Spring 2018 Personal Bioblitz

Main Content

Quick Links

• Our project on iNaturalist
• Information poster (196k PDF)
• Facebook group
• Email list at Rutgers (subscribe for updates)
• How to get started on iNaturalist

Who Can Participate?

You can be part of the Spring 2017 Personal Bioblitz if you fit one or more of these categories:

• Faculty or staff at Rutgers University, NJ, USA
• Graduate student at Rutgers
• Undergraduate student at Rutgers
• Alumni from Rutgers
• Family member of Rutgers employee or student
• Friend of Rutgers employee or student (this includes anybody not at Rutgers that has a friend or friend of a friend at Rutgers)
• Other (this includes 4-H, Continuing Education students, volunteers at Rutgers, students that join as part of a teacher project, etc.)
• Note – ‘Friend’ can include anybody that is invited by someone already in the Bioblitz, this year or previous years. Invites might be sent out via e-mail, Facebook, or any other way by existing Bioblitzers.

How to Join?

Fill out the sign-up form. Note, you need to get an iNaturalist account first, then fill in the form, so that you can list the iNaturalist account name on the form and we can add you to the project.

General Rules

• iNaturalist focuses on wild and naturalized species that survive without human assistance, so we will follow this general rule (see below for specifics).
• You have to have seen or heard a species in person. If someone finds a species and shows it to you, then you can count it, as long as the species is not labeled with its species name and you really experience it.
• We expect all participants to be helpful to all participants, both in person and online on the iNaturalist website, and be courteous and play nice, especially in the comment fields on iNaturalist. All comments are public and visible by anyone.
• Species observations start at 00:00 AM on March 1, and end at midnight (11:59 PM) on May 15, 2018.
• All observation data from the Bioblitz have to be uploaded by the end of the day on May 25, 2018.
• Observations follow the honor system; we trust you that you fill in the correct date and place and species (to the best of your knowledge), and all observation data is public.
• Your observations can be at the species level, but also at higher levels (Plant, Bird, etc.)
• Each species observation has to have a date and have a geographic location.
• Photos, when possible, are optional, but strongly encouraged as documentation of what you saw (we know, birds and some other animals are fast and furious, no photos needed for such things). If you have no photo your observation will be automatically classified as ‘casual’ in iNaturalist, but your species will show up in your species list.
• Every counted observation at the end of the project has to have a taxonomic name (even if just a larger group name, like ‘gilled fungus, Basidiomycetes’ or ‘snake, Serpentes’), has to have a date and place of location, and been seen and uploaded by you in person. If not, then these observations will be removed from the iNaturalist project.
• Everybody running this project is a volunteer; we have no paid staff.
• The leadership team has the right to remove any observations and any person from the project that does not follow the rules.
• You are responsible for following the general iNaturalist rules, and as part of the project the iNaturalist web site will generate a life list for you, and you can continue to use iNaturalist afterwards for anything else you see outside of the goals for this project. If one of your observations is removed from this project (see above), it is still on iNaturalist if you don’t remove it yourself.

Challenges

• Which Rutgers graduate student will observe the most species?
• Which Rutgers undergraduate student will observe the most species?
• Who will have the most observations overall?
• Who will observe the most species?
• Who will see the most species not seen by anybody else?
• Will we together see more than 4,966 different species?
• Will we together report more than 20,861 observations?
• RESULTS of the Personal Bioblitz 2017 can we beat these records in 2018?

Which Species and Observations Count?

YES, Count It!

1. The observation or collection date is within the project dates.
2. You saw or heard the species. Even better, have a photo of it.
3. Outdoor species, unassisted* (ex. birds, insects, mosses)
4. Indoor species, unassisted* (ex. cockroaches, mice, bread mold)
5. Remnants of once alive species (ex. antlers, roadkill, shells, dried fruits) as long as unlabeled and you know its collection date and geographic origin, and it was originally collected during the Bioblitz period [mark the type of remnant in your iNaturalist observation notes field].
6. Microscopic species (including bacteria and archaea), as long as actual organism is wild-collected during the bioblitz period and observed (not just its effect), and it wasn’t ordered or kept in a lab as labeled culture. We highly encourage the use of microscopes to find protozoa, planktons, fungi, parasites, etc.
7. Species as part of research projects collected in the wild (as long as unidentified specimens and collected during the project time frame).
8. Humans and feral populations of former pets, crops, and farm animals.
9. Invasive, parasitic, and alien species (weeds, pests, etc.).
10. Species effects that can be identified distinctly to a particular species or group of species are allowed, such as galls, tracks, leaf miners, chewing marks, egg cocoons, spider webs, and eggs (but see note below about diseases), but include photos of these.

NO, Doesn’t Count!

1. The species is already labeled (the idea here is DISCOVERY)
2. Using human disease symptoms to identify a pathogenic species
3. Pets, supermarket produce, spices (anything sold and traded with a label on it; exception: wild species that inadvertently show up with such items are OK, like parasites in oysters or spiders in local produce)
4. Species maintained in greenhouses, museums, zoos, aquaria, gardens, etc.
5. Anything that can only securely be ID’d with molecular/ DNA data (if you can visually identify it to a higher-ranking group [class, family, etc.], then list it under the higher-ranking group’s name)
6. No viruses (sorry)
7. If you are uncertain if your species should be counted, please contact the Leadership Team, and they will make a decision on a case-by-case basis.

* Unassisted species are those that live without assistance from humans. Pets, houseplants, and planted crops are considered assisted if they rely on humans to survive. Feral cats and abandoned crop fields are unassisted since they no longer rely on humans.

Getting started on iNaturalist

• Go to the iNaturalist website and open a free account (if you don’t have one) and familiarize yourself with their very user-friendly website.
• Explore the ‘get-started’ webpage on iNaturalist.
• If you want, download the Android or iOS app for your smartphone or tablet for easy observation reporting (links at the bottom of the iNaturalist webpage).
• If you don’t have a digital camera of some kind, we suggest you get one. You can upload photos to iNaturalist and you can get help identify species from your photos. Only observations with photos can reach Research Grade status on iNaturalist.
• A sound recording device might be good if you want to learn bird songs and frog calls, etc., and sound files can be uploaded too.

How Do I Use iNaturalist for This Project?

• All observations have to be uploaded to the iNaturalist website, and added to the project called Personal Bioblitz Spring 2018.
• You first have to join the project as a member on iNaturalist before you can add observations to it. After you have joined, it should show up as a project in your list and you can add observations to it when you upload observations.
• Observations can be uploaded even if they are not identified to species at first (you can change all identifications and other data for all uploaded records later).
• You can also keep a simple handwritten or computer-based list of observations, places and dates, and upload these observations to iNaturalist when you have the time. Instructions for upload and linking to photos are on the iNaturalist website.
• All observations that are uploaded to iNaturalist are available to the public and visible to everybody on the iNaturalist website.
• Observations follow the honor system, we trust you that you fill in the correct date and place and species (to the best of your knowledge). People may challenge and comment on your observations if they don’t seem to have the correct identification date, or and place (to fix mistakes).
• Your observations might be used for research by anybody in the world, so your observations add to the total knowledge for these species.
• Your observations can be at the species level, but also at higher levels (Plants, Birds, Ciliate, etc.)
• Each species observation has to have a date and geographic place (GPS location on a map). Locations can be open or obscured, but not hidden (contact us for advice on endangered species).
• Photos, when possible, are optional, but strongly encouraged as documentation of what you saw (we know, birds and some other animals are fast and furious, no photos needed for such things). It is easy to upload digital photos to iNaturalist either from your computer, or from your tablet/smartphone, or from a Flickr account.
• If you want help with identification you have to have a photo and/or a sound recording of what you saw/heard.
• If you want people to agree with your species identifications (and get a Community ID confirmation on your observations) you should also help out with by commenting on others ID (to the best of your knowledge, of course). Only agree with other species ID’s if you think they are correct based on your knowledge of that group. Don’t assume they are correct, and then just agree because you know a person. Some participants will have knowledge in many taxonomic groups, others have very little, so we do not expect that everybody can help out equally with species identifications. But everybody can learn and share knowledge to the best of their ability.
• Unidentified species without photos or sound, or without date, or without locality will be deleted from our iNaturalist project at the end of the project, since the observation is incomplete. Your observation will still be on iNaturalist, just not in the Bioblitz project. (Unidentified species that has this information will stay, since they might be identified later)
• Feel free to add observations to your iNaturalist account before and after the Personal Bioblitz is going on (to start your life list!), but don’t add them to the Personal Bioblitz project on iNaturalist.

How Do I Get Help with Identification?

• First, to be able to get help you will need one of these things: the species in question (alive or dead), a photo of it, or a sound recording.
• You can upload a photo or sound to iNaturalist to see if someone can help you identify it. Your observations are visible by anybody in the world on iNaturalist, so you might get help from people from anywhere, including people that are locally based and part of this project.
• Contact taxonomic expertise, anywhere where you can find it (Facebook groups, online identification forums, researchers, societies and organizations).
• We will also post recommended websites and literature for species identification on the project website.

Who Runs This Project? Who Do I Contact?

The project is led by Dr. Lena Struwe and a Leadership Team consisting of students at School of Environmental and Biological Sciences, Rutgers University.

This project is run by Rutgers University in collaboration with iNaturalist (California Academy of Sciences).

For questions or comments about this site, contact lena.struwe@rutgers.edu.