Also, I’ve always wondered how the person behind Gerald’s observation reacts lol
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And mollusks, too!
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my first indication that I’ve reached “top identifier” status for a taxon is usually not by actually checking my ranking (because really, who does that?), but when I suddenly start to get a bunch of people tagging me for ID help without any other explanation… then I might go and see that my “rank” has risen. but since so-called “farming” (a rather novel take on the iNat community ID system!) doesn’t have any other benefits…
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Ditto. And someday I might get around to looking at RG observations and adding yet another ID, but that will be after I finish working on as many Needs ID observations as I’m capable of (in other words, probably never).
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Except Psilocybe species. They’re feasted upon.
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I never heard the term ID Farming and still unclear what it’s referring to.
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rank hunting. making many ids in one taxon to increase id rank. not always the motivation, but often so.
some folks simply love to interact with certain lifeforms via inaturalist. not rank hunting per se, simply passionate ‘obsession’.
edit: there is synergy between ^those^ two purposes.
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I agree on the fungi, the problem is having all the information to get a solid ID and so few are doing the IDing.
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I was going to say turn your focus to lichens- where you’re lucky to get anyone to look, let alone ID haha
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When I agree with an ID, it’s because I’ve reviewed the observation and thought about the ID. There are a lot of research grade misidentifications, so it definitely helps to review them.
There are a few people out there who identify without looking at the observation and thinking about what it is. I guess they just want numbers. Most people don’t do this though.
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It is funny to see how different species and different localities can affect one’s perception of iNaturalist. Barely 50% of my observations have received a concurring ID. I would guess that less than 15 have received more than 2-3 and those are all megas like harpy eagles or African wildlife. I use the occasional notifications as opportunities to look back on some very cool species I have seen. I can’t even imagine being annoyed at someone taking the time to look at my photos and acknowledging them in any way.
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Yep I think that’s a phenomenon most of us have encountered, popular critters (like birds and herps) have no shortage of identifiers but less popular ones go unnoticed. An example of this that I notice the most is the lack of crawfish identifiers. Maybe I’m just biased, but to me crawfish are some of the most interesting and eye-catching of all aquatic invertebrates, and yet they don’t seem to get a whole lot of attention. Tons of misidentified observations of them that go years without anyone correcting them. It doesn’t help that they can be quite confusing to identify, there is a lack of up-to-date field guides for them in many areas, and most photos you see on inat aren’t good enough to get species-level identification
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If the observer has opted out of community ID, then ‘Based on the evidence, can the Community Taxon still be confirmed or improved?’ in the Data Quality tab and select, ‘No, it’s as good as it can be.’ makes the observation casual (if the community ID is different from the user’s ID). Not a waste of time.
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I agree that it’s the confusion aspect behind it, and would say it’s more the easier critters than popularity that get the most IDs. So many bugs and fungi and the like are simply difficult or impossible to identify from images alone, and there are so many more plants than there are birds to learn, etc. That said, birds are a gateway to general naturalist, judging by how many profiles say “I started as a birder”!
Even with birds, some days I’m up to spending a few hours with my books and websites open trying to ID a handful of the glorious confusion of Pacific Northwest winter gull observations, but many days I have to pass them by because I’m just too tired or my brain is kaput. Judging by how many Larus gulls are un-IDed, I’m sure a lot of people feel the same.
I ID crawdads in my county when they pop up (I don’t really know them farther afield) and just learned the term “obliterated areola” the other day as a result of a more specialist’s confirming ID and comment. That was an awesome day.
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Also, to my knowledge, the identification leaderboards on taxa at least keep track of leading and improving identifications rather than agreeing identifications. Someone looking to top the leaderboard for a taxon wouldn’t be going through and agreeing on a bunch of IDs (unless they don’t know this, of course).
I have one observer - Opted Out - for whom I add thoughtful IDs to interesting obs - because I know they follow their obs IDs and respond promptly. The others I Mark as Reviewed. If the list of identifiers is already long - I leave an Opted Out comment. Which irritates the observer, for some reason?
I remain mystified by farming identification?? What crop can they harvest?
If emails are irritating - which they are - switch them off.
Check your notifications in iNat when you are here anyway.
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Recent example, won’t provide links, just the lowdown.
One user id bombed several related bird species over the course of several daze/week, id-ing thousands of observations in each sp, stopping all id-ing once they’d attained the top of the leaderboard on all of the species.
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backing up to my previous comment re fungi id-ing, in the bay area of northern california, id-ing fungi ramps up when the rains come. folks are scanning the local observations, seeing what’s out there, getting a sense of the season, making lots of fungi ids. not just psilocybes, all fungi. id-ing locally, though, not globally. go with what you know, you know.
addendum:
seeing many of the same fungiphile folks adding ids to observations already at research grade confirms a community of common interest and cooperation. the more the merrier.
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This thread title is the first instance of that term being used on inaturalist or any other sites.
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The crop of
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