Plant identification apps!
Sam m -
Hey everyone, this is a follow-up to my previous post, so I think it would be better if you read that first!
Last time, I mentioned the issue of plant identification which I’ve talked about previously before in terms of dichotomous keys, but I want to touch on another really cool topic. Namely, plant identification apps and their usage. My advisor first made me aware of these when suggesting ways to identify the plants in my squares. I was kind of aware of their existence, but I hadn’t really played around with them that much. Nevertheless, I downloaded a few of these apps and tried them out. The first thing I noticed is that it could often get things spot on. I tried them out using a ponderosa tree as a reference which they got perfectly. From there, I tried it out on some more dubious/unknown plants:
For example, I had no clue what this was, but it instantly identified it as a great mullein. I was suspicious at first, but it seemed to track! This app could not only ID plants, but animals and fungi too! Here’s another example which the app detected as a common pill woodlouse:
I’ve kind of gotten addicted to this app; I’ve been using it on track days during downtime or just when out and it’s fun to grow your virtual plant catalogue! Anyway, they certainly aren’t flawless. Sometimes, it would identify a patch of dirt as a spider or lizard that wasn’t there. Although usually, after thinking for a few seconds, it would figure it out. For the most part, it seems to face the same type of issues a human would, in narrowing down a specimen to a species if it isn’t particularly distinct. It definitely performs best on plants/animals with more distinct features like Banana Yuccas, Ponderosa tress, etc. and struggles with many bushes, for instance (although many plants still aren’t in full bloom, so that might complicate matters).
That’s it for this post, thanks for reading!
Comments:
All viewpoints are welcome but profane, threatening, disrespectful, or harassing comments will not be tolerated and are subject to moderation up to, and including, full deletion.