There are a lot of observations of taxidermied animals on iNat, usually a result of schoolchildren taking pics of museum exhibits. And there seems to be some disagreements among identifiers on how best to treat them.
(Just to be clear, I am not talking about the observations that include documentation of where and when animal was taken, but rather the case where the only info is a photo of the taxidermied object)
Approaches I’ve seen include:
ID as “human” since it is arguably half man-made parts and no longer in anything like a natural state
Mark as “captive”
Mark “location / date inaccurate” since it is photographed at the museum, not where the animal ever was when alive
Mark “No recent evidence” since it’s probably been a while since it was ever alive
None of these quite seem to fit the case for me, though I’d probably fall on the side of “No recent evidence” for lack of a better option.
I would love to hear others’ thoughts on the matter, and if there’s a general consensus I’ll adjust my tactics to include it.
UNLESS The date of death and location are provided on a tag/sign/database (which some museums have for taxidermy specimens)
Hope this helps!
Edit:
I did not see this part at first, oops! I would still try to find info on the specimen, either by asking the observer or, if the name of the museum is mentioned, see if they have a database or similar as I mentioned above.
Things I wouldn’t do are mark as captive or ID as Human, because 1.) They once were a real animal and are currently still the remains of said animal and 2.) Some taxidermy used to be wild.
I mark as “captive” because it was in that place at that time because it was put there by humans. Marking it as “captive” says nothing about its state when it was alive, or whether it was “wild” in the ordinary sense of the term. I don’t see how this is substantially different than a zoo animal or a wild animal temporarily living at a rehabilitation center, except that it came under human control after it was already dead.
In some cases of poor taxidermy the animal is distorted, since its body/skeletal system is not really used in that process. This can display features that the actual animal would not have had. That’s how I think it’s different then a zoo or rehabbed animal.
The eyes really do make the taxidermy either spring to life or look like an undead creature cursed with the burden of senscience. I don’t really make obs of taxidermy for the reason @DianaStuder has, but if I did, I would only upload pictures of well made taxidermy.
I agree with using the “captive” field here. The organism (er, it’s remains) is not in that location because it intended to be, but because a human intended it, which is the crux of captive vs. wild.
Consider a related observation - an observer encounters a naturally mummified or otherwise preserved remains of an organism that was living within the past 100 years. Everyone (as far as I know) agrees there’s no issue with this, and these types of observations, while comparatively rare, can be Research Grade. The only real difference from the observation of the taxidermied specimen is that a human moved the organism’s remains.
In regards to the other options:
The date/time are not incorrect in the observation of the taxidermied specimen assuming that they are at least when the photo was taken by the observer. The date/time of all observations should be for the interaction of the observer with the organism. So if the date/time are of when the observer saw the taxidermied specimen, they are correct.
If it is a really old specimen (like older than 100 years), it’s probably fair to downvote recent evidence, but otherwise I wouldn’t.
If there’s no ID, then I’d consider IDing it as Human as “off brand” but allowed. But if the observer has entered a correct ID, I wouldn’t ID as Human as this isn’t respecting their wishes. They may wish to document that they’ve seen a specimen of that organism, which is legit. The observation just shouldn’t be Research Grade.
I also see different approaches to these types of observations, and I’ve used some different ones in the past, so my own votes are probably not consistent over time, but “captive” is what I use now.
I would think these should be treated the same way as preserved insect/plant specimens in collections/herbariums
If the observer is the one who collected/pinned/pressed/shot/taxidermized the organism, and they use the date and time of original encounter, they should be research grade.
If the observer just saw the taxidermized specimen in a museum somewhere, it should be marked as captive.
I agree, but I don’t think this is necessarily a reason the observation can’t reach research grade. Pinned insects don’t have their wings arranged in a natural way, they have a manmade pin added to their body, and their colors may have faded over time; herbarium specimens are often discolored, distorted, and pictured with glue and labels and other manmade “add-ons”- but we still allow those to be research grade if the original collector posts them with the original collection date/time.
So I’d say any of the suggestions given are okay for the situation you describe, where the observation is of someone else’s taxidermy, except for:
I would not do this, as the manmade parts are not what the observer is observing- they’re observing the (partial) remains of an animal, which were removed from the wild. If a single chunk of one bone of a deer counts as “deer”, then a whole deer pelt that’s been attached to a mold by a taxidermist should still count as “deer”, albeit not a wild one.
It’s not captive because it’s not being held captive by a person (like a cat in a house). The specimen represents the animal from when it was alive. If it was a pet raccoon (raised in captivity) and then taxidermied, then it would be captive. If it was a wild animal and then taxidermied, it is not captive. A dead animal or its parts are not captive. A bone in a drawer is not a captive animal.
A taxidermy specimen should be treated the same way that scientists treat museum voucher specimens. The data on the tag is the date and location it was captured. If those data are missing, then just indicate “location/date inaccurate”. Any other approach is very, very, very incorrect!
If the date and location given in the observation are that of when the observer encountered the taxidermied specimen, it does not in fact represent the animal when it was alive. The dead animal has been in human care since it was killed and it has undergone physical changes since its wild (live) state.
It is “captive” (as used on iNat) in exactly the same way that a fruit from a wild plant that has been intentionally transported by a person to their home is “captive” – because the location no longer reflects where it occurred in the wild, but was chosen by humans.
I am sympathetic to the argument for marking such observations as “location/date inaccurate”, but iNat defines an observation as the observer’s interaction with an organism at a particular place and time. According to this definition, the date and location do reflect when the observer interacted with the specimen (the observer did not see the specimen when it was alive and living in the wild).
I would definitely mark it as captive, as it’s not where it wants to be at that time and place. As multiple people have explained, the observation records the encounter with the organism, so as long as the date and time of the encounter is correct, those data are correct.
If the specimen is over 100 years old then yes, it can be marked as not recent evidence.
I would say annotating as “Dead” and “Captive” is the best option. The important thing to remember is that an observation depicts what the observer saw at a specific place and time. Since the observer is not the collector or taxidermist, it was seen at the museum, not at the original collection location. Based on that, it is captive, because it was moved from the place of death (which is the last place it chose to be). It should not be marked “location/date inaccurate” because they are accurate for what the observer saw. “No recent evidence” is mainly intended for fossils and such, so while you could use it if you know the organism was collected more than a hundred years ago, it’s not the best fit. Given your specific question,
I would say don’t use it, since you have no way of knowing the date of collection.
Taxidermied fish haven’t been mentioned yet, and can be different than other preserved specimens. Traditionally, fish were taxidermied using the skin and replacing some fish parts (eyes, fins, head) with plastic or glass. Now, it’s more popular to have a fiberglass replica, which will be painted to resemble the individual fish being taxidermied, but is actually a mold of a totally different individual fish, being replicated again and again.
The fiberglass fish replica really seems like a fringe case for iNaturalist, perhaps closer to a field sketch.
I’ll chime in that I also don’t think “captive” is a good solution here, and would rather vote for date/location are inaccurate. Perhaps this illustrates a split in mentalities between entomologists and vertebratists (edit: or maybe better museum vs non-museum folks)-- we’re used to thinking of a specimen as a placeholder for the actual encounter “in the wild”, so long as the metadata accurately represent that moment.
This also illustrates that we do need to fix some of the problems with captive in iNat, since it’s serving as a catch-all for very unrelated “issue” observations.
That’s a reasonable way to look at it if the observer is someone who actually saw the organism in the wild at the time of collection; however, the example given by @graysquirrel makes it very unlikely for that to be the case.
With this example, the date and location are most likely set to the museum, and the observer had nothing to do with the animal being collected.
Philosophically, that feels wrong to me (no one would ever, ever, ever call a deer head on the wall a captive deer). I understand that iNat is documenting encounters with organisms (or parts of organisms) and not documenting where specimens were when they were collected by someone else. But captive? I suppose there’s no better alternative that would be correct so we’re forced to use captive to accomplish the purpose of preventing it from being research grade and also fulfilling the purpose of iNat (documenting an encounter). Captive here may best be defined as “not in its natural environment”–which now makes perfect sense.