For quite some time now I have been seeing a lot of observations from the same person, usually uploading lichens or fungi.
While no two observations use the same photo (except for cases with multiple species in the same photo, which is totally fair), a lot of consecutive observations seem to have been made very close to each other, probably (for the non-lichenised fungi) different fruiting bodies of the same fungus.
My question is: As photos of the same encounter with the same organism should be bundled under one observation, shouldn’t these observations be bundled too? Or is it 1 observation per fruiting body technically okay?
How is this for lichens? I’ve seen multiple observations of a lichen “carpet” where the photos of the different observations were only a few cm apart. One could argue they weren’t the same individual, but even so, that seems a little excessive, doesn’t it?
I agree that very close fruiting bodies of the same species may be excessive, however, with such a close resemblance between certain species that may occur together eg. leccinum holopus & shistophilum or scabrum, it may still be useful. When we use inat data for modeling (MaxEnt), we correct for observations made in a very close proximity.
A bunch of fruiting bodies from the same mycelium is akin to photographing several flowers on the same tree and uploading them all as separate observations. They probably should all be combined into one. However, given that mycelium is underground it may be hard to judge if and how everything is connected. I’m not sure what the “lichen carpet” looks like but find lichens are often a conglomerate of multiple species. I sometimes actually use the same photo for 3-4 observations, each pointing out what I think is a different lichen in the mix. It might differ on a case-by-case basis.
Yes, this is the main cause for my uncertainty of what to do in this situation. Especially because sometimes the fungal network can be massive. It’s just impossible to tell what is one organism
I would have linked the example, but that is against forum rules. In this case it was a carpet of one species (Xanthoria parietina) on the same fallen branch and both observations were IDed as such (and both already RG).
I wouldn’t worry about it if it was an isolated case, but the user has 106 observations of the same species in a very small area, and looking through their observations, these cases of “unclear” double (or tripple) observations are quite common.
I agree. I’m not really good at IDing fungi (so thank you very much for all the IDs!! :D) apart from a few species of lichen so I might make this mistake or ignore a species because I think it’s the same as the other fungus right next to it.
What are their other observations like? There could be any number of reasons why this behavior seems sensible to the observer.
Some users feel the need to create separate observations for every individual in a group; they may not be aware or may not be thinking about the fact that mushrooms are fruiting bodies of a larger organism rather than independent entities.
Some users are not aware that it is possible to upload multiple photos for an observation; or if they are uploading via Seek, there may not be a straightforward way to do so.
Or they may think that the mushrooms look different enough that maybe they are different species, or they might be trying to document the variety of forms/colors within a population, etc.
Probably the only way to know is to ask the observer about their reasons and (perhaps) gently suggest that they could consider consolidating some of the observations.