Every invasion starts out small

The forlorned look on Paul Gregory’s face (Maine Department of Environmental Protection) said it all – the worst of the worst aquatic invasives was indeed found in a small lagoon of lovely Damariscotta Lake near Jefferson, ME. That’s the bad news. The good news is that a volunteer lake monitor detected the infestation early, and so far the extent of the infestation appears limited to this lagoon. A legion of volunteers have answered the call for help and have dispatched to survey the remainder of the lake, urgently working in an attempt to beat the seasonal changes in the air. So far no other sites have been identified so it appears that hand removal of the plants may be possible, and containment fields and benthic barriers installed by DEP personnel may be sufficient at preventing further spread. This lake may well have been saved thanks to this one volunteer who made a keen observation and reported it.

The moral of this story is clear: the more eyes we have looking for unwanted invasives, the better. The message to students contributing to the Vital Signs invasive species data is also clear: your data observation may be the tip that saves an entire lake some day and rejoice when an invasive species is NOT FOUND!

13 + 17 + 21 = awesome

We started a year ago with 13 teacher advisors (blue). In a few short days we're welcoming 17 more (green). In a few short weeks we'll stir in 21 more (yellow). In a few short months we'll welcome their hundreds of students...and their hundreds of students' observations and projects and great ideas and....

Wow.

A distribution map is always handy when you have 51 PLUS to play and learn with.

First annual equipment blitz

2 days
3 GMRI-ers
3 volunteers
100 quadrats
15 weed weasels
15 kicknets

All ready for 37 new Vital Signs teachers to use with their students this coming fall!

Laura Seaver, teacher extraordinare from Old Orchard Beach's Loranger MS, pointed us to this Simpsons episode from 1998. "Bart the Mother" could be a good hook for students. Laura is going to show clips to classes this week as part of her ecosystem-health-biodiversity-invasive-species unit, and will report back on its success.

Episode synopsis:
"Bart accidentally kills a mother bird with Nelson Muntz's bee-bee gun, and tries his best to raise the mother's eggs on his own. But when the hatchlings turn out to be a pair of destructive lizards that harvest nests for their own survival, the town's bird population is placed at great risk. Guest voice Phil Hartman, in his final speaking role on The Simpsons" (http://wtso.net).

The Simpsons 1003 Bart the Mother

Feeling good

Petri has started working on the look & feel of the VS website. Your sneak peek....

Expert & peer review

All of a sudden our data review process has taken shape. Here's how we think it'll play out:

Expert Review
Sarah & Sarah will assign specific species to selected "experts." These expert reviewers will have the power to change the status of species identifications from Pending to Confirmed or Questioned. They will then suggest a different identification (as necessary), and leave a comment.

These special reviewers will be given this “expert reviewer status” on their profile page (community participation statistics).

Peer/ Community Review
All users will be able to suggest a different identification and comment on a data record. Clicking on username will help the community figure out if this is user is credible or not. Comments won't be limited to the species identification - we'll encourage notes on photographs, measurements, field notes, ....

No Edits!
Further, no one will be able to edit a data record once it has been submitted (not even species experts changing incorrect identifications). “Corrections” will be made on the Species Observation Detail page as suggested identifications and comments.

The big issue with this is that the map view may be confusing and terribly misleading to those who don’t understand the review process (They found hydrilla there!?!)…but it may work to our advantage to motivate discussion and drive people to find out more.

This approach is certainly in line with MCIAP and DEP wanting to be alerted of any species that looks "suspicious." And suggesting an identification and commenting both allow the data collector to change her mind after the fact - while preserving the valuable thought trail and data integrity.

Finding and not finding

We're trying on a new approach to reporting species. See how it fits.

Species was FOUND by Username on 2008-11-26 in Portland

Species was looked for but NOT FOUND by Username on 2008-11-26 in Portland

Gettin' tough on data entry

Gettin' tough on data entry

As the data entry wireframes shape up, we've had to make a few tough decisions:


1. No "Practice Data Entry" interface or separate website. It was a nice dream while it lasted. We've since convinced ourselves that practicing how to input data isn't really the learning we're after and slim chance it would improve data quality. Instead we'll encourage those who like practicing to do so with the paper form. Everyone else will just jump right in.

2. We're going to make everyone pick a species from the pulldown list. No unknowns. No write-ins. Use your brain, your resources, be brave, pick the closest species, back 'er up with evidence, and let the community do its magic. Our intended use is to go into the field armed with a known species to look for, and a hypothesis about whether it will be found or not, so this should work out just fine.

3. No more confidence ratings for species identifications. After polling and mulling, we're now sure that there's little if any learning in this very subjective rating process, and doesn't set novices up for any sort of success. Jenny Novice is "wicked sure" she found garlic mustard...expert reviewer says no way nicely)...Jenny Novice experiences a big and unfortunate bust in confidence.

LL Bean boot design overhaul

Invasive didymo (rock snot) and milfoil have lost a favorite vector....

How-to

We keep hearing from teachers that they want to "see it" before they "do it," so we started collecting how-to videos moons ago. The plan is to shoot more more more....building equipment, preparing for trips, collecting data, identifying certain species, telling look-alike species apart, eating invaders....

I've just retrieved videos from the Flip in preparation for building kicknets and weed weasels for the spring field season. Here are a few from Mike Denniston (Middle School of the Kennebunks). I have others of giddy students actually using the nets, but can't post faces. Use your imagination.

We think its important for the videos to be made by members of the VS community (motivating, accessible, real, la la la), so we'll be asking our student, teacher, and scientist types to shoot as often as they can in the early years. We're hoping teachers see how-to video production as a nice way for students to demonstrate learning.

How to build a kicknet that'll survive students & post-hurricane rapids for 9 years running:


How to keep equipment from clunking, crunching, and splashing: