Observations of absence vs presence

[tony_wills]

To quote Jon_sullivan from Observation field: Taxon sought but not found www.inaturalist.org/observation_fields/10102

For several years now I’ve used the Sought but not found field (Yes/No) in combination with my observation ID to specify what I was looking for when I didn’t find anything. For example, if I searched for butterflies but found none, I’d upload an observation with the ID Papilionoidea and set “Sought but not found” to “Yes”.

This hasn’t been ideal because every time I do this it puts a pin on the map for Papilionoidea.

I’ve just added this new field, “Taxon sought but not found”, so I can do this a better way. Now I can add a new observation with no ID so it doesn’t show on the iNat map. Then I can specify the taxon I was looking for with “Taxon sought but not found”.

I could also answer the Data Quality Assessment question “Based on the evidence, can the Community ID still be confirmed or improved?” to “No” so nobody needs to bother trying to ID it.