Do any of you have an interesting observation that has been sitting in your list for ages but has still not gone to research grade?
How long do you mean by āagesā?
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No, but I can say Iāve been looking at many observations that have been in the category of āVascular Plantsā for a very long time. Apparently itās not a popular category for identifiers to look at.
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Same with fungi, it seems.
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Maybe a year plus
I have quite a lot.
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Yeah thatās kind of the norm for me. Many observations will never reach Research Grade because they are simply not possible to identify to species based on macromorphology. Even for those that can be, there arenāt enough identifiers. There are also cases where taxonomy is currently shifting/uncertain and it just makes sense to wait a few months/years before giving out a bunch of IDs that may just be bumped back to genus. Iām currently not doing many/any IDs for some morel species where new cryptic species have been detected but arenāt yet well-understood and donāt have a well-defined range, making it hard to know exactly what ID guidelines should be used for those that look similar and occur in the broader region. That can happen even for species that were previously well-defined and thought to be identifiable.
Sometimes I do have an easily identifiable observation where Iām surprised at how long it remains unidentified, but I figure it will happen eventually. Iāve IDed observations from 10 years ago where I as the IDer was baffled at how it remained without an ID for so long, and a very large fraction of the observations I ID are at least a year or two old. So it generally makes sense that some of mine will take a similar amount of time.
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So many.
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It seems to me that getting corroborating IDs for species or other taxa that arenāt popular or trending in some way is an inevitable consequence of the āsocial media-esqueā nature of iNaturalist. That and observations made by observers that arenāt well known or popular on iNaturalist, regardless of what their status might be in the real world or on legacy platforms (like printed journals, newsletters, email discussion lists, etc.).
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1 year plus? Look az this pne, which waited a tit bit longer
https://www.inaturalist.org/observations/22561
As an IDer I frequently ID observations 5 years or older and also regularly ID observations about 10 years old. I love when those finally go to RG.
As an observer I had that happen to my observations after 3 or more years and love it. Unfortunately it only happens rarely
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I just checked on mine; three-and-a-half years. 
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One other neat thing. I have been getting way more IDs since I started IDing myself. So for anyone who is finding their observations neglected, let that be a motivation to begin IDing/learning to ID if you havenāt already! It all started with a morel I was having trouble identifying this Spring. I thought āsurely, it canāt be that hard to ID a morel, these are some of the most popular mushrooms in the world!ā I was wrong, 9 months and 3200 IDs later and Iām still getting confused by morels, but now my confusion is often at the limit of collective knowledge where no one really knows the answer and experts may not always agree, and I get to watch as new species are discovered and participate in the informed speculation about them.
Anyways I just got 20 IDs (out of my 114 observations) from a prominent mycologist I respect, including for one of my favorite observations that hadnāt been touched since I posted it in Spring, which is now at Research Grade at species level. The one that sparked my interest isnāt there yet, but Iām only ~90% sure on the ID myself and thinking about it getting it sequenced to confirm, so it feels appropriate that itās still lingering where itās at for now. Itās also possible that posting in this thread may help get IDs, I canāt rule that one out haha.
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I just checked mine, I have a lot that will probably never get research grade. My oldest observation is a grounsel observed back in 2023. A majority of my other āneeds IDā observations are fungi, invertebrates or plants. I think most of them that havenāt been identified in over 2 years will probably stay as āneeds IDā for a very long time, if not indefinitely.
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I have over 1,000 Needs ID from 2021 and 9,000 total. Thatās how it goes with so few identifiers.
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I checked through a few of my Needs ID observations from 2020. They represent a bit over a quarter of my observations for that year. I removed one because even I agreed it it wasnāt photoād clearly enough to ID. Most of the Needs ID observations seem to be members of very difficult groups, mostly fungi, small bees, Pyrobombus, and flies. I doubt they will ever be IDād. Some are from difficult groups but should be identifiable from the photos provided. A minority make me think, āCome on people. What else could it be?ā With what Iāve learned in the past four years, I was able to improve the names on some, more often to genus than species. One I duplicated because while the fungus in the photo will probably never be IDād, the moss is quite recognizable (now that I know more). So now these observations get to wait for more years. Thatās OK. I forget that trying to ID older photos can seem very useful, even though many observations have to be skipped over.
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I have some that are several decades old now.
No big deal. Just let them be and eventually someone gets around to IDing or confirming and IDā¦. or not. No biggie either way.
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Because I ID a lot, I am comfortable @mentioning for help on my own (which are few - 2025 my photos still wait) Broad IDs can languish for a entire decade and I start clearing my bookmarked URLs from oldest observed first.
This weekās ID-a-thon target of Is A Flower! goes back to ā¦ 1920 ! 1968. The Seventies.
Still. Over half a million flowers in waiting. I have less than 2K left for the Western Cape - which I will clear.
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That is an interesting spin. Identifiers choose their preferred taxon (for specialists) or their preferred location, or new accounts, random, or āthis monthā. We have many filters to use - but - I donāt know how I would set out to ID for āpopularā iNatters ? There is a gap between identifiers who default to āwhat is coming in nowā and a deliberate sweep from a bookmarked URL - which is why I ID for people who joined iNat This Week. And I am still clearing the CNC25 residue and and and
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I am satisfied with the ratio. Thanks a lot to the identifiers.
1770 observations
1213 need ID
552 research level
1128 IDs made for others
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One of my first observations on iNat is still unconfirmed seven years later. However, thatās because my photo was not sufficient to make a species-level ID. I should re-ID it to genus, which can be confirmed from the photo, but itās not important to me that it reach Research Grade.
More broadly, Iāve come to an interesting realization in the last couple of weeks, in part because of the ID-a-thon sponsored by iNat and in part because I have recently been identifying the two native species of Spiraea in eastern North America. Many of those Spiraea observations were five or six years old and yet hadnāt been IDed, despite perfectly good photos showing the needed characteristics.
Hereās the realization: Identifying is just not as much fun as observing. So, of course, there arenāt enough IDs being made! In fact, itās kind of amazing that so many IDs have been made.
Just to put this shocking realization (Iām being sarcastic) in perspective, Iām a very active identifier of plants in New England in the US. In 2025, I made an average of 325 IDs a day (not just New England plants, but mostly those). Currently, there are 1,437,942 Needs ID plant observations in New England. If we wanted all of those to reach Research Grade (or Casual) in 2026, weād need slightly more than 12 identifiers like me, doing nothing but New England plant IDs. Really, weād need twice or maybe three times that many identifiers, to account for the facts that some observations need more than one identifier and that most identifiers (like me) do more than just New England plants.
Now, we are lucky in New England in that we do, in fact, have at least 12 high-volume, competent plant identifiers, but we donāt have 24 or 36. And the volume of Needs ID observations grows and grows every year!
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