Abstract
There has been an increased effort to utilize untapped sources of historical phenological data such as museum specimens, journals written by nature-minded citizens, and dated photographs through local phenology projects for climate change research. Local phenology projects have contributed greatly to our current understanding of phenological changes over time and have an important role in the public’s engagement with natural history, but there are also significant challenges in finding and analyzing historical data. The West Virginia Climate History Project collected historical phenology data (1890-2015) from citizens in West Virginia with scientific and cultural results. We discuss the development of the project, issues we overcame, recommendations for future projects, and the conservation value of local phenology projects. Local phenology projects lend value to climate change research and conservation education. Policy directed towards supporting humanities grants and museum collections, including herbariums, is crucial in the success of these projects.
Highlights
Phenology, the timing of biological events in relation to seasons, has become popular due to its public accessibility [1], potential for scientific education [2], and use in tracking responses to climate change [3]
There has been an increased effort to utilize untapped sources of historical phenological data such as museum specimens, journals written by nature-minded citizens, and dated photographs through local phenology projects for climate change research
There has been a surge in attempts by researchers to utilize untapped sources of historical phenological data such as museum specimens, journals written by nature-minded citizens, and dated site-specific photographs [4] [5] [6]
Summary
The timing of biological events in relation to seasons, has become popular due to its public accessibility [1], potential for scientific education [2], and use in tracking responses to climate change [3]. Researchers have used phenological data found in journals of naturalist-minded authors as a baseline to compare with current dates of phenological events to estimate how climate change is affecting the timing of phenophases [12] [13]. These isolated studies, which involve local communities in research on familiar flora and fauna, are important for understanding individual organisms’ responses to changes in climate. There is a need for long-term phenological datasets in West Virginia to assess the current and future effects of climate change, as well as to set the stage for future citizen science projects. The purposes of this paper are to outline the WVCHP, advise other local phenological projects, and discuss the conservation value of local phenology projects
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