The following discussion is an archived debate of the proposed deletion of the article below. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the article's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this page.

The result was delete‎. Liz ^{Read! Talk!} 06:13, 9 October 2023 (UTC)[reply]

List of Lepidoptera that feed on Aster[edit]

[Hide this box] New to Articles for deletion (AfD)? Read these primers!

(Find sources: Google (books · news · scholar · free images · WP refs) · FENS · JSTOR · TWL)

Don't really see how this can at all be construed as a notable topic; there's probably tons of butterflies that feed on the 170 species of Aster that commonly occur around the world, but no RS discusses them as a group. AryKun (talk) 16:20, 2 October 2023 (UTC)[reply]

Note: This discussion has been included in the deletion sorting lists for the following topics: Biology and Lists. AryKun (talk) 16:20, 2 October 2023 (UTC)[reply]
There seems to be support for deleting the whole series of lists, so I am also nominating the following related pages:

Delete Maybe this would work as a category? But even then, that's weirdly specific. CaptainEek ^{Edits Ho Cap'n!}⚓ 19:51, 2 October 2023 (UTC)[reply]
Contextual note: A search for intitle:"List of Lepidoptera that feed on" shows that there are 66 lists in this series. Almost all of them are similar to this one, but some may have had some additional work. I believe these were all based on HOSTS - a Database of the World's Lepidopteran Hostplants which was a major work by the Natural History Museum, London, but which has not been kept up to date. It says "Please note: HOSTS will not be further updated or amended. This dataset is an archival resource and has been made available in full for those who wish to re-use and build on the data, not as an ongoing project." Oddly it also says it was last updated March 24, 2023. I suspect deletion is the right choice, but the entire list should be addressed. SchreiberBike | ⌨ 21:15, 2 October 2023 (UTC)[reply]
SchreiberBike, I'd like to add all of those lists to this nomination, but don't know how; could you help? HOSTS just seems to be a database, so I don't think its coverage of this subject contributes to notability at all. It's also clearly ridiculous to have lists of Lepidoptera that feed on genera with huge rages and hundreds of species, as is the case in many of these lists. AryKun (talk) 07:58, 3 October 2023 (UTC)[reply]
@AryKun: The instructions for doing that are at WP:MULTIAFD. There it suggests starting with one, then if there's clear consensus on that, doing the rest of them all at once in a separate process. I think that makes sense because this example isn't clearly listed as a reason to do multiple deletions, and I don't have time to figure out how to do it right now. It probably means this discussion and that discussion when it happens should be advertised fairly widely. If this plan makes sense to you and others, I will let WP:LEPID, WP:PLANTS and WP:BIOLOGY know. If you have other ideas, let's discuss. Thank you, SchreiberBike | ⌨ 12:53, 3 October 2023 (UTC)[reply]
SchreiberBike, I've bundled the other lists into this discussion and notified the relevant Wikiprojects (I notified WP:TOL instead of Biology because Biology seems to high-level to be concerned with this specifically. AryKun (talk) 09:54, 5 October 2023 (UTC)[reply]
AryKun, FYI, I added three pages to this AfD from Category:Lists of Lepidoptera by food that weren't included. I am not sure if you would also like to nominate Larval food plants of Lepidoptera. — The Earwig (talk) 19:16, 7 October 2023 (UTC)[reply]
Delete, and I would support extending this to the entire series identified in the comment above. This is several steps too far in the direction of using Wikipedia as a simple mirror of a database available elsewhere on the web. The content seems to consist entirely of the HOSTS DB, which under one freely accessible link already offers this exact information - including much more extensive contextual column sorting. I don't think that it would be an issue that the DB is no longer updated, since this is not exactly a rapidly evolving topic and in any case such lists need not claim to be complete. But it is a problem that this constitutes a single-source database dump. Not what we are here for. --Elmidae (talk · contribs) 13:15, 3 October 2023 (UTC)[reply]
Delete - I think this topic would work if it were one level of organisation higher (i.e. Lepidopteran families specialised onto Asteraceae) but I don't think sources are granular enough to work at this level. NeverRainsButPours (talk) 08:25, 5 October 2023 (UTC)[reply]
Comment - I have added the external link for the NHM host database to the Lepidoptera article in case these lists are deleted and the link is lost. Tony Holkham (Talk) 10:26, 5 October 2023 (UTC)[reply]
Comment (Leaning Keep) If sources like this (etc) exist (for hazel), is it not that the topic meets the requirement for WP:NLIST as it has been discussed as a group? So shouldn't this be kept and sourced rather than deleted? Procedurally speaking, having to check if each and every group has been the subject of extent literature may take a. lot. of. time. So there, too, leaning procedural keep. Best, -My, oh my! (Mushy Yank) 10:50, 5 October 2023 (UTC)[reply]
That's a pretty standard primary paper in the vein of "what species feed on what in this area" and doesn't contribute to notability imo. As another example, any large mammalian predator (eg the jaguar) will have many scholarly papers listing what other animals they eat; we just mention major ones in the main article and leave the rest, because it's basically just scientific trivia. AryKun (talk) 16:34, 5 October 2023 (UTC)[reply]
Large mammalian predators are much less specialized in what they feed on then lepidopteran larvae, which may only feed on a single species of plant (Fender's blue butterfly only feeds on one subspecies of Lupinus sulphureus). For many lepidoteran species, it is far more feasible to list every plant they have been observed to feed on than it is to list every animal a jaguar has been observed to eat (however, that information would belong in the article on the lepidoteran species and doesn't necessarily justify lists like these). Plantdrew (talk) 16:51, 5 October 2023 (UTC)[reply]
But we aren't listing what plants the butterflies are feeding on, we're listing what butterflies feed on the plants. So many of these genera have cosmopolitan distributions and dozens of species; there are hundreds, if not thousands, of butterflies that feed on them, and no notability to that collection of species. AryKun (talk) 17:02, 5 October 2023 (UTC)[reply]
Delete - Too specific and not appropriate for Wikipedia. - Aa77zz (talk) 12:08, 5 October 2023 (UTC)[reply]
Comment - I would say that a few of these lists are actually valuable to keep in place, though most are not. I would support a limited set of deletions, but not the wholesale elimination of all the articles. The criterion I would suggest is this: is the plant a major crop plant or keystone ecological plant (i.e., major tree or invasive species)? If so, then keep that particular list. That would mean oaks, pines, elms, pears, cotton, spruce, eucalyptus, alders, beeches, grasses, willows, Cirsium, birches, Solanum, Brassica, maples, Prunus, poplars, ash, grapevines, and Malus would easily pass that criterion. Obviously, I'm suggesting a rather subjective cutoff, but in principle I would argue that this is a fair parallel to Wikipedia's general requirements for "notability". A lot of the plants in the existing array of articles are really not that notable, and lists of their herbivores are not of general interest, but the ones I just mentioned (and perhaps a few ornamentals like roses) are well-known plants whose herbivores are diverse and noteworthy. I would not be averse to a discussion about this, here or in private, but - again - I don't like the idea of removing ALL of these articles. The only other comment I would make is that if a plant has an existing "List of insects that feed on X" then the lepidopteran list should be merged with that list, so the Lepidoptera-only list can be safely deleted. Yes, I'm suggesting a bit of care and research here, but I think it's merited. Dyanega (talk) 16:21, 5 October 2023 (UTC)[reply]
Most taxa in these lists have at a minimum several dozen species, and many have hundreds (grasses theoretically covers 13,000!). This is clearly ridiculous; at that point, there's thousands of butterflies and moths that sometimes feed on them; if any of them are particularly notable, just mention them briefly in the main article; otherwise, it's just database replication. AryKun (talk) 16:31, 5 October 2023 (UTC)[reply]

You seem to misunderstand; the insects are not the criterion, it doesn't matter whether any of them are notable. It's the PLANT that should be notable. Oaks are notable, even if the associated moths are not. Speaking from a very (and strictly) practical viewpoint, it is very helpful to have a list of moths known to feed on a given plant if you are, like I am, an entomologist who is sent a sample of a moth from (e.g.) an oak. I can look at the list, and narrow the search to a very tiny subset of moths, instead of starting from scratch. Again, for keystone ecological plant and major crops, the list of known herbivores is valuable information. Dyanega (talk) 18:34, 5 October 2023 (UTC)[reply]

You could then look at the database we’re copying this from? I mean, this is a pretty clear NOTDATABASE violation, and I’m really struggling to see a situation in which a list of every lepidopteran pollinator of a cosmopolitan genus is helpful for identification. AryKun (talk) 19:08, 5 October 2023 (UTC)[reply]

That claim depends on your perspective regarding the two main features of these existing articles. The first feature, the list of species per se, is, as you note, redundant; you could post links to HOSTS that have already had a search query performed, and use those links to replace the deleted articles (on the pages that presently link there). So, for example, this search query for oaks shows all the entries for oak-feeders, and to that extent then I would agree that replacing the links that presently point to (e.g.) "List of Lepidoptera that feed on oaks" is not the worst alternative. Linking to HOSTS could allow that particular utility to persist in the absence of full articles. However, the primary functional difference, and the main argument for retaining any of these articles, is that the HOSTS database (1) does not link to the articles for the various lepidopterans, or (2) explain what the insects ARE, like the Wikipedia articles (i.e., giving common names, or indicating whether they are specialist or generalist feeders). That functionality goes far beyond just giving the insect scientific name, and is absolutely unique to Wikipedia, so it deserves a little more than casual consideration prior to deletion. That's why the NOTDATABASE criticism is not accurate here; the database in question gives zero information on the various listed insects. Just look at a side-by-side comparison of that HOSTS query result above, and compare it to the List of Lepidoptera that feed on oaks article itself. For one thing, the WP article is significantly abbreviated (HOSTS has over 6,000 records, so the WP article is not just an unedited data dump), and there are some species listed in the WP article that did not come from HOSTS. I would argue that the WP article has a considerable amount of "value added" - including (and especially) the hyperlinking - that makes it much more than just a plagiarized database. Or are you claiming that no amount of value-added features or content can justify extracting information from a database and making it available here? Dyanega (talk) 21:00, 5 October 2023 (UTC)[reply]

I somewhat agree with your comment, but I think that the information could easily go into information about a genus's or species's Ecology or other information section. For example Taraxacum has a section Food for wildlife where the "List of Lepidoptera that feed on dandelions" could be placed rather than as a stand alone article. I'm headed over there to place a comment too see if there would be an objection to doing that. 🌿MtBotany (talk) 23:29, 5 October 2023 (UTC)[reply]

Delete all. Here from this note. As much as I'd like to see more entomology info out there, these all run against WP:INDISCRIMINATE, especially with being primarily sourced to a database that isn't discriminating what is WP:DUE. If better sources highlight key feeders of a specific type of plant, then that could be listed in prose at a respective article, but I wouldn't be in favor of just moving lists to a given plant article. As others mentioned, a few primary scholarly sources will sometimes group descriptions by X feeders, but that doesn't confer notability to the whole group. Instead, a given group would have to have some pretty serious discussion as a whole group to warrant a list article. KoA (talk) 00:10, 6 October 2023 (UTC)[reply]
Delete all per KoA: Wikipedia is not a database, these lists violate INDISCRIMINATE, and aside from HOSTS there is little scholarly discussion of all the lepidopterans that feed on a given plant. I would also like to point out the mangled titles: It should be "List of lepidopterans that feed on X". Happy editing, SilverTiger12 (talk) 13:49, 6 October 2023 (UTC)[reply]
Delete all. It looks like someone just wanted to wikify HOSTS - A Database of the World's Lepidopteran Hostplants. To the extent that some of this information might be notable for Wikipedia, it would belong on a specific page, ideally with an additional source explaining why it's notable that a certain butterfly eats a certain plant. --Tserton (talk) 18:58, 6 October 2023 (UTC)[reply]
Comment: would these work as categories instead? That moves the maintenance responsibility to the species' pages while still providing a list of members for each group, which seems better, though we lose some of the organization and commentary. For species with specific hosts the category would be a defining feature but for less specialized species like Alcis repandata (which is on nine of these lists) that would likely be overcategorization. So maybe having categories for obligate hosts or nearly obligate is more maintainable. But is that useful? — The Earwig (talk) 19:10, 7 October 2023 (UTC)[reply]
I don't think it'd be too useful. For obligate or near-obligate feeders on a particular species, it'd presumably be mentioned in the article text, and as you said, it'd be overcategorization for the rest. AryKun (talk) 19:40, 7 October 2023 (UTC)[reply]

The above discussion is preserved as an archive of the debate. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the article's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this page.