I do check for taxa with few obs. If my ID is for a placeholder, then I will withdraw as soon as the observer, or a competent identifier adds their ID. The second ID taking it to RG will NOT be mine.
Or come and help ID when the Great Southern Bioblitz obs roll in 20-23 September later this week.
Definitely, though not as much as I expected. As a means of anti-gamification I find it’s nice to photograph certain things like wasps and flies that are unlikely to ever be ID to species because it’s. just. Difficult. From photographs alone. that gives you the opportunity to sit with something that can’t be IDd more finely and just be… Ok with it.
It’s also nice once you have an observation of an organism to find something you like about them and then say ‘ok I want a photo when it’s doing XYZ’, that is so classic or interesting of that species, particularly interactions.
All that said, if I know a friend is going somewhere new/productive, and their species count is approaching some nice round number, it would be unsporting not to prod them into motivation by asking them if they think they’ll bump a milestone during that trip…
What would be nice to see if someone has done it, would be to see some kind of table of observers that have observations of species with <1,000 obs, <100 obs, <10 obs, etc. There are different users here; some never tire of uploading mallards (good on them!), and some make few observations but of exceedingly rare things, or some only upload observations if it’s something new to them, and of course most of us do some combination of these things.
I am absolutely gamifying both - observing and IDing.
As an observer, one of my greatest enjoyments is to see another dot appearing on my small and semilarge-scale maps… I love to see this carpet of dots densifying. Of course I am always on the hunt for new lifers or even new species in an area/country/on the platform and use these to learn more about certain taxa. And when I am at a new place, I will check the documented taxa / leaderboards as well… it is too easy to add new taxa in many cases, just documenting some common species many overlook. While living in South America I especially enjoy finding new Bromeliaceae species… despite me not knowing much about them and they do look all the same to me (ok, some even I recognize by now)… but we have few great IDers of those who will help me out every time.
As an IDer I love to challenge myself to do certain numbers of IDs… ideally all needs ID in certain taxa and/or places, which can take a while. From time to time I work myself into a new taxa and when I got it figured out I will go “hunt” for a certain species in the needs ID. Recently I got into trying to get not yet CVed taxa up to 100 observations IDed or more and can’t wait to see the new update on the CV next time…
All these smaller and greater goals keep me motivated and going. I think I would get bored at some point otherwise (not of observing… I do this since loooong before joining iNat, but maybe of uploading and certainly of IDing).
My general base goals each year are 1000 observations of 500 species and 40.000 IDs … Missed all of those goals last year, but am on a good way this years to achieve them
This made me laugh because I jokingly refer to my iNaturalist as my “Critterpedia” (Animal Crossing reference) to my friends.
I think it’s fun to try and increase the number of species I have catalogued and having stats on that is a big motivator to go out and find more life. I certainly game-ify verifying others’ IDs because ideally we want as many research grade observations as possible, and this along with my desire to be accurate pushes me to research species outside of my specialties.
I wrote down how many species I found last year to try and beat it…but this game just keeps getting more difficult!
My bias is towards vertebrate animals, which is my area of study and work, so I can’t add all that many species in a given year without traveling a lot. If I really wanted to boost my species number I should focus more on the local diversity of plants and arthropods. I do try to photo any interesting plants I come across, and insects if they cooperate, but if the birds are active I’ll be spending most of my field time chasing them for a shot, especially if it’s something I have not photo’d before.
I love questions like this that reveal the many approaches people have to iNaturalist. What’s especially cool is that nearly all of them, competitive or not, end up contributing to and improving the resource. I tried keeping up a daily observation streak and got tired of it after a month. But I will grind though dozens of microscopic examinations of Sphagnum in the hope of getting one or two new species a year or even expanding a documented range.
I definitely play iNaturalist like a game, not as much as eBird. The broadness of what iNaturalist covers makes it’s hard to pick a jurisdiction that matters to you. I just report whatever I find interesting, but I don’t report everything and anything.
I had been thinking about something like this too. Here’s my first draft of ideas:
1 point for every observation (base point value, stacks with everything else)
ID specificity (these don’t stack with each other, but stack with other categories)
+1 point if the observation has been ID’d to kingdom level
+2 points if the observation has been ID’d to phylum level
+3 points if the observation has been ID’d to class level
+4 points if the observation has been ID’d to order level
+5 points if the observation has been ID’d to family level
+6 points if the observation has been ID’d to genus level
+7 points if the observation has been ID’d to species level
Taxon rarity (within the group of people participating in your contest) (these don’t stack with each other, but do stack with other categories)
+1 point if only 5 people have observed the most specific taxon your observation achieved
+2 points if only 4 people have observed the most specific taxon your observation achieved
+3 points if only 3 people have observed the most specific taxon your observation achieved
+4 points if only 2 people have observed the most specific taxon your observation achieved
+5 points if you are the only person to observe the most specific taxon your observation achieved
not yet sure how to handle community ID vs. stuff with only one ID
also miscellaneous bonuses for other things i guess? (e.g. first time the taxon has been observed in the geographic area)
The fact that my calendar records which species I’ve observed for the first time on my account, on any given day’s worth of observations, has definitely incentivized me to find new “life firsts”.
Though, my main concern is that this might disincentivize observing common species. That said, people who care are already incentivized to seek out such “lifers” anyway, even if iNat doesn’t record them.
Good question!
I started like that. Wow I got 50 species in a day! Look I am top 10 or 5 on the bioblitz!
I was absolutely stoked to have the first confirmed observation of a species.
The game is evolving and I stopped being competitive. One, the disc got full. Until I got another TB, I was questioning my self “Do you need another winter grass?” and this approach never fully left me.
The other reason is that I got tagged from other continents about a moss genus. I was flattered and answered to the best of my knowledge but the question lingered why. There are a couple of people in my state who regularly post observations of that genus, which is quite variable. I identified a small fraction and it got me #2 in my state, in Australia and in the world. That was a good lesson in humility, I don’t have any qualification, not even a microscope. Now I monitor the leaderboard to make sure I am not too far ahead.
I try to tame the inner collector too: “You can’t have all the taxa of that genus” but it is too ingrained. I just want to see the ones that are described as common or widespread, in the field or at least in other people’s observations.
There is a bit of hoarding, too. Do I need to keep all 50000 photos and back ups?
The excitement of exploration, visiting new places and finding new (to me) life forms is as strong as ever but the game changed and so did I. I say taxa instead of species and use words like hyaline and acuminate with a straight face.
But how many different species do you have with likes? 
iNaturalist definitely incentivizes novelty seeking and I would consider that the “gamified” aspect for me, I seek out life firsts and aim to have at least one on every outing. Tracking my total species count and watching it grow is my constant moving goal.
While finding rare species or ones that are less observed on iNat (under 100 obs. for ex.) always feels satisfying and I do seek it out, I don’t think I would count behavior that as gamified.
Contrary to what others are saying, surveying areas that few have botanized (with public records) in the last 2 decades or identifying observations feels more like a obligation to me, I feel compelled to do so. And so while covering the map and increasing my number id’d is satisfying it does not feel like a game but rather a responsibility?(probably my neurodivergency coming through) Hopefully after I have my degree I can pursue field botany and have that be my actual responsibility rather than an assumed one.
Without iNaturalist as a platform, I would be doing the same behaviour with my botanizing but by keeping track in notebooks, sketches and maps. iNaturalist gamifies it by having it all accessible from a central portal. When records are in a physical format, it is harder to have a running total of a variety of data points, and basically impossible to have one auto update. The latter half of my formative years was well in the digital era(I am 21), but looking at my older botany peers/mentors/professors who have journals and notebooks going back years, I probably would have been the same way back in the day.
Could you post a link?
I was aware of the green ones, but I had no idea they came in red or even blue! What species are the blue ones?
Not the foggiest. I just throw them all in Condylostylus, because that is as far as my expertise can take me. Sorry!
it’s very important to me that i’m the #1 identifier of domestic horses, both captive and wild. i’m also looking to achieve the same for equines in general, donkeys, and mules. one day i might expand that same goal to gray wolves, domestic dogs, domestic cats, and other species i can easily recognize.
https://www.inaturalist.org/projects/great-southern-bioblitz-2024-umbrella
Choose a location or tackle the whole hemisphere …
I don’t know if this is gaming mindset activity but, I go to parks close to where I live. They are not the wildest compared to other larger parks a little bit farther away where more people go. I like it when I find things in the less desirable places. It fills in the map. It shows that nature will thrive if given a little bit of green space. It is more of a challenge to find things in less desirable places. This is very true with birds. I tell census organizers that I am willing to go birding in a parking lot if it needs to be covered in a survey.
I understand that people want to find things and that’s why they go to more natural areas. And, I don’t work anymore so, I can go out during the week. I don’t feel too bad if it’s raining and I can’t go out. People who only have weekends to go to the parks have a different perspective. Their options are limited so, they want to maximize their time. And, I do share tips about finding things with people who work.
That’s definitely something I do. For my favourite families, or if I encounter multiple species of the same genus, I start “collecting” these observations. (As in, I get excited when I find a new species of that genus) and try to find as many different ones as I can.
For example: Coccinellidae, Chrysididae, Campanula, Veronica
The other game I play is trying to remember the scientific names of species I encounter on “dry stretches” where I find nothing particularly interesting to observe.