Inaturalist Guides to the United States

General
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Hey y’all!

So I’ve got a huge passion and goal to create a comprehensive guide of the animals and plants (and maybe fungi someday) of the United States. I’m actually very far along with the plants including identification sections but I have to go back and touch it up before publishing. I’ve got links to a lot of animal sections below. I would love help from anyone with a passion for nature and field guides to work on this project.

I personally love the Inaturalist guides, especially the ability to have an explorable mini-map when looking at the “card” view on a browser. My overall vision is to have guides available for everyone with photos, range maps, and seasonality; as well as identification and information to help everyone identify each species. In the plants section I have also used the ‘Import Tags’ function to create tags for states or counties as applicable and hope to have the same for some of the animals below.

Feel free to send me a request to be added as an editor to these guides. I will shoot you over some general guidelines for consistency, but realistically the most important thing is just citing sources correctly. Also try to not make these available offline please for the sake of iNaturalist’s servers lol.

Mammals Pt.1 : https://www.inaturalist.org/guides/18661

Mammals Pt.2 : https://www.inaturalist.org/guides/18662

Birds Pt.1 : https://www.inaturalist.org/guides/18663

Birds Pt.2: https://www.inaturalist.org/guides/18665

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Birds Pt.3: https://www.inaturalist.org/guides/18666

Reptiles: https://www.inaturalist.org/guides/18660

Amphibians: https://www.inaturalist.org/guides/18659

Fish Pt.1: https://www.inaturalist.org/guides/18654

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Fish Pt.2: https://www.inaturalist.org/guides/18655

Fish Pt.3: https://www.inaturalist.org/guides/18656

Fish Pt.4: https://www.inaturalist.org/guides/18657

Fish Pt.5: https://www.inaturalist.org/guides/18658

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Cartilaginous and Jawless Fish: https://www.inaturalist.org/guides/18670

Butterflies Pt.1: https://www.inaturalist.org/guides/18668

Butterflies Pt.2: https://www.inaturalist.org/guides/18669

Moths – Bombycoidea (Sphinx Moths and Silk Moths): https://www.inaturalist.org/guides/20533

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Moths - Noctuidae Pt.1: https://www.inaturalist.org/guides/21390

Moths - Noctuidae Pt.2: https://www.inaturalist.org/guides/21393

Moths - Noctuidae Pt.3: https://www.inaturalist.org/guides/21394

Moths – Noctuidae Pt.4: https://www.inaturalist.org/guides/21395

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Moths - Noctuidae Pt.5: https://www.inaturalist.org/guides/21396

Moths - Notodontidae, Euteliidae, Nolidae: https://www.inaturalist.org/guides/21397

Moths – Yponomeutoidea: https://www.inaturalist.org/guides/21401

Moths - Erebidae Pt.1: https://www.inaturalist.org/guides/21398

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Moths – Erebidae Pt.2: https://www.inaturalist.org/guides/21399

Moths – Erebidae Pt.3: https://www.inaturalist.org/guides/21400

Moths – Misc. Moths Pt.1: https://www.inaturalist.org/guides/21402

Moths - Misc. Moths Pt.2: https://www.inaturalist.org/guides/21403

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Odonata: https://www.inaturalist.org/guides/18671

Cicadas: https://www.inaturalist.org/guides/18673

Dynastinae (Rhinoceros Beetles): https://www.inaturalist.org/guides/21390

Rutelinae (Flower and Jewel Scarabs): https://www.inaturalist.org/guides/21391

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Planthoppers: https://www.inaturalist.org/guides/21428

Fireflies: https://www.inaturalist.org/guides/20864

Thrips: https://www.inaturalist.org/guides/21482

Stick Insects: https://www.inaturalist.org/guides/21425

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Mantids: https://www.inaturalist.org/guides/21424

Coreoidea: https://www.inaturalist.org/guides/21424

Grasshoppers Pt.1: https://www.inaturalist.org/guides/21488

Grasshoppers Pt.2: https://www.inaturalist.org/guides/21489

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Katydids, Grigs, King Crickets, and Wetas: https://www.inaturalist.org/guides/21483

Crickets: https://www.inaturalist.org/guides/21487

Mosquitos: https://www.inaturalist.org/guides/21490

Seed Bugs and Bordered Plant Bugs: https://www.inaturalist.org/guides/21427

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I see that your mammals guide includes mammals that are in the US only in zoos, including Loxodonta africana, which is shown as widespread in North America because it is kept in so many zoos. This is an unusual choice for any naturalist guide, for good reasons, and I wonder if this is intentional?

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It pulled some of those in from the bulk upload. Ive been meaning to clear out taxa that are only found in zoos. Ideally i would still want to keep exotics that escape (like Blackbuck for an example) since i do come across those in Texas from time to time.

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I would strongly recommend only including verifiable and wild observations for all taxa. Many plants, for example, are kept in gardens or houses outside their native range. A map that shows every observation of Spanish Moss in the United States will indicate that it occurs in South Dakota. The same map, including only Verifiable observations, shows what parts of the US it actually occurs in the wild. This will still included cases of escapees that are no longer captive/cultivated, including the Texas Blackbuck: https://www.inaturalist.org/observations?place_id=1&subview=map&taxon_id=42416

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I’d be interested in helping out with the fungi (at least the ascomycetes) if those are planned to add. I’m writing a field guide to one specific family with dichotomous keys, and something like this could be a useful online geographic supplement.

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