It is nice that iNaturalist automatically selects taxon photos sometimes. However, in the case of Mecaphesa aikoae, which has no photographs confirmed via dissection, I feel that there should not be a taxon photo. I have been identifying this species based on the written description in Schick 1965 , …

I think it’s RG observations, not just observations in general?

I unchecked ‘auto photos’, not sure if that will stop it or not because the text about how ‘auto photos’ works references flickr photos specifically.

Odd as I’ve run a across a lot of taxon that don’t have a taxon photo.

Do these taxa have any observations? I think all of the organisms without a photo also didn’t have any observations.

[image] grampianshiker: I think it’s RG observations, not just observations in general? correct. Once a species gets its first RG record, the first photo from that record will automatically be made the thumbnail image after ~24 hours. So there are plenty of species with only Needs ID records …

[image] natev: which has no photographs confirmed via dissection, I feel that there should not be a taxon photo I respect your knowledge. But iNat is focused on people engaging with nature - we, non-scientists and also iNat’s CV need photos of whole and living organisms. iNat uses the ‘photo…

[image] Genus Level ID as Research Grade in cases where RG has been reached at a genus level, it means the ‘no, it’s as good as it can be’ box has been ticked: [image]. This feature is often used for genera which cannot be identified to species from photos alone, e.g. genera that require genita…

Thanks. I’m aware of making observations RG at genus, but I feel like that is not actually helpful in this scenario. There are almost 25,000 observations of Mecaphesa at genus level, and while some of them are not identifiable, I believe many of them are identifiable once the work has been done to e…

Thanks, this does indeed appear to be the answer. I just need to make sure people don’t make these RG until we have habitus photos of confirmed specimens to compare.

A few did have observations. If none are at research grade I don’t think iNat populates the field with photos, they have to be added manually in that case.

Is there a way to prevent iNaturalist from automatically adding a taxon photo?

General

DianaStuder January 11, 2025, 7:19am 8

from this thread
https://forum.inaturalist.org/t/genus-level-id-as-research-grade/12508

Topic		Replies	Views
Implement automatic addition of taxon photos (for compare tool) Feature Requests	10	493	August 5, 2021
What prompts the automatic addition of a taxon photo? General	8	514	September 5, 2023
Is it possible to make taxon photos for all life stages/with all relevant features/parts of an organism? General question	10	791	May 14, 2020
Taxon photos automatically added? General	3	88	August 6, 2026
Flag or otherwise mark taxon photos whose CID doesn't match taxon Feature Requests	56	4172	February 7, 2025

Is there a way to prevent iNaturalist from automatically adding a taxon photo?

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