Red-tailed hawk incorrectly showing up as non-native

General
1

I see Buteo jamaicensis is incorrectly showing up as introduced to Washington DC. Not the first time I’ve seen this error pop up with native species!

Here is an example of a recent observation showing this error: https://www.inaturalist.org/observations/263198626

Thanks for help!

2

Shouldn’t this be in Bug Reports?

3

Not sure…last time I had this issue it was related to an incorrect source feeding into the curation of the site (the IRMA database needed to be corrected), so maybe it depends on the source of the issue? Happy to have the topic moved if it should be moved.

4

Establishment means can be edited by anyone via the taxon page on the relevant “Place” checklist, such as https://www.inaturalist.org/listed_taxa/4882

https://help.inaturalist.org/en/support/solutions/articles/151000176171-how-to-add-or-edit-establishment-means-in-inaturalist

EDIT: It looks like that taxon page on the North American checklist was updated by a newly joined user today, with 0 observations and 0 identifications. However, looking at a variety of the individual state checklist pages, it says the taxon for that checklist was last updated by “Site Admins” at various different times in the last 24 hours. Not sure who would be doing that, or why.

In order to avoid having to manually fix every descendent checklist, this task is probably best left to a curator, as they will have the option to apply the establishment means change to all descendent places (states) of the higher checklist. Might be worth making a flag for it, if a curator doesn’t notice it from this thread within a reasonable amount of time.

5 Likes
5

Thank you, I didn’t realize it was possible for anyone to edit this! I did go ahead and make the change on the “Washington West” checklist, and now I see my recent observations are still showing as introduced based on the “District of Columbia” checklist. So I see what you mean that it’s a larger issue. I did go ahead and add a flag.

…Ahh, but now it looks like maybe a curator has already corrected the issue? I see it’s now showing as native in the US on the taxon page. I’m still seeing “introduced” on my recent observations, but hopefully it just takes some time to correct.

Thanks!

6

Just a quick update that although this taxon is now showing as native in the US, it is still appearing as introduced in descendent locations. So definitely need some curator help with this one I think.

2 Likes
7

Yes, for issues like this, please flag the relevant taxon on iNat for curators to deal with and explain the situation. Since this can be handled on iNat, I’m going to close the thread.