Just wondering how you all feel about posting plants from botanical gardens. Over the years I’ve made lots of visits to the Cleveland Botanical Garden, and have found some pretty interesting species in the Madagascar and Costa Rica glasshouses. I want to document the species I find there (especially the Madagascan succulents/xerophytes), but don’t know if iNat is the right way/place to do it, since wild organisms are the goal here. Thanks for your thoughts!
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Please do share! It’s nice to have photos of expert-identified plants. Just mark them cultivated/captive.
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Well, you need to mark botanical garden observations as cultivated, that’s the key point. I have done it occasionally (especially if iNat doesn’t have great coverage of that species, doesn’t have flowers, whatever) but as you point out wild specimens are the main focus so I don’t post cultivated observations very often.
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Just mark them Cultivated/Captive (not wild)
It s fine to observe botanical garden specimens under that condition
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I do it sometimes if the species doesn’t have very many good photographs on iNat.
Theoretically posting the location might possibly increase the chance of the specimen getting stolen from that garden. So maybe consider that as well.
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I don’t really post cultivated plants much either. The only times I do is if it’s planted within it’s native range (oaks, maples, plants in a native plant garden, etc.), a conifer (I love conifers!), or an otherwise cool/interesting species. I always make sure to mark them as cultivated when I post so they don’t mess up the maps.
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I had considered that as well. Technically it’s not much different than posting desirable species that get dug up by passerby in parks (Trillium, Claytonia, Goodyera, Erythronium, etc.), but then again there are lots of stories of rare plants, especially aroids, getting stolen from botanical gardens because of the houseplant craze
Botanical gardens may be a good place to make very exhaustive observations of non-wild plants. Just remember to mark them properly.
You can also find wild organisms. In the case of plants, if you are not totally sure it can ben wild, ask someone else.
I often take pictures of cultivated plants to have an observation of the “hosts”, when I look for interactions of insects or fungi with these plants. Also, it can be a good way of learing some species - you have the opportunity to take a picture of specific features of a plant that is already identified, someone already mentioned it above. Make sure that some botanical GArdens have species rules regarding photography (but rather when it comes to professional photographers, that want to earn money with their shots).
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Aside from marking the observation captive/cultivated, also keep in mind that just because the label in front of the plant has a name on it, that name is not necessarily correct. Plants get misidentified, labels can get moved, and sometimes what was behind the label dies and is replaced by a weedy volunteer.
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It’s just like any other captive observation, so long as you mark as captive and don’t exclusively post captive observations, it’s fine.
Agreed. At this botanical garden there was a plant that was obviously Aloe deltoideodonta labeled as Aloe ibityensis
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Consider obscuring a rare plant’s location to decrease the likelihood of its getting stolen or clipped. See the discussion Best way to obscure.
With some detective work, a motivated person may find the plant anyway, but if that person feels about the plant as we hope most iNat people do, myself included, the result will be a visit to the plant only to admire it, with the plant remaining unharmed as of the conclusion of the visit. ;)
I do occasionally post cultivated plants when I want to link them to a leaf miner or phytopathogen associated with it. Botanical gardens are a great source to find interesting stuff, possibly rarely observed species and sometimes even new findings for the country or state
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As other have stated, the main issue with posting images of cultivated plants (botanical gardens or anywhere) is that they really must be marked as captive/cultivated, and that happens far too infrequently. That annotation removes them from the primary display of distribution maps, and that is important. In the absence of that annotaion, the distribution maps of many cultivated species are now peppered with outlier observations that probably, maybe?, possibly? were made in cultivated situations that are difficult to resolve.
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https://forum.inaturalist.org/t/make-captive-cultivated-not-automatically-no-id-needed/112
Open request with 125 votes.
iNat discourages observers from putting Not Wild before they have an ID.
Give us personal settings ( I want to see Not wild if it still Needs ID) I will tip it to Cultivated with my (first) ID if it is commonorgarden. If the obs is interesting I will wait for Notification of the second ID, then tip it to Not Wild. And I tidy up weird distribution maps …
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I’ve gotten some really neat observations in obscure greenhouses or back parts of botanic gardens… always mark as not wild as others have said. Some were iNat firsts for the species, so valuable for the photos though not for ecological correlates. I only do it rarely but find it’s a fun way to get a snapshot of the neat stuff in those places.
Hard to imagine people stealing from a botanical garden or not knowing a botanical garden has rare plants, but i’ve been to places like small greenhouses of research facilities that should be obscured. All in all there’s no real downside in obscuring things from botanical gardens because the location isn’t all that meaningful - it’s there because it was planted and cared for, not because conditions are particularly suitable for that species.
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https://www.news.uct.ac.za/article/-2014-09-29-rarer-than-rhino-and-just-as-prized-by-poachers
Cycads poached from Kirstenbosch garden - now caged for protection
https://www.inaturalist.org/observations/196194612
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So sad :(
I hate seeing beautiful cycads in cages where you can’t appreciate their full glory, just because of the greed of others
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