Has anyone else discovered small populations of animals far outside their natural range, solely by playing with iNat’s explore page?
I find that I often use iNaturalist’s explore page to answer general questions about the ranges of particular animals. For instance, I wanted to know whether porcupines are found in the state of Rhode Island, so I pulled up the species on the explore page and found that there are no observations of porcupines in Rhode Island. Obviously, iNat does not perfectly reflect all animals’ ranges, but it can quickly and easily show you where the animal is common (as long as there are enough people in that area).
This led to me learning that there is a herd of zebras in California, and a population of white-tailed deer in Finland. Has anyone else had a similar experience?
The Californian zebras are ‘zoo’ animals?
Yeah, rheas in Germany was a new one for me.
Wilde Nandus in Deutschland???
Man lernt wirklich nie aus …
I looked it up and there’s a herd of around 100 Plains Zebras that roam free on the 82,000 acres around Hearst Castle. They were turned out when they dissolved the estate and now the descendants are free-roaming.
I experienced something similar.
I was skimming through Painted Lady Beetle observations in British Columbia when I came across one that looked off. It resembled a European species called the Larch Lady Beetle. At the time, I knew this species was introduced to Canada and the US, but hadn’t established outside North Carolina.
After talking with other users and finding other observations in BC, it turned out Larch Lady Beetles had been brought to the province in the 1960s. A small population was rediscovered in the 80s and 90s and was finally seen again when they were observed on iNaturalist!
On the other side of the continent in Newfoundland, the same thing happened with this species; it was introduced decades ago and rediscovered later on. That population is also documented on iNat.
This species has the ability to form self-sustaining populations after being introduced. Their populations are small and local however, so they’re often overlooked. It’s very possible other populations of Larch Lady Beetles exist in North America and are just waiting to be found again!
You can see the observations here:
https://inaturalist.org/observations?place_id=6712&taxon_id=488056
These two are the highlights:
https://inaturalist.org/observations/187684069
https://inaturalist.org/observations/171800749
Bison are native to Florida. the only reason it seems like they are far outside their natural range is because of how disjunct they became after we nearly wiped them out.
They’re considered introduced by iNat on all the obs.
Earlier this year when I was planning a trip to Kentucky, I came across this observation of Cleome ornithopodioides which is native to Eastern Europe and West Asia, and is the only observation of it in all of the americas.
Similarly, near me I found this observation of Alisma lanceolata, a species of aquatic plant native to Asia that has been introduced on the west coast of the US, and tihs was the first record of it in the southeast.
I then visited this population on my own, and since that first observation, the population has exploded.
I didn’t find this population using the map, but in person so I figured I would mention it. I found a local population of Lenophyllum texanum near me that I do not believe was planted, but rather an accidental introduction from its native range in South Texas/North Mexico.
I was pretty surprised to see these:
Hadedah Ibis in the Canary Islands
Yellow-fronted Canary in Mauritius and Hawaii
Clicking Stream Frog in St Helena, a remote island in the middle of the Atlantic Ocean
They aren’t free-roaming, they’re in a fenced area and are returned when they escape.
They’re native to Florida but only the panhandle.
I discovered that Wisconsin and Illinois have Mediterranean Geckos.
The species maps with disjunct records are a good way to detect erroneous IDs for many organisms. Or RG records that should’ve been marked Captive/Casual. Although, yes, sometimes they show a new disjunct natural population.
I don’t normally post captive critters but this one I enjoyed seeing:
https://www.inaturalist.org/observations/251351880
I should have used your method. I once misidentified a deer in Delaware because I had no idea there was an introduction of Sika deer nearby.
Every source I have found for them state they are completely free-roaming and not fenced in.
That’s simply incorrect, the owners of the ranch say so here: https://malibutimes.com/article_78348f9c-b273-11e6-8341-43158324d716
https://www.nbcnews.com/id/wbna41047293
Hearst said: “They have some respect for a fence. But if they want to move, they’ll hop the fence.”
It’s 82,000 acres and they just hop the short fence when they want to move around. I wouldn’t really call that being in a “fenced area”, I mean its technically true but they’re not fenced in the way we’re talking about. For all intents and purposes they’re free-roaming.
have any of you heard of the colonies of random parrots that live in so cal?
its really wild I actually see them frequently and they are LOUD