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Posted by TerranceV | Home, Lifestyle, Sports, Technology, Top Stories, Uncategorized | Posted on June 30th, 2011

Modernity is often the enemy of conservation, as our 21st-Century lifestyles put ever greater pressure on the natural world.

Crucially, that involves encouraging the public to act en masse as field researchers, gathering data.

Meanwhile Project Noah is a global study that encourages nature lovers to document the wildlife they encounter, using a purpose built phone app and web community.

Not initially designed to produce scientific results, the project has already identified two species previously unrecorded in the UK: a bee-fly (Systoechus ctenopterus) and euonymus leaf notcher moth (Pryeria sinica).

"It's important to say that iSpot did not set out to be a source of research data, but in fact we have been so successful that we have generated useful scientific data as well as introducing people to natural history," says Jonathan Silvertown, iSpot project leader and professor of ecology at The Open University.

"A dataset for shieldbugs observed on iSpot was recently validated by the expert who runs the national recording scheme for this group and it has now gone into the records of the National Biodiversity Network."

"We are sure that this is just the first of many datasets that will do this," he adds.

Professor Silvertown says organisations' hesitancy to embrace citizen research is understandable, because of the issues of interpretation and accuracy.

But he argues that involving the public in research is hugely valuable, particularly when that research is publicly funded.

Meanwhile Mr Ansari believes projects such as his own could be inspirational for the next generation of scientists.

"Think of our effort as training amateurs to become better nature observers… All scientists start off as amateurs," he says.

Originally Published On: www.bbc.co.uk – Original Article Here