Wikipedia:Featured list candidates/List of chiropterans/archive1

{{la|List of chiropterans}}

{{Wikipedia:Featured list tools|1=List of chiropterans}}

:Nominator(s): PresN 01:59, 21 April 2025 (UTC)

Alright, mammal list #55 in our perpetual series and bat list #14: Chiropterans, or... bats! That's right, we're finally done with the flying mammals, and close it off with our capstone list for the order. This follows the pattern of our previous order capstone lists (carnivorans, artiodactyls, lagomorphs, diprotodonts, primates, eulipotyphlans) as a list of the genera in the order, e.g. one level up from all of our bat species lists. This reduces the hefty ~1300 species into a more manageable 226 rows of the second biggest mammal order, containing almost a quarter of all mammals. Unfortunately, we're still left with the largest article on Wikipedia; unlike the rest of the top 10, which are 95% pointless details, 5% references, this list is 2/3 references by volume, because I need an IUCN reference per species for the habitat/range. Not much to do there without linking to search pages instead of the species pages. In any case, this is all the bats! Some of them are big, most of them are small; some of them are cute, some of them are... well, still cute, but with horrifying little insect-munching needle teeth. But ultimately, legions of readers asking "how many types of bats are there" now get a nice list to look at. As always, the list reflects the scientific consensus as well as the results of prior FLCs. Thanks for reviewing! --PresN 01:59, 21 April 2025 (UTC)

• First few images need alt text.

:*Which images? The set of six at the top has them, as does the map, and when I inspect the html the result has it despite the imagemap.

• The rest need more detailed alts than "brown bat".

:*Alt text describes what the image is, along with nearby information, not what it looks like; the images + context for e.g. the first bat image is "brown bat, Balantiopteryx plicata, "Gray sac-winged bat"). I am not aware of any guideline for alt text that would require a more detailed description of what the bats look like, nor do I think it is useful to readers to know that the bat is hanging on a wall, looking at the viewer. Did you have something specific that you think should be added to the images?

• I know they will be a pain to add but I think all sources need to be archived.

:*As journal citations, not web citations, it's not expected for there to be archive urls (and I haven't for the past 54 lists). The web citations have archives.

• Why do some have maps for locations and some have words? Could more maps be made?

:*I just use the maps that are available, so if there isn't one for the genus then the list doesn't have one; people generally have not made as many maps for genera as opposed to species, so most have to make do with just a text description. Wikipedia-wide needs more maps, but it's a lengthy process to do one and this list would need 100+.

• "Emballonuridae comprises 54 extant species, divided into 14 genera. These genera are grouped into two subfamilies: Emballonurinae, containing sheath-tailed, sac-winged, ghost, and other bat species, and Taphozoinae, containing pouched and tomb bats." needs an inline citation.

:*Done, at the end of the summary section

• The whole paragraph of classification needs inline citations.

:*Done, at the end of the summary section

• Ping when done. History6042😊 (Contact me) 21:30, 21 April 2025 (UTC)

:*{{re|History6042}} Replied inline/done, thanks for reviewing! --PresN 00:45, 23 April 2025 (UTC)

:*:Seems good, support. History6042😊 (Contact me) 00:48, 23 April 2025 (UTC)

• Family is linked twice in the lead
• When only one is listed habitats should be singular
• Why are some dropdown menus auto open while some are auto closed?

: Ping me when done Olliefant (she/her) 23:32, 21 April 2025 (UTC)

::Fixed, added to template and fixed, and they're auto closed when there's more than seven species, which is about the point that it starts stretching the row to fit. Thanks for reviewing! --PresN 00:25, 23 April 2025 (UTC)

:::Support Olliefant (she/her) 12:50, 23 April 2025 (UTC)

Wow, another amazing page!

• I wouldn't say "colloquially bats" – that's the name used by anyone not discussing scientific taxonomy not merely "colloquial" so reword for a lay reader.
• Eliminate "currently", content is already implied to be accurate to now.
• "classified mammal species" – any species is implied to be classified
• "but also including"
• "families Furipteridae, Mormoopidae, Mystacinidae, Myzopodidae, Noctilionidae, Phyllostomidae, and Thyropteridae and containing the mustached, sucker-footed, bulldog, leaf-nosed, vampire, long-tongued, big-eared, broad-nosed, and disk-winged bats" and the rest of the paragraph is hard to follow with all the common and scientific names. Perhaps put the family names into parentheses after each common name. This paragraph also says "containing" a lot, so changes could make it more concise or clearer. Reywas92^Talk 03:30, 22 April 2025 (UTC)

::{{re|Reywas92}} Done all of these. Thanks for reviewing! --PresN 00:11, 23 April 2025 (UTC)

General notes:

• Is there any source for the number of endangered species anywhere in the body of the list?

:*There is not, it's a summary of the child lists (where it is present), so I'm going to remove that part of the sentence for now.

• Just for my own understanding, I'm assuming the numbers of extinct species are supported by adding up the ones that are individually listed as "extinct" in their respective entries per WP:CALC?

:*Yes

• Does Mammal Species of the World (2005) support the names and years throughout the list (e.g. Gervais, 1856).

:*It does, as does the IUCN cites for each species

• I understand that this might be standard for this sort of list and that there are practical considerations, but don't the collapsed lists of species fall afoul of MOS:COLLAPSE?

:*People have been fine with it as it's not text content, just lists of species names, and I've verified that it shows up correctly if you have javascript off or "do not collapse" features turned on and on mobile.

• It's confusing that "unknown" is listed alongside known habitats. I'm guessing that one or more specific species within the family are unknown here? If that's what's happening, it should be made clear in some way.

:*Change it to be "(some species unknown)" and always at the end of the list of habitats

None of these are things that I'd count against the article, but I feel they're also worth noting:

• "the order as a whole" feels informal to me.

:*Changed to just "the order"

• "capable of true and sustained flight" – Would this still be correct if we omitted "true" and just said "sustained flight"? I want to say that gliding mammals would still be excluded by sustained.

:*I think so, changed

• "both with no tail" – This seems like a minor detail; the size of the animal is what matters, not what body parts contribute to it.

:*I'm fine with dropping the ", both with no tail" bit, it does read oddly here. The reason it's there is that sizes are typically (well, always in these lists) given as e.g. "10 cm long plus a 3 cm tail", because for e.g. a cat "head/body + tail" as two measurements gives more information than just "total length if the tail was stretched out" and matches better what readers think of as "size". In this case, both the largest and smallest bats don't have tails, but the sizes given throughout the tables follow the HB + T pattern so the lead was doing the same.

• The list of families in the lead is rather cluttered. This is normally something I'd suggest should be bulleted, and I'm wondering if it should be removed since the bulleted version immediately follows this.

:*Yeah, I rearranged it for the above reviewer, but it's still a lot of latin names in a big paragraph. I've reworked it again to just use the common names and link to the families; is that better?

I love that this exists. Certainly worthy to hold the title of largest article. Thebiguglyalien (talk) 🛸 21:58, 24 April 2025 (UTC)

:{{re|Thebiguglyalien}} Thanks, and thanks for the review! Responded inline. --PresN 14:21, 25 April 2025 (UTC)

::Looks good! The brief list of species in the lead is especially satisfying to read now. Support. Thebiguglyalien (talk) 🛸 15:28, 25 April 2025 (UTC)

• Source review: Passed
• Reliable enough for the information being cited
• Consistent date formatting
• Consistent and proper reference formatting
• Appropriate wikilinks where applicable
• Spot checks on 20 sources match what they are being cited for

Looks good! Support Hey man im josh (talk) 15:58, 1 May 2025 (UTC)

{{FLCClosed|promoted}} Hey man im josh (talk) 18:47, 12 May 2025 (UTC)

:The above discussion is preserved as an archive. Please do not modify it. No further edits should be made to this page.