I’ve recorded 760 species on 2,700 observations from my UV+moth sheet setup in New Mexico. It’s practically cheating!
17 Likes
You mean “sheeting” 
10 Likes
How does one see this?
You can see this on your year in review page
Just put your username in the url instead of mine and regenerate stats at the bottom of the page
https://www.inaturalist.org/stats/2025/ajott
2 Likes
Oh wow! Cool!
I would love to try this! Do you have any tips for a setup? I have a macro camera but not a flash.
Without a flash, you could use a headlamp for supplemental light or adjust your shutter speed. I use a ring light flash - fairly cheap option.
2 Likes
Well, my camera has a decent built-in flash so I guess a supplemented headlamp should be enough. Do you have a UV light suggestion?
1 Like
23 Likes
Spoilers
I remember when I first saw this I went to check how many Ids I had made. Unfortunately It was already above 10,000 when I saw.
4 Likes
Thanks for all those ids!
I’ll be watching for you to hit 5000 species 
!
7 Likes
Amazing, thank you for all that great IDing!
3 Likes
Maybe later this year, if my plans work out!
4 Likes
Almost at 3000 species and 40,000 ID’s
maybe not a true milestone yet but I have come a long way
and keeping a good ratio of about 20id’s for every 3 observations
17 Likes
Definitly cheating…
I now moth sheet on my trips. In my seven weeks in Peru, I did plenty of moth sheeting. The majority of my ~300 species (likely to keep going up as more are IDed) of lepidoptera were on the sheet https://www.inaturalist.org/observations?place_id=7513&taxon_id=47157&user_id=sebastiandoak&verifiable=any
Add in other insects and its much higher. UV sheeting seems a no brainer to increase your counts. Since a sheet, some string, and a UV torch takes virtually no room in the backpack.
8 Likes
I’ve been very busy IDing bunnies. I racked up another 1,000 IDs in only 9 days. About 750 of those being cottontails; the rest being mostly plants.
11 Likes
How do you power your UV torch, is it battery powered with an on and off switch like a regular flashlight? Something like this?
1 Like
I see thats a UVbeast V2. One of my lights is the v3
I get a couple hours out of it, with two batteries fully charged. Thats normally enough time for me to do a night hike and come back to it. It can extend to 3 batteries for longer run time, but I have found that not seem to really change much in my run time.
I have found it to be a bit hit or miss, stopping randomly. I dont know if its the build quality or if something is loose.
I started with a nitecore cu6 https://flashlight.nitecore.com/product/cu6
It only has one battery and a much lower output, but I have pretty much never had it fail, like I use it for hours on a full charge and it keeps going. But usually I leave the other one (Which is brighter, and heavier) on the sheet, and use the CU6, on hand for my general searching (Mostly I use it to look for harvestmen).
You find lots of plants IDed as bunnies? I found this bunny IDed as a plant:
https://www.inaturalist.org/observations/159004726
Probably just a slip of the finger by the observer typing “cotton” and accidentally clicking the wrong one. (Those taxa do seem to shift around a bit as you are typing.)
5 Likes