Ever heard of BiRP,CWAC, SABAP, CAR, PHOWN, iSpot, NERCS or SAFRING? If so, you already know a nit about what this blog is all about – citizen science! Citizen science is a form of scientific research whereby everyday people are involved either completely or partly in the research conducted. This is an open platform for the general public to be actively involved and/or contribute to science either with their intellectual and/or surrounding knowledge or with their tools or resources. Citizen scientists not only acquire an understanding of scientific work and skills but also add great value to research and research-based decision making as a result of their contribution.The big picture is what happens with the data – how it affects conservation policy – that is exciting, knowing your individual contribution makes a difference! See this fabulous article by ADU Director Prof Les Underhill on joining the dots…
There are literally dozens of fabulous projects citizen scientists can get involved in. The Nature’s Valley Trust participates in many of them, which enables members of the public to be actively involved in its work, thus contributing to NVT’s cutting edge conservation projects, and to national datasets. There are two main groups that co-ordinate Citizen Science programs in southern Africa, namely the Animal Demography Unit (ADU) at UCT, and SANBI. The Programs NVT uses include the following:
Coordinated Water Avifaunal Counts (CWAC) is a national project run by the Animal Demography Unit at the University of Cape Town. This project involves counting water birds in Januaryand Julyon major water bodies across South Africa, in an effort to monitor water bird populations and the conditions of the wetlands important for these birds. Since July 2013, the NVT research team has been part of this project where the team assisted Geoff and Jill McIlleron, and Maaike Murphy from BirdLife Plettenberg Bay in counting birds at the Groot River estuary. The Groot River estuary has been counted for over ten years by these stalwarts from BirdLife, who are also residents of Nature’s Valley. The team also assist BirdLife Plettenberg Bay members to conduct the count on the Keurboom’s Estuary, which has been counted for over 15 years.
CWAC survey at the Groot River estuary
The Tsitsikamma Fynbos Research Program was launched in April 2013 by NVT in an effort to collect and manage scientific data of this highly diverse plant kingdom. There are two Citizen Science programs we contribute to under this program. Firstly, we use mistnets to trap, ring and release birds in the Fynbos, with Dr Mark Brown our Program Director and MinkeWitteveen, one of our research students, both being registered bird ringers with SAFRING. NVT encourages communities at large to be part of this bird movement monitoring process by reporting any ring sighted or found on a bird to either NVT or the South African Bird Ringing Unit that administers bird ringing in southern Africa. NVT also provides training for people interested in becoming bird ringers.
Mark explaining bird ringing Mark explaining bird ringing
A Cape Sugarbird with a SAFRING ring and additional colour ring
Secondly, the Tsitsikamma Fynbos Research program also utilises iSpot to record data from our plant surveys. At the beginning of May 2014, NVT initiated a plant survey of the Salt River and Kalanderkloof trails at the top of the Groot River pass, as well as the Fynbos Reserve located in Nature’s Valley. The purpose of this project is to determine what time of the year the plants are flowering and also to create a record of the plants species in these areas. To assist with plant identification NVT has started uploading photos of flower species onto a website created by the South African national Biodiversity Institute (SANBI) called iSpot which is user friendly. SANBI created this website so that members of the public and scientists alike could share their discoveries and help each other with identification. iSpot covers a number of categories namely plants, birds, reptiles and amphibians, fungi and lichens, fish, invertebrates and mammals. This program has been very useful and has helped NVT identify a number of flowers in the area. NVT also uses iSpot as the repository for data collected in the Groot River Estuary Fish Monitoring Program– we upload representative photos of each species we catch when we net in the lagoon.
The ADU also has a series of Virtual Museums– where the specimens are not dead animals but rather photographs lined to a date and a place enabling large scale data collection of a species’ distribution and how it changes over time. We currently submit photo’s to the following projects:
- FrogMAP
- LepiMAP
- MammalMAP
- OdonataMAP
- PHOWN
- ReptileMAP
- EchinoMAP
A record on Reptile Atlas of Southern Africa added by our Program director, Mark Brown
Monthly submissions to the South African Bird Atlas Project over the years
NVT staff contribute to one other important citizen science program – the second South African Bird Atlas Project or SABAP2, which is arguably the most important and most influential citizen science project running anywhere in the world at present. With over 1400 citizen scientists contributing 5.5 MILLION records since 2007, data from this project, when compared to its predecessor run 20 odd years ago, enables scientists to track how bird distributions have been affected in the last 20 years! The map below shows one example of this note, how the Black Sparrowhawk have moved their distribution westwards in the last 20 years.
Distribution map of the Black Sparrowhawk
Citizen science has impacted scientific research in that it has allowed people who are concerned about their environment to be connected to projects that benefit immensely from their hard work and dedication. Public participation can also allow investigations that would not otherwise be possible without large numbers of participants. In addition, citizen science can lead to a well informed public that will play an important role in influencing larger decisions regarding science policy.
Citizens at one of our bird ringing sessions
All the projects that NVT is part of have been a fantastic effort from all those involved and have added great knowledge to conservation research in our region. NVT is grateful for the hard work and contributions of these outstanding citizens who voluntarily contribute their time, effort and resources towards scientific research. We would also like to invite and encourage more citizens to be part of science.If you are keen, watch this slide show on how to register with the ADU to become a citizen scientist, or join the Nature’s Valley Trust research team next time you’re in the Valley!