I want to ID snakes with Fungal Infections

[danaleeling]

@Snake.Fungal.Disease

How can I create that group if it requires 50 verified observations?

Welcome to iNaturalist! This refers to you as the user have to have 50 observations. There is a long but very worthy backgrounder on Upcoming Limits on making projects, places, and sending messages

I know when I first registered I immediately thought I needed to have a project for my own particular needs. In hindsight I realize that I did not. The core message in the thread is put most succinctly by the following.

@kueda

For some reason, a lot of people sign up for iNat and think the first thing they need to do is make a project. I have no idea why, but the first thing you should do on iNat is make an observation or an identification. That’s the core of iNat. Everything else is ancillary, and this will hopefully help new users understand that. Projects can be a support headache and we receive many emails about them, most of which are from people who have barely added any observations and/or have a tenuous understanding of what iNat is about. Everyone who makes a project needs to understand iNat from an observer’s perspective, and if 50 obs sounds like work, good. It is.

Two months, 72 observations, 1412 identifications later, I understand. Do not be discouraged, I was slow on making observations! And along the way I have learned so much that I feel like I am back in the wonderful halls of academia. I personally also recommend spending some time here in the forum! As I work with iNaturalist I also remember the following quote from an interview with the co-founder:

“If we connect people to nature without contributing to any specific scientific outcomes or quantifiable conservation results, then we’re still doing our job,” says Ueda. “But if we just contribute to science without helping people care about the natural world, we’ll be on the wrong track.” - Ken-ichi Ueda
https://sciencenode.org/feature/nerding-out-over-nature.php