iNat: The Good, The Bad, and The Ugly

Certainly, some photos are better than others. I try to photograph a subject in such a way that honors the specimen. I much admire my iNat colleagues for some truly excellent work. Sometimes, I just have to take a photo to document something. The lighting may be poor. The background may be plain. The animal may be dead. The subjects may be in flagrante delicto. Indeed, there is at least one iNat site dedicated to cataloging breeding behavior. There is even a Dead Mammals project. Nonetheless and despite my best efforts, I've had some outright failures by my own admission.

My dead rat is resoundingly ignored. Yet the dead racoon, deer, and pelican are immediately identified. The pelican is even adding to a birding site.

Rat - https://www.inaturalist.org/observations/60387910

Raccoon - https://www.inaturalist.org/observations/56669404

Deer - https://www.inaturalist.org/observations/52553644

Pelican - https://www.inaturalist.org/observations/61457522

Yet my brother-in-law's very clear photo of two flesh flies in the act receives profound inattention. Whereas, the much cuter Western Leaf-cutter bee photo, from a refreshing front perspective is adorable. Thank you catchang for your beautiful work. The bee's face was so cute and it antennae so jaunty that I must of looked at the picture five times before I noticed the bee beneath it.

Common Flesh Flies - https://www.inaturalist.org/observations/59191860

Cute bee photo - https://www.inaturalist.org/observations/61973069

Yes, the good, the bad, and the ugly are all here with us in life and online. All we can do is try to capture a better photo when possible, admire the excellent work of our colleagues, and pardon ourselves for posting the occasional bad photo when our impulse to document is greater than our compunction.

Posted on October 24, 2020 03:40 PM by arlenedevitt