Common Name and Scientific Name

[Ry Beaver]

Hi,

I am trying to understand why this observation doesnt pick up the scientific name when looking in the list of observations http://www.inaturalist.org/observations/159878 when this one of the same species does http://www.inaturalist.org/observations/44773.

Also I would like to know how I can get the common name added to this as a Paper Wasp http://www.inaturalist.org/observations/159872.

I do understand for new species they get spotted and then added later on by the curators such as the Western Kangaroo Tick (

Amblyommo triguttatum) http://www.inaturalist.org/observations/159882.

Thanks Ry

[Charlie Hohn]

If you go to the species page you can add common names.  Though I wonder if 'Paper Wasp' is a bit overly general name, because other species of wasp also go by that name.  That comes up a lot because of the large geographic scope of iNaturalist.

[Ken-ichi]

Hi Ry,

There was a bug in the way it was choosing a name based on your search
terms that was just fixed. If it's still not doing what you expect,
let me know exactly what part of the page isn't showing the name you
want.

-ken-ichi

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[Ry Beaver]

Thanks ken-ichi - I have updated the name and now it shows. 

 

I was looking at this list http://www.inaturalist.org/observations/ryber where it lists common name at the top and scientific name in italics underneath.

 

I am still getting my head around some of the inaturalist environment but am really enjoying getting out there and then reporting my observations.

 

Cheers Ry

[Charlie Hohn]

On a perhaps less pressing note, there are so many species of the diverse Sphagnum genus with the name 'Sphagnum', it's almost impossible to put in an ID at the genus level (which is the only level I can identify most of them to).  Is there something I can type into the ID field to make it go to genus?

[Ken-ichi]

That's a bit silly. In situations like this where a generic scientific
name is being used as the common name for many members of the genus, I
usually just delete the common names. Almost no one uses the name
"sphagnum" to mean any single species in the genus Sphagnum. I'll
delete these names now, and Charlie, I'm making you a site curator so
you can do this in the future.

-ken-ichi

> https://groups.google.com/d/msg/inaturalist/-/XddAbC7ncusJ.

[Charlie Hohn]

Yay!  Thanks!  I agree it is silly and contrary to the purpose of the site... there is a book at work by a renowned sphagnum expert, I will check what names he used.  Though, most sphagnum experts probably just use the Latin names.

[sea-kangaroo]

In a similar vein, I was wondering if it might be possible to weight taxon search results a bit, either towards higher-level taxa or towards exact matches?  For example, searching "spiders" results entirely in vertebrates:

http://farm9.staticflickr.com/8234/8514693692_15924d22ba_z.jpg

And "mosses" gives you a bunch of moss animals:

http://farm9.staticflickr.com/8109/8513582889_dac9ded4f9_z.jpg

-C

[jschoen]

More common/scientific name problems:

I’m trying to create a couple of guides to aquatic insects.  The target audience is largely flyfishing anglers, who are or will be contributing observations to the River’s Calendar project. http://www.inaturalist.org/projects/the-river-s-calendar

I’ve run into some issues with common vs. Latin names.  For instance, while working on a guide to (selected) aquatic insects of Oregon (http://www.inaturalist.org/guides/671), I’ve found that at least 3 species: Rhithrogena morrisoni, Hexagenia limbata, and Siplhonurus occidentals - all display with a primary name of Efimera – the Latin name only shows in smaller type, or parentheses. I gather Efimera is the Spanish word for Ephemera? Or perhaps Ephemeroptera? This will not do. For one thing, the users of the guides I’m creating will be overwhelmingly English-speakers, and for another this assigns (at least) these 3 entirely different species a single name.  It will confuse the people I’m trying to recruit into this project, and will not help them increase their knowledge of entomology. 

The problem apparently is not limited to guides. I note that one River’s Calendar observation – of Ephemera guttalata  (http://www.inaturalist.org/observations/601699) states that E guttalata is a member of  Mosca de mayo (Genus Ephemera). I doubt that this is taxonomically correct (Spanish translation is Fly of May? Or Mayfly?), and it’s certainly a head-scratcher to the New England anglers I’m working with on this one.  

Related issues: If I put Efimera into the Observation Search field, nothing comes up. So we have this odd situation where a Latin name for any of the 3 abovementioned species returns Efimera, yet I can’t use that term to find any observations.

What can be done to fix this problem? It seems to me there are several possible routes:
- allow Guides and/or Projects to define their own common names; overriding any that are used generally throughout iNaturalist.

-       Allow searches, and displays to feature either common or Latin name, by choice of the user.

-       In the particular cases of  Efimera and Mosca de Mayo, have the insect curator go in and clean up the names –either by substituting with a more accurate common name (and preferably using the default English, as I understand it’s supposed to work) or eliminating the common name and sticking with the Latin.

I myself tried to create a common name (Hendrickson – widely known to anglers) for the mayfly Ephemeralla subvaria. I notice that when I look at the iNaturalist Ephemerella page, it shows that name, but crossed out. What does this mean?  (note I tried to do the same for Rhithrogena Morrisoni, by creating a common name “March Brown” for it, but this also shows with strikethrough font).  However, that said, h I’m not sure I really WANT Hendrickson or March Brown to be in use, if these are going to displayed instead of the Latin names. Especially if these common names aren’t searchable. Again, the user should have the choice – or stick to Latin only.

Thanks for any help you can offer.

-Jerry

[Charlie Hohn]

The way iNat works now, if there is an English scientific name it displays first. If not it will display a Spanish name if there is one, or names from other languages... sometimes even the six letter plant codes. If none of those, it displays the scientific name.

If there is an English common name for these species, and it is one that is widely used or documented somewhere (it is probably OK if it's just Wikipedia or a similar site, but don't just make one up) you can add it to the species page! That's probably the best approach.  if several species have the same common name (in English or Spanish or any other language) they probably need to be looked at.

I believe the site admins have talked about someday adding functionality so it defaults to the language of your choice but not sure if that is true yet, or if it still displays other languages if there are no other options. It would be nice to have an option to display scientific name instead for those inclined, but that probably isn't the best for a fly fishing guide.

Good luck!

On Sunday, December 9, 2012 9:27:48 AM UTC-5, Ry Beaver wrote:

[Ken-ichi]

For the record, a lot of these Spanish common names for inverts were
added by our partners at NaturaLista before we started listing higher
level groupings along with species names (e.g. Rhithrogena morrisoni,
a member of Stream mayflies). They basically never want a scientific
name to appear without some kind of common name b/c scientific names
are confusing and intimidated for people who are just getting started,
but their initial approach to address the problem resulted in a lot of
unspecific names like Efímera. I've bee deleting these names as I find
them and re-applying the to the appropriate higher level taxa (about
to do so for Efímera), but I still haven't done a systematic
eradication.

Within a guide, though, you can choose whatever common name you want
as the "display name."

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[jschoen]

Charlie and Ken,

Thanks for your remarks. These are helpful.

- Jerry

On Sunday, December 9, 2012 9:27:48 AM UTC-5, Ry Beaver wrote:

[snuroo]

Just wondering if it would be possible to make the Scientific Name the priority name? It sounds like this is possible in guides, but would it also be possible in a specific project? The English common names don't mean much in Madagascar, where our project is focused. Thanks!

Steve