anomalurodae, so that remains for a moment, to be seen, but the website does seem to say that the anomaluroidae is synonymous with “scaly-tailed squirrels”.

The Scurdae, however, are not shown as synonymous with the word “squirrel”. It has chipmonks, marmots, and prairie dogs, all of which are not likely targets for a person typing “squirrel” into the search engine. So we follow to this page: http://tolweb.org/Sciuridae/16456.

Here we learn that there are five main types of these, which are all probably “true squirrels” of one kind or another. Starting from the bottom up, we find the Neotropical Pygmy squirrel, Sciurilinae, and the Giant squirrel (Ratufinae). Next, there are the Sciurinae, of which there are two types, the flying squirrels on one hand, (pteromyini), and then on the other hand, another, unnamed cleave including the basic tree squirrels, the (Sciurini), and then on the other hand the Tamiascurini, or “Chickaree squirrels, which as I Google them, turn out to look exactly like tree squirrels in my book. Then skipping to the top we have the Callosciuinae, which have nothing but tree squirrels of one kind or another. The last of these groups is the Xerinae, which we must follow for common names to this page:

http://tolweb.org/Xerinae/50680. Here we find the three groups, the African Ground Squirrels and Long-clawed ground squirrels, which all look pretty ground-squirrely to me. Then there are the Protoxerini, a pretty squirrely picture here.

Then, finally, we run into some trouble with the English Language. The Xerinae also include the Marmontini, which is another ground-squirrel group, and there are six different types of varying squirrlishness. Sciurotamias, or rock squirrels, are not pictured here, but are being called squirrels, as are the Antelope ground squirrels, Ammospermophius, and another large group of ground squirrels alled “Spermolphius”, although we’re warned they are non-monophyletic, although I’d rather assume they weren’t. Then there are the prairie dogs, cynomys, which aren’t very squirrelfish, and the marmots and woodchuck, which I don’t know about you but I’ve never heard anyone call “squirrels” except if they were speaking very technically. And then there are the chipmonks, which we don’t call “squirrels” at all but clearly are a kind of ground squirrel. To accept all of these as “squirrels” pushes the definition uncomfortably.

In conclusion:

1. There is probably no one perfect scientific synonym for the English word “squirrel”, although the word “Sciuridae” comes close. 2. To say that Sciuridae = Squirrel is to simplify the question slightly, as a Woodchuck is not very squirrelly, just to name one. 3. To say Sciuridae = Squirrel is to say that The Anomaluridae are not squirrels. There seems to be some support for this, but they are a very squirrelly bunch. 4. There may be no scientific synonym for "tree squirrel" making creation of such an article difficult. Chrisrus (talk) 06:17, 3 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Sorry about reverting you, but...[edit]

First, I'd just sorted out those "other uses" and you reverted them to the disorganized state. So if you undo my undo please don't undo that part.

Second, there are not that many Scuirids that are at all in the gray area around the concept of squirrel. It's not a situation of a) the whole taxon vs. b) tree squirrels - everything else. The sources that distinquished were only quoted as calling it "squirrels, chipmonks, and marmots/woodchucks", max. The way you did it, you had the second option only as tree squirrels or all sciuridae.Chrisrus (talk) 06:07, 20 February 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Specifically, the word "Squirrel", it's Anglo-norman ancestor, and the Greek word Scuirid, all have always refered to those rodents with tails that they could hold over their backs like umbrellas. This has always been the case, and you will notice that all scurids that have such tails are called squirrels:, tree, ground, or flying, antelope, whatever. If it's a Scuirid and it's got the word "squirrel" in it's name, no source to my knowledge has used the word in such a way as to clearly exclude antelope squirrels and such. We are not looking for trouble here, why overstate the separatists case for them? They are only excluding those scirids that don't fit the traditional meaning of the word. The "-dae" suffix indicates the central root + close "allies" (i.e.: Talpinae vs. Talpidae; Caninae vs Canidae, Hominidae vs. Homininae....Chrisrus (talk) 06:19, 20 February 2010 (UTC)[reply]

No, the -dae suffix indicates that it is a family. Please keep your original research out of the article. And do you know what a ground squirrel's tail looks like? Ucucha

As we both know, if a taxon is called a "family" (root + -dae) it means "the (tribble) family of animals, meaning the central form embracing a slightly wider or looser definition than the more central root from which the taxon gets it's name. Like you'd have the tribbles, the tribbles and the closest thing, and so on. Therefore, we are not arguing about this. To say as you do "No, ... family" in no way disagrees with what I said.

Second, any original research or whatever you might call what is alluded to above as I reviewed the facts in the sources is appropiate for a talk page and never in the article, so WP:NOR does not apply.

Third, with regard to the tail, yes. As we both know and would expect, they demonstrate varying degrees of squirrelishness, from huge umbrellas to little chimponk tails. But you are right, who are we to say what constitute a squirrel? That's for the sourses to do, and at some point the Oxford English Dictionary and Mammal Species of World and everyone else accepts most ground squirrels as squirrels.Chrisrus (talk) 17:15, 20 February 2010 (UTC)[reply]

I believe you are wrong on several counts (cf. etymological fallacy), but instead of going off into tangentials, let's focus on the contents of this article. Ucucha 19:04, 20 February 2010 (UTC)[reply]

I have restored a version similar to my previous version, but added a piece saying that "squirrel" can also refer to all sciurids except marmots, chipmunks, and the like. Encyclopedia Britannica explicitly states that to most people, "squirrel" refers to tree squirrels. Ucucha 14:35, 20 February 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Thank you for your help. I didn't know a reliable source had a third common definition that excepted ground squirrels. So now we have three takes on Sciuridae, 1. all 2. all-some ground squirrels 3. all but tree squirrels. Thanks to your cooperation, this page is much, much better than it was a week ago, although further tweeking may be needed.

Chrisrus, please review WP:MOSDAB#Linking to a primary topic. Ucucha 16:12, 20 February 2010 (UTC)[reply]

I see. Given that, which in your opinion should be primary and why? Chrisrus (talk) 17:15, 20 February 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Obviously, squirrel is the primary topic; see WP:PRIMARYTOPIC. Ucucha 19:04, 20 February 2010 (UTC)[reply]

As you know, tribbldae would include the tribbles and their close cousins. So it's not exactly right to equate the tribbldae with the word tribble because, even in cases where we have no evidence of the existence of such close cousins, reason dictates that someone might dig up a fossil of an intermediate form tomorrow, snd that would also be a tribbldae, but not necessarily fully a tribble. It would include intermediate forms that don't fit the root definition. So while I not only do not oppose but in fact appreciate what you are doing by merging these two articles, I would like to work on a compromise wording with you.

Second, we are advised to keep in mind our reader. A person who searches for “giraffe”, should he or she be directed to a page about the giraffe family of animals? Perhaps, but if so, he or she should be told in as upfront a way as appropriate that this is what is being done. This can probably be done in this case with very little change. Chrisrus (talk) 04:06, 21 February 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Didn't my version of this page do precisely that? Ucucha 04:24, 21 February 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Maybe, but we haven't done a primary yet. If the best thing is to send a person who wants to know about squirrels directly to an article about the entire squirrel family, we can do that, but that article needs to be a bit clearer about the difference. So let's take this conversation there if that's what you want to do. Chrisrus (talk) 06:11, 21 February 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Verb Usage?[edit]

Here in the UK, to "squirrel something away", means to take something and put it in a safe place.

For example, in software development, .. "I have took the files, and squirrelled them away"