Ginkgo citizen science project using iNaturalist (Smithsonian)

General
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This came across my newsfeed today. Smithsonian is requesting that citizen scientists collect Ginko leaves from around the world, mark the observation on inaturalist, and send them the sample (6 leaves). I don’t know if there is an official project where these observations are being curated or not.

https://www.si.edu/fossil-atmospheres/leaf-survey?fbclid=IwAR3NrH7MxBuOcBFzcX7V61bRQZCbWTlCG4qVCN6JFqkYDSaBN7z9J3daV3g

https://www.facebook.com/SmithsonianNMNH/videos/2641791995833580/?xts[0]=68.ARBq8cnd9mEvlxndM36kFoHaK3lVvXaQwgx6mg-PIrHfOwE7gBgE6RY9V6NhVSKjwCf4pNJ9Dk6UwgL-En5_YUQEqCGo_SP7K9lhyyhJGRH3H2H9jX6N9gPNfCyI8ER5M96ZCT2TY_KL4UIvdpxXisxqeRBVfYepb-6pB75kQM38vzDrR-d97_eUn_oLXGsq1bf_14jaT7V63sPnyhSGAhNlgdGFWpdRhIbwRGikCRg_zFVnBbOhz1mzXxb2nI9r_GeKD1AatpIVPUUOQ-1X0wU2Rnt7njAtpOHNMgPyXJdTeKKE21_ILx7Clgbe2qTva3eWrlxZeQ3Z5-lxccV15ZN1j6sCDDRaw2o0k8rPBnSPtzTL-61a9w&tn=H-R

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There’s a project (https://www.inaturalist.org/projects/fossil-atmospheres)

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Awesome! I guess the project name is pretty intuitive, but I didn’t know how to find it short of guessing the name.

I suspect ginko trees I have access to wouldn’t generate much new data, since I’m only 30 min away from the smithsonians, so they probably already have MD/DC/Northern VA data.

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They want the age or height of the tree and sex IIRC, so you might provide different data points for them.

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There are plenty of non-wild Gingko trees. I’ll see if they can maybe edit the web instructions in add in the step of marking captive/cultivated if necessary.

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are there such things as wild ginkgos?

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I don’t know enough about them to say one way or the other.

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I’ve seen wild grown saplings but never a mature tree myself

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