You may already have the chironomid larval identification references at John Epler’s website, but if not, his manuals are very useful (https://johnepler.com/). With good photos of the head/antennae/mentum, body, and anal proleg area, some larvae can be identified to at least genus.
Oh, I was shocked to see a year-old midge obs of mine go to RG at species, so this is why. The fly guide is an amazing resource and it’s great to see it expand!! Thanks for your efforts.
I’ve got 45 observations, none RG. My approach is to photograph anything that appears at the insect lights. If it sits still, I’ll fill up the frame and then try to get a side view. https://www.inaturalist.org/observations/205599246
My basic working premise is that data is useful, but only if you collect it. Photos collected today can be more useful in the future if they get more attention, or as the automated ID improves. Some of the insects I document are almost certainly the beginning or the end of a species moving north, and the relatively low level of iNat activity in SE Ohio often means that few other, or even no other, people are capturing them and checking in the observations.
IF it would improve current or future ID efforts, I’d put more time into this category. I’m not currently focus stacking any insects other than moths and dragonflies, but if it’d help, I can experiment with it (harder on tiny skinny subjects).
I’m not going to put any of these under a scope, but I’d be happy to collect specimens for someone else.
Goeldichironomus carus has a distinct set of 6 black spots on the thorax. Though we recently learned that Goeldichironomus picta also has 6 black spots. G. picta has been reported to be found recently in Florida, so G. carus observations there are in a little bit of doubt now. Goeldichironomus has been in general a difficult genus to get information on at least in my experience.
Many of your photos are good quality and could most likely reach at least genus for most of them. The reason none are RG is more so because you just so happen to be photographing difficult ones, or ones we haven’t researched about yet. Many of the gray ones can be difficult to ID, but we are working on them. For example Glyptotendipes is a genus that we collected a decent amount of information on. A few Glyptotendipes species are able to be reliably IDed through photographs.
For those possibly interested, there are a number of species of Chironomids that need more observations to be included in the CV system. These are species that we have learned to ID and are hoping to get into the CV system to help improve overall Chironomid Identifications on the site as a whole.
For example if you are in the northeastern part of North America, particularly the New England area and southeast Canada. Zavrelimyia and Stictochironomus are currently in season.
While there are too many to go into detail, more Chironomid observations especially of unique looking ones would be greatly appreciated. While not perfect, looking at the observation page of Chironomids in North America shows a good overview of currently identified Chironomids and what they look like. Keep in mind not all are in season, and many live in different regions. Also some like Cricotopus, Chironomus plumosus, Tanytarsus, etc have not been corrected, or worked on yet. Another note, most Chironomids we still either don’t know how to ID yet, or they aren’t able to be IDed. Hence why we are targeting certain groups. Any extra time made to look out and observe more Chironomids would be greatly appreciated.