what are you?

me and my brothers (August 1976)

Nature ID is my learning tool to help me find answers when I take pictures of little living things, here and there, plants, butterflies, what have you, and I ask, "What are you?" The funny thing is, I get asked this question all the time of me. Even when it's not Halloween. By complete strangers.  "What...  are...  you?" in a loud, slow, measured way, as if I can't hear (uh, yes, I have a hearing impairment, but that's beside the point).  I get asked as if I were somehow not human.  As if I were a chair, or a dog.  "What are you?"  I've been asked so often in my life that I count down, 3, 2, 1, for the follow-up questions that are sure to come in rapid-fire succession, "Chinese?  Japanese?  No?  What are you?"  It used to piss me off.  Okay.  It still pisses me off. I have yet to come up with a witty reply, because so often I'm stunned into silence by the sheer surprise of the question.  Any suggestions?

Andy has been lamenting that I haven't been posting to my blog very much recently.  He's been extremely supportive of this hobby I started over 5 years ago, which is now a huge part of my life.  After a couple crappy job interviews this past spring, I decided to use what I love about Nature ID and what I've learned and direct all my energies into something new, something yet undefined, something of my own creation.  And, it's scary.

I'm now asking myself that same funny, pissy question, "What are you?"  Haha.  I'm in one of those awkward developing and gangly growing stages, and more than ever, I'm afraid of looking like an idiot.  Am I merely one of those annoying people who asks far too many inappropriate questions?  Am I a naturalist?  Am I a lepidopterist?  Am I a botanist?  Am I a phenologist?  Am I a citizen scientist?  Am I an actual scientist?  What does that even mean?  Where will I be in another 5 years?

So, I don't know how to proceed with this blog.   I've learned a lot this year, and it's difficult to translate that as a continuing process in an online format that gets forever saved in time by RSS feeds and search engine spiders.  Hey, as I find errors on Nature ID, I've gone back and corrected them.  And, there are a lot of errors.  Eh-hem.

Time and time again, I've seen how misinformation gets spread around by people who act like they know everything.  I think we all fool ourselves at times, some more than others, even though I'd like to believe I'm self-aware and forthright when I don't know something.  It's been called to my attention that this gives off the impression that I don't know much of anything, especially among folks who apparently know even less and who actually advised me to shut up and blindly defer to the old guys.

This does not sit well with me.

There were a couple years or so while I was learning English, when I could understand what people were saying, but I could not speak it.  My mother told me that I was a chatterbox when I first arrived, but as soon as I figured out that no one around could understand me in my native language, she said I went quiet for a very long time.  Quite frankly, I was scared silent by the strange, slow monster speak coming from these fair-skinned giants with big, blue eyes.  Once I got the hang of English, she joked that she could never get me to shut up again.  Ha!

I've discovered I'm in a similar situation now, in that I understand a lot more than I have the vocabulary to express.  It's frustrating as hell.  However, just like when I was a kid playing with the big boys, I can stand up for myself, even if I can't speak the speak of all the -ists out there. Yet.  Watch out, guys!

ps - It's National Adoption Month, btw.

pss 01/15/15 - For those still hung up on the question "What are you?" that I purposely did not answer, please refer to this New York Times article on adoptees returning to their home country.  It's not an easy question to answer when you've lived it like I have.

pss 05/18/19 - The thoughts and words I typed out here were completely my own in 2014.  Imagine my surprise to find people's comments about Keanu Reeves and their own experiences regarding the ridiculously offensive question of "What are you?"

coast horned lizard ~ 05/23/14 ~ Pinnacles

coast horned lizard
Phrynosoma blainvillii

Apparently, this cool lizard is now supposed to be called Blainville's horned lizard?  Sigh.  I can't keep up with all the name changes, scientific or common.  Eh, that's not the point of this post, anyways, even though I have seen a few impressively large horned lizards during my many recent activities.

Paul has suggested I try iNaturalist as a way to document and share what I find during my weekly Pinnacles visits.  I haven't decided yet, because I have questions about macro photo quality and GPS capability in a smart phone where there's no cell service.  Click here to see Paul's photo of this same horned lizard using his iPhone 5 (don't know which letter c or s), and then click on my photo above to enlarge.  What do you think about the photo quality comparisons?  I think Paul's appears very tan colored and a little flat, even though my depth of field is shallow.  I'll mainly be taking photos of little butterflies about the size of the lizard's head anyways, but coloring is important.  And, I'm still unsure how to resolve the pseudo-GPS in phones issue.  I heard there are GPS units that bluetooth to the phone, but what a pain and more crap to carry.  Does anyone have any suggestions to obtain accurate GPS linked to a phone-generated photo?  Are there actual GPS phones, not the fake ones reliant on cell service?

Oh, have I mentioned I don't currently have a smart phone?  I've had my flip phone since 2006, which I think is the responsible thing to be aware of in this day and age of disposable everything, including electronics.  I had my last computer for 10 years before I upgraded to iMac.  I really don't need the latest and greatest toy, but it may be time to update.  Plus, we've been needing to switch carriers for some time since many of my calls get dropped at home on the Peninsula where ocean meets spotty cell coverage.  We never had a land line.  There was a bit of a city hall brouhaha over additional cell towers being installed.  On one side were the monarch butterfly lovers who didn't want the overwintering butterflies or themselves to be radiated (is that the term?), and on the other side was the city needing to offer basic public services, like cell phone coverage for emergencies.  The towers went in, cleverly disguised as chimneys.  Are we all being microwaved now?

ps 05/30/14 -  One of the take-aways I got from the Citizen Science Session of the Ocean Science Trust Conference last month was that citizen science could and should be able to provide data rigorous enough for scientific review (Thanks, Lisa Emanuelson!).  So, when a few days later CalAcademy announced their acquisition of iNat, I paid attention.

Ken-ichi Ueda, co-founder of iNaturalist, has been kind enough to reply to my numerous criticisms (hopefully, constructive!) and questions as I figure out the best recording method(s) for my project, which in an unexpected way could also help shape its initial purpose.  With Ken-ichi's permission, here's what he said, "Ok, let's talk tech. For iNat, my recommendation is to get the latest iPhone. Our iOS app is quite a bit better than our Android app, and the iPhone's GPS and camera are great. Here's are some particulars:

IMAGE QUALITY
As you pointed out in your post, the iPhone isn't quite as good as a conventional camera, but it's still pretty good. It doesn't give you much DoF control, but it can be quite sharp, particularly for stable subjects that are close.

GPS
Any device with a real GPS chip should get coordinates *anywhere* it has a clear view of the sky, since it works by communicating with satellites, not ground-based towers. Reception may vary depending on weather, topography, or the particular configuration of satellites in line-of-sight from your position. Devices like the iPhone can improve both the speed of coordinate acquisition and the accuracy of those coordinates by using cell tower and wifi signals, but they aren't required. Almost every cell phone has a real GPS chip on board, including every iPhone and most Android phones. Note that the majority of tablets do NOT have onboard GPS. This includes the iPad.

In my experience the iPhone's GPS functionality is very accurate. If you get a chance to look over someone's shoulder, you'll see that the iNat works by continually acquiring coordinates until it gets the precision below 5m."

To keep this from becoming free advertising for phones and plans, I'm skipping some of what Ken-ichi recommends.  Then, he goes on to say, "Regarding iNat recording devices, keep in mind you don't need a phone to use iNat! You can upload images directly. My usual practice is to use my phone for most observations, but to also carry around my SLR and a handheld GPS in my pack. The GPS is always recording a track, which I use to add geotags to my SLR photos later (I use http://www.earlyinnovations.com/photolinker/ for this, but there are many other such applications, including Lightroom). The SLR is much faster and sharper, so for things like butterflies, that's usually what I'm going to use. Getting identifiable lep shots with a phone takes more time and patience than you can probably spend if you're doing a research project. Most high-end point-and-shoots would probably be as good or even better (in terms of flexibility) than my SLR setup."

Then, I asked questions about iNat itself.

I haven't found where it explains the different color map markers (red, blue, green?).

"Colors relate to the "iconic taxon" of the thing observed: blue for most animals, orange for insects / spiders / molluscs, green for plants, purple for slime molds, brown for chromists, pink for fungi. It isn't really explained anywhere. There are a lot of things on the site we just assume people will figure out for themselves."

I also don't understand how the "Redo search in map area" works, because it comes up with new and different points depending on the zoom level on the map.

"It redoes the search using the bounding box of the current map. It loads different observations because some of the observations in your previous search will be outside the bounding box."

Then, how do you select the marker that sits just below another one when on max zoom?

"I guess you don't, but you can see them all in the list on the right. You can also zoom in much farther with the satellite tiles."

Is it possible to select by week number to see everything found at a particular location in that week of any year?
"You can't look up observation by week, but you can do it by month. If you go to http://www.inaturalist.org/observations and click the "Search" button you'll see a bunch of filters, one of which is a month filter. If you set that and leave year and day blank, you'll see all the observations added in that month, regardless of year."

... He did say he privatizes his locations, does not carry a GPS unit, guesses based on a google app, so maybe that was the result of being "obscured" as well.  It doesn't seem like that should qualify for "research grade".
"... his observations for that day is due to the fact that he obscures the coordinates, which means each observation is displayed at a randomly chosen location somewhere within 10km of the true coordinates. iNat's "research" quality grade doesn't consider how precise the coordinates are, just that you've added them. The name "research" was probably a poor choice since it seems to get people's ire up, but it just means observations of that grade are probably more accurate / complete than others. Then again, the definition of "research" is pretty flexible. For some studies, precision of 50k might be adequate."

Finally, in the spirit of encouragement to become better, I had the audacity to question Ken-ichi's algorithms.  It's a bit meta, and I've noticed not everyone appreciates the different perspective.  In fact, he seemed very receptive to it.  I agreed with him that the freedom to make errors is educational, which is why this hobby blog has been so liberating for me over the past 5 years.  By being okay to make mistakes, being honest in the not knowing, asking those questions, and accepting of others' help, I have learned so much.  Here's Ken-ichi's reply to my algorithms charge:
"I would argue that our crowdsourcing approach generates data that is close to the accuracy of professionally collected data, with the added benefit that it usually comes with media evidence for independent verification. It is generally not as comprehensive as professionally collected data (most casual naturalists aren't going to identify every carabid under a log in the way that a working coleopterist would), but if you look at the inaccuracies present in supposedly professional collections at museums or in GBIF, you will find most of the same geographic biases (no collections far from roads or trails), identification mistakes, and taxonomic confusion... except it's really hard to see this errors because either there's no associated media evidence or you have look at a specimen. An actually quantitative comparison between professional and crowdsourced data collections like this would be a pretty cool outcome of being at CAS. We shall see."

This is all very helpful information for me.  Thanks, Ken-ichi!

The future of natural history documentation is at our feet, a path extending into the digital age through the eyes and hands of millions of curious participants.  I know that sounds corny, but it's true.  This is exciting stuff!  It's too bad it currently selects for the well-to-do with expensive phone requirements, GPS devices, and fancy cameras.  The reality of the situation is nature is available to pretty much everyone... and it's free, if we just put down our electronic devices.

food markets across cultures

Rome, Italy

Chennai, India

Blog Action Day 2011 Food

links updated 02/18/16 - I remembered a bit late that it is Blog Action Day today. As I looked through my pictures for ideas, I have plenty of photos of friends and special gatherings that included food... but none of our local markets. I figured the above travel photos made a great contrast next to each other. Fruits and veggies and seafood are common themes. However, I did not have a comparable photo from Chennai for cured meats like in Rome. Go figure. I'll let the folks who read this make their own conclusions about each photo.

Travel shopping aside, we live within reasonable walking distance to 3 grocery stores, 2 farmers' markets, and a couple convenience or ethnic markets. And, yet more often than not, like today, we chose to drive to the supermarket up the hill. Why? Because it's the cheapest. We spent $82.99 for a week's worth of groceries, much of it boxed or somehow wrapped in plastic. I'm a little embarrassed on several levels about this.

While Andy and I have gradually cut out many commercially canned, jarred, or frozen food items from our diets (not on principle, more for taste), I'll admit that I rarely buy organic. Quite frankly, I don't trust the label "organic" and feel it's a successful marketing ploy to charge twice the price, e.g., organic milk anyone? Plus, given my research background, I know organic does not necessarily mean pesticide-free. Doesn't anyone else miss the butterflies? We almost always take our own canvas bags and reuse those plastic produce bags until they're too torn to use. I tried my hand at growing my own tomatoes this year, and I ended up unintentionally raising more aphids per pound than tomatoes. Maybe someday, we'll have the opportunity to grow our own food, not counting culinary window herbs. It seems unnatural that it's practically an American luxury to have homegrown, unadulterated food.

When all is said and done, I feel incredibly blessed that I can afford to buy food... the energy for life. As a continuing theme from my last Blog Action Day post, my sister and I were "found" abandoned in a food market.  My mother told me she was coming back.  She never did.  At least she had the sense to leave us where there was food and help.

H2O - the bad and the healing

Blog Action Day 2010 Water

My sister died from bad water. Acute gastroenteritis. We were supposed to be adopted together. I had 3 sets of legal parents and guardians across two continents. I lived with more families than I can recall. I would have loved to have my sister along for this journey. I miss who she could have become. I am now living by the ocean. I hear salt water is healing... the sea, the sweat, and the tears.

This is my story.
Katie

does anyone know about parkour?

Monterey Custom House Plaza, CA
May 22, 2010

This is what I like...
District B13 - David Belle chase scene
Kat - 2008 - Female Parkour

For the longest time we couldn't figure out this sign on the plaza walls. It's poorly written. Then, my hubby found a G4 Ninja Warrior try-out vid from these same walls. The guy was good, but I can't find him online anymore.

Like my mom always insisted, get outside!  Although, she preferred for us not to be bleeding, or covered head to toe in mud, or holding a bucket full of stinky crawdads to boil, or... well, you get my drift.

ps 06/23/10 - Continuing with this post, I get a good laugh at the odd looks I see from people while out and about during my early morning "walks" in addition to exclamations of "Holy ****, how'd you do that!?!" Here's another YouTube video that inspires me: click here.

pss 06/25/10 - For some reason, I've been getting more comments lately from complete strangers who see me. Today I met an exuberant mom with her two young children on the summer trolley. She said they spotted me earlier and thought I looked like I was having so much fun jumping around and that she wished she had as much energy so early in the morning... Um, hello? Don't have kids! Well, I didn't know quite how to respond in a nice way, so I thanked her and started a conversation on what she and her family planned to do while they were in town during her husband's business conference. Another couple sat on my favorite hopping rocks while I was passing through. I told them to not move as I jumped around them. I again laughed as their exclamations of "Huh? Whoa! Did she just do that?" faded away.

I dunno, maybe in my own mind I'm better than I really am, but it's kinda fun to hear these things. Mainly for me, it's all about finding my own inner balance. Many days I'm off kilter and take it slow. Other days, I feel entirely comfortable in my own body and the space around me and just go for it. It's a great feeling when that happens.

ps 01/07/15 - Love, love these: Iranian girls do parkour in Tehran and Assassin's Creed Unity meets parkour in real life.

my Carlton Duty story

There's a rather large jar of Italian Nutella still sitting in my office. I neglected to mail it to Carlton before I left town again. He claims the Italian version is much better than the US product.

Anyways... this reminds me of a true story I wrote as a facebook note and have been meaning to post to my blog. With Carlton's permission, here it is:

As a kid, I liked show and tell almost as much as I loved bugs. My dad would come home from work and frequently find me in the middle of our long, dirt drive, in my bathing suit and rubber galoshes, crouched over an ant hill, simply watching the activity... well, alright, I preferred to plop unsuspecting caterpillars over the hole to see how each critter would react... and maybe I shouldn't mention I also liked to see if butterflies could still fly, missing a wing or two? Ants, butterflies, mayflies, spiders, praying mantids... you name it, I'd catch them, play with them for a while, and then let them go.

So, in the 2nd grade, I took a praying mantid to school for show and tell in my shiny, new bug cage from Grandma. Show and tell wasn't until after morning recess, so I carried my little friend out to the playground with me. While hanging around on the monkey bars, I looked down and noticed the cage was open and my mantid was... gone!

I looked up to see you, Carlton Duty, a very tall 3rd grader with your arms up in the air, proclaiming “FREE THE ANIMALS!!!"

In tears, I ran to the playground teacher and told on you. I’m sure she scolded you as we frantically looked around for my mantid before the end of recess. I finally found it...

Under the monkey bars.

Flattened.

Dead.

Thanks, Carlton Duty. Your name is forever burned into my memory from 2nd grade.

But, wait! The story doesn’t end there…

I majored in entomology in the midwest and by happenstance headed the invert. zoo. dept. at a natural history museum for a couple years. I was studying the field effects of organic pesticides (bacteria and a virus) on non-target Lepidoptera with an eye towards more responsible stewardship of our natural areas. Also, I was participating in a couple butterfly conservation projects. As part of my job and with more knowledge than I had as a kid, I loved rearing various bug-type animals. My apartment was often FILLED with insects.

So, several years ago, Kia and I were catching up. I told her what I was doing and mentioned my 2nd grade story as evidence that I have always loved bugs. She then told me she had recently seen you, Carlton Duty. She said you were working for Clark Pest Control!

How ironic!!!

------------------------------------------------------------------------

As a ps and in Carlton's defense, here's the following fb thread:

Carlton: Katie has a good story to tell, and I will start it with the apology from me to her. "I'm so sorry. I feel horrible."

Julie: She has been telling that story for years! I'm so glad she got to tell you about it. hahaha. :)

Carlton: The worst part is I vividly remember it.

Katie: Haha, Carlton, you remember it, too, from 3rd grade?!?

Carlton: Kia was yanking your chain. I think in 1999 I was farming grapes in Delano. Waaaayyy worse than Orkin. Meh, not so bad. I was an accountant. The last thing I wanted to do was pay for another round of pesticides. It hurt my P&L.

Katie: Seriously!?! Dang, the working for Clark was the cherry on top of my story. I may be seeing Kia later today and will have to ask her. But with 4 kids running around, her memory is shot. Julie was correct in stating that I've been telling this story for years!

Katie: Carlton, Kia confirmed that when she talked with you back when, she pictured that TM van with the big bug on the side. Are you sure you never worked for Clark Pest Control?

Carlton: 100% positive. I've done a lot of stuff, but pest control isn't one of them!

Carlton: I figured it out. I used to work for these guys. Kia got confused with the other Clark.

Katie: LOL! I'm almost sad to hear you never worked pest control. Thanks for letting me share my story with you! Welcome to fb! You look like you're doing really well with wife, old stang, and cute doggies. Great!

Kia: I was thinking about this all night trying to rack my brain, even dreaming about it. I knew I wasn't witty enough to make it up, but get confused, yeah, that's more like it. lol

Julie: Carlton, you look like you're ready to do some pest control in your profile pic.

Katie: I thought the same thing, too, Julie! That must be his old flame the mustang.

sentimental about seasons

my dad's John Deere (September 1988)

I grew up in the Central Valley of California on a small, family farm (cows, sheep, goats, geese, chickens, cotton, wheat, corn, almonds, apricots, and boysenberries) where it felt like it was either 104 degrees of dry, extreme heat in the summer or soupy-thick fog in the winter. Everything had to be irrigated and anything that popped out of the ground that wasn't purposely planted was considered a weed. I didn't experience true four-seasons-a-year changes for the first 23 years of my life. I would read about seasons in school readers or in National Geographic Society's 1970's World magazine and would wonder if there really were spring and summer wildflowers, or leaves that honestly turned bright orange and red in autumn. In a weird twist of fate, I ended up working for an educational publisher that was purchased by NGSP.

Sigh... it's yet another cool grey, high-fog, coastal summer morning here, which is very typical of Pacific Grove...

And I find myself fondly remembering the warm, fertile fields, forests, bogs, and fens that I was lucky enough to experience in Ohio for 9 years. I adored the steady color procession of summer wildflowers and butterflies; the crisp air of the fall, marked with heady scents of apple cider and the sounds and sights of crunchy, colorful leaves; and the excitement of spotting the first bright yellow forsythias and daffodils of the spring... However, I detested the very cold, long, bitter winters where early, lake-effect snow would refreeze several times to become massive, dirty, ice obstacles on the roads. The best thing about winter in Ohio was that I could jest that I walked on water, thanks to a frozen Lake Erie. On the other extreme, there was the regular, high humidity, sticky heat of Cleveland during the summers. Often 90 degrees in the Midwest somehow felt so much hotter than the dry 104 degrees of the Central Valley of California... and neither suited me.

Thus, I have purposely chosen to live on the coast for its mild winters and cool summers. As much as I sought out a moderate climate, I still miss the cycle of "traditional" seasons. Admittedly, it took me a couple of years after returning to California to really get interested in the local nature, because, in my mind, it couldn't compare to the bounty of an Ohio summer. Too often I've hiked locally and noticed fantastic flowers and such and dismissed them by shrugging, "Oh, that's a pretty flower." or "That's an interesting bug." to be quickly forgotten. I was starting to feel too pedestrian and somewhat ignorant.

So, this year I invested in a couple local guide books and created Nature ID the first week of May 2009 (older posts are predated). My first post to Nature ID is here. Google states I've had this identity since 2008, but that was because I set up a couple other basic blogs as favors for friends who don't have computers.

Thanks to Nature ID, I'm appreciating the local diversity and uniqueness like never before... after all, there is an ocean of life within a stone's throw of where I live and if I really wanted a little warmth, all I have to do is hop in the car for a 20 minute drive inland. I love spring which lasts ostensibly from mid-January to mid-May. My favorite series of blog posts are my wildflower pics from a hike at Fort Ord on March 14, 2009.

I've looked repeatedly for another nature blog in the local area and have yet to find one that resonates with me in that peculiar, romantic love of nature like the ones from the Midwest and the UK. Here's a partial list of those that feed my soul and fantasies of living somewhere else:
Nature Remains
Tricia's Tales
The Ohio Nature Blog
Orchids and Nature

A HUGE thank you to all the nature bloggers out there for sharing your local bounty, whatever the season!

ps 07/29/09 - I started this entry on Friday and it's remained cool and foggy through to this morning. An unfortunate use of pointy "carrots" deleted most of my original post and since then I've edited this post repeatedly, because I was still figuring out what I wanted to say. I usually try to refrain from posting too many random musings on Nature ID, since that's not my goal for this blog... but these past several mornings, I felt the need to work out my thoughts in writing.

pss 04/21/10 - Lately, I've been absolutely wowed by pictures on other blogs... which got me thinking about my own pictures and what kind of camera I want next. I took the photo above for a photography elective my senior year of high school. I don't remember much from the class except struggling with an awkward black cloth box to unload the film from the cassette. I even developed the film, too. I am so used to digital now that I almost forgot what it used to be like to take a picture. Anyone remember those square, disposable flash bulbs?