Volunteer Macroinvertebrate Monitoring: Assessing Training Needs through Examining Error and Bias in Untrained Volunteers

Abstract

BRIDGES is a recurring feature of J-NABS intended to provide a forum for the interchange of ideas and information between basic and applied researchers in benthic science. Articles in this series will focus on topical research areas and linkages between basic and applied aspects of research, monitoring policy, and education. Readers with ideas for topics should contact Associate Editors Nick Aumen and Marty Gurtz. Citizen monitoring groups are an important source of data needed to assess the status of streams and rivers. Scientists and other resource management professionals are striving to increase the involvement of citizens, and to improve the quality of the data they collect. In this article, Nerbonne and Vondracek address the ability of volunteers to correctly sort and identify benthic macroinvertebrates. The authors demonstrate the effects that macroinvertebrate size and motility have on the results of volunteer efforts, and relate these results to the use of 2 different taxonomic keys available from volunteer monitoring programs. Specific recommendations are made to improve volunteer monitoring programs.