Development of the European Ladybirds Smartphone Application: A Tool for Citizen Science

Jiří Skuhrovec,Peter M J Brown,David B Roy,Peter Zach,Sandra Viglášová,Helen E Roy,Alberto F Inghilesi,Karolis Kazlauskis,Tim Adriaens,Alois Honek,Oldřich Nedvěd,Antonio O Soares,Zdenka Martinkova,Ján Kulfan

doi:10.3389/fevo.2021.741854

Abstract

Wildlife observations submitted by volunteers through citizen science initiatives are increasingly used within research and policy. Ladybirds are popular and charismatic insects, with most species being relatively easy to identify from photographs. Therefore, they are considered an appropriate taxonomic group for engaging people through citizen science initiatives to contribute long-term and large-scale datasets for use in many different contexts. Building on the strengths of a mass participation citizen science survey on ladybirds in the United Kingdom, we have developed a mobile application for ladybird recording and identification across Europe. The main aims of the application are to: (1) compile distribution data for ladybird species throughout Europe, and use this to assess changes in distribution over time; (2) connect and engage people in nature and increase awareness about the diversity and ecological importance of ladybirds. In developing the application we first constructed a database including ladybird species from the United Kingdom, Czech Republic, Slovakia, Italy, Belgium, and Portugal with associated information on relevant morphological features (e.g., size, main color, pronotum pattern) to inform identification. Additionally, the species were assessed on the basis of probability of occurrence within each country which enables users to reduce the number of species to only those with relevance to the location of the recorder. This is amongst the first collaborative citizen science approaches aimed at involving participants across Europe in recording a group of insects. In the near future, we aim to expand the use of the application to all countries in Europe.

Highlights

Citizen science, otherwise known as public participation in scientific research or community science, can be a powerful tool to obtain data on insect diversity and abundance across larger spatial scales whilst simultaneously promoting education and awareness about insects (e.g., Eitzel et al, 2017; Gardiner and Roy, 2021)
Considering reports of global insect declines (e.g., Hallmann et al, 2017; Cardoso and Leather, 2019; Wagner et al, 2021), enhancing citizen science or community science, especially in areas where academic or professional infrastructure is lacking, was one of the immediate actions proposed by scientists when formulating a roadmap for insect conservation and recovery (Harvey et al, 2020)
The brightly colored forewing patterns of ladybirds enable relatively easy identification to species-level from photographs for most species (e.g., Jouveau et al, 2018)

Summary

INTRODUCTION

Otherwise known as public participation in scientific research or community science, can be a powerful tool to obtain data on insect diversity and abundance across larger spatial scales whilst simultaneously promoting education and awareness about insects (e.g., Eitzel et al, 2017; Gardiner and Roy, 2021). Information collated through the European Ladybird App will be openly available to address many potential questions but we focus on three main areas: (1) Understanding the ecology and distribution of ladybird species; (2) Informing ladybird conservation; (3) Education and engagement in biological recording and entomology. Long-term conservation trends for ladybirds are so far only available for very limited regions (e.g., United Kingdom; Roy and Brown, 2018) or databases (e.g., GBIF—the Global Biodiversity Information Facility) and we aim to use the European data to inform Red List assessments (Maes et al, 2015) the app has the potential to generate timely data on the arrival of new ladybird species in a country: for example in the United Kingdom, the first records of Oenopia conglobata L. were received via similar citizen science tools (Brown et al, 2015b). Connecting with nature is known to enhance the well-being of participants (Pritchard et al, 2020)

CONCLUSION

Findings

DATA AVAILABILITY STATEMENT