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For centuries, grizzly bears ranged free and thrived across North America, from Central Mexico to the Arctic Ocean.
That’s changed in the past few decades. In Alberta, Canada, once home to a large grizzly population, it’s now estimated that there are roughly 20,000 bears left, and they’re particularly sensitive to human activities and natural events. They are listed as a threatened species.
It’s a tall task for conservationists in Alberta to protect the grizzly population. Fortunately, that’s starting to change with the launch of GrizzTracker, a citizen science tool that allows everyday people to track grizzly bear sightings. It’s an example of citizen science, a method that uses everyday citizens as a mode of scientific data collection. Citizen science is emerging as a way to democratize science and help protect endangered or threatened species.
GrizzTracker was created to provide users with the opportunity to track grizzly bear sightings, or lack thereof, either way providing essential data of Grizzly whereabouts.
Courtney Hughes, Senior Landscape Ecologist with Alberta Environment and Parks, has worked in the Government of Alberta for the last 15 years, with roles focusing on natural resource policy, environmental education, biodiversity, and more.
In 2010, the year grizzlies were listed as a threatened species in Alberta, Hughes and her team collaborated with scientists from non-government organizations, industry, forestry, and agricultural land-based cooperators, to formalize a working group called the Northwest Grizzly Bear Team.
The team decided that they needed a “single, standardized, automated data collection tool to capture these opportunistic sightings of grizzly bears,” Hughes says. “It was that real-time reporting that we were lacking because there was only so many staff, and there were only a handful of us in the Northwest – a big landscape, with remote, difficult-to-access locations. We really needed to rely on the collaboration and cooperation from others who are interested in reporting their sightings, and we did, and it was fantastic.”
Here’s how it works. According to Hughes, you simply start a trip on the app, and then “if a grizzly bear is then observed while you're out and about – whether you're recreating, or perhaps you're working for a forestry company – you can use a standardized data entry form with very simple, clear, drop down, categorical options to describe what the bear observation is.”
For instance – did you see one bear or two bears? Does it look like a male or female? How old do you think it is, based on it’s size? And what was the bear doing?
Users can also add a photo, Hughes says – “because that can help reduce some of those identification issues that we might have between black bears and grizzly bears.”
In addition to the app, Hughes and her team also developed a website with broader information and educational information about identifying Grizzlies and black bears, as well as safety information.
According to Hughes, this program has had a multitude of impacts. She says, “we evaluated the GrizzTracker program, and what we learned is that, of course, the public, whether specific user groups or just someone interested who happens upon the app with the proper information to utilize the tool, can provide really helpful data for scientists, managers, etc, to use in their work, right, and in this case, it was for grizzly bear management and to support some of the recovery objectives. We also found that they can conduct meaningful applied research to help us, and I think that's reflective of other citizen science programs.”
Further, the app is beneficial to citizens themselves: “We also found that the app users indicated that they learned more about their ecology, their safety, different scientific research methods, including Citizen Science and the public policy process through our program.”
“I think that's a really big impact, the ability for citizen science projects, particularly when community-driven, have the opportunity to spark the curiosity of the users, of the community scientists, and in turn, you know, they're going to then look for the information to self educate because they're curious. And that can, in a conservation world, I think, help spark a stewardship ethic or a passion.”
Another citizen science project Hughes collaborated on was focused on bat conservation.
According to Hughes, “We had piloted a project in the Peace River area, with my colleagues in the Wildlife Biology Department at the time, and we had worked with the public library because they were interested in having educational sessions on bats, some of the threats facing bats, particularly white nose syndrome, which was recently identified in Alberta, and then some of the research that was being done, and the different techniques and methods, and how people could get involved.”
Members of the community were able to use smart-phone enabled wildlife acoustics bat sensors, or external acoustic monitoring devices, “to go out and monitor and just record vocalizations of bats at dusk and dawn. Mostly people did dusk, of course, because an evening walk is much more pleasant than an early morning one, you know, bringing kids along.”
According to Hughes, this program was largely beneficial because of the education it provided kids and citizens alike. She says, “the original intent was to continue sparking that curiosity, which then leads to kind of that inquisitiveness to learn more about different bat species: little brown bats, big brown bats, Tory bats, etc, White-nose syndrome, habitat aspects… and what we found, is that people were really curious. They started to realize bats aren't these kind of scary creatures that fly in your hair, that's a myth. They're actually really great for the ecosystem and particularly insect management. And we could provide safe spaces for bats to coexist with people, which was people getting curious about setting up bat houses.”
The original intent was to continue sparking that curiosity, which then leads to inquisitiveness to learn more about different bat species.
Further, giving the citizens the opportunity to make a difference themselves can motivate them to learn and contribute more.
“There's a link between knowing more and having that motivation to do something because you care, to having some applied action on the outcome, whether that's continuing to conduct this applied research as a citizen scientist, or you might say, ‘oh, I want to put up a bat house,’ or ‘I'm going to share with my neighbors how to be bear safe when they're recreating in their country, or my family members.’ So I think there's different ways that this can manifest in positive outcomes that we did see across the different communities, and we've been working with them.”
Citizen science programs for conservation do have some limitations.
For instance – though the impacts of the BatCaver program were substantial, the program was short-lived.
“Part of the risk of these community science projects is that they're often contingent on one or a few people, and of course, funding streams,” Hughes says. It can also be difficult to ensure the long-term sustainability of these projects: “How do we find either other groups or ambassadors or, you know, sustainable funding mechanisms within different agencies and organizations to ensure that these programs can stay going?”
Though citizen science works great for the conservation of some endangered species, there are limitations with others. In speaking with experts in Piping Plover conservation, it was clear that it can be difficult to balance the desire for citizens to help endangered species while simultaneously keeping them safe and their habitats unharmed.
Stephanie Schubel, University of Minnesota field lead and head bander for the Great Lakes Piping Plover Conservation Team, has been working in Piping Plover conservation since 2003. As a part of her job, she does some volunteer training, but mostly focuses on banding efforts and coordination with other organizations, along with data management and social media.
Schubel will be helping with “the training of volunteer monitors over on the east side of Michigan in a couple of weeks.” She says, “at most places where we have volunteers, there is an in-depth training session, which can be in person, or volunteers can watch the recorded session which we share with all our volunteers.” They also share training manuals with all volunteers. For people who want to volunteer, the monitor training sessions offer a great opportunity to get involved and learn more about our program.
However, it can be dangerous for untrained citizens to become too involved in conservation efforts.
Sara Ziegler, Ph.D, Research Geographer at the U.S. Geological Survey, is a landscape ecologist who studies habitat changes and their effects on species, especially those that are endangered. In 2015, her and her USGS team were involved in monitoring Piping Plovers for conservation efforts, but data collection efforts from different entities were not standardized.
According to Ziegler, Rob Thieler “had the idea to develop an iPhone app that all of our management partners could use as a way to, in the course of their normal monitoring efforts, you know, collect the data we needed without actually requiring much additional work on their end, they could just simply punch in what they were seeing into this iPlover app. And then that information, you know immediately was uploaded into the cloud and then I could use that as I was developing that Piping Plover habitat selection model. So all of those data went into informing the model and its ability to make predictions about Habitat availability. So it was a really cool effort.”
Though the app is no longer running, it ran from 2015 to 2016, it is a great example of cooperation between different organizations to problem solve: Ziegler states, “it's not currently active, but it still remains a very rare, and I think a really cool example of how people from different organizations can sort of work together for a science problem.”
However, this app was not citizen science, it was only available to be used by people very knowledgeable about Piping Plovers and the iPlover app to standardize data collection. Sara explains why this is: “Piping Plovers and shorebirds like them are really hard to get the public involved more generally. And that's solely because of the way they nest, so they create these little depressions in the sand where they lay their eggs, and I don't know if you've ever seen a Piping Plover nest, they're incredibly well camouflaged, so it's easy even for the experts who do this, just to accidentally step on a nest and destroy all of the eggs. So a lot of times if you go to a place that has Piping Plovers, those areas, you know where there's nesting are kind of fenced off with like symbolic fencing, you know, like rope and things like that, and that's to prevent people from accidentally stepping on nests more generally. So, we couldn't have like, people who weren't involved in the study, you know, who are just kind of more general members of the public like walking around in those areas looking for nests because it was just too much of a risk for, you know, this threatened species to have these accidental tramplings.”
However, if citizens have done their research, there are some ways they can still be quite helpful. According to Schubel, “in terms of citizens, I think even just birders being out there and reporting about Plovers on Ebird or iNaturalist, that’s helpful because sometimes at sites where we don't know there's Plovers, we may see a neighborhood sighting and that's a way for us to key in on that being a location that we need to check out.”
Further, generally respecting the birds’ habitat is crucial. Schubel says, “the key thing is, giving them space, sharing the shores, keeping your dogs leashed, respecting signs, and keeping the beaches clean. Then, spreading the word about Plovers, how they're important, and how beaches and beach habitat systems are important helps as well. Plovers are just one part of that system, and by protecting them we're protecting all the other organisms in the shoreline and dune systems. I believe it's important to protect the organisms in all the different habitats and ecosystems we have out there so that we can keep them intact and help them stay healthy.”
And in the Great Lakes area, Schubel says, “If you see Plovers on a beach and you don't see any signs or information about them, get in touch with us.” You can help the Plovers by sending in photos to Schubel’s team through their email addresses, plover@umn.edu and glpipldata@gmail.com. Further, if you want more information on how to help Plovers or even get involved as a volunteer monitor, visit: https://www.greatlakespipingplover.org/get-involved.
If you’re looking to learn more about citizen science or for resources on engaging in citizen science in ways that maximize impact, visit, Association for Advancing Participatory Sciences. Moreover, Proximate’s Can Citizen Science Drive the Sustainable Development Goals? offers additional information on how citizen science currently tracks the success of SDGs, how it contributes to achieving these goals, and how citizen scientists can advance the success of these goals even further.
