Journal archives for August 2013

August 14, 2013

iNaturalist for President

I love iNaturalist. It scratches all the right places in my obsessions and hobbies. It fulfills such a valuable role in citizen science, and provides an easy solution to the challenge that Aldo Leopold lay down for us 70 years ago in Sand County Almanac to know the place that we live. Who will chronicle these species if not us? In California, Sudden Oak Death is ravaging the tan oaks in my community and many others - changing the complexion and complexity of the oak woodland communities and coastal fir-oak coves on the wet side of Inverness Ridge. iNaturalist gets me out there documenting the great ones before they die, before the inexorable winch of time tightens down and simplifies them right out of existence.

On the bright side, it helps me learn what's what in my neighborhood and beyond, in the wet ditches of often hiked but seldom studied trails and roads. I have yet to crack the sound file upload yet - although I have lots of sound files recorded on my iPhone. I need to learn how to make quick edits and file splits so I can tease out the hairy woodpeckers and the Swainson's thrushes and chickadees on the same file. My knowledge of, and therefore appreciation of, the amazing biodiversity of my community is growing by leaps and bounds.

So has my interest in nature photography - almost as a happy byproduct of using iNaturalist. I bought my first DSLR camera so I could better capture birds, especially out here near the Point Reyes National Seashore, where the unusual is possible at any time. I won't let another booby go by unphotographed - like i did in May when the county's third brown booby showed up. For the past two weeks I've spend more time learning my camera and learning how to use the controls than I have uploading to iNat. But time well spent - the point of the app is to document, and I'm learning how to be a better record keeper.

Posted on August 14, 2013 05:58 AM by wildmarin wildmarin | 0 comments | Leave a comment

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