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April is Citizen Science Month
While physical isolation guidelines are being implemented globally, this doesn’t mean we need to feel isolated and powerless during this challenging time. Indeed citizen science is all about the power and potential of ‘scale’ and that by working together we can do more.
Even from your backyard, home, local park or nature reserve you can participate in collecting citizen science information – download some of the apps or participate in some upcoming “blitzes”. Here are just a few to start you on your journey:
- Wild Pollinator Count – April 12-19th 2020 – count wild pollinators in your local environment and help build a database on wild pollinator activity
- Citizen Science Month – April 2020 – check out on social media #CitSciMonth for things happening to celebrate citizen science internationally and ways to participate virtually.
- iNaturalist – record your observations of species, and share with the iNaturalist community
- FrogID – a national citizen science project that is helping us learn more about what is happening to Australia’s frogs by recording frog calls.
- NatureMapr – community based citizen science platform to collect, manage and share species data.
- QuestaGame – a game to make the adventure of going outdoors real and contribute to research.
- Birdata – BirdLife Australia’s platform for those interested in the amazing array of birds in Australia.
- ClimateWatch – understand how changes in temperature and rainfall are affecting the seasonal behaviour of Australia’s plants and animals.
- Urban Wildlife App – an app with research from the environmental science program the Clean Air and Urban Landscapes Hub looking at bell frogs, flying foxes and beneficial insects.
- Hush City – a science mobile app, which empowers people to identify and assess quiet areas in cities to create an open access, web-based map of quiet areas, with the potential of orientating plans and policies for healthier living