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American paddlefish

The American paddlefish (Polyodon spathula), also known as a Mississippi paddlefish, spoon-billed cat, or spoonbill, is a species of ray-finned fish. It is the last living species of paddlefish (Polyodontidae). This family is most closely related to the sturgeons; together they make up the order Acipenseriformes, which are one of the most primitive living groups of ray-finned fish. Fossil records of other paddlefish species date back 125 million years to the Early Cretaceous, with records of Polyodon extending back 65 million years to the early Paleocene. The American paddlefish is a smooth-skinned freshwater fish with an almost entirely cartilaginous skeleton and a paddle-shaped rostrum (snout), which extends nearly one-third its body length. It has been referred to as a freshwater shark because of its heterocercal tail or caudal fin resembling that of sharks, though it is not closely related. The American paddlefish is a highly derived fish because it has evolved specialised adaptations such as filter feeding. Its rostrum and cranium are covered with tens of thousands of sensory receptors for locating swarms of zooplankton, its primary food source. The only other species of paddlefish that survived to modern times was the Chinese paddlefish (Psephurus gladius), last sighted in 2003 in the Yangtze River in China and considered to have gone extinct no later than 2010.

The American paddlefish is native to the Mississippi River basin and once moved freely under the relatively unaltered conditions that existed prior to the early 1900s. It commonly inhabited large, free-flowing rivers, braided channels, backwaters, and oxbow lakes throughout the Mississippi River drainage basin, and adjacent Gulf Coast drainages. Its peripheral range extended into the Great Lakes, with occurrences in Lake Huron and Lake Helen in Canada until about 1917. American paddlefish populations have declined dramatically primarily because of overfishing, habitat destruction, and pollution. Poaching has also been a contributing factor to its decline and is liable to continue to be so as long as the demand for caviar remains strong. Naturally occurring American paddlefish populations have been extirpated from most of their peripheral range, as well as from New York, Maryland, Virginia, and Pennsylvania. They have been reintroduced in the Allegheny, Monongahela and Ohio river systems in western Pennsylvania. However, their current range has been reduced to the Mississippi and Missouri River tributaries and Mobile Bay drainage basin. American paddlefish are currently found in twenty-two states in the U.S., and are protected under state, federal and international laws.

Taxonomy, etymology and evolution

In 1797, French naturalist Bernard Germain de Lacépède established the genus Polyodon for paddlefish, which today includes a single extant species, Polyodon spathula. Lacépède disagreed with Pierre Joseph Bonnaterre's description in Tableau encyclopédique et méthodique (1788), which had suggested that paddlefish were a species of shark. When Lacépède established his binomial name Polydon feuille he was unaware the species had already been described in 1792 by taxonomist Johann Julius Walbaum, who had named it as Squalus spathula. Consequently spathula has priority as the specific name (and 'Walbaum, 1792' is the taxonomic authority to be cited). But Walbaum's generic name Squalus was already in use for dogfish, so Lacépède's Polyodon is the valid name for this paddlefish genus. Hence 'Polyodon spathula (Walbaum, 1792)' is the accepted full scientific name of the American paddlefish.

The American paddlefish is the sole surviving species in the paddlefish family, the Polyodontidae. This is the sister group to the sturgeons (family Acipenseridae); evidence from DNA sequences suggest that their last common ancestor lived roughly 140 million years ago. Together these families compose the Acipenseriformes, an order of basal ray-finned fishes. Paddlefish have a long fossil record dating back to the Early Cretaceous 125 million years ago. American paddlefish are often referred to as primitive fish, or relict species, because of morphological characteristics that they retain from some of their early fossil ancestors. These characteristics include a skeleton composed primarily of cartilage, and a deeply forked heterocercal (spine extending into the upper lobe) caudal fin similar to that of sharks, although they are not closely related.

The family Polyodontidae comprises six known species: three fossil species from western North America, one fossil species from China, one recently extinct species from China (the Chinese paddlefish, Psephurus gladius; last recorded 2003), and the single extant species, the American paddlefish, native to the Mississippi River Basin in the United States. DNA sequences suggest the Chinese and American paddlefishes diverged about 68 million years ago. The oldest fossils of paddlefish belonging to Polyodon are those of P. tuberculata from the Lower Paleocene Tullock Member of the Fort Union Formation in Montana, dating to around 65 million years ago. An elongated rostrum is a morphological characteristic of Polyodontidae, but only the genus Polyodon has characteristics adapted specifically for filter feeding, including the jaw, gill arches, and cranium. The gill rakers of American paddlefish are composed of extensive comb-like filaments believed to have inspired the etymology of the genus name, Polyodon, a Greek compound word meaning "many toothed". Adult American paddlefish are actually toothless, although numerous small teeth less than 1 mm were found in a juvenile paddlefish measuring 630 mm. The name spathula references the elongated, paddle-shaped snout or rostrum. Compared to Chinese paddlefish and fossil genera, American paddlefish (and the fossil relative P. tuberculata) are considered to be highly derived because of their specialised adaptations.

Unlike the planktivorous American paddlefish, Chinese paddlefish were strong swimmers, grew larger, and were opportunistic piscivores that fed on small fishes and crustaceans. Some distinct morphological differences of Chinese paddlefish include a narrower, sword-like rostrum, and a protrusible mouth. They also had fewer, thicker gill rakers than American paddlefish.

Description

American paddlefish are among the largest and longest-lived freshwater fishes in North America. They have a shark-like body, average 1.5 m in length, weigh 27 kg, and can live in excess of thirty years. For most populations the median age is five to eight years and the maximum age is fourteen to eighteen years. The age of American paddlefish is best determined by dentary studies, a process which usually occurs on fish harvested during snagging season, a popular sport fishing activity in certain parts of the U.S. The dentary is removed from the lower jawbone, cleaned of any remaining soft tissue, and cross-sectioned to expose the annual rings. The dentary rings are counted in much the same way a tree is aged. Dentary studies suggest that some individuals can live 60 years or longer, and that females typically live longer and grow larger than males.

American paddlefish are smooth-skinned and almost entirely cartilaginous. Their eyes are small and directed laterally. They have a large, tapering operculum flap, a large mouth, and a flat, paddle-shaped rostrum that measures approximately one-third of their body length. During the initial stages of development from embryo to hatchling, American paddlefish have no rostrum. It begins to form shortly after hatching. The rostrum is an extension of the cranium, not of the upper and lower jaws or olfactory system as with the long snouts of other fish. Other distinguishing characteristics include a deeply forked heterocercal caudal fin and dull coloration, often with mottling, ranging from bluish gray to black dorsally grading to a whitish underbelly.

Feeding ecology and physiology
Scientists began to debate the function of the American paddlefish's rostrum when the species was described in the late 1700s. They had once believed it was used to excavate bottom substrate or functioned as a balancing mechanism and navigational aid. However, laboratory experiments in 1993 that utilized advanced technology in the field of electron microscopy have established conclusively that the rostrum of American paddlefish is covered with tens of thousands of sensory receptors. These receptors are morphologically similar to the ampullae of Lorenzini of sharks and rays, and are indeed passive ampullary-type electroreceptors used by American paddlefish to detect plankton. Clusters of electroreceptors also cover the head and operculum flaps. The diet of the American paddlefish consists primarily of zooplankton. Examples of animals in the P. spathula diet are copepods, cladocerans such as Daphnia pulex, and ephemeropteran nymphs. Their electroreceptors can detect weak electrical fields that signal not only the presence of zooplankton, but also the individual feeding and swimming movements of zooplankton appendages. When a swarm of zooplankton is detected, the paddlefish swims forward continuously with its mouth wide open, forcing water over the gill rakers to filter out prey. Such feeding behavior is considered ram suspension-feeding. Further research has indicated that the electroreceptor of the paddlefish may serve as a navigational aid for obstacle avoidance.

American paddlefish have small undeveloped eyes that are directed laterally. Unlike most fishes, American paddlefish hardly respond to overhead shadows or changes in illumination. Electroreception appears to have largely replaced vision as a primary sensory modality, which indicates a reliance on electroreceptors for detecting prey. However, the rostrum is not their only means of food detection. Some reports suggest a damaged rostrum would render American paddlefish less capable of foraging efficiently to maintain good health, but laboratory experiments and field research indicate otherwise. As well as electroreceptors on the rostrum, American paddlefish have sensory pores covering nearly half of the skin surface extending from the rostrum to the top of the head down to the tips of the operculum flaps. Studies have indicated that American paddlefish with damaged or abbreviated rostrums are still able to forage and maintain good health.

Reproduction and life cycle

American paddlefish are long-lived, sexually late maturing pelagic fish. Females do not begin spawning until they are seven to ten years old, some as late as sixteen to eighteen years old. Females do not spawn every year; rather they spawn every second or third year. Males spawn more frequently, usually every year or every other year beginning around age seven, some as late as nine or ten years of age.

American paddlefish begin their upstream spawning migration sometime during early spring; some begin in late fall. They spawn on silt-free gravel bars that would otherwise be exposed to air or covered by very shallow water were it not for the rises in the river from snow melt and annual spring rains that cause flooding. Although availability of preferred spawning habitat is essential, there are three precise environmental events that must occur before American paddlefish will spawn. The water temperature must be from 55 to 60 F; the lengthened photoperiod which occurs in spring triggers biological and behavioral processes that are dependent on increasing day length; and there must be a proper rise and flow in the river before a successful spawn can occur. Historically, American paddlefish did not spawn every year because the precise environmental events occurred just once every 4 or 5 years.

American paddlefish are broadcast spawners, also referred to as mass spawners or synchronous spawners. Gravid females release their eggs into the water over bare rocks or gravel at the same time males release their sperm. Fertilization occurs externally. The eggs become sticky after they are released into the water and will attach to the bottom substrate. Incubation varies depending on water temperature, but in 60 F water the eggs will hatch into larval fish in about seven days. After hatching, the larval fish drift downstream into areas of low flow velocity where they forage on zooplankton.

Young American paddlefish are poor swimmers which makes them susceptible to predation. Therefore, rapid first-year growth is important to their survival. Fry can grow about 1 inch per week, and by late July the fingerlings are around 5 - 6 in long. Their rate of growth is variable and highly dependent on food abundance. Higher growth rates occur in areas where food is not limited. The feeding behavior of fingerlings is quite different from that of older juveniles and adults. They capture individual plankton one by one, which requires detection and location of individual Daphnia on approach, followed by an intercept maneuver to capture the selected prey. By late September fingerlings have developed into juveniles, and are around 10 - 12 in long. After the 1st year their growth rate slows and is highly variable. Studies indicate that by age 5 their growth rate averages around 2 in per year depending on the abundance of food and other environmental influences.

Habitat and distribution

American paddlefish are highly mobile and well adapted to living in rivers. They inhabit many types of riverine habitats throughout much of the Mississippi Valley and adjacent Gulf slope drainages. They occur most frequently in deeper, low current areas such as side channels, oxbows, backwater lakes, bayous, and tailwaters below dams. They have been observed to move more than 2000 mi in a river system.

American paddlefish are endemic to the Mississippi River Basin, historically occurring from the Missouri and Yellowstone rivers in the northwest to the Ohio and Allegheny rivers of the northeast; the headwaters of the Mississippi River south to its mouth, from the San Jacinto River in the southwest to the Tombigbee and Alabama rivers of the southeast. They were extirpated from New York, Maryland and Pennsylvania, as well as from much of their peripheral range in the Great Lakes region, including Lake Huron and Lake Helen in Canada. In 1991, Pennsylvania implemented a reintroduction program utilizing hatchery-reared American paddlefish in an effort to establish self-sustaining populations in the upper Ohio and lower Allegheny rivers. In 1998, New York initiated a stocking program upstream in the Allegheny Reservoir above Kinzua Dam, and a second stocking in 2006 in Conewango Creek, a relatively unaltered section of their historic range. Reports of free ranging adults captured by gill nets have since been documented in Pennsylvania and New York, but there is no evidence of natural reproduction. They are currently found in 22 states in the US, and are protected under state and federal laws. There are 13 states that allow commercial or sport fishing for American paddlefish.

Propagation and culture

The artificial propagation of American paddlefish began with the efforts of the Missouri Department of Conservation during the early 1960s, and focused primarily on maintenance of the sport fishery. However, it was the growing importance of American paddlefish for their meat and roe that became the catalyst for further development of culture techniques for aquaculture in the United States. Artificial propagation requires broodstock which, because of the late sexual maturation of American paddlefish, are initially obtained from the wild and brought into a hatchery environment. The fish are injected with LH-RH hormone to stimulate spawning. The number of eggs a female may produce depends on the size of the fish and can range anywhere from 70,000 to 300,000 eggs. Unlike most teleosts, the oviduct branches of American paddlefish and sturgeons are not directly attached to the ovaries; rather, they open dorsally into the body cavity. To determine the status of progression toward maturation, ova staging is performed. The process begins with a minor procedure that involves a small abdominal incision from which to extract a few sample oocytes. The oocytes are boiled in water for a few minutes until the yolk is hardened, and then they are cut in half to expose the nucleus. The exposed nucleus is examined under a microscope to determine stage of maturity.

Once maturation is confirmed, one of three procedures is used to extract the eggs from a female paddlefish. The three procedures are:

 * 1) the traditional hand-stripping method, considered to be time-consuming and laborious;
 * 2) Caesarean section, a relatively quick surgical method of extracting eggs through a 4 in abdominal incision which, though considered faster than hand stripping, can involve time-consuming suturing and an incision resulting in muscular stress and poor suture retention which lowers survival rate; and;
 * 3) MIST (minimally invasive surgical technique), which is the fastest of the three procedures because it requires less handling of the fish and eliminates the need for suturing. A small internal incision is made in the dorsal area of the oviduct, which allows direct stripping of eggs from the body cavity through the gonopore bypassing the oviductal funnels.

A spermiating male indicates successful production of mature spermatozoa which results in the release of large volumes of milt over the course of three to four days. Milt is collected by inserting a short plastic tube with syringe attached into the urogenital opening of the male and applying light suction with the syringe to draw the milt. The collected milt is diluted in water just prior to adding it to the eggs and the combination is gently stirred for about a minute to achieve fertilization. Fertilized eggs are adhesive and demersal, therefore if incubation is to take place in a flow-through hatching jar, the eggs must be treated to prevent clumping. Incubation usually takes anywhere from five to twelve days.

Hybridization
A 2020 paper reported that eggs from three Russian sturgeons were crossbred with American paddlefish using sperm from four male paddlefish, resulting in hybrids called sturddlefish, a blend of the two names. The offspring had a survival rate of 62–74% and on average reached 1 kg after a year of growth. This was the first time such fish from different families were successfully crossbred. Their last common ancestor is estimated to have lived 140 million years ago.

Global commercial market
Advancements in biotechnology have created a global commercial market for the polyculture of American paddlefish. In 1970, American paddlefish were stocked in several rivers in Europe and Asia. Introduction began when five thousand hatched larvae from Missouri hatcheries in the United States were exported to the former Soviet Union for aquacultural utilization. Reproduction was successful in 1988 and 1989, and resulted in the exportation of juveniles to Romania and Hungary. American paddlefish are now being raised in Ukraine, Germany, Austria, the Czech Republic, and the Plovdiv and Vidin regions in Bulgaria. In May 2006, specimens of different sizes and weights were caught by professional fisherman near Prahovo in the Serbian part of the Danube River.

In 1988, fertilized American paddlefish eggs and larvae from Missouri hatcheries were first introduced into China. Since that time, China imports approximately 4.5million fertilized eggs and larvae every year from hatcheries in Russia and the United States. Some American paddlefish are polycultured in carp ponds and sold to restaurants while others are cultured for brood stock and caviar production. China has also exported American paddlefish to Cuba, where they are farmed for caviar production.

Sport fishing
American paddlefish are a popular sport fish where their populations are sufficient to allow such activity. Areas where there are no self-sustaining populations rely on state and federal restocking programs to maintain a viable fishery. A 2009 report includes the following states as allowing American paddlefish sport fishing per their respective state and federal regulations: Arkansas, Illinois, Indiana, Iowa, Kansas, Kentucky, Mississippi, Missouri, Montana, Nebraska, North Dakota, Oklahoma, South Dakota and Tennessee. Since American paddlefish are filter-feeders, they will not take bait or lures, and must be caught by snagging.

The official state record in Kansas is an American paddlefish snagged in 2004 that weighed 144 lb. In Montana, an American paddlefish was snagged in 1973 weighing 142.5 lb. In North Dakota, one snagged in 2024 weighed 131 lb. The largest American paddlefish on record was captured in West Okoboji Lake, Iowa, in 1916 by a spear fisherman; it measured 85 in and weighed an estimated 198 lb.

Overfishing and habitat destruction
American paddlefish populations have declined dramatically, primarily as a result of overfishing and habitat destruction. In 2004 they were listed as Vulnerable (VU A3de ver 3.1) on the IUCN Red List of Threatened Species. In 2022 the status category was changed to VU A2cd throughout their range as the result of a U.S. Fish & Wildlife Service assessment. The assessment concluded that "an overall population size reduction of at least 30% may occur within the next 10 years or three generations due to actual or potential levels of exploitation and the effects of introduced taxa, pollutants, competitors or parasites." American paddlefish are filter-feeding pelagic fish that require large, free-flowing rivers with braided channels, backwater areas, oxbow lakes that are rich in zooplankton, and gravel bars for spawning. Series of dams on rivers such as those constructed on the Missouri River have impounded large populations of American paddlefish, and blocked their upstream migration to spawning shoals. Channelization and groynes or wing dykes have caused the narrowing of rivers and altered flow, destroying crucial spawning and nursery habitat. As a result, most impounded populations are not self-sustaining and must be stocked to maintain a viable sport fishery.

Zebra mussels
Zebra mussel infestations in the Mississippi River, Great Lakes and other Midwest rivers are also negatively affecting American paddlefish populations. Zebra mussels are an invasive species well adapted for explosive population growth as a result of high rates of fecundity and recruitment. As filter feeders, zebra mussels rely on plankton and can filter significant amounts of phytoplankton and zooplankton from the water, altering the availability of an important food source for paddlefish and native unionidae. A few days after the fertilization of zebra mussel eggs, a microscopic larva emerges called a veliger. During this initial stage of development, which usually lasts a few weeks, veligers are able to swim freely in the water column with other microscopic animals comprising zooplankton. Veligers are poor swimmers, making them susceptible to predation by any animal that feeds on zooplankton. However, natural predation of zebra mussels at any stage of development has not made a significant contribution to the long-term reduction of zebra mussel populations.

Poaching and overexploitation
Poaching has been a contributing factor to declining populations of American paddlefish in the states where they are commercially exploited, particularly while the demand for caviar remains strong. Since the 1980s, a trade embargo on Iran restricted imports of the highly sought after and most expensive beluga caviar from the Caspian Sea, limiting U.S. sources of caviar. The most sought-after caviar is produced by sturgeons in the Northern Caspian Sea, but overfishing and poaching have exhausted the supply. American sturgeon and paddlefish populations were targeted as likely substitutes.

The roe of American paddlefish can be processed into caviar similar in taste, color, size and texture to sevruga sturgeon caviar from the Caspian Sea. Several cases of mislabeled American paddlefish roe sold as Caspian Sea caviar have been prosecuted by the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service. State and federal regulations restricting the harvest of American paddlefish populations in the wild, and the illegal trafficking of their roe, are strictly enforced. Related violations such as the illegal transport of American paddlefish roe have resulted in convictions with substantial fines and prison sentences. American paddlefish are also protected under Appendix II of the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species (CITES) meaning international trade in the species (including parts and derivatives) is regulated.

Extinction of Chinese paddlefish
The primary reasons for the decline of the now-extinct Chinese paddlefish are similar to those of American paddlefish, which include overfishing, the construction of dams, and destruction of habitat. The last confirmed sighting of a live Chinese paddlefish was from the Yangtze River on January 24, 2003. From 2006 to 2008, scientists conducted surveys in an effort to locate the fish. They used several boats, deployed 4,762 setlines, 111 anchored setlines and 950 drift nets covering 488 km on the upper Yangtze River, most of which lies within the protected area of the Upper Yangtze National Nature Reserve. They did not catch a single fish. They also used hydroacoustic equipment to monitor sounds in the water, but were unable to confirm the presence of paddlefish. The species is believed to have gone extinct before 2005 and no later than 2010. The IUCN assessed the species as extinct in 2019, formally publishing this categorisation in 2022.

title: American paddlefish


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Foobar2000

foobar2000 (often abbreviated as fb2k or f2k) is a freeware audio player for Microsoft Windows, iOS, Android and macOS developed by Peter Pawłowski. It has a modular design, which provides user flexibility in configuration and customization. Standard "skin" elements can be individually augmented or replaced with different dials and buttons, as well as visualizers such as waveform, oscilloscope, spectrum, spectrogram (waterfall), peak and smoothed VU meters, which all of them are analysis-oriented, at least for built-in visualizations. foobar2000 offers third-party user interface modifications through a software development kit (SDK).

foobar2000 supports many audio file formats, has many features for organizing metadata, files, and folders, and has a converter interface for use with command line encoders. To maximize audio fidelity in cases where resampling or downscaling in bit depth is required, it provides noise shaping and dithering. There are a number of official and third-party components which add many additional features. The core is closed source, whereas the SDK is licensed under the Three-Clause BSD license.

History and development
foobar2000 was first released in 2002 and developed by Peter Pawłowski, who had previously worked at Nullsoft and developed plugins for Winamp. He created foobar2000 with the audiophile community in mind. The software's mascot and logo icon consists of a white "alien cat".

foobar2000 supports Windows, though the support of older versions for Windows XP and Vista has been dropped as of version 1.6 (released 2020). Windows 2000 support was dropped as of version 0.9.5 (released 2008) and Windows 95/98/ME/NT4 support was dropped as of version 0.9 (released 2006).

Most functionality also works as intended under Wine on Linux, although the program's crash reporter will detect Wine and direct the user to the Wine Bugzilla.

foobar2000 versions since 0.9.5 feature a revamped default interface, with embedded support for album list, album art, spectrum visualization, and some other features and improvements.

In May 2016, versions for mobile devices were released,   and in January 2018, an early beta version for macOS was released.

In August 2022, a beta version of foobar2000 v2.0 was released with 64-bit support, Dark mode, and hardware-accelerated visualizations.

Version 2.0 beta 28 introduced native support for ARM. The ARM64EC binary is compatible with Windows 11.

On 26 April 2023, foobar2000 2.0 final was released after an extensive testing cycle which involved 35 beta versions.

Core
At its core, foobar2000 natively supports a range of audio formats, including MP1, MP2, MP3, MPC, AAC, WMA, Ogg Vorbis, FLAC / Ogg FLAC, ALAC, WavPack, WAV, AIFF, AU, SND, Audio CD, Speex, and Opus.

foobar2000 also has a highly customizable user interface, advanced tagging capabilities and support for ripping Audio CDs, as well as transcoding of all supported audio formats using the Converter component. The player can read inside ZIP, GZIP, and RAR archives.

Additional features include ReplayGain support (for both playback and calculation), gapless playback, keyboard shortcuts and support for DSP effects such as equalization and crossfade.

Users can configure the foobar2000 Media Library with automated folder watching and Windows Media streaming. The client is built with an open component architecture, allowing third-party developers to extend functionality of the player.

Optional
With addons or plugins, foobar2000 can read the APE, HDCD, AC3, DTS, SACD and DVD-Audio formats.

Other optional features include playback statistics, CD burning, kernel streaming, ASIO support, WASAPI output compatibility, and a UPnP/DLNA renderer, media server and controller for networking. Third-party support is also present in the audio client. For instance, foobar2000 supports Last.fm scrobbling and integration with Apple iPod, including album art support and automatic transcoding of audio formats not supported by iPod itself.

Derivative works
foobar2000 developer Peter Pawłowski has also made other audio software, including Boom, which his web site describes as an "easy to use audio player intended for casual computer users". It runs on Windows.

license: Creative Commons - Attribution Share-Alike - https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/

title: Foobar2000


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Chinese paddlefish

The Chinese paddlefish (Psephurus gladius; : literal translation: "white sturgeon"), also known as the Chinese swordfish, is an extinct species of fish that was formerly native to the Yangtze and Yellow River basins in China. With records of specimens over 3 m and possibly 7 m in length, it was one of the largest species of freshwater fish. It was the only species in the genus Psephurus and one of two recent species of paddlefish (Polyodontidae), the other being the American paddlefish (Polyodon spathula). It was an anadromous species, meaning that it spent part of its adult life at sea, while migrating upriver to spawn.

The Chinese paddlefish was officially declared extinct in 2022, with an estimated time of extinction to be by 2005, and no later than 2010, although it had become functionally extinct by 1993. The main cause of its extinction was the construction of the Gezhouba and Three Gorges dams, causing population fragmentation and blocking the anadromous spawning migration. Overfishing also played a significant role in its demise. Fishing of the Chinese paddlefish dates back centuries, with annual harvests reaching 25 tons by the 1970s. Since the 1990s, the species was officially listed by the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN) as critically endangered, and was last seen alive in 2003. A 2019 paper including scientists from the Yangtze River Fisheries Research Institute found the species to be extinct. It was unanimously agreed to be extinct by the Species Survival Commission Sturgeon Specialist Group of the IUCN on 15 September 2019, with its conservation status being formally updated by the IUCN Red List in July 2022.

Description

The Chinese paddlefish had a white underbelly, and its back and head were grey. Its dorsal and anal fins were situated considerably far back on the body. The paddle-like rostrum was narrow and pointed, and was between a quarter and up to a third of total body length. Its eyes were small and round. The tail fin was heterocercal (spine extending into the upper lobe), with the lower lobe being well developed. The skull is more elongate and narrower than that of the American paddlefish, and lacks the sculpturing present on the skull bones of other paddlefish, with the stellate (star-shaped) bones on the rostrum less numerous than those of the American paddlefish. The teeth were small, sharp, canine shaped and inward curling, and became proportionally smaller relative to the jaw during growth, and in mature adults were completely fused into the bone. Compared to Polyodon, the jaws were shorter, and had a proportionately narrower gape, and unlike the American paddlefish, but similar to fossil paddlefish, the upper jaw was not firmly attached to the braincase. Like other paddlefish, the skeleton was largely cartilaginous. The body lacked scales, except for small scales in the caudal peduncle and caudal fin.

Juveniles attained a weight of around 1 to 1.5 kg by their first winter and a length of 1 m and a weight of about 3.3 kg by the time they were a year old. Beyond this length, proportional weight gain relative to body length dramatically increased, reaching a weight of about 12.5 kg by the time they were around 1.5 m long. They reached sexual maturity at a weight of around 25 kg. The maximum length of the Chinese paddlefish is often quoted as 7 m, with this estimate apparently being given by C. Ping (1931), though according to Grande and Bemis (1991), specimens over 3 m had not been definitively measured. Ping recorded that fishermen in Nanjing caught a Chinese paddlefish with a length of 7 m and a weight of 907 kg. FishBase and World Wide Fund for Nature gives a conservative maximum weight of 300 - 500 kg. Female fish are suggested to have grown larger than male fish once sexually mature, though they grew at similar rates prior to this. The lifespan has been estimated at 29–38 years, though the theoretical maximum lifespan is likely to have been significantly higher, as the estimate reflects anthropogenic impacts on the population.

Taxonomy and evolutionary history
The species was first named as a species of Polyodon by Eduard von Martens in 1862. It was placed into a separate, monotypic genus by Albert Günther in 1873. The species was also given a different name, Spatularia angustifolium by Johann Jakob Kaup also in 1862, but this is considered a junior synonym of P. gladius.

Paddlefish (Polyodontidae) are one of two living families of Acipenseriformes alongside sturgeons (Acipenseridae). The oldest records of Acipenseriformes date to the Early Jurassic, over 190 million years ago. The oldest paddlefish fossil is that of Protopsephurus from the Early Cretaceous of China, dating to around 120 million years ago. The oldest representatives of the genus containing the American paddlefish (Polyodon) date to around 65 million years ago, from the beginning of the Paleocene. Various molecular clock estimates have been given for the age of the divergence between the American and Chinese paddlefish, including 68 million years ago 72 million years ago, and 100 million years ago, all dating to the middle to Upper Cretaceous.

Relationships of recent and fossil paddlefish genera, after Grande et al. (2002).

Distribution, habitat and ecology

The Chinese paddlefish was native to the Yangtze (Chang Jiang) River basin and its estuary at the East China Sea. Historically it was also recorded in the Yellow River basin (which is connected to the Yangtze by the Grand Canal) and its estuary at the Yellow Sea. It primarily inhabited the large rivers, but sometimes travelled into large lakes. Due to their anadromous nature, mature individuals were found in coastal waters of the East China Sea and the Yellow Sea; occasionally spring tides would bring individuals into the lower reaches of the Qiantang and Yong rivers of Zhejiang province.

The species spent part of its life in the lower section of the Yangtze, including the brackish water of its estuary, but migrated upriver and into major tributaries to congregate for spawning, which occurred in spring, from mid-March to early April. One spawning site on the Jinsha River, located at the midpoint of the river, around 60 m from the riverbank, was around 500 m in length, and had a max water depth of 10 m and rapid water flow, with the bottom sediments in the lower reaches being shingly and in the upper reaches muddy/sandy. A study on a sample of spawning Chinese paddlefish found that they were all at least 8 years old. Females likely sexually matured later than males, and probably did not spawn every year, likely every other year or somewhat less frequently, like other acipenseriforms. The ovaries of the female fish contained over 100,000 eggs, each approximately 2.7 mm across. The developing zygotes and fry were restricted to the region of the Yangtze basin upstream of Luzhou in southeastern Sichuan, while yearlings and adults were widely distributed throughout the Yangtze river proper from the lower to upper reaches.

The fish was largely solitary, and occupied the lower-mid layers of the water column. Chinese paddlefish were noted for being strong swimmers. Unlike its relative the American paddlefish, which is a planktivorous filter feeder, the Chinese paddlefish was primarily piscivorous, mainly feeding on small to medium-sized fishes like anchovies (Coilia), cyprinids (Coreius, Rhinogobio), gobies (Gobius) as well as bagrid catfish and bothid flounders. Shrimp and crab were also eaten. The jaws, unlike the American paddlefish but like sturgeons and fossil paddlefish, were capable of protrusion, a form of cranial kinesis allowing them to move relative to the rest of the skull, with the upper jaw being able to thrust downwards and forwards in order to seize prey. Paddlefish, like other Acipenseriformes and several other groups of vertebrates, engage in passive electroreception (the sensing of external electric fields) using structures called ampullae that form an extension of the lateral line system of sensory organs. Passive electroreception (where electric fields are sensed but not generated, as in electric fish) is primarily used for detecting the weak electric fields generated by prey. The head and rostrum of Chinese paddlefish, like those of other paddlefish, was densely packed with ampullae, indicating that enhancing electroreception was one of the rostrum's primary functions.

Decline and extinction
The last records of Chinese paddlefish in the Yellow River basin and its estuary date back to the 1960s, although declines were realized between the 13th and 19th centuries. Declines were significant throughout its primary range in the Yangtze basin, but annual captures of 25 tonnes continued into the 1970s. In 1983, the Chinese government made fishing of the species illegal due to its decline in numbers. The species was still being found in small numbers in the 1980s (for example, 32 were caught in 1985), and young were seen as recently as 1995. Due to the rarity of the fish by the time it was realised that it was in peril, and the fact that the adult fish were difficult to keep in captivity, attempts to create a captive breeding stock failed.

Since 2000, there have been only two confirmed sightings of the fish alive, both from the Yangtze basin: The first was a 3.3 m, 117 kg female caught at Nanjing in 2002 and the second a 3.52 m, 160 kg female accidentally caught at Yibin, Sichuan, on January 24, 2003, by fisherman Liu Longhua (刘龙华); the former died despite attempts to save it and the latter was radio-tagged and released, but the tag stopped working after only 12 hours.

During a search conducted in the Yangtze basin from 2006 to 2008, a research team from the Chinese Academy of Fisheries Science in Jingzhou failed to catch any paddlefish, but two possible specimens were recorded with hydroacoustic signals. A comprehensive study published in 2019, including scientists from the Yangtze River Fisheries Research Institute, found that the species was certainly extinct, based on its absence from extensive capture surveys of the Yangtze between 2017 and 2018. The paper estimated that the species went extinct between 2005 and 2010, but became functionally extinct by 1993. The primary cause of its extinction was overfishing and the construction of dams along the Yangtze. The paddlefish was heavily overfished in all stages of growth from fry (which were easily captured by traditional fishing methods) to adult, which combined with the long generation time due to its slow maturation led to reduced sustainability of viable populations. Dam construction, notably the Gezhouba Dam, which became operational in 1981, and the Three Gorges Dam landlocked and divided populations and prevented the spawning migration. The paper thus recommended the reclassification of the species as Extinct by the IUCN. A similar recommendation was also made by the Species Survival Commission Sturgeon Specialist Group of the IUCN in September 2019.

The official IUCN status of the species was formally updated to "extinct" in July 2022.

title: Chinese paddlefish


text:
Dave Farrell

David Michael Farrell, also known by his stage name Phoenix (born February 8, 1977), is an American musician, best known as the bassist of the rock band Linkin Park. He was also a member of Tasty Snax, a ska punk band.

Early life
He was born in Plymouth, Massachusetts but later moved to Mission Viejo, California at the age of five. Farrell was taught how to play guitar by his mother when he was in high school. He also played the violin in high school. Farrell attended UCLA, where he was roommates with future bandmate Brad Delson. Farrell graduated from UCLA with a degree in philosophy.

Tasty Snax
While attending high school, Farrell joined a Christian ska punk band named Tasty Snax, who would later rename themselves to The Snax. Phoenix transitioned from the electric guitar to bass to accommodate The Snax. The band included Farrell's longtime college friend Mark Fiore, who was also associated in making of various video albums for Linkin Park. The band recorded two studio albums and one compilation album, signed to Screaming Giant Records. Farrell left the band in 2000.

Linkin Park
Farrell joined Xero, the earliest incarnation of Linkin Park, after meeting Brad Delson at UCLA. He contributed to the band's self-titled demo tape in 1997, but left the project to tour with Tasty Snax. Farrell's void was temporally filled by Delson, Ian Hornbeck and Scott Koziol, who all contributed to Hybrid Theory, Linkin Park's debut album. Farrell returned to Linkin Park in 2000 after a year-long absence. He served as the band's bassist for six of the band's seven studio albums. Along with Brad Delson and Rob Bourdon, Farrell also helped manage the band's business operations.

Linkin Park went on a hiatus after Chester Bennington died in 2017;   Farrell chose not to speak at Bennington's memorial service because he said he was unable to fully express his feelings with words.

Personal life
Farrell is an avid golfer. He has a podcast with his best friend and professional golfer, Brendan Steele, and Mark Fiore, Linkin Park's videographer and video editor. He enjoys drinking coffee, beer, and wine.

With Linkin Park

 * Reanimation (2002)
 * Meteora (2003)
 * Minutes to Midnight (2007)
 * A Thousand Suns (2010)
 * Living Things (2012)
 * The Hunting Party (2014)
 * One More Light (2017)

With Tasty Snax

 * Run Joseph Run (1998)
 * Snax (2000)

title: Dave Farrell


text:
Hamza Yusuf

Hamza Yusuf (born Mark Hanson; 1958) is an American Islamic neo-traditionalist, Islamic scholar, and co-founder of Zaytuna College. He is a proponent of classical learning in Islam and has promoted Islamic sciences and classical teaching methodologies throughout the world.

He is an advisor to both the Center for Islamic Studies at the Graduate Theological Union in Berkeley and the Islamic Studies programme at Stanford University. In addition, he serves as vice-president for the Global Center for Guidance and Renewal, which was founded and is currently presided over by Abdallah bin Bayyah. He also serves as vice-president of the UAE-based Forum for Promoting Peace in Muslim Societies, where Abdallah bin Bayyah also serves as president. The Forum has attracted huge controversy for its close ties to the UAE dictatorship as well as Hamza Yusuf's personal support for authoritarian leaders since the Arab Spring.

The Guardian has referred to Yusuf as "arguably the West's most influential Islamic scholar". The New Yorker magazine also called him "perhaps the most influential Islamic scholar in the Western world", and journalist Graeme Wood has called him "one the two most prominent Muslim scholars in the United States today". He has been listed in the top 50 of The 500 Most Influential Muslims. His detractors, however, have widely criticised him for his stance on race, politics, the Syrian revolution, and the Palestinian-Israeli conflict.

Early life and education
Yusuf was born as Mark Hanson in Walla Walla, Washington to two academics working at Whitman College and he was raised in northern California. He grew up as a practicing Irish Catholic Christian and attended prep schools on both the East and West coasts. In 1977, after a near-death experience in a car accident and reading the Qur'an, he converted to Islam. Yusuf has Irish, Scottish and Greek ancestry.

After being impressed by a young couple from Saudi Arabia who were followers of Abdalqadir as-Sufi —a Scottish convert to Islam and leader of the Darqawa Sufi order and the Murabitun World Movement—Yusuf moved to Norwich, England to study directly under as-Sufi. In 1979, Yusuf moved to Al Ain in the United Arab Emirates where he spent the next four years studying Sharia sciences at the Islamic Studies Institute of the United Arab Emirates University, more often on a one-on-one basis with Islamic scholars. Yusuf became fluent in the Arabic language and also learned Qur'anic recitation (tajwid), rhetoric, poetry, law (fiqha) and theology (aqidah) among other classical Islamic disciplines.

In 1984, Yusuf formally disassociated himself from as-Sufi's teachings and moved in a different intellectual direction having been influenced by a number of Mauritanian scholars residing in the Emirates. He moved to North Africa in 1984 studying in Algeria and Morocco, as well as Spain and Mauritania. In Mauritania he developed his most lasting and powerful relationship with Islamic scholar Sidi Muhammad Ould Fahfu al-Massumi, known as Murabit al-Hajj.

In 2020, Yusuf completed his Ph.D. at the Graduate Theological Union. His dissertation was titled, "The Normative Islamic Tradition in North and West Africa: A Case Study of Transmission of Authority and Distillation of Knowledge in Ibn Ashir’s Al-Murshid al-Mu’in (The Helpful Guide)." Yusuf previously earned an associate degree in nursing from Imperial Valley College and a bachelor's degree in religious studies from San José State University.

Zaytuna College
He and other colleagues founded the Zaytuna Institute in Berkeley, California, United States, in 1996, dedicated to the revival of traditional study methods and the sciences of Islam. He was joined by Zaid Shakir and Hatem Bazian in establishing what was then Zaytuna Institute. In the fall of 2010 it opened its doors as Zaytuna College, a four-year Muslim liberal arts college, the first of its kind in the United States. It incorporates Yusuf's vision of combining the classical liberal arts—based in the trivium and quadrivium—with rigorous training in traditional Islamic disciplines. It aims to "educate and prepare morally committed professional, intellectual, and spiritual leaders". Zaytuna College became the first accredited Muslim campus in the United States after it received approval from the Western Association of Schools and Colleges. Yusuf stated that "We hope, God willing, that there will be more such Muslim colleges and universities to come".

Hamza Yusuf has been involved in controversies in recent years on issues of race, politics, and the Arab revolutions.

Views and influence
Jordan's Royal Islamic Strategic Studies Centre currently places him 36th on its list of the top 500 most influential Muslims in the world. In its 2016 edition, Yusuf is described "as one of the foremost authorities on Islam outside of the Muslim world" by The 500 Most Influential Muslims, edited by John Esposito and Ibrahim Kalin.

Yusuf has taken a stance against religious justifications for terrorist attacks. He described the 9/11 attacks as "an act of mass murder, pure and simple". Condemning the attacks, he also stated that "Islam was hijacked ... on that plane as an innocent victim."

Yusuf is one of the signatories of A Common Word Between Us and You, an open letter by Islamic scholars to Christian leaders calling for peace and understanding. Yusuf was also one of the signatories of an open letter to former ISIS leader Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi that sought to refute the principles promoted by the terrorist organization.

Interfaith
Yusuf participates in the Forum for Promoting Peace in Muslim Societies hosted by the UAE. He praised the UAE for its increasing tolerance and its adoption of multi-faith initiatives and plans to build a multi-faith centre in Abu Dhabi.

Comments on the Syrian Revolution
In 2019, Yusuf urged patience and caution in relation to the Syrian crisis. Although some viewed these comments as supportive of the Syrian regime, this has been rejected by Yusuf, who made a statement of response.

2016 Black Lives Matter comments
In December 2016, Yusuf made comments that were perceived as critical of the tactics employed by the Black Lives Matter movement. Yusuf claimed there were more endemic issues facing the black community within, such as the breakdown of family. He also raised concerns about racist sentiments in the Muslim community, where the condemnation of 'white privilege' is fierce, but silent on 'Arab privilege', citing the treatment of Pakistanis and Indians in some parts of the Arab world. For these comments he was attacked on social media, but many scholars defended Shaykh Yusuf, such as Imam Zaid Shakir who stated, "I can say with absolute confidence that there is not a racist bone in Shaykh Hamza’s body. A racist is someone who believes in the superiority of one race over another. Shaykh Hamza, like any serious Muslim, totally rejects that idea."

Poems
• Spring's Gift

• Be Like Ahmed, a poem dedicated to the Prophet Mohammed, recited at the ceremony of the Prophet's birthday on the 12th of Rabi' al-Awwal (9th of October 2022).

title: Hamza Yusuf


text:
User:Hoyi

Hi Hoyi. This is your user page. I have left a message for you on your user talk page. You can delete this afterwards and replace it with your own user page, if you like!--Robert Merkel 02:42 17 Jul 2003 (UTC)

title: User:Hoyi


text:
Heim ins Reich

The Heim ins Reich (meaning "back home to the Reich") was a foreign policy pursued by Adolf Hitler before and during World War II, beginning in 1938. The aim of Hitler's initiative was to convince all Volksdeutsche (ethnic Germans) who were living outside Nazi Germany (e.g. in Austria, Czechoslovakia and the western districts of Poland) that they should strive to bring these regions "home" into Greater Germany, but also relocate from territories that were not under German control, following the conquest of Poland, in accordance with the Nazi–Soviet pact. The Heim ins Reich manifesto targeted areas ceded in Versailles to the newly reborn state of Poland, various lands of immigration, as well as other areas that were inhabited by significant ethnic German populations, such as the Sudetenland, Danzig (now Gdansk), and the southeastern and northeastern regions of Europe after 6 October 1939.

Implementation of the policy was managed by VOMI (Hauptamt Volksdeutsche Mittelstelle or "Main Welfare Office for Ethnic Germans"). As a state agency of the NSDAP, it handled all Volksdeutsche issues. By 1941, the VOMI was under the control of the SS.

History
The end of World War I in Europe led to the emergence of new 'minority problems' in the areas of collapsing German and Austro-Hungarian empires. As a result of the Paris Peace Conference, 1919, more than 9 million ethnic Germans found themselves living in newly organized Poland, Czechoslovakia, Romania, and Yugoslavia. Unlike the new sovereign states, Germany was not required to sign the Minority Treaties.

Prior to the Anschluss in 1938, a powerful radio transmitter in Munich bombarded Austria with propaganda of what Hitler had already done for Germany, and what he could do for his native home country Austria. The annexation of Austria was presented by the press as the march of the German armed forces into purported German land: "as representatives of a general German will to unity, to establish brotherhood with the German people and soldiers there". In a similar manner, the 1939 German ultimatum to Lithuania, leading to the annexation of Memel from the Republic, was glorified as Hitler's "latest stage in the progress of history".

After the Anschluss with Austria, Germany popularized the "Back home to the Reich" slogan among Sudeten Germans. During the Czech crisis, Hitler visited the German Gymnastics and Sports Festival in Breslau. When the Sudeten team passed the VIP stand where Hitler was, they shouted "Back home to the Reich!" Josef Goebbels noted in his diary that "The people yelled, cheered and cried. The Führer [Hitler] was deeply moved."

On 7 October 1939, immediately after the end of the Germany's Polish Campaign, Hitler appointed Reichsführer-SS Heinrich Himmler as Reich Commissioner for the Consolidation of German Nationhood (RKFDV). Duties of the new position included furthering the "return" of Volksdeutsche and organising newly-conquered territory for German settlement.

Concurrent with annexations were the beginnings of attempts to ethnically cleanse non-Germans both from Germany and from the areas intended to be part of a "Greater Germany". Alternately, Hitler also made attempts to Germanize those who were considered ethnically or racially close enough to Germans to be "worth keeping" as part of a future German nation, such as the population of Luxembourg. Germany officially considered these populations to be German, but not part of the Greater German Reich, and were thus the targets of propaganda promoting this view in order to integrate them. These attempts were largely unpopular with the targets of the Germanization. Up to 97 percent of Luxembourgers voted in a 1941 referendum against being recognized as German.

Propaganda was also directed to Germans outside Nazi Germany to return as regions, or as individuals from other regions. Hitler hoped to make full use of the "German Diaspora". As part of an effort to lure ethnic Germans back to Germany, folksy Heimatbriefe or "letters from the homeland" were sent to German immigrants to the United States. The reaction to these was on the whole negative, particularly as the letters increased in volume. Goebbels also hoped to use German-Americans to keep America neutral during the war, but his actions produced among them great hostility to Nazi propagandists. Newspapers in occupied Ukraine printed articles about antecedents of German rule over Ukraine, such as Catherine the Great and the Goths.

"Heim ins Reich" in occupied Poland 1939–1944
The same motto (Heim ins Reich ) was also applied to a second, closely related policy initiative which entailed the displacement and relocation of ethnically German communities (Volksdeutsche ) from Central and Eastern European countries in the Soviet "sphere of influence", whose ancestors had settled there during the Ostsiedlung of earlier centuries. The Nazi government determined which of these communities were not "viable", started propaganda among the local population, and made arrangements and organized their transport of such communities. Its use of scare tactics about the Soviet Union resulted in tens of thousands of persons leaving. They included ethnic Germans from Bukovina, Bessarabia, Dobruja and Yugoslavia. For example, after the Soviets had assumed control of this territory, about 45,000 ethnic Germans left Northern Bukovina by November 1940. (Stalin permitted this out of fear they would be loyal to Germany.)

In the Greater Poland (Wielkopolska ) region (joined together with the Łódź district and dubbed "Wartheland" by the Germans), the Nazis' goal was complete Germanization, or political, cultural, social, and economic assimilation of the territory into the German Reich. In pursuit of this goal, the installed bureaucracy renamed streets and cities and seized tens of thousands of Polish enterprises, from large industrial firms to small shops, without payment to the owners. This area incorporated 350,000 such "ethnic Germans" and 1.7 million Poles deemed Germanizable, including between one and two hundred thousand children who had been taken from their parents (plus about 400,000 German settlers from the "Old Reich"). They were housed in farms left vacant by expulsion of the local Poles. Militant party members were sent to teach them to be "true Germans". Hitler Youth and League of German Girls sent young people for "Eastern Service", which entailed (particularly for the girls) assisting in Germanization efforts. They were harassed by Polish partisans (Armia Krajowa) during the war. As Nazi Germany lost the war, these ethnic Germans were expelled to remaining Germany.

Eberhardt cites estimates for the ethnic German influx provided by Szobak, Łuczak, and a collective report, ranging from 404,612 (Szobak) to 631,500 (Łuczak). Anna Bramwell says 591,000 ethnic Germans moved into the annexed territories, and details the areas of colonists' origin as follows: 93,000 were from Bessarabia, 21,000 from Dobruja, 98,000 from Bukovina, 68,000 from Volhynia, 58,000 from Galicia, 130,000 from the Baltic states, 38,000 from eastern Poland, 72,000 from the Sudetenland, and 13,000 from Slovenia.

Additionally some 400,000 German officials, technical staff, and clerks were sent to those areas in order to administer them, according to "Atlas Ziem Polski" citing a joint Polish–German scholarly publication on the aspect of population changes during the war Eberhardt estimates that the total influx from the Altreich was about 500,000 people. Duiker and Spielvogel note that up to two million Germans had been settled in pre-war Poland by 1942. Eberhardt gives a total of two million Germans present in the area of all pre-war Poland by the end of the war, 1.3 million of whom moved in during the war, adding to a pre-war population of 700,000.

The increase of German population was most visible in the urban centres: in Poznań, the German population increased from around 6,000 in 1939 to 93,589 in 1944; in Łódź, from around 60,000 to 140,721; and in Inowrocław, from 956 to 10,713. In Warthegau, where most Germans were settled, the share of the German population increased from 6.6% in 1939 to 21.2% in 1943.

title: Heim ins Reich


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User talk:Hoyi

Hi, welcome to the Wikipedia!

I notice you have uploaded a number of images of what appears to be Chinese dumplings. Generally, it's a good idea to give any images you upload a descriptive title, for example "pork_dumplings.jpg" See Image use policy for more information.--Robert Merkel 02:44 17 Jul 2003 (UTC)

Image tag
Thanks for uploading Image:Edit_pic02.jpg, Image:Edit_pic03.JPG, Image:Edit_pic04.JPG. I notice it currently doesn't have an image copyright tag. Could you add one to let us know its copyright status? (You can use if you release it under the GFDL, or  if you claim fair use, etc.) If you don't know what any of this means, just let me know where you got the images and I'll tag them for you. Thanks so much, Aqua 05:28, Dec 24, 2004 (UTC)

title: User talk:Hoyi


text:
Talk:Celia Cruz

Wiki Education Foundation-supported course assignment
This article was the subject of a Wiki Education Foundation-supported course assignment, between 6 September 2018 and 20 December 2018. Further details are available on the course page. Student editor(s): Eileenarnold.

Above undated message substituted from Template:Dashboard.wikiedu.org assignment by PrimeBOT (talk) 17:02, 16 January 2022 (UTC)

Early life
we need to know more about her childhood and how it affected her.

Can someone move the picture up higher so we can see Celia when we open the page?
I'm sorry, but I don't know how to do it. 68.3.214.66 (talk) 20:48, 22 November 2007 (UTC)

Birthday
SHAME TYLER!!!! Encyclopaedia Britannica lists 1929. http://www.britannica.com/eb/article?eu=124776

CNN say 'she was believed to be 78 years old' which if to October birthdate is correct then she was born in 1923. http://www.cnn.com/2003/SHOWBIZ/Music/07/16/cruz.obit/index.html

BBC say 1924, http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/entertainment/music/3073287.stm

New York times say died at 77, assuming an October birthday would place birthdate at 1925 http://www.nytimes.com/2003/07/16/obituaries/16WIRE-OBIT-CRUZ.html

For the moment it is hard to put an exact year on her birth. Popsracer 03:38 17 Jul 2003 (UTC)

I have decided to go back to 1924. What appears to be her offical website http://www.celiacruzonline.com/, list 1924 so I will go with that. Popsracer 04:08 17 Jul 2003 (UTC)

 * TV news said "born in the 1920s" and that she didn't like to tell her age. -- Error 19:50 17 Jul 2003 (UTC)

I know she has to be 78 I calculates the results and got 78 Melanya321 (talk) 02:01, 4 February 2016 (UTC)

Leaving Cuba
- Why is there no information on her leaving Cuba, or her opinions on the post-Revolution government? - — feripe
 * Because little is known so writing anything would be purely speculative

well she was exiled from cuba because their president of cuba did not allow for her to move and leave cuba so she could never com back so when her parents died she was devistated because she could no attened her parent funeral because it was held in cuba and she could never come back.

Name
Her full name is posted as Úrsula Hilaria Celia Caridad Cruz Alfonso. I believe that since we know it, it should be displayed. Every part of her legal name is as important despite being known as simply Celia Cruz. --Speakslowly 06:05, 11 July 2006 (UTC)

Autobiography
I don't own my own copy, so I haven't access to it at the moment, but there definitely are sections worth adding ... the present article just ever-so-slightly references the political climate in Cuba, but it was a huge deal with her (as with so many of the exiles) and deserves more space with respect to its impact on her personal and professional life. Also, in the book, she discusses her own feelings on the use of the term salsa for her music, noting that while friends and colleagues such as Tito Puente disliked the term, in her own opinion the popularization of that term saved Cuban/Afro-Cuban music from extinction by making it acceptable to a younger generation that thought "Cuban music" was for the old folks. These both are areas worth adding to the article. --Lawikitejana 04:57, 28 October 2006 (UTC)

Discography need
About a month ago I included Ms. Cruz in the Category:Musicians work group articles needing discographies list. Someone added a discography sketch. I think a even a discography sketch should at least inform the casual listener which are the important compilations and the best selling albums. This does not truly meet my criterion. I will discuss with the Musicians work group and see if it should be relisted pending further work. TonyTheTiger 20:47, 31 October 2006 (UTC)

Translating Spanish Discography
Someone with stronger spanish skills than me should translate her discography from Spanish wikipedia. TonyTheTiger 19:21, 8 December 2006 (UTC)

Siempre Viviré ( I Will Always Live) is better translated as "I Will Survive", as it is a Spanish language cover of the English language song of that name originally performed by Gloria Gaynor in 1978. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 66.93.212.216 (talk) 03:22, 19 May 2008 (UTC)

Date of death
The date of her death is different in the table on the right compared to the main text. table sais 2003 text sais 2006 —Preceding unsigned comment added by 76.11.2.181 (talk) 14:45, 28 December 2007 (UTC)

Exile and move to us are important
I find it ridiculous that the article does not even contain a mention of her move to the US from Cuba. It's okay if we don't know all the details--we do know that it happened. The fact that she lived in the US and never returned to Cuba was an important part of her life, as well as a theme often expressed in nostalgic songs about her homeland (e.g. Guantanamera). We need to put some info like that in there to make this even a reasonably comprehensive biographical article--anyone more expert than me have some ideas as to the most kosher way to go about it? 128.232.242.23 (talk) 14:25, 5 March 2008 (UTC)

 * please fix celia cruz was sevied by pedro knight and luis falcon the man they called there son her biography luis falcon and omer pardillo are both celia cruz kids so please —Preceding unsigned comment added by Luis22 (talk • contribs) 17:58, 10 September 2010 (UTC)

 * Please see WP:V, WP:CS and WP:RS. If you can provide a reliable, verifiable source for the material you wish to add, then we can add it. Nightscream (talk) 22:41, 10 September 2010 (UTC)

Grainy photo
The photo at the top of the article is way too grainy. :| Can we get a better one? --RyanTee82 (talk) 06:04, 13 October 2009 (UTC)

Crude, a bit?
The second to last sentence in the "career" section of this article says, "She had weight issues." Is that really necessary? --68.105.187.199 (talk) 03:51, 19 March 2010 (UTC)

It’s hardly crude; sounds more like a prim euphemism. Was she seriously overweight, and did this have an impact on her health? (Did it, for example, necessitate the knee surgery mentioned?) If so, it may be worth saying, more clearly. If not, it should be removed.AuntFlo (talk) 02:34, 13 July 2010 (UTC)

Edit request from, 31 October 2011
188.222.171.18 (talk) 23:55, 31 October 2011 (UTC) I have found an misinformation about the name of celia cruz wish is only CELIA CARIDAD CRUZ ALFONSO ,,foun in a book writen by Hector Ramirez Bedolla from medellin,colombia.
 * We need more to go on like a book name. C T J F 8 3  00:41, 1 November 2011 (UTC)

Edit request from, 16 December 2011
The article mentions that Celia got her first major breakthrough in 1950. But Celia was singing on the radio in Havana Cuba (Mil Diez (1010) and Radio Cadena Azul if I am not mistaken) with Bienvenido León and Alfredo De La Fé (father of Alfredo De La Fé the violinist). Additional information is available in the Spanish wiki article for Celia, but it also does not mention the specifics of her career on Cuban radio.--Salsany (talk) 21:42, 16 December 2012 (UTC)

Her religion
Isn't it Santeria or Yoruba? She sings about Yemaja and Chango and elegua and Ochun.... RocketLauncher2 (talk) 04:20, 19 June 2013 (UTC)

Celia was a practicing Santera and Roman Catholic. --66.65.174.128 (talk) 12:14, 19 June 2013 (UTC)

 * Do you have a reliable, published source that we can cite, per WP:V and WP:CS? Nightscream (talk) 22:31, 19 June 2013 (UTC)

 * If there's no mention of her religion, I'd be fine if it at least acknowledges she sings something to do with Yoruba.

"The album, a collaboration with the crooner and trombonist Willie Colon, is a collage of themes and styles Ms. Cruz has touched upon before, including the image of the hardworking underdog and references to santeria, the African Yoruban religion prevalent in the Caribbean. One song, Los Vendedores, champions the street vendors of Miami who came to the United States as part of the 1980 Mariel boatlift and have often been the object of scorn." http://www.nytimes.com/1987/08/30/arts/celia-cruz-salsa-star-expatriate-whirlwind.html

"Celia Cruz has sung of deities like Chango. " http://www.nytimes.com/1997/01/27/nyregion/after-years-of-secrecy-santeria-is-suddenly-much-more-popular-and-public.html?pagewanted=all&src=pm

Here's one article that mentions her religion but I don't know how notable it is: http://www.oldies.com/artist-biography/Celia-Cruz.html "Cruz first appeared on Santero, an album of Afro-Cuban cult music on the Panart label. (Two of her later bestselling albums on Seeco, Homenaje A Los Santos and Homenaje A Los Santos Vol. 2, contained recordings of sacred songs, and her association with Santeria or Yoruba was highlighted in UK media coverage though she always claimed to be a practising Roman Catholic). "

They source " The Encyclopedia of Popular Music by Colin Larkin. Licensed from Muze. " though so maybe it is notable. RocketLauncher2 (talk) 23:40, 19 June 2013 (UTC)

 * The issue for sources is reliability, not notability, which is something else. Why I'd like to know is, what does "association with" mean? That's kinda vague. It doesn't actually say she subscribed to, adhered to or practiced that religion. Nightscream (talk) 01:57, 20 June 2013 (UTC)

 * From her autobiography Celia, mi vida page 24: "I respect all religions and beliefs, including santería, but I don't follow it. A lot of people who don't know me very well assume that I am santería. They see that I am a Cuban woman and black so I must be santería. I have fought against this my whole life." She was definitely Catholic only. In the same book she discusses learning santería songs as a girl from her neighbor Chela who was a practicing santería, but Celia's mother didn't like her. She later talks about being baptized Catholic and attending Ermita de la Caridad church throughout her life to pray with her rosary because she had a special affinity for Our Lady of Charity whose name she was baptized with. She also mentions that her husband Pedro Knight was Catholic as well. (page 74) Yamada Taro (talk) 01:59, 1 February 2014 (UTC)

Extra Names?
Several extra names were added as an unsourced "minor edit." Where did they come from? Are they accurate? Was her name:

1. Celia Cruz

2. Úrsula Hilaria Celia de la Caridad Cruz Alfonso

3. Úrsula Hilaria Celia de la Caridad Cruz Alfonso de la Santísima Trinidad

RWB22 (talk) 05:00, 21 October 2013 (UTC)

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title: Talk:Celia Cruz


text:
San Geronimo Valley

San Geronimo Valley is located in Marin County, California, composed of four unincorporated towns: Woodacre, San Geronimo, Forest Knolls, and Lagunitas. It is a fairly close-knit community, with a rather liberal citizenry. The farther west one goes along the valley, the more forested the land becomes. The valley is bisected roughly east-to-west by Sir Francis Drake Boulevard; a number of streets in the towns along this road were constructed on the former right-of-way of the Northwestern Pacific Railroad. The valley has numerous hiking/biking trails. Most of the residents reside on the south, shadier, side of the valley.

The San Geronimo Valley derives its name from the San Geronimo Ranch, established by Adolph Mailliard and Ann Eliza Ward in 1868, where they bred thoroughbred horses, including the famous stallion Monday, who sired most of the race horses in California.

The Valley is part of the Lagunitas School District, unique in that it operates two alternative elementary programs and a traditional middle school program on two connected campuses with one superintendent, one principal, and one school board. Each elementary program (Open Classroom, Montessori-inspired) has its own unique philosophy and pedagogical methods, all working within the framework of the California professional and academic standards. Each program involves parent participation to some degree.

The main businesses in the Valley are the Papermill Saloon in Forest Knolls, Arti Cafe, The Pump Espresso, Woodacre Market and Deli, and the Lagunitas Grocery, though there are numerous others. Woodacre is home to Spirit Rock Meditation Center, dedicated to the teachings of Buddha and Vipasannā mediation; Dickson Ranch, and the Marin County Fire Department headquarters. San Geronimo Valley also comprises the greater part of the Lagunitas Watershed, in which some of the last remaining coho salmon spawn. The San Geronimo Valley Community Center, attached to the school district, is a hub for community events and hosts the local food bank.

title: San Geronimo Valley


text:
Talk:Campfire

Legality
Should we include a bit on the legal status of building campfires? Especially in good parts of Europe it is generally forbidden to do so.2001:610:308:692:BC7A:10AA:9770:5AA7 (talk) 18:04, 19 September 2012 (UTC)
 * Please research and furnish link. Kortoso (talk) 17:05, 16 June 2014 (UTC)

Chopping some deadwood from this forest of original research
This article is, quite frankly, terrible. I started with the most obvious target, the unsourced section that says scouts drink ashes mixed with water. Sounds like a snipe hunt situation to me, but even if true it needs a source. As drinking ashes could in fact be quit detrimental to one's health I have removed that section entirely and would ask that it not be restored until a proper, reliable source is attached. Now, on to the rest of the article. Most of it appears to be personal observations. Some of it, for example the description of the "Schwedenfackel" style of fire building, makes little to no sense. Only one source is used for the entire article, leading me to believe that vast portions of this article are in fact original research. This thing needs a serious makeover. Beeblebrox (talk) 19:46, 4 December 2012 (UTC)

 * Actually, seems like it would make a pretty good start for a how-to article. But I agree that it is a very poor encyclopedia article.  Maybe someone could take on the task of migrating the misplaced content to Wikibooks, and then creating a skeleton article from what remains, to allow a proper article to be built? 138.16.113.241 (talk) 18:51, 2 September 2013 (UTC)

 * How about linking to well-regarded sources, such as US Army Field Manual FM 21-76 and the Boy Scout Handbook? Kortoso (talk) 16:56, 16 June 2014 (UTC)

US Forest Service Link
It's down. This page has some information, maybe a more permanent link:
 * http://www.smokeybear.com/campfire-safety.asp

Kortoso (talk) 16:54, 16 June 2014 (UTC)

Tinder
I suggest replacing this:
 * "Tinder lights easily and is used to start an enduring campfire. It is anything that can be lit with a match and is usually classified as being thinner than your little finger. A few decent natural tinders are birch bark, cedar bark, and fatwood, where available; followed by dead, dry pine needles or grass; a more comprehensive list is given in the article on tinder. Though not natural, steel wool makes excellent tinder and can be started with steel and flint, or a 9 volt battery without difficulty."

...with something a little more accurate and less OR:
 * http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/tinder?s=t
 * 1. a highly flammable material or preparation formerly used for catching the spark from a flint and steel struck together for fire or light.
 * 2. any dry substance that readily takes fire from a spark. Kortoso (talk) 17:06, 16 June 2014 (UTC)

Ignition
This section seems as if it contains biased information and a style of writing which diverges from the article, making it hard to understand. It is also written in an overly simple way. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Starwarsalp (talk • contribs) 17:05, 2 May 2017 (UTC)

The first sentence is ambiguous.
The article reads: "A campfire is a fire at a campsite that provides light and warmth, (...)" It can be understood that the definition applies only to those campsites that provide light and warmth. 85.193.228.103 (talk) 23:01, 2 September 2020 (UTC)

title: Talk:Campfire


text:
Winchester (disambiguation)

Winchester is a historic city in southern England.

Winchester may also refer to:

In Winchester, England

 * Winchester (UK Parliament constituency)
 * Winchester Cathedral
 * Diocese of Winchester
 * Bishop of Winchester
 * Winchester College
 * City of Winchester, the local government district containing Winchester
 * University of Winchester

People with the surname

 * Henry of Winchester (1207–1271), who would become King Henry III of England
 * Henry of Winchester (1101–1171), also known as Henry of Blois, the Bishop of Winchester
 * Benjamin Winchester (1817–1901), early leader in the Latter Day Saint movement
 * Boyd Winchester (1836–1923), United States Representative from Kentucky
 * Brad Winchester (born 1981) American professional ice hockey player
 * Caleb Thomas Winchester (1847–1920), professor for English literature at Wesleyan University, Middletown, Connecticut
 * Charles Alexander Winchester (?-1883) consul of the United Kingdom in Shanghai
 * Colin Winchester (1933–1989), highest-ranking officer to be murdered in Australian policing history
 * Elhanan Winchester (1751–1797), preacher
 * Ernie Winchester (1944–2013), Scottish footballer
 * Ian Winchester (born 1973), discus thrower from New Zealand
 * Jack Winchester (disambiguation)
 * Jesse Winchester (1944–2014), stage name of musician James Ridout Winchester
 * Jesse Winchester (ice hockey) (born 1983), Canadian professional ice hockey player
 * John de Winchester (d. 1460), bishop of Moray
 * Jude Winchester, Northern Irish footballer
 * Mary Winchester (Zoluti) (1865–1955), English girl kidnapped by Mizos
 * Olive Winchester (1879–1947), pioneer biblical scholar and theologian in the Church of the Nazarene
 * Oliver Winchester (1810–1880), largest stockholder of the Winchester Repeating Arms Company
 * Sarah Winchester (1837–1922), wife of William Winchester and builder of the Winchester Mystery House
 * Scott Winchester (born 1973), American former Major League Baseball player
 * Shurwayne Winchester (born 1974), soca artist from Trinidad and Tobago
 * Simon Winchester (born 1944), author and journalist
 * William Wirt Winchester (1838–1881), son of Oliver Winchester

Fictional characters

 * Major Charles Emerson Winchester III, a character in the television series M*A*S*H
 * Dean Winchester, a character in the television series Supernatural
 * John Winchester (Supernatural), a character in the television series Supernatural
 * Mary Winchester (Supernatural), a character in the television series Supernatural
 * Sam Winchester, a character in the television series Supernatural

United States

 * Winchester, Arkansas
 * Winchester, California
 * Winchester (San Jose), a neighborhood of San Jose, California
 * Winchester Transit Center, a light rail station in Campbell, California
 * Winchester, Connecticut
 * Winchester, Georgia
 * Winchester, Idaho
 * Winchester, Illinois
 * Winchester, Indiana
 * Winchester, Iowa
 * Winchester, Kansas
 * Winchester, Kentucky
 * Winchester-on-the-Severn, Maryland
 * Winchester, Massachusetts
 * Winchester, Michigan
 * Winchester, Mississippi
 * Winchester, Missouri
 * Winchester, Clark County, Missouri
 * Winchester, Nevada
 * Winchester, New Hampshire, a New England town
 * Winchester (CDP), New Hampshire, the main village in the town
 * Winchester, Adams County, Ohio
 * Winchester, Jackson County, Ohio
 * Winchester, Richland County, Ohio
 * Winchester, Oklahoma
 * Winchester, Woods County, Oklahoma
 * Winchester, Oregon
 * Winchester, Tennessee
 * Winchester, Texas
 * Winchester, Virginia
 * Winchester, Grant County, Washington, an unincorporated community
 * Winchester, Vilas County, Wisconsin, a town
 * Winchester (community), Vilas County, Wisconsin, unincorporated community within the town
 * Winchester, Winnebago County, Wisconsin, a town
 * Winchester, Wyoming

Elsewhere

 * 747 Winchester, an asteroid
 * Winchester, Ontario, Canada
 * Winchester, New Zealand
 * Municipality of Deloraine-Winchester, Manitoba, Canada
 * Rural Municipality of Winchester, Manitoba, now incorporated into Deloraine-Winchester.

Computers and software

 * Winchester, code name for an Athlon 64 processor model
 * Winchester disk, a once-common generic name for hard disks, from the code name for the early IBM 3340 storage system
 * Winchester connector, a connector for wideband modems located on layer 1 on the OSI model, specified in the ITU-T Recommendation V.35 standard and later in Rec. V.11

Entertainment

 * The Winchesters, a U.S. fantasy television series, spin-off of the WB/CW show Supernatural
 * The Winchester, a fictional English pub in the movie Shaun of The Dead
 * Winchester '73, an American Western movie released in 1950 starring James Stewart, remade as a made-for-TV film in 1967
 * Winchester (film), a 2018 American horror film

Firearms

 * Winchester Repeating Arms Company, manufacturer of Winchester firearms
 * Winchester rifle, a lever-action rifle popular in the US since the mid-19th century
 * 9×23mm Winchester, a centerfire pistol cartridge (introduced c. 1996)

Vessels

 * HMS Winchester, a name used seven times for Royal Navy warships from 1693–1946
 * USS Winchester (SP-156), a United States Navy patrol vessel in commission from 1917–1919
 * Winchester, the class name for the military BHC SR.N6

Weights and measures

 * Winchester measure, an archaic set of weights and measures
 * Winchester quart, an archaic measure of volume

Other uses

 * Book of Winchester (also known as the Domesday Book), the record of the great survey of England completed in 1086 for William I
 * Winchester (bottle), used in laboratories for the storage of corrosive chemicals
 * Winchester Mystery House, a well-known mansion in San Jose, California, United States
 * The Winchester, Highgate, a London pub, England, United Kingdom

title: Winchester (disambiguation)


text:
Clapperboard

A clapperboard, also known as a dumb slate, clapboard, film clapper, film slate, movie slate, or production slate, is a device used in filmmaking and video production to assist in synchronizing of picture and sound, and to designate and mark the various scenes and takes as they are filmed and audio-recorded. It is operated by the clapper loader. It is said to have been invented by Australian filmmaker F. W. Thring. Due to its ubiquity on film sets, the clapperboard is frequently featured in behind-the-scenes footage and films about filmmaking, and has become an enduring symbol of the film industry as a whole.

History
In the silent era the principal requirement of film stock identification during a day's shoot was the slate.

The clapper as two sticks hinged together was invented by F. W. Thring (father of actor Frank Thring), who later became head of Efftee Studios in Melbourne, Australia. The clapperboard with both the sticks and slate together was a refinement of Leon M. Leon (1903–1998), a pioneer sound engineer.

Description
The clapperboard combines a chalkboard slate or acrylic board with a set of clapper sticks across the top; one stick is fixed to the upper edge of the slate, while the other is attached to it by a hinge at one end. The slate displays the name of the production, the scene and "take" about to be performed, and similar information; a camera assistant holds the clapperboard so the slate is in view of the cameras with the clapper sticks already open, speaks out information for the benefit of the audio recording, then snaps the sticks shut.

The shutting of the clapper sticks is easily identified on the visual track, and the sharp "clap" noise is easily identified on the separate audio track. The two tracks can later be precisely synchronized by matching the sound and movement. Since each take is expressly identified on both the visual and audio tracks, segments of film are easily matched with corresponding segments of audio.

Purpose
Finding a way to synchronize visual and audio tracks was essential to traditional filmmaking because film stock reacts to light, not sound. During a film shoot, the audio track was always recorded by the audio engineer with a separate system on separate media (so-called double-system recording). (For early sound films, playback of the audio track was synchronized during post-production with sound-on-disc techniques; engineers later figured out how to directly add an audio track to a release print with sound-on-film techniques.) Failure to use clapperboards can prevent the film editor from synchronizing the visual images on film footage with the accompanying audio recordings, as actually happened with the long-delayed film Amazing Grace.

Methods were later developed to directly record sound to film (technically, a magnetic stripe on film) as part of a single system integrated with the film camera (so-called single-system recording), which was most commonly used with small formats like Super 8 film. However, single-system recording did not render clapperboards obsolete. First, single-system recording of sound-on-film is "decidedly inferior in audio quality" to traditional double-system recording. Second, footage from single-system recording is difficult to shoot and edit. Since the sound playback head cannot block the projector gate and must be placed after the gate, the soundtrack must be offset by several frames (usually 28, 26, or 18 ahead) to maintain sync with the frame in the gate. With such footage, cutting to the next shot when an actor's lips stop moving will risk cutting off their last syllable, unless the soundtrack is copied and edited on a separate system, and actors must be directed to pause to allow for such cuts. Because of these technical limitations, the film industry has continued to use double-system recording for professional-quality film projects.

Construction
A traditional clapperboard (i.e., a dumb slate) consists of a wooden slate with a hinged clapper stick attached to its top. A modern clapperboard generally uses a pair of wooden sticks atop either a whiteboard or a translucent acrylic glass slate (the latter being easily legible via the light coming through it from the scene about to be shot). The clapper sticks traditionally have diagonally interleaved lines of black and white to ensure the camera can capture a clear visual image of the clap in most lighting conditions. In recent years sticks with calibrated color stripes have become available.

A digislate is a clapperboard with an inbuilt electronic box displaying SMPTE time codes. The timecode displayed on the clapperboard will have been jam synced with the internal clock of the camera, so that in theory it should be easy for the film editor to pull the timecode metadata from the video file and sound clip and synchronize them together. However, electronic timecodes can still drift during a long shooting day, so the clapper sticks on the clapperboard still need to be closed together in order to ensure there is a way of manually synchronizing the footage and audio if matching the digital timecode fails.

Operation
The slate typically includes the date, the production title, the name of the director, the name of the director of photography (DoP) and the scene information — which follows two popular systems:
 * 1) American: scene number, camera angle and take number; e.g. scene 24, C, take 3;
 * 2) European: slate number, take number (with the letter of the camera shooting the slate if using multiple-camera setup); e.g. slate 256, take 3C.  Often, the European system will also include the scene number; however, a separate continuity sheet that maps the slate number to the scene number, camera angle and take number may be used if the scene number is not included on the slate. This is generally not as great a concern with short films, however.

A verbal identification of the numbers, known either as "voice slate" or "announcement", occurs after sound has reached speed. At the same time or shortly thereafter, the camera will start running, and the clapperboard is then filmed briefly at the start of the take; its two sticks are snapped sharply together as soon as the camera has reached sync speed. Specific procedures vary depending on the nature of the production (documentary, television, feature, commercial, etc.), and the dominant camera assisting regional conventions.

A clapperboard is generally used to identify all takes on a production, even takes that do not require synchronization, such as MOS takes, which have no sound. When a slate is used to mark an MOS take, the slate is held half open, with a hand blocking the sticks, or closed, with a hand over the sticks.

Operator
The clapper loader (or 2nd AC) is generally responsible for the maintenance and operation of the clapperboard, while the script supervisor is responsible for determining which system will be used and what numbers a given take should have. While these are usually fairly obvious once a system has been agreed upon, the script supervisor is usually considered the final arbiter in the event of an unclear situation.

Alternatives
Sometimes a "tail slate" or end slate is filmed at the end of a take, during which the clapperboard is held upside-down. This is done when the slate was not captured at the start of the take due to the camera being set up for the shot in such a way that the board cannot be captured, for example when a specific focus or frame is set up and cannot be altered until the take is complete. Tail slates are also commonly used when the director makes the decision that clapping a slate at the beginning of the scene would be distracting to the actor, such as when filming a highly emotional performance.

title: Clapperboard


text:
User:Blackjack3

I'm surprised that anarchy works so well here. But the result is a great encyclopedia that stays current.

I thought I could write fairly well until some of the authors here rewrote my paragraphs, and I saw the improvements.

I'm sure I'll be corrected again. Like when Noah Webster's wife caught him in the pantry in the act of kissing the cook, she said "Why, Mr. Webster, I'm surprised." "No, my dear," he replied. "I'm surprised' you're amazed." Blackjack3 (talk) 11:37, 2 March 2008 (UTC)

title: User:Blackjack3


text:
Solomons

Solomons may refer to:

Places

 * Solomon Islands, a sovereign state
 * Solomon Islands (archipelago), an archipelago that includes the sovereign state nation of Solomon Islands and the Papua New Guinea island of Bougainville
 * British Solomon Islands, the Solomon Islands apart from Bougainville before 1978
 * North Solomon Islands, the area of the Solomon Islands archipelago previously under German control and covering Bougainville and what are now the northwestern provinces of Solomon Islands
 * Solomons, Maryland, USA
 * Solomons Island: see Solomons, Maryland

Military

 * Solomon Islands campaign, a World War II campaign
 * Naval Amphibious Training Base Solomons

People

 * Adolphus Solomons (1826–1910), American philanthropist
 * Adrian Solomons (1922–1991), Australian politician
 * Anzel Solomons (born 1978), South African chess master
 * Burt Solomons (born 1950), American attorney
 * David Solomons (accounting scholar) (1912–1995), British/American accounting scholar
 * David Solomons (photographer) (born 1965), British photographer
 * Levy Solomons (1730–1792), Jewish Canadian merchant and fur trader
 * Nat Solomons (1858–1943), London-born Australian cinema entrepreneur and later mayor, chairman of the Greater Wondergraph Company in the 1910s
 * Ralph Solomons, a pseudonym used by Kent Walton (1917–2003) as film producer

title: Solomons