BirdPix on a run in 2021
BirdPix is important because it is going to be used to test whether “species distribution models” can be used to generate maps that look like the bi...
Author: Les Underhill
Prof Les Underhill has been Director of the Animal Demography Unit (ADU) at the University of Cape Town since it started in 1991. Although citizen science in biology is Les’s passion, his academic background is in mathematical statistics. He was awarded his PhD in abstract multivariate analyses in 1973 at UCT and what he likes to say about his PhD is that he solved a problem that no one has ever had. He soon grasped that this was not the field to which he wanted to devote his life, so he retrained himself as an applied statistician, solving real-world problems.
How do you refresh a butterfly? You LepiMAP it in 2021!
The take home message of this blog is one of disappointment! But the reality is that we have never looked at the butterflies in LepiMAP in this way before. Beca...
Starting from scratch : OdonataMAP in 2021
We lost all the data***. Now we need to be starting from scratch! This is not such a crazy idea. It is so easy to think. I know that the Red-veined Dropwing has...
Progress with BirdPix in the Free State during 2020
We will slowly work out way through projects and provinces! We have done BirdPix in the Western Cape. This map shows the number of bird species recorded for Bir...
Refreshment dip into Yzerfontein during lockdown
“Starting in my home grid cell on 1 January 2021, I will upload records to the Virtual Museum of as many species as possible (and I will be especially careful n...
Progress with BirdPix in the Western Cape during 2020
This is planned to be the first of many similar blogs. We are starting with an easy project, BirdPix, in my home province, Western Cape. It is still a bit exper...
Fundamentals of Citizen Science, a BDI course
During 2021, the BDI will offer a course called "Fundamentals of Citizen Science".
Archive/BDI Citizen Scientist Hours/BDI YouTube Channel/Biodiversity/Citizen Science/News/Virtual Museum
BDI YouTube Channel: three months of growth!
The BDI launched its YouTube channel on 2 July. Three months later, the channel contained 61 videos and these videos had had more than 3,000 views. Up to now th...
Citizen Science Week #1 from 19 to 27 September 2020: OdonataMAP in South Africa
OdonataMAP is the Odonata Atlas of Africa. OdonataMAP is one of the sections of the Virtual Museum. From September 2020, the project has been hosted jointly by ...
Fanie Rautenbach’s Great LepiMAP Challenge 2020/21
Fanie Rautenbach has worked his way through the LepiMAP records for South Africa, Lesotho and Swaziland, has identified data gaps, and is challenging us to fill...