[MAIPC] Using New iNaturalist Collective Projects for Early Detection of Invasive Plants

[Mark Frey]

Kate

Thanks for setting that up!

I see you are a maybe for the NCR-PRISM Launch tomorrow. I hope you can
make it! We will be talking about harnessing data with tools like this one
and a data-aggregation tool that aggregates iNat, EDDMaps, ebird and 1000+
other sources and then puts them through a geographic filter (for just DC
and adjacent counties) and then filters out natives and common non-natives.
If you can't make the Launch tomorrow let me know and I can share a bit
more.

Mark Frey
(National Park Service)

On Mon, Jul 30, 2018 at 11:34 AM Kate Wagner <kaitlynwagnermusic at gmail.com>
wrote:

> Dear MA-IPC Members:
>
> My name is Kate Wagner. I am a writer by trade and a life-long citizen
> scientist who has been working primarily in North Carolina focusing on
> using citizen science resources, specifically iNaturalist, for the purposes
> of early detection of invasive plant outbreaks. [I gave a talk at the 2016
> NC Invasive Plant Council Symposium about this! (
> http://nc-ipc.weebly.com/2016-agenda.html)]
>
> I have since moved to Maryland, and am eager to continue my work in the
> Mid-Atlantic. I wanted to make the list-serve aware of the new collective
> projects iNaturalist rolled out in April. (Note: I am not professionally
> affiliated with iNaturalist in any way, and am just an enthusiast.) Unlike
> the previous iNaturalist projects, which required tediously adding
> observations to projects manually, the new collective projects aggregate
> sightings and observations by taxa in real time, which makes them
> particularly useful tools for tracking and verifying citizen science
> reports of invasive plants as they come in.
>
> I wanted to alert you to a new collective project I created for invasive
> plants in the state of Maryland based off of the Mid-Atlantic National
> Parks Invasive Plant List and lists of invasive plants compiled by
> organizations and government offices in Maryland:
> https://www.inaturalist.org/projects/invasive-exotic-plants-of-maryland
>
> Already the project has aggregated over 6,000 invasive plant sightings in
> Maryland and is aggregating more in real time every day. Some sightings
> include plants currently being discussed right now in the listserv, such as
> Wavyleaf Basketgrass, which was observed by a volunteer naturalist
> yesterday <https://www.inaturalist.org/observations/14905447>. Volunteers
> with training on how to identify invasive plants can then verify these
> sightings, follow up about reports to EDDMapS, and the complete list of
> observations can be exported as a CSV. iNaturalist users can "follow" the
> project and get updates on their iNaturalist dashboard. (I call it Twitter
> for Plants)
>
> If anyone has any questions about how the projects work, or if there is
> broader interest in the creation of a new collective project targeting the
> entirety of the Mid-Atlantic or simply for other states in the
> Mid-Atlantic, I am happy to help anyone who is interested.
>
> I also look forward to helping the MA-IPC in any other way I can.
>
> Best wishes,
>
> Kate Wagner
> Baltimore, MD 21218
> 910-684-0083
> https://www.inaturalist.org/people/kate_wagner
>
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>
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