Latest news with #citizenScience
CTV News
7 days ago
- General
- CTV News
Why Calgary wants your mosquitoes – dead or alive!
They don't care if you kill it first, but city officials are asking Calgarians to send them their mosquitoes this summer. The City of Calgary is teaming up with the University of Calgary on a citizen science project examining mosquito ecology and the potential health implications of the invasive northern house mosquito, also known as culex pipiens. The process is simple: just head to the Inglewood Bird Sanctuary or Ralph Klein Park to grab a mosquito kit – which comes with a collection tube and label – and use it to collect mosquitoes encountered in the park during your visit, whether alive or dead and squished. You then fill out the label with the date, time and location, and drop off the sample in boxes within the parks. 'What we'll do, is then identify what the mosquito is, and that'll help us know where mosquitoes are throughout the city that are harassing people, and what species of mosquito they are,' said John Soghigian, an assistant professor of veterinary medicine at the University of Calgary. 'Of course, we also are still putting out traps all over the city and working with The City of Calgary to monitor mosquitoes, but sometimes it's hard to get at mosquitoes when they are actively seeking a host, so this helps us do that.' Calgary collecting mosquitoes from citizens for science Calgary is collecting mosquitoes from citizens for science in summer 2025. Alex Coker, an integrated pest management technician with the City of Calgary, says citizens will start to see more mosquito activity now that the temperatures have climbed. Calgary has 35 to 40 different mosquito species. All of them tend to lay their eggs near or in water. 'A lot of the mosquitoes we have here are floodwater mosquitoes, they use bodies of water that dry up multiple times through the year, so things like ditches are areas we tend to focus on when it comes to monitoring the larvae,' Coker said. She cautioned that they also breed in rain barrels and bird baths, something for homeowners to keep in mind. The City of Calgary uses a bacterial product to fight local mosquito populations. It's dispensed by spraying it into bodies of water. 'Basically, the way it works is that the mosquitoes will ingest it … and it gets activated once they eat it, and basically it creates pores in the lining of their gut, and that's what kills them.' If there is a lot of standing water throughout the city, officials can use an aerial program, which allows them to use a helicopter to apply the bacterial product to a large area over a short area of time. If you've ever wondered why city officials can't just attempt to eradicate all the mosquitoes, it's because they actually are vital to the ecosystem. Only female mosquitoes feed on blood; males rely solely on nectar as a food source, while females use both. Because both males and female feed on nectar, they do act as pollinators and also serve as a food source for a lot of species including birds and dragonflies, and also aquatic organisms like fish. Coker says mosquito numbers in Calgary typically peak in July.
Yahoo
25-05-2025
- Science
- Yahoo
Calling all fungi fans: the New Brunswick Museum needs your help
If you've ever dreamed of being a mushroom scientist, now is your chance. The New Brunswick Museum is starting a citizen science project to document the varieties of mushrooms in Atlantic Canada. Alfredo Justo, the museum's curator of botany and mycology, is leading the project and says he needs help. "This is going to be a big, years-long — if not decades-long — project," Justo told CBC Radio's Information Morning Saint John. "So we need all the help we can get from people interested in biodiversity and citizen scientists." Justo said getting involved starts in the field. "If you see a mushroom that looks interesting, or if you're actively collecting mushrooms, just take some photographs of the mushrooms, keep the mushrooms as if you were foraging. The difference is that you're going to preserve it for scientific study," he said. Justo said the collected mushrooms need to be dried using a dehydrator or fan at 60 C or below for 12 to 24 hours. They can be stored in a small plastic bag and then mailed to the museum. A portion of the mushrooms will become a part of the project's collection, while a small bit will be used for DNA sequencing. LISTEN | Mycology curator explains how citizen scientists can help gather mushroom data: Justo said the project is important because there are a lot of unknowns about the mycology of Atlantic Canada. "Mushrooms are really under studied, especially when we compare what we know about plants or big animals," he said. Justo said there are an estimated 3,000 species of mushrooms in the region, which is double the estimated number of plant species. But, there are only 10,000 mushroom samples at the New Brunswick Museum and 40,000 plant samples, "so, you see the disparity there," he said. "We need to get a lot of collections, just to get to the same baseline data that we have for plants or birds or mammals." Justo said the project will aim to bring our knowledge of fungi at the same level as other species and will help scientists in the future understand changes in the mushroom landscape in Atlantic Canada. "We will be able — in the future — to look back and say, 'Oh, this species was at this place 10 years ago. Is the species still there?'" For more information on the project and how to take part, visit
CBC
25-05-2025
- Science
- CBC
Calling all fungi fans: the New Brunswick Museum needs your help
If you've ever dreamed of being a mushroom scientist, now is your chance. The New Brunswick Museum is starting a citizen science project to document the varieties of mushrooms in Atlantic Canada. Alfredo Justo, the museum's curator of botany and mycology, is leading the project and says he needs help. "This is going to be a big, years-long — if not decades-long — project," Justo told CBC Radio's Information Morning Saint John. "So we need all the help we can get from people interested in biodiversity and citizen scientists." Justo said getting involved starts in the field. "If you see a mushroom that looks interesting, or if you're actively collecting mushrooms, just take some photographs of the mushrooms, keep the mushrooms as if you were foraging. The difference is that you're going to preserve it for scientific study," he said. Justo said the collected mushrooms need to be dried using a dehydrator or fan at 60 C or below for 12 to 24 hours. They can be stored in a small plastic bag and then mailed to the museum. A portion of the mushrooms will become a part of the project's collection, while a small bit will be used for DNA sequencing. Justo said the project is important because there are a lot of unknowns about the mycology of Atlantic Canada. "Mushrooms are really under studied, especially when we compare what we know about plants or big animals," he said. Justo said there are an estimated 3,000 species of mushrooms in the region, which is double the estimated number of plant species. But, there are only 10,000 mushroom samples at the New Brunswick Museum and 40,000 plant samples, "so, you see the disparity there," he said. "We need to get a lot of collections, just to get to the same baseline data that we have for plants or birds or mammals." Justo said the project will aim to bring our knowledge of fungi at the same level as other species and will help scientists in the future understand changes in the mushroom landscape in Atlantic Canada. "We will be able — in the future — to look back and say, 'Oh, this species was at this place 10 years ago. Is the species still there?'"
