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rebeccathenaturalist · 7 months
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ETA: I wrote up a guide on clues that a foraging book was written by AI here!
[Original Tweet source here.]
[RANT AHEAD]
Okay, yeah. This is a very, very, very bad idea. I understand that there is a certain flavor of techbro who has ABSOLUTELY zero problem with this because "AI is the future, bro", and we're supposed to be reading their articles on how to use AI for side hustles and all that.
I get that ID apps have played into people's tendency to want quick and easy answers to everything (I'm not totally opposed to apps, but please read about how an app does not a Master Naturalist make.) But nature identification is serious stuff, ESPECIALLY when you are trying to identify whether something is safe to eat, handle, etc. You have to be absolutely, completely, 100000% sure of your ID, and then you ALSO have to absolutely verify that it is safely handled and consumed by humans.
As a foraging instructor, I cannot emphasize this enough. My classes, which are intended for a general audience, are very heavy on identification skills for this very reason. I have had (a small subsection of) students complain that I wasn't just spending 2-3 hours listing off bunches of edible plants and fungi, and honestly? They can complain all they want. I am doing MY due diligence to make very sure that the people who take my classes are prepared to go out and start identifying species and then figure out their edibility or lack thereof.
Because it isn't enough to be able to say "Oh, that's a dandelion, and I think this might be an oyster mushroom." It's also not enough to say "Well, such-and-such app says this is Queen Anne's lace and not poison hemlock." You HAVE to have incredibly keen observational skills. You HAVE to be patient enough to take thorough observations and run them through multiple forms of verification (field guides, websites, apps, other foragers/naturalists) to make sure you have a rock-solid identification. And then you ALSO have to be willing to read through multiple sources (NOT just Wikipedia) to determine whether that species is safely consumed by humans, and if so if it needs to be prepared in a particular way or if there are inedible/toxic parts that need to be removed.
AND--this phenomenon of AI-generated crapola emphasizes the fact that in addition to all of the above, you HAVE to have critical thinking skills when it comes to assessing your sources. Just because something is printed on a page doesn't mean it's true. You need to look at the quality of the information being presented. You need to look at the author's sources. You need to compare what this person is saying to other books and resources out there, and make sure there's a consensus.
You also need to look at the author themselves and make absolutely sure they are a real person. Find their website. Find their bio. Find their social media. Find any other manners in which they interact with the world, ESPECIALLY outside of the internet. Contact them. Ask questions. Don't be a jerk about it, because we're just people, but do at least make sure that a book you're interested in buying is by a real person. I guarantee you those of us who are serious about teaching this stuff and who are internet-savvy are going to make it very easy to find who we are (within reason), what we're doing, and why.
Because the OP in that Tweet is absolutely right--people are going to get seriously ill or dead if they try using AI-generated field guides. We have such a wealth of information, both on paper/pixels and in the brains of active, experienced foragers, that we can easily learn from the mistakes of people in the past who got poisoned, and avoid their fate. But it does mean that you MUST have the will and ability to be impeccably thorough in your research--and when in doubt, throw it out.
My inbox is always open. I'm easier caught via email than here, but I will answer. You can always ask me stuff about foraging, about nature identification, etc. And if there's a foraging instructor/author/etc. with a website, chances are they're also going to be more than willing to answer questions. I am happy to direct you to online groups on Facebook and elsewhere where you have a whole slew of people to compare notes with. I want people's foraging to be SAFE and FUN. And AI-generated books aren't the way to make that happen.
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lukevenechuk · 25 days
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oliviarosaline · 8 days
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Eastern Redbud Tree
Cercis canadensis
This small tree in the legume family showcases lovely pink blooms in spring and is native to much of eastern North America. They grow in a variety of habitats, but prefer well-drained slopes in woods without many other plants to compete with. Its flowers are pollinated by carpenter bees and other bees with long tongues, and the leaves provide food for several caterpillar and moth species. The flowers on this tree are also edible and contain beneficial anthocyanins, a group of antioxidants.
March 19th, 2024
St. Charles County, Missouri, USA
Olivia R. Myers
@oliviarosaline
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typhlonectes · 8 days
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How to eat acorns - hot leaching method by boiling the tannic acid out
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forestduck · 2 months
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Oct 16, 2023 - Mimmi Penguin.
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morethansalad · 11 months
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Authentic Greek Hortopita / Wild Greens Pie (Vegan)
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troythecatfish · 2 months
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wildfoodsandmedicines · 2 months
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kineats · 1 year
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Can I request for Goblinkin? The skrunklies are in need of inspiration.
Of course!
Here's some Mushroom Growing Kits
Seared Hen of the Woods
Sautéed Chicken of the Woods (Different from Hen of the Woods)
Buttery Puffball Mushrooms
Some Lion's Mane Mushroom Recipes
Wild Berry Soup
Dandelion Soup
Dandelion Cookies
Red Potato and Sautéed Greens Salad
Chicory Roasted with Thyme & Bacon
Green Onion and Sunflower Seed Pesto
Fish Stew
And one of my favorite foods: Purple Dead Nettle Recipes!
I hope this helps! I tried to find all kinds of edible forageables and recipes for them!
Always be very **very** careful if you forage anything and try to have a guide who is an expert in the area!!! Otherwise just buy them from specialty suppliers online ^///^
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mysteriouslyjellyfish · 4 months
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umm so I left for a while, like months, and now here I am again, maybe, I dunno, life is hard and I just wanna post pictures of dumb little things i do but in a weird anonymous way and not on instagram where people i actually know could see them, and what does that say about me? (and everyone else on this website)
in the spirit of things here is a photo from late summer, cherry tomatoes from my garden and a bowl full of wild grapes and a birchbark basket full of aronia berries (chokeberries).
but first can someone explain why my dashboard is full of people I don't follow, and how do I get rid of them.
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sidewalkchemistry · 9 months
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The Passion of Violet (by Gather Victoria): This wild woodland beauty offers one of the most romantic scents of history. Used to perfume the body and breath, this ancient aphrodisiac is also one of our favorite culinary flavors: infused in wines, liqueurs, and old-fashioned cordials & syrups, sweets and confections. Violet has been adding her charms to cuisine for centuries
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rebeccathenaturalist · 7 months
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hey there! fellow naturalist (albeit less experienced!) here! in regards to the AI-generated ID guides, do you have any advice for helping the general public learn to recognize them? are there any giveaways other than incorrect information a layperson might not pick up on that we can tell people to watch out for?
Hi, @fischotterkunst! It's a messy topic, to be sure, but here's what I've been seeing of these AI-generated texts, at least on Amazon:
--If you sort your search for "foraging book" or "mushroom hunting" or whatever search string you use by "Newest Arrivals", you'll notice that there is a glut of books that have come out in the past few weeks. Yes, there are always new books, but this is at a higher than normal rate, which suggests AI is behind at least some of them. There ARE occasionally real authors' books that just happened to come out recently, so don't dismiss every single book that is a fresh release. Use the other criteria below.
--They will invariably be self-published or from some publisher with zero online presence. Not a problem by itself; my own chapbooks are self-published on Amazon KDP. But they come out every three months, not every three days, because I am researching, writing, and editing them all myself, rather than churning out content with AI.
--The titles and subtitles are often very long and stuffed with keywords. They are obviously optimized for search engines rather than being descriptive of the book and they have a rather clunky fashion.
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--Look for obvious typos and other errors; for example, in the image above we have "WILD MUSHROOM COOKBOOK FOR BEGINNER: The complete guide on mushroom foraging and cooking with delicious recipes to enjoy your favorite". It should be "for beginners", and the subtitle just...ends prematurely. Favorite what? Favorite mushrooms? Favorite cartoon characters? Favorite color? Also, while there are lot of variations on name spellings, "Magaret" instead of "Margaret" stands out as a possible fake in combination with other clues. (All her other books also have this spelling, though.)
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--This is a BIG one: Who's the author? Check their bio. In the above image you'll see that "Jason Cones", the author of "The Wild Edible Plants Forager's Handbook: A Beginner's Guide to Safe Foraging, Including How to Identify Edible Plants, Learn About Their Medicinal Properties, and Prepare Them for Cooking", has a very generic picture and bio that has pretty obviously been generated by AI. If you search for him online, the only page for an author named Jason Cones is the Amazon author page--no website, no social media, no interviews, nada. Even a brand new author will at least have something other than their Amazon page, and they'll mention experience, credentials, other biographical info.
--Look at the author's other books. Magaret seems to focus on cookbooks of very specific sorts, but again they've all come out in a very short time. They also tend to often be on really super-specific niche subjects--this, again, is not a red flag in and of itself, but it's a common pattern with AI "authors". Jason Cones, on the other hand, has written over two dozen books not just about foraging but anger management techniques, acupressure, and weed gummies, and all of his titles have come out since last December.
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--If all the books have the same cover but slight differences in title, it's also a big red flag. There are reputable publishers of regional foraging guides like Timber Press, but their books are written by multiple authors and have come out over a long stretch of years (plus they're a well-known publisher with a solid track record, online presence, etc.) Also notice the typos in the title and subtitle; everyone says "Mushroom Foraging", not "Mushrooms Foraging", and "Keep Track Your Mushroom Sightings" is missing "of".
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--Compare the descriptions of multiples of these new books and you start seeing patterns. If you look at the images above, you'll notice that both Lorna K. Thompson's "Foraging Recipe Cookbook" and Kevin Page's "The Ultimate Foraging Guide for Seniors" have a very similar formulaic description. They start with a brief story about a person in a town or village who discovers some foraging secrets and then transforms his life, and then a list of things you're supposedly going to find in this seemingly miraculous book. This basically reads like "Hey, ChatGPT, tell me a story of a person who improved their life with foraging in two hundred words or less!" Also, the ends got cut off of my screen shot, but they both end with "GET YOUR COPY TODAY!"
I have not purchased any of these books to verify how awful the content is, but what little content I can see in the previews is uniformly formulaic and, again, reads like someone asked an AI to write content on a topic with some specific keywords thrown in. Needless to say, I do NOT recommend any of these books.
Also, I feel really bad for any actual authors who released their books in the past few months. They're likely getting drowned out by this AI junk, though hopefully they're getting enough attention for their work through their publishers, social media, etc. to get some sales. Support your real-life authors, and boycott AI!
Finally, PLEASE reblog this! It's really, really important that people know what to look for, and the more posts we have floating around with this info, the less likely it is someone's going to get poisoned by following what these books have to say.
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lukevenechuk · 27 days
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Mushrooms turn dead wood into food and medicine which is better than anything any tech start up has ever done
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unidentifiedmammal · 2 years
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Dandelion stem basket + felted rabbit! 🐇
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This is the first one I've fully made this season, and I decided to take photos with a felted bunny I made a while back; also with flowers and the like!
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I used strips of yucca leaf for the spokes and yucca cord for a little handle!
I've been collecting a bunch of stems, especially the longest ones (just for ease of weaving). It's just so much easier to wait for them to start growing long stems than to try to weave using the short stems of early season growth.
I've also been messing around with other dandelion crafts and uses. I can split and flatten the stems to use as a collage element. They look almost like very tiny fish or seal skins when you look at them for long enough!
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You could sort them by color, glue them down, cut them into shapes, and use them as a unique visual texture!
I've also been doing some cooking with dandelions, which probably deserves its own post. Ive boiled some of the greens (and been finding ways to avoid their bitter taste) and fried the flowers in breading! I could also roast the roots to make a drink/coffee extender, which i may or may not do. More to come!
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A sneak peek of cooking shenanigans; flowers with a surprisingly umami flavor!
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wildernesswanderess · 2 years
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Quite a haul! 😍🍄💕
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forestduck · 1 year
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