Curious when common raccoon (P. lotor) became raton laveur and what the basis for making that change was.
This is due to an issue with how common names are attributed to regions. Some French Canadian names were given priority over French names within Canada, but that also sets them higher in priority than the English name. See this bug report: https://forum.inaturalist.org/t/common-names-in-french-instead-of-english/43005
There are active flags for some of these taxa (including common raccoon) where this is being addressed. In the future, if you notice something off about a taxon, please flag it for curation. The forums are more of a general discussion area than for addressing specific taxon curation issues and there’s less of a guarantee a curator will see it here.
7 Likes
I find it very strange that iNat prioritizes locale over language when displaying common names. I’m sure there are exceptions but I would think the average user is more likely to recognize and use the global name in a language they do speak than the local name in a language they don’t.
4 Likes
Sorry, just poking in to ask how you do this? The issue is appearing again, but appears to only be effecting the app, not the website. Would the same steps apply?
I’m not sure of the flagging steps on the app, but on desktop you can flag taxa via the “Curation” drop-down menu below the seasonality graph on a given taxon’s “About” page.
1 Like
OK, wondering if there is a missing update somewhere, the issue is back, but only on the app, when I look at the same observation on the site it’s a non-issue.