# Lumping Impossible/Hard to ID species

**URL:** <https://forum.inaturalist.org/t/lumping-impossible-hard-to-id-species/42794>\
**Category:** General\
**Created:** [June 23, 2023, 3:29pm UTC](https://forum.inaturalist.org/t/lumping-impossible-hard-to-id-species/42794 "2023-06-23T15:29:50Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 1\
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**Author:** ![lothlin](https://sea2.discourse-cdn.com/flex016/user_avatar/forum.inaturalist.org/lothlin/32/40591_2.png) [@lothlin](https://forum.inaturalist.org/u/lothlin)\
**Post date:** [June 23, 2023, 3:49pm UTC](https://forum.inaturalist.org/t/lumping-impossible-hard-to-id-species/42794/2 "2023-06-23T15:49:32Z")

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I don’t think its backpedaling data if you’re fixing potential inaccuracies. If there’s enough information to say that its more likely one lookalike species than another, that’s one thing, and I think species level IDs would be fine to leave at that point, but if there truly aren’t visual differences in the photo - leave it at genus.

red _Russula_ mushrooms in the US are a big issue with this - Russulas are everywhere, they’re very common, there’s a bunch of different species and they all _look_ the same and can basically only be IDed via microscopic examination of spores, DNA testing, or tasting them (and well, unless you’re really into mushrooms you probably don’t know that taste can be an important diagnostic.) If I ever want to do some mindless IDing I’ll just sit down and bump red russulas to genus with a note explaining why, and then mark it ‘good as it can be.’

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