People confuse common names so often. Examples: ice plant! No one calls it sea fig or Hottentot fig. Manroot - many people think of it as wild cucumber. If we could add a field with “other common names” or when they write it in, several options are shown, they could see all common names and we wouldn’t have to write back to them with explanations every time. Not that we can have every common name out here, but at least a few commonly used ones for the commonly confused taxa.
@grnleaf Welcome to the iNat forums!
So I’m just trying to visualize what you have in mind here. We can already add multiple common names for any taxon on its taxon page. And when someone types a common name, all taxa that use that common name will show up in the pick list.
Are you looking for a way for these names to be more readily visible to the user for a taxon, without having to go look on the taxon page?
Or is it a place for the user to more readily add a common name for a taxon (maybe as they create an observation for it), without having to visit the taxon page?
Or something else I’m missing?
vernacular names have been incorporated into the taxonomic system quite well for a very long time, even to having regional capabiltiy:
https://inaturalist.nz/taxa/202012-Steatoda-capensis#taxonomy-tab
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