This question appears all the time on forum. Why there’s a lack of botanists? I can’t get why they avoid iNat. I understand entomologists disassemble own summer catches, but what botanists do at winter?
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I don’t really think there’s a lack of botanists, it’s just that there are far more plants posted than any other kingdom, so the botanists have a lot to work through (Out of the ~36 million observations worldwide, it looks like ~14 million are plants - the next highest kingdom is insects, at ~8 million, and birds at ~ 5 million).
Also plants are extremely accessible to new users, requiring little effort to find or snap a picture of, which inevitably leads to a lot of pictures that lack the vital diagnostic clues (pictures of trees taken at 500 meters with the sun behind them, for example). So there’s a lot to sort through to even get to the ones that are identifiable.
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Yes, but still, when I look at local project for Tracheophyta there’s little more than 10:1 RGvsNeeds id, so I feel it’s one of the best-ided groups after birds. But people comlain about plants a lot, so I really think there’s a problem, sure, tropical regions is a different song, but temperate areas should be better dealt with, I checked USA and the amount of “needs id” obs is almost the same as RG, and it’s the patrimony of iNat. Can it be only because of the amount? I’m not sure, all I (can) do for american plants is adding Russian names.
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We pick the low hanging fruit first. I go thru unknowns for Cape Town … and some get confirmed as I type in my ID. Beautiful clear pictures, show what they need to. Or something unmistakable which a few people have observed now.
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One of the reasons I’ve gotten into plants and plant IDing was because I realized there was a shortage of plant IDers, especially in my region (the Middle East). But I’m still new to botany, and I learn new species to confident-ID level just a few at a time. So, even though I’ve got nearly 30k IDs, usually the best I can do is get to Family, and even that is a challenge. Usually you need several photos of specific parts to get a plant ID, whereas for many animals, one good photo is enough. Even when I ID a plant I know very well, between 20-75% of the observations will be impossible for me to confirm, either because I don’t have a key / time to key it, or because of lack of needed photos.
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i looked at some of your observations, and it looks to me that most of them are fairly well identified. things that aren’t identified at a species level seem to be things that probably can’t be identified to species with high confidence based on what’s provided – at least not by most mere mortals. unfortunately, iNaturalist isn’t blessed with magic beyond the community of identifiers and computer vision.
i’ve found that the way to get things identified better is to learn how to identify some of your own observations. that way, you’ll know what you need to capture in future observations so that they’ll have a better chance of getting more specific identifications. you can also search the forum for the many previous discussions on how to get things identified.
over the last 4 months, the percentage of needs ID vs verifiable observations has gone down across all “iconic taxa” groups, even while >3 million observations have been added over that period. here’s a snapshot from October 21, 2019, along with a link to generate the latest numbers: https://forum.inaturalist.org/t/recruiting-more-identifiers/2388/294.
these are the current stats for the original poster:
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Thanks for the link. I’m off to generate stats now!
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I checked your plant observations that still need identifications. If I were located in the southeast, maybe I could give a few more names, but I can’t. Getting a genus is doing well with these dormant or early spring plants that aren’t flowering or fruiting. You do have good photos, close enough, but these plants will be more identifiable later in the year.
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Wrong question. There are just a few more than 1,100 bird species in the U.S. There are over 21,000 plant species in the U.S. Many of those plant species have very limited ranges. I personally can ID most of North America’s bird species (not sandpipers!), at least in their most distinctive plumage and when well photographed, and I’m not even much of a birder any more! I can’t come close to identifying all the plants, though I do what I can.
Also, people often post plant photos that can’t be identified, at least without intense local knowledge. So many beautiful flower photos with no leaves! When often what distinguishes plants within a genus is the leaves. Although plants aren’t as bad as insects, we often do need to look at small parts that usually aren’t photographed. Frustrating!
During winter we identify the plants we captured in summer, write labels, donate specimens, write papers – all the things entomologists do in winter. (And realize that some areas, e.g. southern U.S. don’t have much winter so the botanists can be busy in the field all year long.)
Therefore, we need more botanists than people who can identify vertebrates, but guess which classes attract more students? Classes in birds, etc. Plants aren’t as popular. So, there are fewer botanists and more species per botanist. It’s not surprising that identification of plant photos on iNaturalist lags behind that in many other groups.
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If they can’t be ided to genus they go from “needs Id” to casual grade with “as good as it can be”.
What you described definitely sounds as lack (on iNat).
We have an entire floral kingdom. Flora Capensis. And very few skilled botanists. (But we still won our first Bioblitz last year, in our off season when most plants are leaves and very hard to ID)
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Yes, birding has always been more popular than botanizing, at all levels of education and training.
@Zeldalola has all this helped with your understanding of response time for IDs, and the factors involved?
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Yes, I agree it’s a lack on iNaturalist, but it results from two things outside iNaturalist control. First, a lack of botanists (compared to people who study animals). Second, a great diversity of plants.
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Universities are closing botany departments and teaching biology, or natural sciences. Of which botany is then, merely a part.
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That’s an interesting link, which conforms what I suspected. The majority of verified observations are of vertebrates. The %RG of Verifiable drops off sharply once the chart hits invertebrates. On that chart, there are over 11 million plant observations, of which about half have been identified to RG. Similar to insects, although the observations start off at 7 million for that group. I suspect the bulk of iNat users/identifieers are focused on vertebrates. Invertebrates are more likely seen, but less likely identified.
I know that is supposed to happen (with genus level being Research Grade) but I don’t think it does happen in a lot of cases which is why I started that topic about it (Adding an identification and stating that you believe it’s as good as it can be
Yeah, it doesn’t happen asmuch as it could be becuse casual grade feels for people as if the observation is underrated.
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I’ve seen many where it would make to observation research grade (two or more IDs and community I’d as genus level) where no one has clicked that.
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That’s because it’s not always clear if someone can id it to species level, I’m not sure how experts check observations, if I know that they check genus RGs I would mark many things with less hesitation.
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Sometimes I try to push IDs forward by adding other people’s observations such as katydids, grasshoppers, crickets, locusts to relevant projects like Orthoptera. Maybe I can’t add anything further to the ID, but often I have the gratification of seeing the mystery orthopteran identified to genus or species level in short while.
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