Yes, iRecord is very functional, observations assessed by experts and added to the database. But it isn’t a learning space in the same way that iSpot is (your recent observation of the Lesser Butterfly Orchid being a case in point). The favourite facility is brilliant, setting an unknown or interesting species in a seperate file which is easily accessable to refer back to. And yes, some of the comments are hilarious - Steve Smailes’ adventures immediately comes to mind!!
Yes absolutely. I’m not surprised they have difficulty finding enough experts who are prepared to devote the huge amount of time to checking what must be mountains of records, and we are lucky both Ian Wallace and Craig Macadam are still willing to check mayfly and caddis larvae. I didn’t know some experts don’t like iRecord, I wonder why? As to the BTO, they’re lovely because they record breeding as well as species and numbers plus the local representative gives feed-back at the end of the year.
All I know is that one of the Surrey recorders told me that he hated the system, that it was far too complicated to use and that he knew other recorders who felt the same. And another recorder (different taxa) said that he would review my records personally rather than go to iRecord.
On the other hand, it works superbly for hoverflies where records are nearly always assessed the same day. And ladybirds are pretty quick, too. It seems to be random. I put a Sussex moth sighting in and got a quick response. Barklice and slugs, woodlice and slugs all seem to get looked at reasonably quickly.
I am ignorant of the ‘hierarchy’ of official recording in the UK (or anywhere else), and I don’t really know where iRecord, NBN, GBIF, and various others fit into it.
My personal experience of iRecord is generally positive (apart from the automated ‘wrong flight season’ response to any caterpillar submission). But it does seem to vary according to taxonomic group: some of my submissions never got a response - though that may be due to the vagaries of IT, rather than people involved.
Right, that explains why irecord have difficulty in recruiting enough experts which does mean there are huge gaps. I agree slugs and hoverflies particularly are brilliant (the UK Hoverflies fellow seems to cover irecord as well) but lots of insects, invertebrates (apart from Mayflies and Caddis) and of course lichen and fungi are totally ignored on irecord which is odd, whereas I have had the most enormous amount of help and supprt with identifying fungus (and other species) on ispot.
Moans aside, there are lots to like on irecord - I find the “view species details” and its maps for example both helpful and interesting and really aren’t we lucky to have so many completely free and easy to access experts available?
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Yes, you can download records you have entered yourself on iRecord provided you were logged in at the time. But I found I wasn’t allowed to download other people’s records made at Farm Moelyci, not unless I created a bespoke electronic recording card within iRecord, then I would be able to download records that other people entered using that recording card. Whereas what I wanted was to pick up miscellaneous records from visitors who were just passing through.
It turned out I wasn’t missing much. Last time I looked there was one record of a meadow brown from the farm, and a record of a seal from several miles away in the Menai Strait which had such an imprecise grid reference (10 km square) that it overlapped with the farm. But I feel conservation bodies ought to be allowed to download the records for their own sites, and last time I asked, that was not allowed.
That’s a shame because being able to download records is an essential part of trying to conserve vulnerable sites. Some friends of mine have discovered some land near us (a former golf course) which has been left untouched for several years. It is now awash with nightingales and other scarce birds (and probably inverts as well). Efforts are afoot to try and get some sort of conservation status for the site (which has just been put on the market if anyone has £2m to spare!). But clearly being able to gather data from iRecord would be an enormous help.
It’s probably better to collate the record initially, and then delete it if it’s obviously wrong. Salmon on Withdean Park was one of my favourites 
Some records were rejected in the early days of iRecord, collated by very competent naturalists. It was a pity as 1. the potential record becomes ‘extinct’, 2. the recorder is not encouraged to stick with the system.
iRecord was cruel to some recorders in the early days. It was difficult to configure it for particular areas (Brighton & Hove + a patch of sea in my case).
My original post was about how well the different systems can collate information, as the NBN page only refers to two recording systems.
It could be worth ‘testing’ how well the various systems feed into the NBN at the end of each recording cycle.
Precisely. Data flow only one way (to the senior administrators) is disheartening.
I like being able to select a polygon (Brighton & Hove) and see what has appeared recently.