Citizen Science and the India Biodiversity Portal

Thomas Vattakaven, Strand Life Sciences, Bangalore, India.

•http://indiabiodiversity.org/ •Aims to aggregate information on the biodiversity of India and make it openly accessible to all.•All data is put out under Creative Commons Licences.

Information modules

• Species pages – descriptive content on species (Crowd sourced from verified users)

• Observations – species sighting records with media- (Crowd sourced – Citizen science)

• Lists – species records from a locality (Crowd sourced – Citizen science)

• Maps – map layers containing ecological information.

• Documents – publications on a species. (Crowd sourced)

Species Pages

Observations Species lists

Map layers Documents

Species Pages

Observations

TreesIndia• Aim: To document every tree species in India with a photo-essay and

at least one occurrence record.• Initiated in January 2014• Collaborative effort – several experts with interest in Trees of India

were invited to join as founders of the group• Members of IBP were invited to join as participants• All existing tree observations and species pages were added to the

group.• A workshop was conducted in February to plan the a campaign to

map and document neighborhood trees across India.• 33 partcipants across the country attended. These included NGO

representatives, researchers, school teachers and students as well as Masters’ and PhD students

Neighborhood Trees Campaign

• Users asked to photograph, document and write a story• Campaign ran for 1 week from Earth Day 22nd April to

28th April.• Run exclusively online• Advertised on email groups, facebook, Google plus and

to all users of IBP• Press kit and publicity material prepared and provided

to the press – received wide coverage across India• Interested organizations were asked to join as partners

of the campaign and conduct tree-walks

5842283

14

34

Gurgaon

Hoshangabad

Mumbai

Panjim

Bangalore

Kottagiri

Thiruvananthapuram

Participation

Percentage of registered users who uploaded observations

Percentage of registered users who provided species Identification

Participation in Species Identification

Less than 20% of the total observations were unidentified during the campaignThe unidentified percentage is now less than 10%

31 29 29 20 19

15 15171718

Ficus religiosa Delonix regia Mangifera indica Artocarpus heterophyllus Peltophorum pterocarpum

Ficus benghalensis Azadirachta indica Spathodea campanulata Grevillea robusta Cassia fistula

Most identified tree species

About 680 species of trees were uploaded during the campaign, of which 68% were native to India and 32% are introduced species.

Outcome..

• Participation continues with many of the users becoming regular users. Currently around 750 members.

• There are now 450 tree species pages with at least 1 image and 1300 species pages with at least 1 record.

• Continued effort to energize citizens to participate and upload observations/ provide IDs and to convert enthusiasts into species page contributors.

• Neighborhood Trees Campaign 2015

Uploaders

ID providers

274 identified species

Dragonfly Observation Bucket Challenge

Challenges

• Participation• Incentives• Ease of use / user experience• Guiding users on effective documentation and

to overcome biases• Identification guides• Value addition

AcknowledgmentsPortal Team

Support

Contributors