Pangolins

From: CHYRON (DSMITHHFX)29 Oct 2019 17:11
To: Peter (BOUGHTONP) 11 of 24
Have you tried crowd-sourcing the ids on insect|bird forums etc?
From: Peter (BOUGHTONP)30 Oct 2019 00:23
To: CHYRON (DSMITHHFX) 12 of 24
On Monday I photographed over a dozen different species; I need a more scalable solution than uploading images, asking people and waiting for a reply.

My ideal solution would be an open source Lightroom plugin that did image recognition for the basics, then asked questions for the bits it's not certain about, and worked fully offline.

What I expect I'm going to have to do instead is spend a significant amount of money on a stack of books that will then become a constant source of getting in my way.

From: CHYRON (DSMITHHFX)30 Oct 2019 00:52
To: Peter (BOUGHTONP) 13 of 24
Books are underrated, these days. Go with the books.
From: graphitone30 Oct 2019 10:32
To: Peter (BOUGHTONP) 14 of 24
You tried the library?
From: Peter (BOUGHTONP)18 Nov 2019 15:08
To: ALL15 of 24
Wolfram thinks this is a Lycopodium obscurum.
Google says Juniper tree.

If I could tell them it was found in Pembrokeshire woodland they'd know those answers were wrong.

But I can't, so I'm back to guessing unknown attributes and scrolling through an endless haze of mature pink flowers trying to figure out if any of them match what this bastard thing might become.

:@

From: Peter (BOUGHTONP)18 Nov 2019 15:18
To: ALL16 of 24
"This" being a photo that refuses to attach, which probably means there's something wrong with thumbnail generation.
Attachments:
From: ANT_THOMAS18 Nov 2019 17:15
To: Peter (BOUGHTONP) 17 of 24
Holcus lanatus
From: Peter (BOUGHTONP)18 Nov 2019 18:37
To: ANT_THOMAS 18 of 24
Commonly known as Yorkshire fog, (plus a bunch of other names). It certainly looks like that, and is supported by Wikipedia's assertion of "Holcus lanatus in its natural habitat is a food source for butterflies such as the speckled wood..." - because that's what the flying caterpillar sitting on it is.

Thanks. :)

From: ANT_THOMAS18 Nov 2019 18:47
To: Peter (BOUGHTONP) 19 of 24
I used the "Picture This" app for that.
It only gives a few free searches though.
From: Peter (BOUGHTONP)18 Nov 2019 19:12
To: ANT_THOMAS 20 of 24
And appears to work with a browser except the upload icon just prompts to install the mobile app. :@
From: Peter (BOUGHTONP)19 Mar 2020 15:27
To: ALL21 of 24
So, got a picture of a bird at a place that had an list of names on a board - which, excluding the ones I knew, means it's almost certainly one of seven.

Wolfram's Image thing said wheatear, which is a candidate and a regular image search for wheatear agrees (and matches closer than any of the other six, despite mostly all being chats), as does Wikipedia.

Hooray for simple victories! (dance)

Fun fact: wheatears are not named after cereal grain, but a corruption of the descriptive term: white arse.

From: Kenny J (WINGNUTKJ)20 Mar 2020 01:02
To: Peter (BOUGHTONP) 22 of 24
Exactly how far ahead of the Coronvirus curve are you, Peter? Does your favourite pizza topping cure it?
From: Peter (BOUGHTONP)20 Mar 2020 13:30
To: Kenny J (WINGNUTKJ) 23 of 24
The photo was taken three and a half years ago.
From: CHYRON (DSMITHHFX)20 Mar 2020 14:47
To: Kenny J (WINGNUTKJ) 24 of 24
Pangolin meat? Doubtful.