Imagine the amount of biological information you could amass if you sent 1,000 observers out into the field to record their observations. Image the depth of that information if they could use a handheld device to collect and transmit that information to a central location!
It’s real. It’s called iNatualist, and the National Park Service has recently established a central repository for iNaturalist data for 412 Park Service units, including Bandelier National Monument (and the Valles Caldera National Preserve).
Data is collected, you guessed it, with your cell phone, or, as I prefer, the old fashioned camera and notebook routine followed by a session on the computer at home (I get better photos that way). Download the iNaturalist app at the Google Play or Apple Apps store, set up an account, then go for a hike.
Find something interesting and take out your phone and power up the app. Look for the + sign in the lower right corner to add an observation.
The green plus sign
Next, select “Take Photo” and iNaturalist will open your camera app.
Take Photo!
If you like the photo, hit OK, if not, retry.
Ok!
On the next screen, you can identify your observation, the day, time and location will be filled in (if your phone’s GPS is on, wait a couple of seconds and it will pop up). If you are in Bandelier, your observation will automatically to added to the Bandelier iNaturalist project and you don’t have to do anything except remember to tap the checkmark in the upper right to save your observation.
Your observations will be listed on your phone, but they look better on a computer screen. You log into your account on iNaturalist at inaturalist.org and all will be displayed. iNaturalist has cool ways to display your observations on maps, lists, photos, etc.
One advantage of the site is if you don’t know the identity of your observation and if you have a good photo, iNaturalist can almost always tell you what it is. Click on Upload in the upper right, select your photo, then put the cursor in the Species Name box and click. iNaturalist will load suggestions, and the top one is often the correct ID.
(If your photo is from your phone, the Location will automatically fill in. If not, click in the Location box, zoom in on the map, and place a pin. This is a pain, but I do it this way all the time.)
Once the species and location are filled in, hit the Submit 1 Observation button and you are done. Usually another iNatualist user with a special interest in a location or species will confirm your ID or suggest a different one. (I usually review all observations from Bandelier, the Valles Caldera, and Los Alamos County.) If two people agree, the observation becomes “Research Grade.” It’s not foolproof, but at least it is a good indication that you are on the right track. I see an increasing number of scientific papers that use Research Grade iNaturalist observations to track trends in plant and animal populations.
A few pointers: bird observations almost always get confirmed within minutes, plants and insects may take days or weeks. You can edit an observation and put in more photos, those always help (I won’t confirm most sunflower family members without a photo of the underside of the flower head). Confirmation of observations in New Mexico take longer than those in Arizona and California because there are fewer users here. Although your observations are automatically placed in any project that is focused on a certain area, it helps if you “Join” the project.
Be patient with the learning curve, it takes some practice. But the amount of information is rather amazing: as of today, January 25, 2020, Bandelier’s iNaturalist Project has more than 2,700 observations of 765 species.