Citizen Science

Hello again (mostly) local iNat and environmental enthusiasts!

I am using this journal as a way to communicate with other locals in the area for two reasons:

• Next year's BioBlitz
• The possibility of starting a new project in partnership with the NSW government as part of their 'Forest Monitoring and Improvement Program'.

I've just got off the phone with Cassie Thompson from the Natural Resources Commission , who has identified our Coffs and Bellingen area Great Southern BioBlitz project as something we could build into a citizen science partnership for this area. They are trying to link with citizen science organisations and projects already in place to gather data on local forests.

Here are some of the main points we covered:

• They are interested in obtaining accurate and curated data directly from a local project
• Data will focus on all species present in forests including state forests, national parks, private native forests and crown forested land
• Particular focus on threatened species in conjunction with common species
• Possibility of being provided with remote monitoring systems ie remote video and recording devices to enable monitoring of local forests for difficult to find species (sound recorders, camera traps etc)
• Workshops and training

This could possibly be an opportunity for locals (such as ourselves) to provide data directly to a government organisation, in order to (hopefully) protect our local forests and ensure they are managed correctly.

I know there are other local environmental and citizen science projects in our area aimed at protecting the ecosystems we have left and hope to link with them if something comes of this. I am envisioning a local community of naturalists helping and learning from each other, contributing something meaningful and usable. We all know the potential iNaturalist has for citizen science and it would be nice to expand it locally and possibly have a real impact.

If you have any thoughts, questions, ideas, comments or people that may be interested (including yourself of course!) in contributing to such a local project/partnership, please comment below or get in touch.

More information on the project can be found here: https://nrc.nsw.gov.au/forest-monitoring

Publicado el 29 de octubre de 2020 por nicklambert