Recently, I submitted an observation that I believe to be either (A) an entirely new parasite-host species interaction or (B) an entirely new species of fungus. The observation’s significance was brought to my attention by an amateur mycologist whose opinions I trust, and my own searches have failed to disprove their assertion. I feel like this is a cool opportunity for some mycology lab to describe this species or interaction, and I would like to see this happen, but I don’t know how to go about this. So, I guess I have three questions:
(1) What standard of evidence should I collect on inaturalist before I reach out to someone who works in the field? (I don’t wanna waste their time)
(2) Once I have enough evidence, Who should I contact about the finding? (like, is there a way to do this in inaturalist, or should I search for academics who recently published about related species)
(3) How should I contact these academics? (so that I don’t sound like a crackpot)
I posted this on another form, and I’ve gotten some good feedback.
First off, I understand that the existence of a species or a specific host-parasite relationship may not be the most scientifically important discovery. The reason why I have been hesitant to contact academics is because I don’t want to waste their time with my (vanity) project.
(1) on inaturalist, I’m going to reach out to the top observers of the host species and parasite species to request an ID
(2) Institutions I can contact to get a specimen preserved for ID in the future would be the local agricultural department, DNR, or state university extension office.
(3) If contacting an academic, you should approach them in an open-minded way, under the assumption there may be information that you are not aware of. Someone who has dedicated their career to a certain specialty may have knowledge that is not readily available to me through my own research.
Ok, so I’m more of a gall guy, but I’ll add a little bit.
I don’t know who told you so, but documenting host-parasite relationships is quite useful and I (though I am very biased) would argue that it’s one of the most useful things we can do with iNaturalist data (along with looking at ecological interactions generally). Also, a novel (new to science) relationship is straight up publishable data.
Looking at your observation (I assume this one). There is actually a species known off of your host plant, and you can find info on it on the gallformers page: https://gallformers.org/gall/4783 Thanks @nschwab for getting there with it first. Now, while this one is not necessarily a novel discovery, it is still a cool find! You’re observation #19 in the world!
Finally, the big fat ugly truth with fungi species is that there are quite a few of them, and many, many of them are undescribed. (See this trip of a paper: https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC11687528/) For example, I’ve taken a bunch of photos of plant spots, and while some of those are described and even identifiable, the vast majority will never get IDed. It’s a lot of the same with South American Galls (which I have been diving into lately). So, the real question is often not “Is this species described?”, and more “Can we get it sequenced to describe it?”. If that idea does sound appealing, the people working with Powdery Mildews such as @sbrobeson should be able to introduce you to taking samples.
Also, just as a general note, you seem to be very worried about bothering academics, and truly, I would not worry about it. Academia is strangely isolating in that you tend to interact with a lot of the same people in your field. I absolutely love seeing people get excited about my passion, even if their finding isn’t the breaking edge of science. So, reach out!
Yes, I would not worry about bothering an academic in a case like this. Academics get a ton of emails; most are more boring than asking about a specific organism.. Academic folks are generally going to be good at prioritizing their emails (they have to to survive). If they’re not interested and don’t have time, they just won’t respond/will ignore. If that happens, don’t take it personally. But by emailing you give them the choice, and they may choose to respond!
That said, I think posting on iNat or other fora first and getting some feedback about potential IDs/novelty is a good strategy. In my academic career I got a fair amount of comms from people thinking they had something very novel that warranted bringing to an academic’s attention. This was true in one case out of all those (and I was grateful for it!), but in most cases the person’s observation was just something a little uncommon.
That’s not really associated with iNat. It’s a reddit sub someone made, but the forum here is where serious questions and ones that you want engagement from actual iNat staff and power users should be posted.
reddit definitely has pros and cons. same for discord, tumblr, and other unofficial iNat spaces. but if you want to reach academics, I agree, you’ll want to use this forum.
honestly, reddit isn’t a terrible place to ask for IDs or advice on certain specific topic. Unfortunately I can’t really use it anymore because the antisemitism is so horrific throughout.
That sounds very good I think :) To 2) I would add that you don’t have to necessarily contact a local institution. Finding a specialist from the group you seek help for, can be good idea because people often specialize in certain taxa as a whole, not only those living in the same area they live ;)
As a sort of academic (I do some faunistic research, partially using data from iNat) I can say the ‘open-minded approach’ is a great thing. It’s a bit frustrating when someone comes to you with their hypothesis (for example, of a species ID) and sticks to it even when you tell them that they’re wrong. And I can assure you I’m always happy to be informed about interesting finds that I can use in my research, I think I’m not an exception in that ;)
Regarding evidence, it’s sometimes good to reach the experts with what you have, and ask them what would be needed to prove your find. They may ask for something specific (like, samples for DNA analysis, photos of certain body parts etc), and give you useful advice how to collect the evidence.
Thank you! This was very encouraging. And yes, the observation does not appear to be unique one second inspection; I am grateful to those that helped. I will reach out to the linked individual in the future (sometime when work isn’t so busy) as collecting field samples is one way I had hoped to assist with research.
Thank you for your advice. It makes me feel a lot better getting an academic’s perspective on their experience and on what to realistically expect when I reach out.
Yeah, I was pleasantly surprised how quickly the top identifiers responded to my message. I’m hoping I’ll have the opportunity to assist researchers with collecting samples once things settle down at work. I have a background in bio-sciences and some experience as an undergraduate lab assistant, so I’m hoping that my skills/knowledge transfers.