Call for Cat-Loving Citizen Scientists

[Becky]

National Geographic featured an article recently on "Cat Watch", regarding cat conservation and the desperate need for citizen scientists to help identify cats in hundreds of thousands of images from their camera traps.

You can read about the details here: http://voices.nationalgeographic.com/...

[Becky]

Okay, I have to say that this website is INCREDIBLY addictive! Here is where you can actually help identify the images from the capture cameras: https://www.zooniverse.org/projects/p...

I'm learning how to identify a LOT of different African antelopes, but also saw zebra, porcupines, warthogs, baboons, aardvark, an African civet, a jackal, and a caracal. So much fun - I highly recommend it!

[Kikyosan]

thanks for the suggestion.
I wonder....canis actually ANYONE allowed to identify animals on this site? what if someone is not a serious user? Btw, I love this site!!

[Becky]

They give you a tutorial on what to look for (identifying marks that differentiate various animals) and then each photo is viewed by 10 different citizen scientists so that consensus can be reached. When in doubt, you can also notify the scientists running the program and they will confirm what you're seeing (if they can tell - sometimes the photos are pretty baffling!)

They just finished the first batch (from 3 years ago) and will soon be putting up another season, with new locations and animals. Right now, the site is down because they are making some software changes/improvements. I've learned so much, though - it's definitely worth the wait!

[Kikyosan]

I tried it yesterday. It's really addicting...
A lot of "nothing here" and "vehicle"...when I found an animal I was as happy as a photohunter!! :D
But...some shots are very unclear and you have to be very careful. You obviously speak as a scientific-minded person, but I wonder if everyone on that site is so serious and dedicated. I mean, when you find a leg of a hartebeest, are you sure that anyone there is able to tell it from a whatever other African bovid's leg?
However, great time killer :D thanks a lot!