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Map

The map on this page shows a Great Basin Smaller than it actually is. Someone should show replace the map.

Richard knrstauch@msn.com

I agree. This is a very poor map and a confused article. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 71.60.58.71 ( talk) 00:18, 19 August 2013 (UTC) reply

Why are all of the photos from Utah

There seems to be a rather noticeable Utah bias to this article. Both the Great Basin Desert and Region occupy much, much more of Nevada than Utah, but ALL of the photos were taken in Utah. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Austinfidel ( talk • contribs) 00:00, 26 April 2008

Area

I believe the area of 184,427 sq mi (477,664 km2) in the infobox is incorrect. Going through the USGS site I come up with the following:

  • Bear River: 7310 sq miles
  • Great Salt Lake 28700
  • Sevier, Escalante 16200
  • Black Rock, Humboldt 28300
  • Lahotan 12500
  • North Lahotan 4480
  • Central Nevada 47100
  • Mojave 28000
  • Southern Mojave 16000
  • Oregon 17300
    • Total= 205,890 sq mi (533,300 km2)

From the GIS area calculation, I get 541,728.54 square kilometres (209,162.56 sq mi). I believe the discrepancy comes from the USGS number not including the small area in Mexico. I propose using the GIS calculation.

Lynn (SLW) ( talk) 13:39, 12 July 2015 (UTC) reply

Please describe/explain your GIS area calculation in consideration of WP:CALC. Vsmith ( talk) 00:15, 15 July 2015 (UTC) reply
GIS: Geographic Information System. The calculation is done by the ArcMap program. I downloaded the GIS files from the USGS site, (the same files used to make the map on the left, which should be put back into the article) plugged them into ArcMap, and it calculated the area of the polygons (which is probably how the USGS got the numbers in the list above). All I had to do was add up the areas. Lynn (SLW) ( talk) 00:35, 15 July 2015 (UTC) reply
Thanks, that's the answer I wanted to see.. Vsmith ( talk) 01:10, 15 July 2015 (UTC) reply

I also have a little heartburn with the sentence "The Great Basin can be defined hydrographically, geologically, and biologically. Each of these definitions yields a different geographical boundary of the Great Basin. The hydrographic definition is the most commonly used." In my mind, there is only one boundary of the Great Basin, and that is the hydrographic one, the area named by Fremont because it has no outlet to the sea. The other boundaries are for areas named for the Great Basin. I know that most of the sources use the term defined. So, how about we do something like this:

The term "Great Basin" is applied to hydrographic, [1] biological or floristic [2] geologic or physiographic, [3] and ethnographic regions. [4] The term was originally coined by John C. Frémont who, with knowledge gleaned from Joseph R. Walker as well as his own travels, recognized the hydrographic nature of the area as "having no connection to the ocean". [5] The hydrographic definition is the most commonly used, [6] and is the only with a definite border. The other definitions not only yield different geographical boundaries of "Great Basin" regions, but regional borders that vary from source to source. [3]

  1. ^ Grayson, Donald K. (1993). The Desert's Past. Washington and London: Smithsonian Institution Press. p. 11. ISBN  1560982225.
  2. ^ ibid page 21
  3. ^ a b Grayson, Donald K. (1993). The Desert's Past. Washington and London: Smithsonian Institution Press. p. 14. ISBN  1560982225.
  4. ^ ibid page 34
  5. ^ ibid pages 8-9
  6. ^ NPS

Lynn (SLW) ( talk) 23:41, 14 July 2015 (UTC) reply

Grayson, p. 14 just seems to be a list of mountains (at least, in the 2011 printing). Not sure how that supports the statement "regional borders that vary from source to source" ? Are you looking at somewhere else in the book? — hike395 ( talk) 02:50, 15 July 2015 (UTC) reply
Perhaps you meant pp. 12-13 of Grayson, where he states, "only the hydrographic Great Basin allows any real certainty of where the Great Basin starts and stops. Scientists defining one or the other Great Basins draw the edges of their great basins differently depending on the precise definitional criteria they use..."
If so, then your edit looks great to me. — hike395 ( talk) 02:59, 15 July 2015 (UTC) reply

Yes, that's it. It is on page 14 of the heavy, bulky, 1993 hardcover edition that I have. So, I'll go ahead and make the changes. Lynn (SLW) ( talk) 11:26, 15 July 2015 (UTC) reply

Orphaned references in Great Basin

I check pages listed in Category:Pages with incorrect ref formatting to try to fix reference errors. One of the things I do is look for content for orphaned references in wikilinked articles. I have found content for some of Great Basin's orphans, the problem is that I found more than one version. I can't determine which (if any) is correct for this article, so I am asking for a sentient editor to look it over and copy the correct ref content into this article.

Reference named "whatis":

I apologize if any of the above are effectively identical; I am just a simple computer program, so I can't determine whether minor differences are significant or not. AnomieBOT ⚡ 13:56, 15 July 2015 (UTC) reply

Too much emphasis on the Great Basin Desert

Okay, now that we've figured out what the Great Basin is, I think the article is too focused on the northern part. There should be more information on the southern, Mohave region. Also, those climate tables seem really overwhelming. Any objection to taking those out, or putting them in the Great Basin Desert article, since they are all for areas within it? We could then link to that section in that article and the corresponding one in the Great Basin Mojave Desert one. Lynn (SLW) ( talk) 00:44, 23 July 2015 (UTC) reply

Merger Discussion

Request received to merge articles: Great Basin Desert into Great Basin#Merger Discussion; dated December 2015; discussion here. GenQuest "Talk to Me" 15:01, 30 December 2015 (UTC) reply

  • Oppose. The Mojave Desert and the Oregon High Desert are also part of the hydrographic Great Basin. It makes no sense to merge just the Great Basin Desert ecoregion into the article and not the others just because it has "Great Basin" in its title. Lynn (SLW) ( talk) 15:17, 30 December 2015 (UTC) reply
  • Oppose. This article is an article about the ecological region "Great Basin Desert". The "Great Basin" itself is a hydrological region. As Lynn says above, they are not the same (the Mojave Desert is part of the Great Basin). Having a separate, fleshed-out article about a sub-region follows WP:SUMMARYSTYLE. — hike395 ( talk) 23:12, 5 January 2016 (UTC) reply
  • Oppose. Two concepts.-- Zoupan 20:35, 11 January 2016 (UTC) reply

Merger proposal

I propose that Intermountain West be merged into Great Basin. They seem synonymous to me. Keith (Hypergeek14) Talk 18:48, 3 July 2016 (UTC) reply

  • Oppose - not synonymous: the intermountain west covers or includes much more - most notably the Colorado Plateau. Vsmith ( talk) 20:35, 3 July 2016 (UTC) reply
  • Oppose --- Vsmith is correct: it is a larger region than the Great Basin. The Intermountain West includes the Snake River Plain. @ Hypergeek14: would you be willing to improve the existing article? It's in terrible shape. — hike395 ( talk) 07:25, 4 July 2016 (UTC) reply

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