I am co-leading a workshop on the weekend that will visit a Natural Area and provide a “Beginner’s Guide to iNaturalist”. The learning objective is inform the casual user how best to use the application and contribute to conservations.
The irony is that I am also a neophyte and a biological-illiterate, lol.
My question to you, what 2-3 things would you tell a newbie about the application? Remember, these are biologists, but they do go into natural areas here in Alberta. As a result, they may not locate the long-lost species but thy may contribute 10-20 solid observations per year - and become more biologically-literate!
This link is my first cut at what to tell them. Perhaps list your items and see how I did!
I think it’s very important to add some sort of adjective here.
Observer: As the name suggests, a person who has made an observation, provided evidence (e.g. a photo), and saved all of this to the tool. The more good/thoughtful/high-quality observations you make the more credibility you have in the application.
Of the options I gave, I think “thoughtful” might be the best–from time to time, we all post observations where the subject and/or the camera did not cooperate, but we’re still hoping that someone will be able to tell what that blurry thing was and that’s fine. But people who make observation volume their #1 priority at the expense of good notes, trying to add IDs to the best of their ability, etc. rarely have high credibility.
I would clarify your discussion of Annotations and maybe put them somewhere separate from the “advanced metadata” like tags.
Advanced User Metadata. Advanced users can add things like a tag, annotation, and observation fields.
Tags are yours to use as you please and aid in searching. The tag ‘invasive’ is perhaps one I use frequently when observing dandelions in the middle of nowhere.[This is about tags, not Annotations.]
Annotations can take you down into the biological rabbit hole of identification.
Annotations add a ton of value to observations and can also really help with getting IDs quickly. If you have a caterpillar or a tadpole or some other animal where the juveniles look really different from the adults, adding a Life Stage annotation will make it much more visible to the Identifiers who have the skills to identify those. Similarly, if you have a plant, adding the Flowers and Fruits and/or Leaves Annotations can help get it in front of the people who are better at identifying fruits, fall foliage, etc.
There are helpful folks who go through and add Annotations to other people’s observations, but if people want an answer quickly (“what is this caterpillar that is eating my tomato plant?”), it’s best if they do it themselves. Adding Annotations is also a really easy way to start contributing to iNaturalist, since it’s usually very easy to tell whether you’ve got a larva or an adult insect, or if a plant has flowers.
More obs = more credibility ?
Maybe - if you are working on the taxonomy - or a taxon specialist who methodically records occurrence and variation.
Quality over quantity for iNat credibility. Dumping your memory card on iNat - not a good idea.
Need a better iNat version but. A puppy is for life not for Christmas.
Please remind newbies to follow notifications. There may be questions - planted in a garden? As the IDs roll in, you might reconsider your own ID.
PS using your Rosa woodsii as an example. The CID algorithm requires ‘more than 2/3’ so a wrong ID needs 3 identifiers to convince it. If the second identifier says - not that rose, but it is a plant - the algorithm invokes Ancestor Disagreement - and 5 identifiers have to weigh in.
PPS if not sure which rose - you can ID to Genus Rosa. Then the CID algorithm doesn’t make IDing difficult for us. If in doubt, go up taxon levels till you are sure.
DO always provide an ID - and if what the CV suggests looks wrong, add an ID yourself instead (not a Placeholder!).
DON’T agree with other people’s IDs unless you’ve actually reviewed them and checked for other possibilities.
DO be willing to withdraw your ID if you decide it’s wrong (thanking an identifier for a disagreeing ID while leaving your wrong ID is just annoying). Incidentally, I really wish it was more obvious how to withdraw IDs…
It’s fine to provide a high-level ID when submitting an observation, or when identifying an unknown. I recently passed a turtle shortly after leaving home, stopped, and took several photos. CV said it’s a box turtle, but if it had said some nonsense like mallard, I’d have called it a turtle, or a hideneck turtle. (The other suborder is the sideneck turtles.) I recently observed something that may be a worm or an insect larva; I’ll probably just call it an animal, since there are several phyla of worms.
I hardly ever withdraw an ID. Rather, I change it to something agreeing. I’ve identified a caterpillar as a geometrid, noting the few prolegs, but also that it might be a noctuid. Someone disagreed and IDed it as Noctuoidea. I agreed. If he had IDed it as a particular species of noctuid, I’d have called it a noctuid, since I knew only that it’s a geometrid or noctuid.
Thanks Lynn, I used this excellent guide for the basis of this post (see the credit section at the beginning). Not only is it informative but the photos are incredible. It would be useful if the statistics were kept up to date (e.g. annually).
I love the iNat and iNot quiz. It did not come up on the original research but I will include. As an aside, being new to iNat I wanted to ensure I understood the steps before looking at 10 people and saying ‘this is how you use the app’. This does lead to an interesting question, the cultivar plants appeared in my wife’s garden.
Is there value in making note of the spread of the plant despite being in an urban setting?
Thank Diana, I will modify this to focus on quality. Per your discussion on the identification, I am thinking the advise to newbies is to not weigh in on identification.
I accepted the suggestion because I simply did not know. The better thing to do is to observe and let the process take its course.
Potted plants can be mildly entertaining! I started Potted Weeds to track these. For conventionally-cultivated plants, it helps to know what’s popular and can become a problem in the future, like Tree of Hell Heaven, Peppertrees and Lantana, so I think potted plant observations aren’t entirely useless. I also enjoy seeing what other plant-identifiers are growing, so seeing their captive/cultivated observations is also worthwhile.
Educate the participants to upload more than one photo to demonstrate several details or views from different angles. Beginners underestimate the importance of details. I would also recommend: once the cv or someone suggested an ID start an internet search to find descriptions that would explain what features are relevant. This is also helpful to learn what type of details are needed for a certain species group.
A huge thank you for your feedback. I have updated the post and made corrections where required. Feel free to reference if useful or ignore if not so much. Remember though, it is for the neophyte.
How long will you have with them? How many touchpoints?
My perfect iNat training session on how to use the app would consist of two 1.5 hour sessions over the course of two days.
Day 1 would be intro and overview, setting up your account, and then “field work” of getting outside to make observations. Have folks come back and reflect and review.
In the interim, you set up a project of participants.
Day 2 would focus on what was collected on Day 1, some of the finer (though not fine) points of IDs, including annotations and Data Quality Assessments (DQA), what is Research Grade, tips and tricks for photography, and more field observations.
That gives the neophyte a good foundation with lots of practice and feedback from the instructor and each other.
Per your question:
Is there value in making note of the spread of the plant despite being in an urban setting?
Yes, absolutely.
I am even in favor of including cultivated plants if they show evidence of animal damage as long as the observation is marked captive and cultivated. That’s important information for understanding the urban food webs.
Oh sure. But in a training session for new iNatters, I am more focused on having them understand how to use DQAs and annotations.
To your point, on Day 2 - the finer points of ID - there needs to be an honest discussion of how a lot of observations can stay at the 1 ID provided by the OO (Original Observer) for a very long time, hence the need to make sure you as the OO are confident (not absolutely sure) of your initial ID. Confident IDs above species, genus or family are higher quality than wild guesses at a more specific taxonomic level. That can be a hard thing for folks to get their minds around.
Help them understand the CV is not always right. It’s good to use it to confirm a leaning or as a starting place to find a higher taxonomic level where the OO is comfortable making the ID.
Thanks Anne. For the session this morning, it is a one off training for 2h. In many ways, this training session is a proof of concept potentially offering longer training in the future. The context is to use iNat as a biophysical inventory of the province’s natural areas. As a result, we are are as interested in dandelions (invasive) the more exotic natural occurring species.
To this end, I will keep in mind the 2-day format. The nice thing is that this format could potentially be run virtually.