Mumbai: Pench starts first citizen science-based bird survey

Citizen Science events are widely conducted in Western countries and recently, in many parts of India to collaborate and contribute in large-scale data collections

Pench TR, Maharashtra, started a science-based bird survey on Friday. The programme has been organised in collaboration with TINSA Ecological Foundation, an NGO involved in ecological research. It is for the first time that it is involving citizens in the survey from 11 states across India.

More than 125 Volunteers from 11 states are participating in the event, including 33 women. The age group varies from 18 to 74 years. Over 200 applications were received for the programme, and participants have been selected based on their experience with birds and interest levels. The team is accompanied by forest officials at protection camps.

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The aim is to collect baseline data on bird diversity and density using the Citizen Science Model. Citizen science events are widely conducted in Western countries and recently, in many parts of India to collaborate and contribute in large-scale data collection. This spreads conservation awareness to a broader community. The technique being used for the survey is adaptive line transect and point count method to record bird diversity between January 13 and 15.

The data will be collected on the Kobo Collect App, a free offline app which will record each bird sighting with its name, number of individuals and its geo-location. A baseline checklist of 310 species in Pench Tiger Reserve has already been created by Central India Bird Academy (CIBA), a Nagpur-based NGO. Pench Field Director A Shreelakshmi, Deputy Director Prabhu Nath Shukla, along with team members of TINSA and other forest officers and staff, were present along with participants at the event.