i feel like i’ve been posting observations with interactions incorrectly, an observation of either the host or parasitoid with reference to the other in the comments. my Cotesia observation mentions the Acharia stimulea host.
i should probably post a second observation, of the saddleback with its Cotesia friends.
should i link the observations to each other in the comments? are there specifically helpful terms to add to tags, observation fields?
yesterday i found the remains of cool dead caterpillar, used to feed and protect a juvenile mummy wasp to adulthood: https://www.inaturalist.org/observations/225005815
a comment informed me of the wasp’s existence, and i’m wondering if i should make a second observation with the same photos for the wasp. that brings up another question, would this be a ‘construction’ as evidence of presence for the wasp?
Replying with what I know, yes you can make a second observation with the same photos for the wasp! Just specify that you in the notes that you are making this observation specifically for the parasitoid wasp.
I generally just link to the other observation in the notes field.
Note that if you duplicate the observation, the photo info page will show that it is used in both observations, but this is not obvious from the main observation page, so I prefer to link the observations in some way as well.
I feel a similar way about some of the interactions I observe. As someone who isn’t particularly good at identifying anything, my greatest interests are in extracting useful information from the platform in other ways, which includes interactions between species.
Although I haven’t even added the correct fields to all of my own observations yet, I feel like iNaturalist’s contributions to GLoBI are extremely valuable, and would love to see more people using GLoBI-compatible fields on their observations.
I think it’s a shame when I see an observation of a parasitised (usually common) spider, but nothing for the parasite (which is usually far less observed)! So yes, feel free to add a separate observation for the parasite, and try to use one of these fields to link them.