Problems Naturalists Have

Hello, Mr. Skunk.  I see you there. 

1.  You have no more storage space on your iPhone because you have too many nature identification apps. 

2.  You have two hundred pictures of fungi on your mobile device, and two of your daughter going to her band banquet.

3.  Out of necessity, you've tried every poison ivy remedy known to humankind.

4.  When you see a snake or a skunk, your first instinct is not "Run away!" but "Let me see if I can get close enough to get a picture for iNaturalist!".

5.  You spent more money on your birding binoculars than you did on your first car.

6.   You once came in last in a 5K because you stopped to see if a bird was a scissor-tail flycatcher.

7.  People tag you on Facebook to identify spiders that they find in their yard, even though you don't really know that much about spiders.  That's okay though, because you know someone who does.

8.  Your kids are used to you pulling over to the side of the road to take pictures of road kill.

9.  You spend way too much money at REI.

10.  You spent six months researching what kind of hiking boots to buy.

11.  You can't use your dining room table because it's covered with fungi spore prints in progress.

12.  When deciding where to go on vacation, a prime consideration is "what great birding spots are nearby?".

13.  You get into intense debates with other people about identification.

14.  You have run out of room on your book shelves for your hard-copy field guides.

15.  When you say things like "I'm going out to the nature preserve; I'll be back in 2 hours", no one actually believes this.

16.  When you're considering selling your house and the realtor comes over to look at it, the first words out of her mouth are "the skull collection will have to go".

17.  Other people post pictures of their kids, or their dinner, or their feet on Facebook.  You post pictures of lepidoptera.

18.  When you hear rain at night, you think "fungi in the morning!".

19. Your kids know all about how critters make more critters.

20.  You have to buy bug spray in bulk.