I want to be able to group together a subset of observations in a certain genus (Cisthene) which may belong in a different genus or deserve subgenus status. The latter name (Maepha) is not currently in the iNaturalist taxonomy, so my thought is to create either an Attribute or an Observation Field in which to add the latter name.
Which of these annotations is appropriate? The result needs to be searchable and collectable in future analyses.
I’m not sure what an attribute is, but an observation field should work well. Have you already tried asking curators to add the subgenus?
I’m not sure what an attribute is either. Could you give an example?
Maybe you were referring to annotations instead of Attributes?
What are tags, observation fields, and annotations?
Sorry everyone, I meant to say “Annotations”.
Presently, Maepha is not a formal subgenus, it’s just an old, now-unused generic synonym, the members of which have been scattered/moved to a number of other genera. It must await formal study (by someone other than me, since I’m not a taxonomist) before Maepha could see the light of day again. But my current hypothesis is that there are a small number of closely related taxa which will eventually be recombined in a resurrected Maepha. That’s why I want to gather the observations together in some informal way for the time being.
So back to my original question that I meant to ask: How do Annotations and Observation Field differ and which would be more appropriate for my task?
This might be a good case for a project actually. You can define the project inclusion criteria as all of the species that you’re interested in, and it will automatically put them all in one place.
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(changed the title)
You cannot create annotations, so I would recommend observation fields and/or a project.
Creating a project with the particular taxa of interest: Interesting strategy! I’ll have to think about this some more.
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