FEATHERS? ¯\_(ツ)_/¯ for identifying?

General
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Curious as I was “exploring” observations on the map, someone had uploaded a feather :woman_shrugging:t3:

I was unaware you could get an identification off of a feather on this platform as in the rules it needs to be a living organism of sorts, is this correct?

I have many feathers I’d LOVE to Help ID or get an ID just wanted to be sure.

Thank you! :blush:

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Observations can be of evidence of organisms, not just the organism itself. So feathers, tracks, poop, eggs, etc. are all great to upload to iNaturalist. There’s also a nice community of people who know a ton about feathers here! If you add your observations to this project they’ll usually get identified pretty quickly: https://www.inaturalist.org/projects/found-feathers

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:exploding_head::pray: thank you! dang I wish I would have checked out this part of iNaturalist when I started 4 months ago! That’s so awesome to know. I very much appreciate the help!

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Definitely check out the USFWS Feather Atlas if you’re looking to help with IDs! It’s pretty neat and not many people seem to know about it. They have an ID tool here and a general browser of the database here, if you click through the family + genus links.. :)

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:pray: WOW! New recourses!!! Love this! Thank you!
I found a dead bird in my back woods and I really never seen anything like it. I’m going to use both your info & the info @bouteloua Provided! Thank you! All so much. :smiling_face_with_three_hearts:

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You may be pleased to know there are several dead bird projects on iNaturalist you may add it to.
I think the “Dead Birds” project is the most general:
https://www.inaturalist.org/projects/dead-birds

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anything that was made by a living organism counts. feathers, remains, tracks, poop, evidence of eating… it all counts!

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Check this project https://www.inaturalist.org/projects/found-feathers

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In addition to the Feather Atlas, if you’re after birds from countries outside North America, Featherbase (https://www.featherbase.info/en/home) have complete feather sets from birds around the world! :)

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@Star3 wow! Who’d a thought there is a “dead bird” project :exploding_head:
Thank you! I joined! Thank you so very much!

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I wish I knew this! Oh my do I wish I knew this! The pics of poop I have in my phone and no one to share with. :woman_facepalming:t3: Not to mention the tracks (I’m slightly obsessed especially in winter)

I finally found my place online :joy:
Seriously tho. Thank you! :pray:

Sorry if I’m using too many emojis if that’s an unwritten rule of annoyance let me know. Just don’t want to get my words left to any confusion.

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There’s more than one! :smiley:

It’s just that some are highly specific (e.g. only for window strike deaths, only for specific cities, etc.)

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Your forum profile says you’re in Minnesota, so you might like these projects, which take observations of prints, scat, and other forms of tracking:

https://www.inaturalist.org/projects/mn-wildlife-tracking-project

https://www.inaturalist.org/projects/north-american-animal-tracks-database

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Thank you @Star3 :smiling_face_with_three_hearts:
I joined them both!
I’m realizing in the last 24 hours iNaturalist has so much more than I was aware of.
I’m so grateful for this forum and nice nature buddies like you all!

Side note:
I have been taking pictures with my phone because that’s what I thought you were supposed to be doing. :woman_shrugging:t3:

I’m pretty embarrassed at my observations now. I did it more as an “on-the-go” type of thing.

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Oh that’s fine! There’s a huge range of people using iNat, from sharing a few pics they took with their phone on a walk to work to people spending thousands of dollars on fancy camera equipment and going on trips halfway across the world to find new species. :)

For the app, some people take photos within the app, while others use their phone’s camera app and import later. Either way works, with pluses and minuses for each method.

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I don’t see anything wrong with that. I only use my phone for pictures; it’s not perfect. But, it’s the one I consistently carry and it records the time and place. Much as I might like to make higher quality pictures, it’s just not going to happen if I have to carry equipment. So, for me, an iPhone photo is better than no photo!

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That is :100: exactly my thoughts! I even got the iPhone 11 pro max just for the fact of taking photos because I do it constantly, there’s no question on where & when that way as well.
thank you for making me feel more comfortable :blush: :pray:

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That’s what I thought I had to do at at first. I use the app only. Never used it on the big girl computer yet. I’m imagining an entirely new experience as far as this forum and exploring other observations.

The issues I had with taking pics within the app is:

  1. Example: I can’t zoom and hold the leaves back at the same time.
  2. Cannot crop within
  3. By the time the app loads and I press “observe” it’s gone :weary: (basically just not as quick as my stock / built in camera)

Not complaining at all! I don’t think I’d like spending time on anything else anyway :blush:

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There is a young woman in Greece (@karakaxa) who has over 38,000 feather identifications. She’s a cracker-jack - my go to person for feather id!!
https://inaturalist.ca/people/karakaxa

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Thank you! I have feathers all over the place! I saved this message in a bookmark because it for some reason wouldn’t let me follow her :woman_shrugging:t3:

Since this post I’ve already got 3 different feathers to observe. I know what they are though. Is that ok?

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