iNaturalist translated to Ukrainian

June 20, 2021
Knowing the names of the butterflies, snakes, salamanders, beetles, fungi, or plants you see  is one of the nice things when being out in the field in nature. Identifying the species used to be tedious work for which you needed many books with detailed descriptions of the characteristics of species. Nowadays, while everyone has a cell phone with a camera, it is much easier. Several mobile apps have been developed that help with the identification of species. As part of the project ‘Mobilisation of biodiversity data from Ukraine to GBIF‘ of The Habitat Foundation, Ukrainian scientists translated the mobile app of iNaturalist, as well as the website of iNaturalist into Ukrainian. They also translated the scientific names of all species into the Ukrainian vernacular (common) species names. This makes the app and the website easier to use for all Ukrainians.

The Ukrainian Nature Conservation Group (UNCG) organises training about the use of the mobile app of iNaturalist. When seeing a plant or animal in the field, you take a picture of the species, and the app will suggest a species name. When you upload the photo with all relevant data, like the location, date and habitat, volunteer scientists will check the identification and inform you about the correctness. All sightings that are uploaded to iNaturalist will go to the  Global Biodiversity Information Facility (GBIF) that collates biodiversity information from all around the world. The databases of GBIF are used for scientific studies on (changes in) biodiversity. This way, you learn more about the species you see and at the same time contribute to the studies on biodiversity and the changes therein.

For an overview of Ukrainian datasets in GBIF, click here.

Project:

Mobilisation of biodiversity data from Ukraine