The Marble Bowl: Citizen Science Takes the Field

From September 3 through November 26th, everyone can participate in the Marble Bowl by submitting observations of wild plants, animals, and fungi to one of two projects on the iNaturalist platform. This online site stores crowdsourced, public observations of biological organisms. Listed below are the necessary steps to participate.

1. Visit inaturalist.org and sign up for a free account. There is also a mobile application for smart devices.
2. Follow the “The Marble Bowl” project to keep up with the current score.
   • Be sure to join either the “Marble Bowl 2022 – Auburn University” or “Marble Bowl 2022 – University of Alabama” project to ensure your observations count and you’re contributing to the appropriate team. Only join one of the two projects or your observations will cancel each other out.
3. To document an observation, you may shoot photos of wild organisms with your cell phone or camera.
   • Because cell phone photographs are automatically timestamped and geotagged, all of the necessary information is already with the photograph when you upload it. If you prefer to take photos with a digital camera, be sure to note the location and include it with your observation if the camera doesn’t geotag it for you.
4. Observations may be uploaded to iNaturalist through a web browser or the app. As you submit observations, the platform’s artificial intelligence will suggest an identification based off what is in the photo along with similar species that have already been observed nearby. You are allowed to suggest a different identification if you’re confident about what you saw. Select your species, and then submit your citizen science observation.