{"id":61258,"date":"2021-03-04T09:23:51","date_gmt":"2021-03-04T14:23:51","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/naturalsciences.org\/calendar\/?post_type=news&#038;p=61258"},"modified":"2021-03-04T09:23:51","modified_gmt":"2021-03-04T14:23:51","slug":"candid-critters-lessons-learned-from-a-statewide-citizen-science-project","status":"publish","type":"news","link":"https:\/\/naturalsciences.org\/calendar\/news\/candid-critters-lessons-learned-from-a-statewide-citizen-science-project\/","title":{"rendered":"Candid Critters: Lessons learned from a statewide citizen science project"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Citizen Science projects using camera traps produce high quality data but are hard to manage at a large scale. How do you get equipment to volunteers? Train them? Get the data back? See how <a href=\"https:\/\/naturalsciences.org\/staff\/roland-kays\">Roland Kays<\/a>, head of the NC Museum of Natural Sciences\u2019 Biodiversity Lab, and colleagues met these challenges in a <a href=\"https:\/\/theoryandpractice.citizenscienceassociation.org\/article\/10.5334\/cstp.343\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">new paper about the statewide camera trap survey<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p>As part of the project launch, the research team created customized training materials and a data management workflow via <a href=\"https:\/\/emammal.si.edu\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">eMammal<\/a>. However, these were the least-fun parts of the project for volunteers, and many dropped out at this stage. \u201cMaking these steps easier should be a priority for future projects,\u201d Kays notes.<\/p>\n<p>They worked with local libraries to loan cameras to volunteers across the state. This allowed them to get cameras to all corners, but required a lot of logistics.<\/p>\n<p>They created a new web application to help with camera management, tracking volunteer training, site mapping, and custom report generation for North Carolina\u2019s Candid Critters. [<a href=\"https:\/\/github.com\/NCMuseumNaturalSciences\/nc-candid-critters\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Code available here<\/a>.]<\/p>\n<p>Currently, the team has a variety of papers in the works with these data, and plans to make all the data publicly available. Until then, you can explore via this great <a href=\"https:\/\/public.tableau.com\/profile\/hailey.boone#!\/vizhome\/NCCCSpeciesGraphic1\/Dashboard1\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">interactive map by Hailey Boone<\/a>.<\/p>\n<div style=\"margin-top: 0px; padding-bottom: 5px; padding-right: 0px; float: left; display: block;\"><a href=\"https:\/\/naturalsciences.org\/calendar\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/03\/standing-bears.jpg\"><img decoding=\"async\" loading=\"lazy\" src=\"https:\/\/naturalsciences.org\/calendar\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/03\/standing-bears_320.jpg\" alt=\"Standing bears in a camera trap photo.\" width=\"320\" height=\"240\" \/><\/a><\/div>\n<div style=\"margin-top: 0px; padding-bottom: 5px; padding-left: 0px; float: right; display: block;\"><a href=\"https:\/\/naturalsciences.org\/calendar\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/03\/thumbnail_image011.jpg\"><img decoding=\"async\" loading=\"lazy\" class=\"alignnone size-full wp-image-61261\" src=\"https:\/\/naturalsciences.org\/calendar\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/03\/thumbnail_image011_320.jpg\" alt=\"Doe nursing fawn.\" width=\"320\" height=\"240\" srcset=\"https:\/\/naturalsciences.org\/calendar\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/03\/thumbnail_image011_320.jpg 320w, https:\/\/naturalsciences.org\/calendar\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/03\/thumbnail_image011_320-300x225.jpg 300w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 320px) 100vw, 320px\" \/><\/a><\/div>\n<p>&nbsp;<br \/>\nClick to enlarge photos.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":61259,"menu_order":0,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_links_to":"","_links_to_target":""},"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/naturalsciences.org\/calendar\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/news\/61258"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/naturalsciences.org\/calendar\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/news"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/naturalsciences.org\/calendar\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/news"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/naturalsciences.org\/calendar\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/naturalsciences.org\/calendar\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/news\/61258\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/naturalsciences.org\/calendar\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/61259"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/naturalsciences.org\/calendar\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=61258"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}