Observations of the Month: Chaparral Pea and San Diego Sweet Pea (Fabaceae)

Chaparral Pea by @salticidlover https://www.inaturalist.org/observations/106643370
San Diego Sweet Pea by @biocowboy https://www.inaturalist.org/observations/116227628

Imagine you are driving along with a friend who is an enthusiastic but new user of iNaturalist. Your friend looks out the car window and says, “Wow, look at those bright pink flowers! I wonder if that could be Chaparral Pea?” You calmly reply, “You mean Pickeringia montana? Not likely where we are—in the coastal lowlands of San Diego County. It’s more likely to be San Diego Sweet Pea (Lathyrus vestitus var. alefeldii).”

San Diego Sweet Pea (L) by Jorge Ayon, Chaparral Pea (R) by EJO (salticidlover)

A few minutes later, your friend shouts, “There’s another one. You gotta pull over. I’ll just take a quick photo from the car through the windshield and see what ID I get on iNat.” Horrified, you suggest to your friend that if they are going to submit a plant observation to iNat, they should take several photos, one to show the plant as a whole, and close-ups of the flower, both sides of a leaf, and any fruits. You know that accurate identification of plants often requires details that are not visible in distant photos. If care is taken with each observation, it is much more likely that the observation will be useful for science, such as the San Diego County Plant Atlas Project spearheaded by Dr. Jon Rebman at the San Diego Natural History Museum. Not only that, but if it is Pickeringia montana, close-ups showing the hairs are helpful in deciding which variety it is.

Undaunted, your friend shoots a quick photo as you bring the car to a stop, and they chortle as they show you the screen of their phone where the computer vision suggestions for identification include Pickeringia montana. You sigh, watch as they take a few more photos of the plant and then say, “You know, the computer vision on iNat is pretty amazing, but it’s not always correct; remember those are only suggestions. C’mon, let’s take a drive up Otay Mountain. I’ll show you Pickeringia montana and you will see that other than having bright pink flowers, it is very different from this plant. We could also find Pickeringia montana on some of the other peaks in the county, and sometimes in areas where we can also find Lathyrus vestitus var. alefeldii so you need to know how to tell them apart. That way if the computer vision on iNat suggests Pickeringia montana you will accept the suggestion only if the plant in your observation has the right characteristics. Pickeringia montana is a shrub with 2 or 3 leaflets on the stems; if your plant is a vine, with lots of leaflets, it’s not P. montana. ”

Publicado el julio 4, 2022 05:55 TARDE por milliebasden