Webinar: How Your iNaturalist Data Makes a Difference for Biodiversity

[@matheuscarneiroheinzelmann1479]

iNaturalist has greatly enriched my life since I started using it in 2021. Through it, I have connected with various researchers who have assisted me either directly or indirectly. I have learned about the local biodiversity in my region and gained a heightened level of environmental awareness, further emphasizing the need to conserve the diverse biomes of our incredible planet. I would like to extend my gratitude to the iNaturalist team and all its users. I'm very happy to be part of this beautiful community!

[@kennycraven2648]

I started in 2020 and find it a very useful tool that has brought a level of enrichment to my outdoor activities and home biodiversity environment.

[@lesley7634]

Me too!

[@francescosacca6674]

dammit do I agree. This one little app opens you a whole world, our world

[@Dunja0712]

This is so beautifully and eloquently put together. :) And I couldn't agree more. I discovered the app because I was reporting about it at work, I tried it out - and fell in love with it. I enjoy using it so much on hikes, I've learned a lot.

[@scaber247]

Thank you for recording this and making it available to those of us who found a 4am (in New Zealand) viewing time a little too challenging!

[@vanremsen8811]

Developers of iNaturalist should receive some sort of major international award for creating and implementing this.platform. Of course there is the scientific use of the data that is valuable, but perhaps more important is the interest it has generated in the natural world. Wouldn't it be nice to know how many people have developed an interest in natural history in general, or of a particular group or a particular site just because of the availability of iNaturalist? Congrats to those who had the vision, skills, drive, and perseverance to create iNaturalist. This is an historic contribution to natural history and conservation.

[@ForestSchweitzer022097]

This was excellent to attend live! Thank you for all the important work you all do. iNat is my favorite app ever and has taught me so much about the world around me.

[@RHINOTUFF]

inaturalist recently became one of my favorite hobbies. Certainly has enriched my life! Keep up the great work!!! Brian Fogel, Selkirk, Ontario, Canada

[@marianabravoart]

INaturalist is my absolute favorite app! I'm a naturalist and it's my go-to tool for ID'ing and just learning about the species that surround me. It's also my collection and it's become somewhat of a travel journal, as I try to record at least one observation everywhere I go because I love to see my map growing. It's great to learn about the big picture and how my data is potentially useful for science! I'll check out my license to make it open if it's not already. Thank you for sharing this! It's great to see the faces behind the project. Love you guys!

[@maegpye]

@@marianabravoart ooh, I do the same thing. Use it as a travel journal. One trip, I tried to stop at least once in every county we passed through to grab an observation. One stop was to pull off onto a country road next to a corn field for insects and weeds. If we stop for lunch in a small town, I might find a boxelder bug or moth on a building. If you check out your yearly summary page, the observations play out across the map in an animated timeline.

[@rosscoupland5833]

I wasnt able to wstch live as i am in Australia. At around 47:00 you discuss how 'experts' and identifiers are outweighed by observers. When considering more obscure orders such as insects and arachnids, this is hardly surprising, given there is little funding for taxonomists, globally-speaking. It would be worth mentioning that such experts that in fact can reliably identify observations, are absolutely critical to the accuracy and integrity of iNat. It is essential to have an accurate identification of a species at some point, so that at the very least, the algorithm has something to go off. Otherwise, every subsequent identification of that species could be inaccurate and skewed. Ultimately, this would create a scenario where an expert would have to 'wade-in' and go through every observation of that species to correct them. A daunting task for many. I feel there could maybe be incentives for experts, to encourage them to weigh-in on identifications, although I suspect that few professionals would be willing to commit to a species-level identification, given the relative low quality of most images, that rarely show important features. Most insects require microscopy or dissection to accurately identify, for example. Just some thoughts, but overall very appreciative that iNat exists and provides a valuable tool for global diversity.

[@ambergeorge877]

Michael Skvarla, Ph.D. was kind enough to direct me to this app, as I had a question regarding the Giant Lacewing. Great people and a wealth of information on your app! (Michael Skvarla, Ph.D. Assistant Research Professor of Arthropod Identification Department of Entomology Penn State University)

[@stenthesnake98]

Haven’t met Michael yet, but I work with some of his colleagues from Arkansas!

[@JustTheDude]

Thank you for making the recording and slides available. I found the presentation very useful. Been using iNat since 2014.

[@razzmatazz1974]

I studied Physics as a career but i have always loved nature in general, specially insects which have fascinated me since i was a child. I started recording observations in my garden using INat and during the pandemic became what it kept me sane during isolation. I discovered that my garden is very biodiverse with more than 300 species! After the pandemic i got involved with naturalists and conservation projects. This year i went back to University to train as field naturalist and conservator. In 15 days i will go camping in the Rainforest for a project. So in many ways INat changed my life and reconnected me with insects, my childhood passion ❤

[@regnierda]

Hooray for Mom for updating her licensing choices and further contributing to biodiversity data!

[@springfieldlakesnaturecare7358]

Dr Scott Loarie the collection of the stats & what people are doing with it were amazing how govt dept are using the data. Invasive species & monitoring road kill or to help endangered species in grass roots projects. Well done!

[@highanddryful]

I have a passion for sound recordings, so I try to upload calls to iNaturalist regularly 😊

[@calho7297]

gOOd tip ! (Didn't realise audio uploads are an option. Thanks.

[@diegoa5636]

Sad I didnt attend, but glad to see this record! thank you staff for all your effort behind iNaturalist! Im happy to be part of this community!

[@snailboy5610]

Love the app, and this was an interesting and informative guide that gave me confidence to upload and participate more. The licensing tip was good too. I like Seek too and use both. Seek gives more instant results and also has the ability the ability to adjust your observation on the fly to get best answer as to what your looking at.

[@OspreyFlyer]

Love iNaturalist! 👍❤️

[@Gladiator239]

Thank you all from iNat Luxembourg 🇱🇺. I’ll now put my observations in open licensing, thanks for the info! Great graphs btw Scott 📈

[@JoNightSloMo]

I am in New Zealand, it was at 4 in the morning for me, I was going to watch but I completely forgot to set my alarm.

[@andrealeong8714]

Points for intending to do that. I was never intending to watch live from Aus (2am)!

[@scaber247]

Me too!

[@moarteavietii]

Thanks for sharing the recording. I wanted to attend live, but failed to do so. Now I know a lot more about iNaturalist and I'll definitely use it more 😁. I also found out about seek (installed it already). Maybe you could make it easier to identify species directly from iNaturalist (so I don't have to use different apps). I use yet another app to identify plants. I'll probably replace (parts of that) with seek (for now). Thanks again for being awesome!

[@LeslieHakkola]

Love using this app! Sharing with family.

[@recklessroges]

Seek and iNaturalist is so much fun and I get to learn so much!

[@theeldritchlibrary]

Thank you for the recording, it's much appreciated. I wasn't able to watch live.

[@SayokoAkuma]

I have been using the apps seek and i naturalist for about 3 years now. I really do hope, that some of my pictures help in whatever way. It's nice to think, that my hobby (gling around and taking pics of stuff outside) is useful.😊

[@ChristopherJohnston]

I want to know how he got that iNaturalist recent observations feed on his TV. I'd love 💗that as a screensaver on my TV or computer!

[@JonathanTarplee]

Really useful and informative, thank you!

[@Way2Death]

Camera tip from my side. I use pro mode a lot when taking photos of small things with a phone. Focus can jump widely when on the edge of the minimal focus distance. Setting focus to manual and adjusting the distance to get things in focus makes things a lot easier when trying to get the closest most high quality shot on your phone.

[@nobodygnomes]

Never stop your hard work!! ❤

[@elias19638]

i looooove iNaturalist

[@jaylay2964]

A great tip for taking photos with your phone is to turn on live motion capture! It allows you to much easier get an insect in frame as you can edit the photo to change the key photo

[@highanddryful]

Question: I upload to INaturalist, eBird and Xeno-canto, should I upload the same observation to all three platforms?

[@elliottgordon3679]

If you want to, but it can result in duplicate data on GBIF.

[@InconspicuousOwl]

Thanks!❤🎉

[@markalvinbagundol2491]

Thank you for the recording, hence the Philippine won't stop ravaging my value and persona

[@CajunBlooms]

Wonderful video with pertinent information

[@abelpgarza1507]

Outdoor enthusiast. That me as well. I really like the easy identification of whatever I come across in our South Texas small ranch. I also like identification of plants on Padre Island.

[@p.7778]

I've been using Inat for more than a year to record my bird observations. It is easier than the specific birdwatching apps. It also helps me record bird sounds so do I need anything else? Looking forward to learn and explore the app more

[@ronmasters751]

Very helpful for making good choices while using the app.

[@andrealeong8714]

27:33 great to know, I'm almost an exclusive bug-snapper!

[@tandinwangdi7968]

Attended live yesterday.

[@CBroPhotography]

Can you add the links that were referred to in chat to this video description?

[@ErikSteenkamp-wi6oy]

I walk see something and log it or sometimes go out if I see something or just explore and learn about something

[@Sweetpeagrows]

Chokma’shki (Thank you in Chickasaw)

[@jasminer8718]

One of the things that would motivate me to do more Identifications is making it a bit easier through the app. The app doesn't filter the searches very well for things that are needing ID.

[@calho7297]

We also found it confusing at first.

[@kennycraven2648]

I do most observation in home gardens of pollinator insects. Interested in species population changes year over year. Some years I identify numerous Queen butterflies or question marks and other years they are rarely seen but more painted and skippers. Hope these trends are being studied.

[@gkcornwall]

Michelle is an outstanding example of why there should be more people studying Cultural Anthropology! Best cross-disciplinary field.

[@tepoztlantours]

Saludos desde México

[@JoeKaikkonen]

Wonderfull. Something new as feature (and also something i recently noted as interesting 🤔 before i see how our kind actually ..makes with it, for me, i recently noted lots of our small birds migrate at or just after sunset, it would be great if bird silhouette ident, counting could be done for migration paterns alone somehow, ? Or, like leaf damage. Inspiring for me😅

[@LeslieHakkola]

I’ll try to do all

[@CornelioChablé-e8c]

Good meet and presentation. I am working in Guatemala to help other peoples how to use iNaturalist. And doing some monitoring of the jaguar and preys on the Mayan Biosphere Reserve in Peten, Guatemala through citizen science which is aproject on iNaturalist.

[@christophermoore753]

I was going to watch it but time was, to late as i am in Australia

[@haldir126]

I work for a public agency in Italy that deals with the verification of the impacts on biodiversity generated by new infrastructures (roads, highways, railways, ...). Often the data of iNaturalist are an indispensable source of data in the absence of other databases; unfortunately in many cases , the geolocalization datas (of the presence of threatened species) are dispersed over a square of several kilometers on each side. For reasons of public utility, with due agreements, is it possible to obtain access to the exact geolocalizations?

[@ozgurkocak1529]

we want more identification for our observations.

[@ziegweid]

cannot figure out how to see the "map gap" nor do I see the promised link here

[@tylercrandall5909]

If you click explore on the app at the bottom it has a grid selection or a map selection to choose from. The map allows you to see all the observations on the map.

[@AubreyCasler-c3p]

I love the map feature, since I’m a plant lover and classic nature documentaries seem to only focus on the animal life in an area. What plants live on the African savanna, or the English fields, or the Amazon rainforest, or the boreal forest of Canada and Siberia, or high Arctic plants

[@LadyDanika]

Any of you iNaturalist enthusiasts have a recommendation on a Macro clip on lens for phones?

[@oscarua1989]

Thank you

[@ErikSteenkamp-wi6oy]

I found a place that is like 350 meters wide by like 2000 to 3000 meter long inside the city where there is 4 observation and 3 of those is mine

[@Gladiator239]

time to explooooore 🤠📸

[@ErikSteenkamp-wi6oy]

Exactly

[@afonsomota-j8e]

Outdoor entusiasta

[@ravemaster143]

where i can get one of your T-shirt? I'm badly want one..pls

[@HoboFreeman710]

Scientist

[@LeslieHakkola]

Other Home gardener

[@kusumstokes5239]

outdoor enthusiast

[@lesley7634]

I LOVE iNat. but a teeny weeny niggle- maybe because I live in England and you don't. There's a plant called 'cuckoo pint'. You at inat call cuckoo-pint 'Arum maculatum' but we call Arum italicum (Italian lords-and-ladies) cuckoo-pint too.

[@rosscoupland5833]

Can be a bit confusing when there's more than one 'common name' for a species, or in your case two different species using the same 'common name'. Which is why it's important to use the scientific names which are specific to just one taxon.