New paper published using iNaturalist as a photographic vouchering system

General
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Hello all,

I thought you might be interested in this paper I just published, in which I used iNaturalist as a photographic vouchering system for roadkilled insects: https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1155/psyc/8881730

The purpose of the study was to test whether surveying dead insects along a roadside could be a method of tracking insect populations over time in a way that: 1) does not require additional insect mortality (many insect monitoring methods require a lot of collecting), 2) does not require a large investment in terms of time, money, or expertise, 3) does not require a lot of processing time or the indefinite maintenance of an insect collection, 4) can be repeated by anyone with a smartphone and an iNaturalist account.

My primary conclusions were that this method could be used to supplement existing insect monitoring methods and may prove useful because of the rapid turn around time from observation to data.

The most interesting thing I observed was that the insect roadkill community on the side of this bridge turned over almost completely from week to week, such that if you sampled for a short time, you would miss huge spikes in population abundance of given insect groups.

Special thanks to my top ten identifiers: @trinaroberts, @pedro3111, @willkuhn, @catherine_g, @bdagley, @samwilhelm, @d2b, @stephenluk, @mmmmbugs, and @heatherholm. And thanks to everyone else who helped ID things!

Best,
Laura

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I really liked the paper! It’s a nice demonstration of how productive iNat can be for surveying, and an ingenious way to avoid causing additional arthropod mortality.

I assumed initially that the “Jersey barriers” separated you from the traffic. I was a little alarmed when I later realized that your collections were made in the unprotected road shoulder. I think the safety risks might make it tough to use this approach in many cases.

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