The following discussion is an archived discussion of the proposal. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on the talk page. No further edits should be made to this section.

The result of the proposal was moved. -- BDD ( talk) 18:22, 7 June 2013 (UTC) reply

Picea pungens → Blue spruce – WP:COMMONNAME Chrisrus ( talk) 21:24, 30 May 2013 (UTC) reply

• Oppose – the common name would not be capitalized. Revise the proposal and we can reconsider. Dicklyon ( talk) 02:32, 31 May 2013 (UTC) reply
• Support unabashedly a move to Blue spruce. Dicklyon, would you support that? Red Slash 04:49, 31 May 2013 (UTC) reply
  • He was just concerned about the capitalization. It's fixed now, I'm sure he'll change to "support". Chrisrus ( talk) 06:10, 31 May 2013 (UTC) reply
    • Yes, support; it seems to me that this is such a well known species with well known common name that it should be titled with the common name. I've made a corresponding case fix multiple RM at Talk:Whitebark Pine, and so far have a little pushback with a preference for scientific name, which may be right for some of those. Dicklyon ( talk) 06:29, 31 May 2013 (UTC) reply
• Comment WP:COMMONNAME is not a policy that automatically favors "common names" over scientific names. The policy talks about "most commonly used" names (in reliable English-language sources). A simple link to WP:COMMONNAME is not a good argument for this move. What is the most commonly used name in reliable sources? "Blue spruce" beats "Picea pungens" in a simple Google test, but NGrams favors "Blue Spruce". Plantdrew ( talk) 02:52, 1 June 2013 (UTC) reply
  • Well said, absolutely! We can only support the vernacular name if it is indeed truly the common name. But I think in this particular case "Blue S/spruce" is the common name, in which case we can go with WP:MOSLIFE to guide us on capitalization. Which we should. Hence my support for exactly Blue spruce. Does that make sense? Red Slash 03:48, 1 June 2013 (UTC) reply
  • Indeed, the original proposal was both wrong case and poorly explained rationale. Still, as RedSlash says, it moved us to the right answer. Compare n-grams. Dicklyon ( talk) 03:53, 1 June 2013 (UTC) reply
• Oppose - the blue forms are the kind that are popular in the nursery trade, but the natural wild tree is green, and that type is known in the nursery trade as "Green Spruce". I could support "Colorado spruce" as a common name for this page, but not any of the capitalizations of "blue spruce". Sminthopsis84 ( talk) 20:57, 2 June 2013 (UTC) reply

n-grams suggest that blue spruce is much more common than any of those alternatives. Dicklyon ( talk) 21:09, 2 June 2013 (UTC) reply

• Comment - the n-grams data would show that people are chatting about their gardens, but if the article is about Picea pungens then I'd want it to cover the wild form of the plant as well as the cultivated types. I'd prefer to see blue spruce and the other capitalizations and silver spruce redirect to a section of this page about the blue and silver cultivars. Sminthopsis84 ( talk) 21:38, 2 June 2013 (UTC) reply

Does it matter at all to anyone if many readers want to read an article about the blue spruce, but not an article about Picea pungens? Chrisrus ( talk) 22:43, 2 June 2013 (UTC) reply

Sometimes when a plant has important uses, we have two pages. I can't think of an example, though, where there is just a single species involved. Banana refers to several species of Musa, Cinnamon comes from several species of Cinnamomum. There's Coffee, Coffee bean, and several species of Coffea. Perhaps there are closer examples to this situation, but if not, I think there could be an outcry about creating two pages. (I'd favour doing so, though). Sminthopsis84 ( talk) 14:30, 3 June 2013 (UTC) reply

Tea/ Camellia sinensis is the best single species/common name for it's product split I'm aware of; both articles are well developed and have a pretty clearly defined scope. Carrot/ Daucus carota is another, but the later article is also necessary for discussing the common weedy forms of the plant ("Queen Anne's lace"). There are several tropical fruits split from their species, but the articles are poorly developed, and scope is inconsistent ( Carambola/ Averrhoa carambola, Sugar-apple/ Annona squamosa, Soursop// Annona muricata, Cherimoya/ Annona cherimola). I can't imagine how to define the scope of separate articles for Blue spruce and Picea pungens. Plantdrew ( talk) 18:32, 3 June 2013 (UTC) reply

So redirecting to a section on this page about the coloured cultivars, blue and silver? Sminthopsis84 ( talk) 10:35, 4 June 2013 (UTC) reply

• Support. I don't think plants should be exempt from COMMONNAME at all, certainly not in this case. -- B2 C 06:49, 4 June 2013 (UTC) reply

The above discussion is preserved as an archive of the proposal. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on this talk page. No further edits should be made to this section.