Hi, how can I add a taxon that is not in the list?

[rachid_mouedden]

Hi, how can I add a taxon that is not in the list?

[earthknight]

Manually enter it and hit the “use as a placeholder” option.

Or do you mean add to iNat overall? Pretty sure curators have to do that.

[papernautilus]

You can flag it.

Go to the taxon page for the parent genus. From the drop-down list for curation, select “Flag for curation.”

[lothlin]

When you flag it, it is useful to link to the citation for the description or the paper it was described in, as well as the observation you want to add it to - some curators don’t love adding taxa if there isn’t an observation that needs it.

[sedgequeen]

Flag it and explain what the problem is. Citing the paper where it is described is helpful to prove that it’s a valid name, but it’s not always necessary. Sometimes, you can simply provide evidence that the name is in use.

[maxkirsch]

@earthknight

Manually enter it and hit the “use as a placeholder” option.

it’s best not to do this, for a few reasons: 1. it doesn’t notify anyone who could potentially add the taxon that the taxon is missing (and thus the taxon isn’t likely to be added to iNat anytime soon for an actual ID on the observation); 2. it leaves the observation without any ID at all (and thus it won’t be included in searches for any higher taxon to which the missing taxon belongs, and won’t be easily findable by potential IDers of that group); and 3. if someone looking through unidentified observations does come across the observation but doesn’t notice the placeholder, they might add a much broader ID (in the hopes of getting relevant IDers’ eyes on the observation), which would override the placeholder and accordingly remove any trace of the observer’s intended ID from the observation (if the intended ID wasn’t also preserved in a comment or the description or something like that).

[jasonhernandez74]

@lothlin

some curators don’t love adding taxa if there isn’t an observation that needs it.

There are many, many more taxa in the world than on iNaturalist. Generally, we prefer to add taxa as-needed; that is, when they are observed for the first time.

[lothlin]

Yes. That’s why I said what you quoted

[sandie43]

hi, i have a similar request, i see that the protozoan taxons are often forgotten, i’m not talking about families or so but bigger, like the Filasterea, which is a whole regnum, and it exists in gbif, and there are even families and names of species on it and observations. Classe Ichthyosporea · iNaturalist and Classe Microsporidia · iNaturalist at the same level in taxonomy are in inaturalist though. At least it would be usefull to include the regnum, if someone finds one of its not well known species it will know the regnum (page on gbif about the missing taxon: Filasterea.)

At the same time, Classe Haplosporea has 0 observations but the taxon is in inaturalist… it makes no sense for me

[lothlin]

Hrm, I was going to say that if you are an expert in something as neglected as protozoa it might be worth applying to be a curator (then you could help with the cleanup yourself,) but editing taxa at higher level than Order is not allowed for creators since it can cause problems - adding a taxa at Class level would require contact the help desk per the curator guide https://www.inaturalist.org/pages/curator+guide#adding

[sandie43]

thanks i will try to do that on my free time, explaining it. how to contact a curator who is specialized in a particular taxa?

[lothlin]

There isn’t really a database - you could maybe look at historical flags of the group and see who has been working with them?

[sandie43]

thank you a lot i will try that, it’s a bit ennoying that a whole order is missing on inaturalist, i bet some people have taken shot of them and they stay “state of life” or something like this, also it would help inaturalist identifying tool by working on the photographs that are present on gbif.

[grampianshiker]

As I understand it, adding an order won’t help iNat’s CV at all, since it only uses photos from iNat observations. So I don’t believe that will help from a suggestions point of view, unless someone makes enough observations of it. If someone’s going to observe it, it’s worth adding; if they aren’t, it probably isn’t for reasons that have been explained elsewhere.

[upupa-epops]

@sandie43 I would suggest making a flag on Choanozoa requesting that Filasterea be added and provide a comment with your reasoning. Wait a few days to see if anyone has opinions about it, then email help@inaturalist.org with a link to the flag and ask them to fulfil it.