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Proposal Name
Web tools to identify, report, and map invasive species.
Fifth year continuation of cooperative agreement 04CRAG0005.
Agreement's Principal Investigator:
Dr. John Pickering, Discover Life,
706-543-1115
pick@discoverlife.org
Agreement's Administrative Contact:
Kevin Weick
617-484-6428
wickkd@aol.com
Agreement's USGS Technical Representative
Annie Simpson, National Biological Information Infrastructure
703-648-4281
asimpson@usgs.gov
1.0 INTRODUCTION
This is a fifth year continuation of a cooperative agreement to develop technology to overcome the major hurdles that greatly impeded citizens from contributing to the study and management of biological diversity. We need interactive identification guides that can be successfully used by experts and non-experts. We also need Web-based tools that empower everyone to contribute biodiversity information, allow the viewing of maps that filter data by source and reliability, and perform data validation and cleaning. There is a parallel a need for training in the use of these biodiversity tools.
2.0 BACKGROUND
The USGS' National Biological Information Infrastructure is a Web-based system to provide better accessibility to our nation's biological resources for land managers, decision-makers, and the general public; it has a broad partner base from government, academia, and the private sector. The partner of this cooperative agreement is The Polistes Foundation, the 501-c-3 non-profit umbrella organization of Discover Life, an online information system whose mission is to assemble and share knowledge about nature in order to improve education, health, agriculture, economic development, and conservation throughout the world.
This collaboration is part of a DOI-mandated project to create a national framework for invasive species early detection, rapid assessment, and rapid response. Successful early detection of invasive species can only be accomplished through the implementation of a series of components:
- A. Identification and Validation
- B. Reporting
- C. Expert Verification
- D. Occurrence Databases
- E. Rapid Assessment
- F. Planning
- G. Rapid Response
The partnership with The Polistes Foundation is making significant advancements and contributing deliverables in the areas of identification, expert verification, occurrence databases, rapid assessment, and rapid response.
3.0 SCOPE
This fifth year continuation of the cooperative agreement will focus on four main areas:
- 1. Creation of a mobile device interface for interactive species identification guides and occurrence mapping
- 2. Development of and training in the use of biodiversity data cleaning and data interoperability tools, for use at local and global levels
- 3. Support and development of the regional citizen science network, the Invasive Plant Atlas of New England (IPANE)
- 4. Development of interactive identification guides for bee species of the Midwestern and Western United States
3.1 Servers
At no charge to users, The Polistes Foundation will serve identification guides, images, maps, and databases through existing Discover Life servers into the foreseeable future. The IPANE system will continue to be served from the Center for International Earth Science Information Network (CIESIN), also at no charge to users. If at some point the collaborators are unable to continue serving the information generated during this collaboration, they will transfer the guides, mapped information, and associated databases to a non-profit organization or government agency so that service to users is not interrupted.
3.2 Copyright
The PI and other contributors will retain ownership and exclusive copyright, with all rights reserved, to any illustrations, photographs, maps, text, or databases that they place in the guides or elsewhere on the Discover Life or associated Websites. The Polistes Corporation does the same for the 20q software that serves the guides, and Topozone.com, for the mapping software and services it provides.
3.3 Security
During this collaboration, the investigators and partners will have no access to USGS restricted information nor require access to government infrastructure. All work will be performed at University or other non-federal locations.
4.0 PROJECTS, PROGRESS, AND EXPECTED DELIVERABLES
4.1 Project:
Creation of a mobile device interface for interactive species identification guides and occurrence mapping
Understanding and managing the impact of invasive species, weather, fire, pollution, and other environmental changes on biological systems is a mammoth task. Fortunately, because of recent advances in technology and statistics, it is now feasible to collect and integrate information from a large number of study sites, tease out the response of populations to natural events, and gain understanding into their environmental requirements and interactions. Data collected in the field using relatively inexpensive hand-held devices is more easily gathered and standardized. This new project will take advantage of the popularity of small data collection devices, and based on the ID Nature Guides of Discover Life, a new graphic user interface will be designed specifically for hand-held devices, in order to facilitate data collection and species identification and mapping in the field.
- 4.1.1 Expected FY08 Deliverables
For this new project, the existing Discover Life Web-based information system will be redesigned with miniature graphics and a touch-screen capability. It is expected that most hand held devices with Internet browsers will be able to use this new graphic user interface for mobile devices.
4.2 Project:
Development of and training in the use of biodiversity data cleaning and data interoperability tools, for use at local and global levels
In cooperation with the Global Biodiversity Information Facility (for which the NBII is the institutional lead in the US) and the Global Invasive Species Information Network (which is coordinated by the NBII), Discover Life will develop tools for biodiversity and invasive species data interoperability and mapping.
- 4.2.1 FY07 Progress
Since inception, Discover Life has had a total of 248 million hits. In March, 2008, it served 12.3 million pages and images to 200,000 different IP addresses.
A formal agreement was signed between the Global Biodiversity Information Facility and The Polistes Foundation, to collaborate on data cleaning tools and biodiversity map services at a global level.
The Data Providers Workshop for training and implementation of the Global Invasive Species Information Network (GISIN) system was postponed from September 2007 at NBII's request, but has been reprogrammed for 02-05 June 2008, with approximately 20 participants accepting the meeting invitation for which The Polistes Foundation will provide logistics.
- 4.2.2 Expected FY08 Deliverables
The Polistes Foundation will refine and create additional algorithms for the data cleaning tool for species locations. It will include the calculation of centroid latitude/longitude equivalents for place names, auto correction of lat/long errors based on place names, and flagging of adjusted information. The data cleaning functionality will be shared with the NBII, GBIF, and other partners with Discover Life.
Logistics and coordination of the GISIN data providers' workshop will take place in April-June. Discover Life will also become a data provider and data consumer for the GISIN system.
4.3 Project:
Support and development of the regional citizen science network, the Invasive Plant Atlas of New England (IPANE)
The Invasive Plant Atlas of New England (IPANE) is a cornerstone of our developing national system of regional invasive plant species early detection networks. It uses a unique combination of scientific expertise for training and quality control and a dedicated cadre of trained volunteers to generate new information on plant invasions in New England. IPANE also provides access to herbarium and museum data on nonnative invasive plant distributions in the region.
- 4.3.1 FY07 General Progress
- IPANE Business Plan - An outline has been drawn up that includes the components of a business plan and questions for the IPANE partners. We have had 2 IPANE Steering Committee meetings (UCONN, New England Wild Flower Society, and Silvio O. Conte Fish & Wildlife Service; CIESIN was telephoned to discuss parts of the BP outline) to discuss current status of IPANE initiatives and staff, future goals and opportunities, and products and services to be offered by IPANE. The business plan is being fleshed out and a budget that reflects the goals outlined therein is being prepared.
- Administrative Structure - The positive and negative aspects of the current administrative structure has been presented to the IPANE Steering Committee by the Program Director (LJM). A new frame work of staff, Steering Committee, Advisory Board has been developed. In this draft the Advisory Board will be created from New England people with an additional subset of Long-distance advisors who will be contacted for their expertise, when needed, by telephone.
Advisory board members will represent various agencies and organizations. Names of possible Advisory board members have been presented but no action has been taken.
- Integrate and check IPANE data - CIESIN staff and IPANE staff have had one meeting and exchanged numerous telephone calls and email about the IPANE website and databases. We have established a priority list of actions (first of which is to insure that the existing IPANE website and databases work easily and faultlessly). We have established protocols for evaluating this and for data entry tests as well as a current data analysis. With CIESIN we have developed a priority list that reflects the needs of the current SOW and projected work plans. Protocols to accept disparate datasets are being developed by CIESIN as one of our IPANE priorities.
- 4.3.2 Expected FY08 Deliverables
The proposed IPANE tasks for funding that would begin in April 2008 are listed below. It should be noted that if funding is available for less than twelve months, there will be a downward adjustment to the number and the detail of these deliverables:
- 4.3.2.1 Early Detection Alert System - New England, Maritime Canada, possibly NY, NJ, and PA. - This new deliverable will be either an email program or list serve that would be limited access (maybe) that would be used to notify key people (state regulatory people, state early detection task force people, Conservation organizations, management and control types about a potentially invasive species new to the region or an invasive species already known in part of the region that seems to be rapidly expanding. A hierarchical approach to reporting and verification will be established as part of this project.
- 4.3.2.2 County early detection lists - There is value to having reliable, computer-generated early detection list for each of New England's 67 counties that can be delivered "on the fly." Working with CIESIN, IPANE will develop lists of early detection species based on existing IPANE data. These lists will also be useful for filling in known or suspected data gaps and help the IPANE.
- 4.3.2.3 Network of LEDSs for New England - Localized Early Detection Sites (LEDSs) are being established in FY08 on small areas with a clearly defined geography such as a national park, a wildlife refuge, or a group of conservation areas, botanical gardens, or an island that includes some of these places. LEDSs can include trained staff, citizen scientists, or both who can report sightings of a small number of site-specific early detection invasive species and comprise a Localized Early Detection Network for New England.
- 4.3.2.4 Restructuring IPANE training sessions - This new effort is to increase IPANE's output of data and better serve volunteers and the public. This will include developing new teaching and training tools to facilitate identification of invasive plants.
- 4.3.2.5 Online IPANE training tools - In FY08, the IPANE website will be used to put the IPANE training manual, handouts, tutorials, etc., on line.
- 4.3.2.6 Field work in northern new England - Northern New England (especially northern Maine) has not been well surveyed because of its remoteness, wilderness areas, and because IPANE has very few volunteers from that region (around 10 in all of northern Maine). There may or may not be high numbers of invasive species in that region. These data are necessary for developing predictive models and early detection lists. In FY08, this effort will be to develop creative ways of solving this data shortage issue.
- 4.3.2.7 IPANE Outreach, Data Gathering, and Field Work
- FY07 Progress: The IPANE attended meetings of the CT invasive Plant Council, the CT Invasive Plant Working Group 2008 symposium planning committee, and the Massachusetts Invasive Plant Advisory Group. By telephone IPANE has assisted the Maine Department of Agriculture, the CT Department of Environmental Protection, the Massachusetts Nature Conservancy, the National Nature Conservancy's Invasive Species Initiative, and has answered numerous phone and email requests for information. The IPANE director attended a meeting with the counterpart program the Invasive Plant Atlas of the MidSouth (IPAMS) and was an invited speaker at a Northeast Region National Park Service Resource Manager's meeting, where he presented the idea of Localized Early Detection Sites (LEDS) for each park in the region (a LEDS network implementation is now under discussion). The IPANE director serves on the national meeting steering committee of the Cooperative Weed Management Areas (CWMA) meeting to be held in April in Reno, NV as the chair of the volunteer section (presenting on lessons learned from IPANE). The IPANE director had an abstract accepted for the 2008 Weeds Across Borders meeting in Banff about IPANE's LEDS program and how it will work with partners in Maritime Canada. The director continues to add data records to the IPANE database from specimens collected during the 2007 field season and has also been trying new ways of encouraging the network of over 900 trained volunteers to submit more information.
- FY08 Deliverables: The director of IPANE will continue to serve on and facilitate the use of IPANE data to a variety of existing and new committees, agencies, and organizations such as the Connecticut Invasive Plants Council, the Massachusetts Invasive Plant Advisory Group, the US Forest Service, and The Nature Conservancy; to present informational seminars when invited; to work with Federal Agencies such as USGS to develop the protocols for a National Early Detection Network; to assist other similar programs such as IPAMS; to serve on planning committees for regional and national symposia such as the 2008 Natural Area Association's meeting (focusing on invasive species) to be held in October 2008 in Nashville, TN where he is on the Early Detection planning committee and will be hosting a session and presenting on IPANE's LEDS network; and to continue to gather data from various sources in New England that can be incorporated into the IPANE program. The primary field focus for FY08 will be to collect data for hard-to-recognize species and for the under-surveyed areas in the 6 state region.
- 4.3.2.8 The National EDRR tool kit -
- FY07 Progress: Working Dr. Randy Westbrooks of USGS, IPANE has created EDRR (Early Detection Rapid Response) reference documents that will be made available through a tool kit that will be hosted by the IPANE website.
- FY08 Deliverables: IPANE, with USGS scientists, will continue to develop components for the National EDRR Tool Kit and to work with states and provincial governments in Northeastern North America to form EDRR Task Forces that are part of the national system. IPANE has met with CIESIN to ensure the upload of the existing pieces of the tool kit will take place in FY08.
- 4.3.2.9 On-line guide to woody vines -
- FY07 Progress: A meeting date to work on this project is being discussed, to determine when Discover Life staff can travel to UCONN to work on this.
- FY08 Deliverables: IPANE will work with Dr. John Pickering of Discover Life to develop an online nature guide to the woody vines of the northeast, with special emphasis on those that are considered invasive in the region. IPANE volunteers may be used to gather data and images and botanical organization members and staff such as those of the New England Wild Flower Society, Arnold Arboretum, New England Botanical Club, Connecticut Botanical Society, etc. will be enlisted to help with data gathering and field testing of the on-line identification guide.
- 4.3.2.10 Sustainable IPANE funding - Sustainable funding is needed in order to maintain the level of excellence and service that IPANE has been able to achieve with start-up funds obtained from federal agencies. Using the business plan being developed for IPANE, the object of this effort in FY08 is to market that plan to a variety of agencies, NGOs, non-profit groups, universities, and granting organizations, and to include creative marketing of some of IPANE's services in order to develop a sustainable funding base for IPANE for the foreseeable future.
4.4 Project:
Development of interactive identification guides for bee species of the Western United States
Pollinator species are in significant decline throughout North America. The 4000 species of bees found in the United States are the primary pollinators of plants, both native and non-native, as well as many agricultural crops. In response to this situation the Department of Interior and other agencies and organizations have joined together to form the North American Pollinator Protection Campaign (http://www.nappc.org/). Groups at Interior (Patuxent Wildlife Research Center), USDA (Logan Native Bee Laboratory), and various academic groups have completed much of the work necessary to best survey and monitor native bees (http://online.sfsu.edu/~beeplot) and are beginning to survey bees in National Parks, Refuges, states, and other geographic areas.
- 4.4.1 Progress in FY05 to present
A grant was received from NBII to work on Native Bee Identification Guides for Eastern North America (http://www.discoverlife.org/20/q?search=Apoidea). With that money and some from the Ambrose Monell Foundation and the Fish and Wildlife Foundation, the project has created a set of 68 separate identification guides for 775 species of bees east of the Mississippi covering all of Canada and the U.S. Since males and females have to be identified separately, this actually works out to building guides for 1550 kinds of things. During that time project members have written over 1460 identification characters for the guides and taken, borrowed with permission, and drawn over 4500 illustrations of species and characters of species.
All species now have at least provisional guides. There are a number of taxonomic issues such as misidentified species, taxonomic naming issues, and species new to science that have prevented the creation of a definitive list. However, the development of these guides has already stimulated taxonomic and molecular revisions to several genera by project collaborators. These guides are now the standard for taxonomic authorities and identification of bees in Eastern North America and are used by hundreds of people. Project members now hold quarterly identification workshops for bee researchers from throughout the U.S. and Canada to teach species level identification using these guides.
- 4.4.2 Expected FY08 Deliverables
This year the guides will be pushed westward, into the Midwest and in some cases throughout all of the U.S. and Canada. This is quite a large task because most of the 4000 bee species in the U.S. occur in the West. Currently, identification guides to bee species in the West are absent or limited to out-of-date literature. Approximately 500 of western bees do not even have published names. This project's money will be used, along with funds from several other grants, to expand the number of species in the guides westward and to contract an illustrator to help illustrate additional key characteristics.
5.0 TIMELINE
The work period of the FY08 funding agreement for these four projects will be from 15 APR 2008 to 14 APR 2009. Project 4.3 (IPANE) currently has funding allocated for 8.5 months, and is eligible for additional funds for the remaining 3.5 months of the agreement if funds become available later in the fiscal year.
Progress reports will be submitted at six months at the finalization of the agreement.
6.0 BUDGET
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