The New Jersey Audubon Society uses citizen science to help collect valuable ecological information. They have many projects and detailed information on their website. There are three main projects New Jersey’s Audubon Society takes part in, grassland, shorebirds, and an area called the Piedmont region in the southern part of the state. They also participate in hawk watches and bird counts.
New Jersey Audubon Society’s Citizen Science program aims to:
- foster environmental awareness among New Jersey’s citizens through active participation- protect New Jersey’s birds and other animals, especially endangered and threatened species through collection of data on bird distributions and abundance, population trends, migration patterns
- promote habitat preservation by improving our knowledge of the ecology of New Jersey through the contributions of Citizen Scientists.
One of their current projects are the 2007-2008 Piedmont Bird Surveys, which are in need of volunteers. This area covers about 1.1 million acres in southern New Jersey (see map below, from the New Jersey Audubon website)
This is a prime example of citizen science and its potential. If you look at the data collected from the 2005 grassland study, for example, you can see how useful this information can be for management purposes and biodiversity studies.
New Jersey is full of good birders and caring citizens, making them a great example of statewide citizen science!
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Having participated in both the piedmont and grasslands surveys, I can tell you that they are top-notch. They do excellent training for participants and make the process easy.
Patrick – it is so great that you participate in these cool surveys!