I make lots of mistakes; maybe you should, too?

I was pleased to notice yesterday that I have contributed over 17,000 observations to iNaturalist - and then I was rather shocked to notice that over 100 people follow me on iNat! I'm shocked because, while I know I post lots of observations of all sorts of species (OK, I admit it, I'm obsessed), I don't think of myself as an expert, so why are you all following me?

Yeah, I have a biology degree and, yeah, I worked for MassWildlife for twenty years, but I'm not an expert in anything. I can never keep Yellow-rumped and Magnolia Warblers straight. Female Common Whitetail and Twelve-spotted Skimmer dragonflies: one has a solid yellow line down the side of her abdomen, one has a series of slanted yellow dashes, but do you think I can remember which is which? No, I cannot. Red and White Baneberry: something about the thickness of the pedicels separates those, but it took me till last week to come up with the mnemonic that wiiiide pedicels means Whiiiiite Baneberry. (Boy, I hope that's correct.)

In short, I don't know everything, and those of you who follow me should remember that I might not always be correct in my IDs. But it gives me so much joy to observe and learn something new almost every week - really, almost every day in the summer - and that is all due to iNaturalist. A couple of days ago, a friend and I were walking in a Black Tupelo swamp nearby and I noticed that some of the tupelo leaves had ruffled edges. (Here's the iNat observation: https://www.inaturalist.org/observations/82815564.) While I was sorting and uploading that batch of photos to iNat, I happened to notice that billmac had seen and posted something called the Tupelo Leaf Edge Gall Mite (here's his observation: https://www.inaturalist.org/observations/80658794). Lo, that's what I had seen! That's a species I didn't even know existed and I got to see it in the town next to mine. Who needs to go to the tropics when you can go to Petersham? (Well, I do WANT to go to the tropics....)

I've been starting to learn lichens and moths over the past year and I have really appreciated it when other iNaturalists correct my clumsy attempts at IDing a lichen or a moth. And that's why I titled this post what I did: it's only by making mistake after mistake that I learn, and I encourage you to get out there and do the same. Plus, it's FUN!

Posted on June 14, 2021 01:28 PM by lynnharper lynnharper

Comments

Great writing, Lynn, and well said! By the way, the baneberry recall is much easier with the scientific name, Actaea pachypoda. "Pachy" means thick, as in Pachyderms meaning thick skin for elephants and rhinos. "poda" means foot. So Actaea pachypoda means thick foot as in the thick pedicels. For me, that's easy, although I like what you did with the whiiite and wiiide!

Posted by wernerehl almost 3 years ago

For me too, it is all about learning new things. Lynn, I follow you because you often go to places where you can observe species that I enjoy seeing through your photographs, and because I often learn new things in the process of looking at your observations. I also appreciate the help you give me in reviewing my observations. We all make mistakes, and we all help each other catch and learn from those mistakes.

Posted by tsn almost 3 years ago

Lynn, I follow you because I want to know how to document ubiquitous things in a way that is useful to other people.

You were the one that explained to me that most people look at tree leaves to ID a tree, and I should include leaves. I'm used to looking at trees, and cutting them up, when they don't have leaves.

Posted by jackcadwell almost 3 years ago

I appreciate your enthusiasm and your IDs! Thank you for sharing :)

Posted by quietlymagical almost 3 years ago

Bravo, Lynn. iNaturalist should be a forum that fosters learning and everything that's involved in that (including mistakes, which we all make and we all ultimately benefit from once we right ourselves). "Fellowship" is the key to understanding Nature, and thus ourselves--that's why iNaturalist has been so successful, I suspect. Thanks for the encouragement you provided in your post.

Posted by ellsp almost 3 years ago

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