How to Easily Record Wildlife on Our Tours

iNaturalist for Beginners: ID photo of the rare Brisbane Ranges Grevillea Roger Smith

Estimated reading time: 10 minutes

What are the benefits of iNaturalist for beginners who want to record wildlife? We describe how you can easily join a global citizen science effort whilst adding meaning to your wildlife experience. Using this powerful, free app, you can turn the wildlife photos you capture on our tours into valuable scientific data. Discover how simple it is to record, identify, and share your sightings ensuring every trip you take with us contributes to biodiversity research

Have you ever wondered if you can save the planet…..while you’re on a tour? With the world’s most powerful citizen science tool, iNaturalist, you may not save the planet immediately but you’ll certainly play a big part in making things better.

Simply by helping us keep a record of wildlife on your tour you will be helping nature…and the planet.

How? Because every entry you make in iNaturalist adds to a vast global resource that helps science figure out the health of our environment. Does this sound difficult?

At first our guests are uncertain about using their phone to help nature but it’s easy. If you can post a photo/message on Facebook you have all the basics you need to use iNaturalist.

Here’s how to get started recording wildlife on our tours or anywhere.

Pop the free iNaturalist app into your phone

iNaturalist is available for Android and iPhone so look it up and download it. You may come across a thing called Seek by iNaturalist which is a simplified version of the main app but it has a long way to go and is not as good as its parent app.

Like most phone apps you’ll need to create a username and password so the app can separate your sightings from the 4.3 million other users (just like Facebook). There will be a few other set up things to do too, just work your way through them.

Now you’re set to go. You can play around in the app looking stuff up (which is fun) but, if you like, you can record your first sighting.

How to create your first sighting on iNaturalist

OK, find something you want to identify. Flowers are easy so find one and let’s get started. These instructions are for Android but are similar for iPhone….if you’ve figured out Facebook you won’t have any problems with iNaturalist. Don’t rush, just enjoy the experience!

Open the app
- On Android tap the sign in the bottom right corner
- iPhone has a camera symbol with Observe over it. Tap that
Now you’ll be offered a few options. Because you’ve chosen a flower, tap Take Photo
Your camera opens – get close to the flower and take a photo of it. Easy!
Tap the yellow circle that appears
A new screen pops up that may look daunting. Don’t worry, everything is going to plan. At the top you’ll see a mini version of the photo you just took. Under it will be a question mark with the words What did you see? Under that there will be other information that your phone has provided automatically ie.date, time, location and more. Forget all the other stuff, just just tap What did you see? and wait. This is where the magic begins
Just like making a phone call, iNaturalist is searching its global database for information — not phone numbers — about flowers that grow in your location.
In a few seconds it will come up with a selection of suggested plants in your area. It’s incredible how fast this happens
You have a few options now but the best thing to do is find a picture that looks similar to your photo (you may need to be a wee bit creative here) and, when you’ve found one, tap the two arrows going left-right.
This take you to the comparison screen with your photo at the top and pictures of the plant you’ve chosen at the bottom. You can scroll left and right on the bottom screen and look at the pictures and if you think everything looks correct click the arrow at the top left of the screen which takes you back to the previous screen. (If you’re not happy with you selection you can try another one by repeating the procedure until you get what you’re looking for)
You’ll see a tick box next to the left-right arrows: tap it. This takes you back to the ID screen where you’ll see another green tick circle at the bottom.

Take a deep breath, you’re about to become a global citizen scientist! Tap the tick circle and you’re done!

Yay! You’ve helped save the planet.

You’ll be taken back to your home screen — titled My Observations — where you’ll see your photo which will hopefully be the first of many on that screen in coming months and years!

And don’t worry if you make a mistake, you can delete the observation and start all over again!

Need help? Here’s a link to iNaturalist’s support page with some great little video tutorials.

Next steps for beginners on iNaturalist

After you’ve made your first sighting you could just leave it at that and go on to another sighting (do it!) BUT remember, there’s a whole new iNaturalist world out there to discover!

Remember those 4.3 million people you shared your sighting with? They will help confirm your identification. Next time you look at your home screen you might see a little red tag with RG over your photo. RG means Research Grade

Congratulations, your sighting has been confirmed by another person. You can go back into the sighting — by tapping the photo — and find out why it’s been assigned the RG status! I’ll let you work that out in your own time. You can even say thanks to the person who helped you. There’s so much more to learn — you’re just scratching the surface — but here’s a little example to give you an idea of how help iNaturalist

How iNaturalist helped me identify an endangered plant

Yesterday, using iNaturalist, I made an observation of a flower that had just begun blooming near where I live. For my observation I snapped 4 photos. HINT: You’ll discover that you can load multiple photos into your sighting – the more info you give the app, the better the result. Here are my photos:

Close up

iNaturalist for Beginners obsertion photo example 2 — *Flower & Leaves*

iNaturalist for Beginners obsertion photo example 3 — *Entire plant*

iNaturalist for Beginners obsertion photo example 4 — *A side view*

Then I asked iNaturalist what the flower was ie. I tapped the “What did you see?” option. Based on my location the app came up with a few suggestions that I scrolled through until I found something that looked similar to my photos. I chose Brisbane Ranges Grevillea, tapped the button and my observation appeared, complete with the full species name Grevillea steiglitziana.

I then tapped the arrow (circled in the screenshot below) which took me to lots of information about this plant including a map of observations made by other iNaturalist users. When I opened the map I discovered that my sighting was of a plant that is only found near where I live and nowhere else ON EARTH! I had to lie down to recover 😉

This is what the sighting looked like on the app:

iNaturalist for Beginners observation view — *The observation*

iNaturalist for Beginners detailed information and map view — *Details & distribution map*

Notice that this plant is considered to be “Near threatened” and on the IUCN’s Red List which means the United Nations International Union for the Conservation of Nature is concerned about its future

Today I checked the app again and another user has agreed with my identification so it’s now Research Grade. I’m pretty damn happy about that and so will you be when you get on board iNaturalist and help us record wildlife on our tours.

Plus you’ll be helping save the planet. iNaturalist is a global powerhouse helping us protect nature. Find out why from its founder, Scott Loarie.

Why use iNaturalist? and other useful info

Why use iNaturalist?

Become a Citizen Scientist—Without Even Trying

Every “Research Grade” observation you submit automatically flows into major global biodiversity databases like the Global Biodiversity Information Facility (GBIF). This data is used by scientists, conservationists, and policymakers.

Connect with Experts and Naturalists Worldwide

When you upload an observation, the global community of biologists and naturalists steps in to help confirm or refine your identification. This is the “science” part that makes it so valuable.

Get a Species ID in Seconds

You can snap a photo during our tour and instantly get identification suggestions

Create Your Personal Digital “Life List”

iNaturalist functions as a fun, easy-to-manage digital journal of every living thing you’ve ever seen. It records the species, the exact location (via your phone’s GPS), and the date automatically.

Deepen Your Observation Skills (It’s Addictive!)

Once you start using iNaturalist, you’ll find yourself paying closer attention to the small details—the pattern on a leaf, the angle of a wing, or the shape of a mushroom. This significantly increases your engagement with the environment.

What you’ll need – not much really

the iNaturalist app on your phone or tablet
a modern phone (or tablet) with a reasonable camera
a normal data connection to the telephone network (this is not critical as observation can be loaded later when you do have a good network connection)

How to get help & other ways to use iNaturalist

iNaturalist Help Page: the app has some easy to understand tutorial videos
Desktop: iNaturalist is also available on your desktop. Search for iNaturalist in your browser. Use the same login details that you used on your phone and find all you sightings on your computer. You can also upload photos that you may have taken on a non-camera phone but you will probably need to enter the location and time information manually.
Shared Projects: you can create specialised projects with the app (on mobile or desktop) and use the project to track information in special locations or by data type and many other ways. Try joining an existing project and find out how it works
Keep discovering: the deeper you dive into iNaturalist the more you will find

Help unleash the power of Conservation Travel

Step into the future of travel. Join one of our Conservation Travel tours. An increasing number of these tours include an important Citizen Science project.

➡️Echidna Walkabout is a Founding Member of Australian Wildlife Journeys.
➡️We create, guide and operate tours for Australian Geographic Travel
➡️$10 from every person on tour goes to Koala Clancy Foundation

➡️Donate to Koala Clancy here

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