This may actually be an “add feature” request, but first let’s see if the features are already there.
Is there a way to batch add observations into the Biodiversity in Urban Gardens: California Home & Neighborhood Gardens (BUG) project? See attached for what happens if I try. All sightings in the example were from the same location, next to the same native plants, but there was no way to answer the required questions:
Otherwise, adding in observations one by one is onerous and time consuming. Lack of a batch option will reduce or eliminate my participation in this project and will certainly eliminate any possibility of adding hundreds or thousands of old sightings.
One additional question about something that would make things a little easier: As soon as one clicks “yes” or “no” on the question “On/in/around Native Plants” why can’t the answer be automatically added? Same for the other questions. Having to click “add” after answering each question is unnecessary extra work. Example:
In the example I have chosen “yes” from the dropdown menu for the first question. Why wouldn’t that complete the question? Instead, I must go back and click “Add” for each question after answering them.
This feature of batch adding observations to traditional projects is not available on iNaturalist yet but I would love to have this feature added some day soon as it would be extremely helpful
However, it doesn’t work for projects that require particular Observation Fields to be completed for each observation. Unfortunately that is the case for the BUG project, and adding them one by one answering the questions for each observation is the only way to do it I think.
Thanks for sharing that @tiwane! @bewickwren reached out to us via email and I suggested he make a post here in the forum to get more intel on batch adding and if there was a way to speed things up when a project has additional questions like BUG does. It is great to know that this tool will help speed things up. We’ll add it to our FAQs.
