I was under the impression that taxa for which there is no pressing need should not be added, to avoid cluttering the database with unused taxon entries. However, in going through the full list of deviations, I see quite a lot of taxon entries (mostly species, mostly of plants) newly added based upo…

There have been a couple of occasions where there has been a discussion about which taxonomic groupings we should follow (i.e. is this one genus or three), when there are disagreements out there and no authority. In that case once a consensus has been reached I have tried to add every taxon (comple…

[image] DianaStuder: As an observer, asking you to add a missing sp for an obs (not mine) would it help if we were asked to link to the active obs, when flagging. Yes, absolutely – I think it would be great if everyone did this. Conversely, if it turned out that the taxon weren’t at least tho…

For what it’s worth, here’s @loarie ’s instructions for how to respond to flags asking for new taxa to be added: https://help.inaturalist.org/en/support/solutions/articles/151000014391-section-a-how-to-respond-to-a-flag-requesting-to-add-a-new-taxon Step 1 says: Generally, we try to add taxa as th…

Thanks very much Tony for digging up that response – guess I should’ve done more looking in the forum! It seems that this strongly supports not adding every taxon, contra some of the above. While it doesn’t answer whether the empty branches are a database load unto themselves, it seems like there’s…

Basically yes, there is nothing that could serve as a ‘taxonomic framework reference’. The result is that one person comes along and says ‘Oh, I’ve seen Genus speciesus’ and adds it, the next person says ‘Oh, I’ve seen Henus speciesus’ and adds it, then the next person says ‘Oh I’ve seen Ienus speci…

It sounds to me like there are too many untrained curators, if all of these are actually being added (not just requested) without summary review of the taxonomy… but that’s probably for a separate topic. I would still opine that the best thing to do is – per site staff, as above – add taxa only as …

Your confusion seems to arise from a mistaken belief that only curators can add species… Anyone can add a species using the ‘Search external name providers’ tool. Curators can organise the taxonomy in such a way that users are less likely to add species in the wrong place in taxa for which it is a …

I’m fully aware that names can be added using that tool, specifically from the 2012 edition of Catalogue of Life, so it is somewhat a concern. I have myself accidentally added and then had to deal with outdated names, mostly in Lepidoptera (search flagged content created by me for a few examples). H…

In many genuses, species are organized into sections and complexes. When us users add an observation of such a new species, it is not put into the right section and complex. That can easily happen in genuses such as Rubus where the taxonomy is really complicated (subgenus, section, subsection, serie…

Personally if I can I’ll add whole genus if genus isn’t super big or I gradually finishing those large genera. In Platyhelminhes we have several ‘superuser’ identifiers who can work with those species on very professional level once such species is spawned in their identification queue. It saving…

Avoid adding new taxa with no observations?

Curators

Topic		Replies	Views
Curators, would some more of you at least add some requested taxa? Curators	28	838	April 1, 2026
Curating taxonomy? Anyone there? Curators	17	1206	September 16, 2025
Limit curators' right to make taxon swaps of taxa they have observed or identified a few times Feature Requests	60	1907	June 3, 2025
New Taxon Flag Page - encourage source citations? Curators taxonomy	38	898	March 10, 2026
Curator not wanting to add species General	14	795	December 2, 2025

Avoid adding new taxa with no observations?

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