Abstract
Crowdsourcing can be a useful tool for the early detection of invasive species. Invasive wild pigs (Sus scrofa) have been reported in Ontario, Canada. We compared trends in reporting frequency of wild pig sightings to trends in media events that included directions for the public on where to submit their wild pig sightings. We found that media events occurring on the same week, and in up to two weeks before the sighting was reported significantly increased the number of wild pig reports we received. Our findings suggest that media can be used to increase participation by the public. Because of this relationship, our findings also imply that reporting frequency alone cannot accurately index real changes in wild pig numbers—participants were more likely to report sightings after they had been exposed to relevant media, and spikes in the number of reports tracked our outreach efforts. Despite this limitation, reports of wild pig sightings from community members remain a cost-effective tool to detect low-density invasive species across large regions, and participation in the program can be increased with periodic news media and social media blitzes.
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Acknowledgements
We thank Paula Julio, Scott Pynn, Bree Walpole, Jeremy Downe, Chris Heydon, and Tore Buchanan for their contribution to our provincial reporting and monitoring system for invasive wild pigs in Ontario. We thank Paula Julio, Casey Nash, Jennifer MacDonald, Favelle Maschke-Michell, and Jolanta Kowalski for facilitating our media outreach. Thanks to Keith Munro and Ryan Brook for helping to share our message with the public and to Hance Ellington and Phil DeWitt for discussions about analyses. We thank the media outlets and reporters that supported our outreach efforts. We offer a special thank-you to the public for reporting wild pig sightings to us.
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Our research was funded by the Ontario Ministry of Natural Resources and Forestry.
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Both authors are employees of the Ontario Ministry of Natural Resources and Forestry.
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Koen, E.L., Newton, E.J. Outreach increases detections of an invasive species in a crowdsourced monitoring program. Biol Invasions 23, 2611–2620 (2021). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10530-021-02526-3
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s10530-021-02526-3