It doesn’t make more sence for me, I’m not a helper for neotropic birds.
1 Like
The thing is, while I try to have more observations than ids, because I don’t have that much experience, identifying observations takes less effort than observing things and posting them, and it takes less time.
1 Like
There is some value to adding at least a couple of IDs after RG. If one of the prior IDers leaves iNat and chooses to remove their observations, with only 2 IDs the obs would revert to Needs ID. Also, especially for somewhat less common species, a consensus of more than 2 people makes for a more reliable ID. Then there are the experts in a given taxon who may go through and place their “stamp of approval” on the records ( :-) ), which both confirms the ID further and keeps their ID numbers up - a nice side effect, even if unintended 
2 Likes
Ditto, which is why my IDs mainly stick to putting coarse IDs on unknowns, and occasionally search sleuthing for the WeirdWildWonders project.
Outside of ID-ing, people like us can add annotations and observation fields, and add observations to projects so experts can see them.
1 Like
imho if you glance and see it is correct you might as well hit agree… it also marks it as something you already looked at for your reference…
2 Likes
You can also hit “reviewed”, not everyone turns off notifications.
2 Likes
Yes, reviewed can be helpful.
1 Like
There is merit to adding additional IDs over and above what is needed to get to RG.
- It marks it as reviewed (and takes it out of your own personal Needs ID pool)
- It follows the observation, and if you have “only different IDs” in your settings, then it will only alert you if the ID is contrary to what you put, so it’s a way of watching observations and being alerted if the ID changes. note: 1 and 2 are accomplished with a single click of the agree button!
- It adds weight to the ID, and if anyone comes through and obnoxiously and maliciously IDs a bunch of stuff as some weird taxa then it won’t shift the CID.
- If you have expertise with a taxon, then it helps put you higher in the top IDs list for that taxa, so anyone else who is looking for an urgent ID, for instance, can tag you and potentially get a reply.
- Also if you have expertise, and assuming others in iNat have come to appreciate your expertise, then seeing your ID even if it is after 4 or 5 other IDs the same, can give someone a lot more confidence in the ID applied. We don’t have a reputation system as such, but when you see someone ID conservatively and seldom show mistakes, then it can be the same as a reputation system!
- If I am an expert in a taxon, and I see an observation IDd by 4 people, but none of them I am familiar with as to their individual identification skills, then I am going to look closely to verify they are right. I often find (easy to make) mistakes in spiders of New Zealand. When I see someone else that I consider to be quite knowledgeable on spiders has also reviewed, then I know I don’t need to check it as much.
- Where I see a new user often making IDs over and above what is needed to get to RG, then there is the possibility of another keen, eager power user spider identifier in the making! I’m going to try and start conversations with that person and find out their interests, and look to supporting them as much as I can. I remember my own learning experiences, and I really enjoy the opportunity to pay it forward!
It’s quite possible that the new alerts and notifications upgrade will address a lot of the problems related to excessive alerts, but regardless I still think it doesn’t hurt to have dozens of IDs on an observation!
6 Likes
I just came up with situations of people rechecking obs of the taxons with RG and adding another, 5th or more wrong id, it’s harder to deal with such obs, you need to invite more people to check it, and also I doubt that all ids were made with long thinking before clicking on “agree”. People (all) tend to be dependant on other’s thoughts, just today I reviewed some RG Herring Gulls with 3-5 id on each for birds out of range and 100% another species, now I know what to do, but some people don’t and time to time you come upon obs with RG and last different id that didn’t change the status. Every type of behaviour have pluses and minuses, something interesting can get more people adding ids, but when a good shot of a common species gets 10+ ids it’s something hard to understand, if you like the photo - write the comment, ofc it’s only my feelings on that and only for some situations, they’re kind of different so it should be different talks I guess, it’s just me liking to sum up everything.
2 Likes
My ratio is currently at 52 IDs per observation. I enjoy observing, but most of my observations come from those rare times when I am out for a walk alone. Other walks, when I am trying to keep pace with other people and/or a dog, are not so conducive to observing!
9 Likes
I most enjoy IDing a few particular plant taxa that are widely distributed and conspicuous but considered tricky to ID to species, especially Smilax and Ludwigia. I learn so much about geographic variation and can test my theories about what are good ID characters. Even better, I get into good discussions with people more knowledgable about botany than I am, and I learn from them too. And, IDing really teaches me a lot about how to take good photos (mostly from seeing bad photos) so it sharpens me as an observer, too. I’d like to keep a ratio of about 3:2 ID to observation, but it varies.
7 Likes
i guess different taxa are different, most plants I see only get 2-3 IDs. But yes for sure if you aren’t confident in your ID no reason to agree just because it’s research grade!
5 Likes
Yes, that’s more about birds, other groups get less attention so they have problems of another spectrum.
I’m about 19:1 IDs to observations. Mostly because I can ID things a lot faster than I can find stuff to photograph. I spent a lot of 2019 laid up with health problems as well, so I expanded my ID numbers by quite a lot during that as well.
5 Likes
I believe it is a language problem, and don’t want to put words in @fffffffff 's mouth, but I believe she is saying that many ‘above research grade’ observations are made simply by clicking ‘Agree’ without checking the organism. If a person bothers to check it out, and finds it is wrong, then 10 ID’s outweighs the correct ID. And then she suggests that observations without a confirming ID are more important than adding to a list of Agree ID’s.
4 Likes
I know that dogs can certainly be a problem when trying to get an observation!!
Interesting poll. I’m mostly an observer. And even if my stats for IDs surpass my obs, I will still consider myself an observer for the foreseeable future. I joined iNat to track my own observations and IDing other peoples’ obs is just something I do to be a good iNat community member. I don’t ever see IDing becoming a primary motivation
3 Likes
Mostly IDs for me! Being winter and all I’m not outside much.
2 Likes
3 obs: 5 ID, so i put “roughly equal”. I try to always keep my ID count higher than my obs to avoid contributing to the backlog of “Needs ID” observations.
4 Likes
I make identifications not to be a good member of Inat, but because I learn about the spatial and temporal distribution of the species I am interested in.
It draws my attention to species that I didn’t think were present close to home (and thus widens the list of potentials to pay attention to).
It also allows me to make discoveries (new species where they were unknown).
This gives me the opportunity to compare my determinations with those of other experts (too rare concerning Opiliones), and to progress in skills.
It pushes me to do bibliographical research on taxa in which I would not have been interested because it is too unlikely that I would meet them personally.
And for many other reasons…
Translated with www.DeepL.com/Translator (free version)
9 Likes