Citizen science

Citizen observations are observations made by non-professionals. In Finland, citizen science constitutes a significant source of information, especially regarding animal and plant species.

Citizen science refers to other than professionally performed monitoring activities. Citizen science is of great importance, as volunteer observations can provide important additional information about the situation in the field. Especially with regard to animal and plant species, citizen science is often a key source of information.

Citizen science covers a wide range of different activities organized by various organizations and entities. Nature observations focus on animals and plants, while environmental observations can also concern, for example, the water level, snow and ice conditions, environmental pollution and other hydrological or environmental physical and chemical phenomena. In addition, the impact of people on nature or their living environment can be observed. Citizen science can also be related to other activities carried out through communal work, crowdsourcing or environmental restoration projects.

Campaigns for increased efficiency in gathering observations

The aim is to organize and guide citizen science activities in such a way that information can be collected in the most usable form. This ensures that the collected information is as applicable as possible for further use. Since certain phenomena in nature only occur under certain conditions, campaigns are often used to collect observations. For example, campaigns to observe the progress of winter or the appearance of cyanobacteria blooms in the summer will be announced at the time when it is possible to monitor these phenomena.

Campaigns make it easy to set clear goals and give instructions for making observations. Citizen science is also a lot about communication and encouraging participation. Observation campaigns are often combined with other crowd-sourced activities, such as environmental clean-up efforts or efforts to combat invasive species.

Observation campaigns, which focus for example on mapping or improving the status of natural habitats, can support national activities or regional activities of the ELY Centers. In this way, citizen science can directly influence the improvement of the environment.

How can I participate in citizen scinece?

Different research and other organizations organize citizen science on different topics

Species observations

The species observations you collect can be stored in the laji.fi service of the Finnish Biodiversity Info Facility, in the databases of the Finnish Museum of Natural History.

Observations in aquatic environments

You can participate in the collection of nature and environmental observations related to water bodies and the sea in the Meri- ja järviwiki service. On this Finnish Environment Institute platform, environmental professionals and citizens can together gather information about various hydrological phenomena. You can also send pictures and stories to the service, which can be useful for example in assessing the status of habitat types. Observation data can also be conveniently saved on a mobile phone via the observation transmitter.

For example, the cyanobacteria situation in water bodies and the ice cover of inland waters are observed through joint projects of the authorities and volunteers, where volunteer observers are trained for their task. The cyanobacteria bloom barometer can also be found in the Meri – ja järviwiki service.

The water situation information service of the vesi.fi website can be used to observe the water situation. In the future, vesi.fi and Meri-ja järviwiki, maintained by the Finnish Environment Institute, will be developed to be interoperable in such a way that findings reported to one service will also appear in the other.

There are more opportunities for participation offered by different organizers on the ymparisto.fi website.

Setting up a new observation campaign?

The Finnish Environment Institute’s citizen observation platform can be used to create automatic notification forms to collect citizen observations. It is very important to agree on these arrangements so that new observation campaigns can be seamlessly integrated with previously collected information or other ongoing activities. In addition, we can adapt existing forms for different websites or new service platforms.

If you want to propose new citizen observation campaigns or share cooperation ideas, you can contact the Finnish Environment Institute’s on-call citizen observation and crowdsourcing service by e-mail at: havaitsemaan@syke.fi.

This email address is also the right place to ask for help with possible problems or to ask questions about current Syke campaigns.