Great British Bee Count

Good morning. We are the representatives of the Biology Club. The theme of this month is to be good at listening, willing to serve. These are values scientists must be familiar with. Scientists listen to the requests from the community to know which areas our society needs improving. It is only through this step, they are given a direction to serve us with their scientific knowledge.

Taking a step back from scientists, us everyday folk can also lend a helping hand as well. To further develop an understanding of certain issues, we need a large amount of data. However, the limited number of scientists brings about insufficient manpower for large-scale data collection. That is where we come in.

Citizen science projects are when scientists recruit and train citizens to be volunteers for them to work together and collect, analyze, or report data, usually on topics like ecology, astronomy, and environmental monitoring.

One of the most well-known examples of this is the Great British Bee Count, where scientists hoped to track changes in bee population over time, providing invaluable information on species diversity and distribution. To accomplish this seemingly impossible task, scientists asked for volunteers to record the species and number of bee sightings.

Volunteers downloaded an app which helped identify bees and provided video lectures by professionals in order to enhance their understanding of bee categories and the importance of these ‘tiny workers’ in the ecosystem. With this, the volunteers quickly acted and gathered data all around Britain in the form of close-up photos and sent them along with the location of the sighting for further analysis.

In the end, a total of 23,755 volunteers managed to record 482,915 bees with 50 unique species. This data went on to aid experts in understanding the threats to bees, such as pesticide use and habitat loss, ultimately helping repopulate bees. The Great British Bee Count continues to be held annually and goes to show how much help from citizens matters to science.

By listening to the people, scientists heard what citizens care about and started projects directed at these areas. They also manage to obtain information otherwise impossible to get. Furthermore, they actively asked for feedback and suggestions from volunteers to identify areas of improvement. Finally, with the help of the people, they share their finds with the public for all to see.

Meanwhile, citizens also exemplify the spirit of listening and serving by responding to the calls of scientists to help and eagerly volunteering. As fellow members of society, we too should follow in progressing the community.

Helping a citizen science project is easier than it sounds. There are plenty of apps that welcome its users to do something as simple as counting certain species of wildlife to playing cognitive games. Though simple, it lets scientists amass the data they need for research. If it is something that doesn’t need much time and effort to be done, why don’t we start serving the scientific community today by listening to their call for action?

Biology Club