An interactive new way of getting to know the natural world is now available, thanks to a new phone app called ‘Seek’ created by iNaturalist. Users of the app, which is similar to Shazam but for photos of natural life, can take a picture of any plant or animal with their phone camera, and Seek will try and identify the species.
iNaturalist is an online social network of nature-lovers, including scientists and biologists. The organisation created the software to allow anyone to become active in and curious about discovering the enchanting things nature has on display.
Pull up the app and take a picture, upload it, and wait for the results to show so you can see what beautiful species you have found. The app currently holds information on more than 30 000 different plant and animal species which was collected from the iNaturalist database and partner sites.
The interactive application rewards you for going out into nature, too; you receive badges by discovering species, and feels not unlike hunting for Pokémon. In other words, it serves as both an adventure and educational app.
Seek does require access to your phone’s location to get a list of all the species in your area in order to give users the best experience. It operates better when it knows where you are, but it does not save or share your whereabouts with other sites.
It is one hundred percent safe for children to use, too. Seek does not require anyone under 13 to create an account or log in, and only users of that age and above are allowed to create an iNaturalist account. Nature-lovers or families who want to explore the outdoors have a fantastic reason to do so with this application.
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