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fdschneider / bexis_traits

developing a trait data framework for use in the Biodiversity Exploratories
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Field measure not on species level #15

Closed caterinap closed 7 years ago

caterinap commented 7 years ago

It is possible that a measured individual cannot be identified at the species level (e.g. a juvenile). In this case:

nadjasimons commented 7 years ago

Regarding your question on species level: yes, trait data might be available on the genus level but this is mostly the case for literature traits. We don't have measurements on juveniles, but it might be possible that somebody measures those in the future. I think we agreed that we will add the higher-level taxonomic names in the Bexis species list. Data owners might put in scientificName_original e.g. Carabus spec. Some of those cases could be identical to the species list, but for some others we might need to ask authors to correct the entry for matching.

nadjasimons commented 7 years ago

@caterinap What case are you thinking of in which one would apply a measurement taken on a different individual to another? The field measurementResolution was meant to capture literature traits for which information is only available at the genus level, e.g. "all species of this genus are saprophag." This information can then be given for all species in this genus, but the information in measurementResolution would indicate an uncertainty.

fdschneider commented 7 years ago

I also think, that in this case higher taxnoomic levels would be entered for this measurement. If someone enters a trait measurement for an completely undefined specimen (which is rather useless) the scientificName_original would take any user-specified label, e.g. unknown, unspecified, NA, and -- since it cannot be mapped to a standard name in GBIF -- the scientificName field would receive an NA.

caterinap commented 7 years ago

Ok, I was mainly thinking about the:

not applying for measured data

in the measurementResolution field in the template_glossary file. Now it's all clear. For plants we have several entries at the genus level only but if genus is possible in scientificName_originalthen it's all fine!