Can Citizen Scientists Avert Australia’s Biodiversity Crisis?

Can Citizen Scientists Avert Australia’s Biodiversity Crisis?

Can Citizen Scientists Avert Australia’s Biodiversity Crisis? In 2023, a Queenslander noticed an interesting clam in the river waters of Ipswich, a town outside of Brisbane. She took a picture and uploaded it to the citizen scientist platform iNaturalist.  The images were of freshwater gold clams, a highly invasive species that was, up to that point, found everywhere except Australia and Antarctica.  That one image triggered Australia’s new biosecurity alert service, which enabled environmental officers to immediately remove the clams and set up a monitoring program to check their spread. Australia is in the midst of a biodiversity crisis, and while the country has strict biosecurity controls, invasive plants, animals and diseases are getting into the country, either intentionally or inadvertently. Freshwater gold clams (also known as Asian clams) found in the Brisbane River in Australia and shared on iNaturalist. Credit: Tommi Mason / iNaturalist To help identify, track and manage invasive…