Citizen Science Participation during a Magicicada Emergence

      Citizen science has become a rapidly-growing tool through out the academic community, as it both encourages the public engagement of science and supports academic research, especially in the fields of ecology and... [ view full abstract ]

      Citizen science has become a rapidly-growing tool through out the academic community, as it both encourages the public engagement of science and supports academic research, especially in the fields of ecology and environmental science. Members of the nonacademic community are able to contribute data-collection and observations to large-scale projects that would otherwise be difficult to obtain. To better understand the distribution of the Brood V 17-year periodical cicada (Hemiptera: Cicadidae: Magicicada spp.) emergence of 2016, citizen scientists were invited to provide observation and occurrence data via several methods. We enlisted public participation via a dedicated website hosted by Marshall University that allowed citizen scientists to provide location data about cicada emergence,location, and abundance. We collected over 400 records via the website, greatly enhancing our understanding of the species’ distribution. Spatially, citizen scientist observations were correlated with human population densities.Temporally, reports fluctuated over the duration of emergence, suggesting that this type of citizen science participation may capture biologically relevant,fine-scale temporal data reflecting regional weather patterns.