Wikipedia:WikiProject Animals/Draft capitalization guidelines

Please feel free to modify anything on this page

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Purpose of this draft proposal:

• To clarify and confirm existing uncontroversial guidelines and conventions, and present them in a "quick-reference" table format, for inclusion into the guidelines for the capitalization of common names of species in order to:

a) help prevent multiple page moves of existing articles;

b) help ensure new articles are properly named when created

• To possibly agree upon new conventions currently unresolved.

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Proposed additions/clarifications to guidelines:

• Common names of animal species are written either in title case or sentence case depending upon the taxonomic group (shown below).

• In title case, the first letter of every important word is capitalized (e.g., Grey Currawong, Duke of Burgundy), except for words that follow a hyphen (e.g., Brown-headed Spider Monkey).
• In sentence case, no capital letters are used (e.g., brown bear, ray-finned shark), except for proper names (e.g., North American beaver, Roosevelt's elk).

• Names of higher categories of animals are always written in sentence case (e.g., kangaroo rat, river martin).

• Individual articles should be consistent in using either title or sentence case for common names. If an article on an animal species uses title-case title, all species mentioned in the text should have their name in title case.

WikiProject examples

Animal type	Case to use	Example article title	Usage in prose	Current status of non-group articles	Capitalisation of groups	Group use in prose	Remarks/exceptions
Mammals	Sentence	Polar bear	The polar bear is a bear.	Mixed	Sentence		Per naming conventions as WP Mammals doesn't have project specific guidelines.
Primates	Sentence	Ring-tailed lemur	The ring-tailed lemur is a primate.	Mixed – converting to lower	Sentence	ruffed lemur
Cetaceans	Sentence	Pygmy blue whale	The pygmy blue whale is a whale.	Mainly sentence	Sentence	blue whale
Rodents	Sentence	Guinea pig	The guinea pig is a species of rodent.	Mixed	Sentence	mouse
Birds	Upper	Bald Eagle	A Bald Eagle is a bird.	Actively upper	Sentence	thick-billed parrot bluebird	Lower case should be used in contexts outside of ornithology
	Upper	Palawan Peacock-Pheasant	A Palawan Peacock-Pheasant is a bird.		Sentence		see Talk:Palawan Peacock-Pheasant
Insects	Sentence	Red imported fire ant	The red imported fire ant (Solenopsis invicta) is one of over 280 species ...	100% sentence	Sentence	rove beetle	Lepidoptera and Odonata species may be capitalised
Butterflies and moths	Mixed	Gypsy moth	The gypsy moth is a moth.	More upper	Sentence	skipper	Ditto
Fishes	Sentence	Ocean sunfish	The ocean sunfish is a fish.	Mainly sentence	Sentence	catfish	Project guideline
Sharks	Sentence	Oceanic whitetip shark	The oceanic whitetip shark is a shark.	100% sentence	Sentence	bullhead shark
Amphibians and reptiles	Sentence	Komodo dragon	The Komodo dragon is a reptile.	Mixed	Sentence	poison dart frog
Turtles	Sentence	Loggerhead sea turtle	The loggerhead sea turtle is a turtle.	100% sentence	Sentence	sea turtle
Arthropods	Sentence	American lobster	American lobsters are usually bluish green to brown.	100% sentence	Sentence	lobster	Few common name articles
Spiders	Sentence	Katipo	A bite from the katipo produces a toxic syndrome.	100% sentence	Sentence	orb-weaver spider
Cephalopods
Gastropods	Sentence	Lightning whelk	The lightning whelk is a large edible sea snail.	Mostly sentence	Sentence	door snail

Addendum - breeds

Animal type	Case to use	Example article title	Usage in prose	Current status of non-group articles	Capitalisation of groups	Group use in prose	Remarks/exceptions
Dogs	Upper	Beagle	A Beagle is a dog.	Actively upper	-	-	Guidelines not followed
Equine	Upper	American Quarter Horse	The American Quarter Horse is a breed of horse.	Actively upper	-	-	Distinction between breed and type often must be determined on a case-by-case basis

See also

• Wikipedia:Specialist style fallacy