HI. I’m unsure if this is the right Forum, but here goes. A person who appears to be young, new, and with no apparent background has ID’d a slew of my observations to RG. I was unsure of many of these when I posted them. How can we de-ID them and is there a moderator who can gently explain how iNat works and why one should only ID when one is knowledgable? He’s made a few observations of his own and it’s clear that he lacks the knowledge base. Sorry to sound so prissy. I’d like an expert to confirm or correct my observations; the RG makes that less likely. I’d prefer to share the relevant info privately. Thank you.
have you either left a comment on one of said observations, or sent them a private message on iNat? You should always assume people mean well, and it is difficult to gauge another person’s thought processes, expertise, etc without engaging in a dialogue with them
Did you try to interact with this IDer and explain that he/she should only agree to your suggestion if he/she can verify them independently? Often communication is the best way to solve an issue.
Other then that, you can always tick the “ID can be improved” checkbox on the very bottom of your observations page, which will send it back to “needs ID”. Don’t forget to untick that box when you feel satisfied with IDers responses.
I made some suggestions to the person on one of their observations–a very fuzzy photo ID’d well out of geographical range. My observations came to their attention because they were taken in the same tiny town in which the person lives. I’m just unsure about how to go about it, since I’m not a moderator, expert or anything else, just a prolific contributor, and the person appears to be a kid. Done indelicately it could shut them off to contributing or quash their interest.
no need to be an expert or moderator, just be diplomatic as you noted. On an observation where you think they made a ‘dodgy’ ID, just politely ask how they made that ID and note that you were uncertain yourself originally
Thank you. Excellent idea!!
Another option: you could withdraw your own suggestion after it was confirmed, when you are not sure about it. So it is again in the pool of “needs ID” and others can agree or disagree with it. … and especially if you upload many observation it might be easier (or not as important) to kepp travk of ticking boxes…
As to the matter of contacting the IDer: I think as long as you keep @thebeachcomber s comment at heart “assume that other mean well” and phrase your response accordingly, I think it will be fine.
You could scroll down to Data Quality Assessment section of your observation and check ‘Yes’ on
Based on the evidence, can the Community Taxon still be confirmed or improved? to open it for other people to id.
I understand your concern here, I often encounter people who agree blindly with me based on a perception that I am an expert (with northeast US ants that perception may not be wrong, but I still want independent IDs to get to RG, and I should certainly not be assumed an expert on every insect)
That said, if you are this concerned that people agreeing with your own ID may be wrong, you probably should change your ID to be the most specific taxon you are reasonably sure of, doing this will also make the observation not RG until you get 2 others agreeing on species.
You can withdraw an ID you are unsure of at any time, which will immediately cause the observation to stop being RG if there is only one person who agreed with you
I have encountered similar situations before with new users. I think they often see that I am IDing their observations and want to “return the favor”. This can mean they agree to my identifications (which are tentative or CV-based) or just add badly wrong guesses. Definitely frustrating! I’ve used the approach @thebeachcomber recommended, and it has worked well in all but one case. In that case, I had to ask the user politely but firmly to please stop identifying my observations, and they did comply - which was good!
I’ve also used both of @Ajott’s suggestions to get my observations back in front of other IDers. I often prefer backing my ID off to genus to return the observation to Needs ID rather than using the DQA simply because I worry about remembering to untick checkmarks in the DQA, but both strategies work.
Sometimes also a little bit of - expert says it is Neoscona blondeli, then the observer / next identifier agrees.
Yesterday there was a spider obs. With one ID to species. I agreed to genus, and left my copypasta - Not disagreeing with you. Observer agreed with the sp and asked why I didn’t, because expert! So I explained ‘how to iNat’ and @mentioned a second spider person. Who also stayed strictly at genus, and explained again. Haven’t had any more notifications for that one …
When my helpful - this was the placeholder - ID is agreed with, I withdraw mine.
PS I have seen our taxon specialists in comments, so everyone gets the benefit of field marks conversation. Then we can bookmark that obs till the info is ingrained.
‘I can’t tell A and B apart. Please tell me how you know this is B?’
I want to agree that just because someone has no profile info doesn’t inherently mean they aren’t knowledgable about some specific taxa; some people just never bother to create a detailed profile. And formal background is not necessarily the same as expertise. Knowledgable people can also occasionally make mistakes, for example due to autocomplete or common names mix-ups.
since the OP’s query has been addressed I’m going to close this thread now to avoid any more speculation about the motivations or expertise of a specific individual identifier