360 Monitoring Threatened Species and Ecological Communities
Introduction
BirdLife Australia (BirdLife) is a conservation and advocacy organisation.
Improving the conservation outcomes for Australian birds is embedded in the
organisation’s Strategic Plan, and while the overall organisational aim is directed at
Australian birds generally, much of the work that BirdLife Australia engages in is
directed towards threatened species conservation. The organisation has been
involved in conservation programs for over a dozen threatened species, including
regent honeyeater Anthochaera phrygia, swift parrot Lathamus discolor, Australian
painted snipe Rostratula australis, Australasian bittern Botaurus poiciloptilus, and
many more threatened species are part of broader bird conservation projects. This
work ranges from simple monitoring projects where observations are collated in a
centralised database, through to ongoing leadership in captive-release programs
and the intensive monitoring involved in these activities. The organisation’s
conservation programs, which have historically developed in a somewhat ad hoc
way in response to opportunities and funding emphases, are now gradually being
articulated through the Conservation Action Planning process (TNC 2007).
Citizen science is an important part of BirdLife’s threatened species monitoring
and conservation programs, but what makes citizen science programs successful?
This is a question that the organisation has not always explicitly considered, despite
BirdLife (and its previous incarnations the Royal Australian Ornithologists Union
and Birds Australia) engaging ‘citizen scientists’ within its science programs for
more than 60 years. Although BirdLife has a long history of using volunteers in its
research and conservation programs, the experiences of these participants are
rarely surveyed or measured, although the Threatened Bird Network does
periodically survey program participants (Weston et al. 2003; Upton 2016).
Much of the content for this chapter was developed through discussion with
project managers and officers within BirdLife Australia working across threatened
species citizen science based projects including:
● (^) Beach-nesting Birds project (2006–present), which protects nesting shorebirds
through community involvement, applied research and adaptive management.
● (^) Shorebirds 2020 (2007–present), which collects data on migratory shorebirds
(Chapter 11).
● (^) Powerful Owl Project in Sydney (2011–present).
● (^) Black Cockatoo Projects in south-western WA (2001–present).
● (^) Threatened Bird Network (1996–present), which is designed to match
volunteers with field-based threatened bird conservation and research.
Four inter-related key elements were identified by project managers and officers
as important to a citizen science program. The collection of useful and useable data
is a high priority. Developing ways of engaging with, and retaining volunteers, is
equally important. The delivery of conservation actions is important for retaining