First time forum poster here. I’ve been looking through the forums for some options but haven’t really found anything (though I’m not quite sure how to phrase my query).
Here’s what I’m trying to do. My focus is on Australian Psychidae (case moths, bagworms). Many observations are of the larval case. However, there are often multiple species that can have very similar looking cases, but those species don’t neatly fall into a formal Taxon group like subfamily, tribe etc…
End result is a ton of observations that can only be identified to family (Psychidae). At the moment, all I do is include this information in my comment with the Psychidae ID, e.g. “Could be Conoeca, some of the Lepidoscia, or an early instar of Trigonocyttara clandestina. Location excludes Amatissa or Dappula.”
I’m trying to figure out a way to effectively include a shortlist of candidates. I had a look at observation fields, but saw that the ones that use Taxon as a field can only be used once per observation. So I’m thinking maybe I’d have to use text? I want it to be something I can search in the future.
Before I go trying to reinvent the wheel, I thought I’d ask if anyone else has already done something like this or has any suggestions on how to best utilise observation fields to achieve this.
Hi, Leonie, nice to see you here.
I’ve been working on adding life stage annotations to Lepidoptera in Australia, and find the Psychidae very frustrating. I wish there was an “Impossible to say” Life stage for them.
You might look at something like what @matthew_connors is doing with the katydids. He has an Observation Field called “Sorting the Australian Phaneropterinae:”, with various values he has created, such as “Broad wings”, “Infuscated Torbia”, and I don’t know how many more. Perhaps something similar could work for your purposes?
you could classify these observations in sets of taxa and would be looking to search by set (rather than by taxon), then i think I would define each set of taxa as a list and then reference those lists as pre-defined allowable values in a text-based observation field.
for example, suppose you create 2 Lists:
List 123 (“Blue Beetles”) = Genus A + Species L + Species M + Species N
List 456 (“Red Beetles”) = Tribe X + Genus B
then in your allowable values in your text-based observation field, you could use something like: Blue (list 123)|Red (list 456).
this kind of setup allows you to:
query observations by an observation field + value
reference a particular list instead of string of taxa
however, if you want to be able to filter by possible taxa rather than by set, then that would require a more complicated setup probably, if it’s even practical.
for example, suppose:
Set 1 = Species A, Species B
Set 2 = Genus X (which includes Species A), Species C
Set 3 = Species D, Species B
… then:
if you wanted to filter by Species B and have it return observations tied to both Set 1 and Set 3, that could be possible, but you’d have to set up a unique observation field (with binary allowable values yes|no or true|false) that corresponds specifically to Species B (and repeat for any other taxon that you might want to query)
if you wanted to filter by Genus X and have it return observations tied to both Set 1 and Set 2, then that’s probably not doable within the system, or at least not practical
if you want to query for multiple taxa, then that can also increase the complexity and make it less likely practical to set up.
Thanks everyone. It seems like using observation fields is probably the way to go. I might try creating a “Possible Psychidae Genus/Species” observation field. I also like the idea of a field for case style. Something like “cone shape”, “dense foliage coverage”, etc… The set idea is interesting. I’ll have a think about how I might be be able to utilise that as well.
Yeah, the Schroedinger’s Case Moth conundrum makes Psychidae a bit more challenging than other Lepidoptera. I’ve been trying to remember to check the life stage fields when I’m doing identifications, but often there isn’t really anything to add if the larval case is the only evidence in the observation. It would be easier to rate the likelihood of each life stage with a Yes/No/Possible/???.
If all that is visible is the case, I annotate Evidence of Presence = Construction and leave it at that. But I have to remember to also mark it as reviewed, or else my query for observations without life stage gets clogged up with pages of case moths.
I’ve created an observation field called “Possible Psychidae Genus/Species” to test out if this will work. I’ve encountered two main issues:
There doesn’t appear to be a way to have multiple entries of the same observation field on a single observation (i.e. if I select the observation field, type “species a” and hit enter, then select the same observation field and type “species b” and hit enter, it overwrites the first entry). So I’ve just been typing the list of possible species, separated by a comma.
I can’t figure out how to include the text within observation fields in a search. I see that I can click on a single observation field value and show all results with that specific value. But what I’m trying to do is search for all values that include specific text.
For example: There could be the following observation field values:
Lepidoscia arctiella
Conoeca, Lepidoscia
Conoeca Lepidoscia, Trigonocyttara clandestina
How do I search for observations where the observation field value includes the word “Lepidoscia”?
The search form will search for text in the description and tags, but I can’t see an option for observation fields. If I go into the observation field page and click “View more search options” it brings up a search and I can see in the filters that it now has Observation Fields, with a grey box that has “ field:possible psychidae genus/species=”, but I can’t edit this, only remove it.
If I can’t search within observation field values, or at least include multiple values in a search, then it isn’t really going to be of much use to me. Since I can’t add tags to other people’s observations, I don’t know what other options I have.