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Biological monitoring by citizens using Web-based photographic databases of fishes

Biodiversity and Conservation volume 23, pages 2383–2391 (2014)Cite this article

Abstract

The Internet has changed the way biologists communicate; this includes the collection of information on fish biology. This technological change may allow the possibility for biological monitoring by general citizens via the Internet. The Japanese Internet atlas of fishes, WEB sakana-zukan, has been in operation since 2002. It provides an opportunity to communicate and accumulate information on fish biology by amateur users, who consist mainly of sports fishing fans. This website has functioned not only as an entertainment and educational tool for users with an environmental and ichthyological interest. To date, more than 35,000 photographs of fishes have been registered on the website by more than 1,000 unique users, and more than 37,500 photographs of fishes have been posted in its bulletin board system (linking approximately 28,000 photographs to the website) by more than 2,000 unique users. As these photographs almost always include time and locality data, it is possible to provide distribution data by publishing the information as scientific papers or registering them as collections at the Kanagawa Prefectural Museum of Natural History (the Image Database of Fishes (KPM-NR) contributing to the Global Biodiversity Information Facility). If the communication method is developed and improved, various scientists will be able to collect much more biodiversity data from general citizens via the Internet.

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Acknowledgments

We would like to thank K. Matsuura, R. Takahashi, H. Konishi, T. Nomura, H. Izumi, N. Miwa, S. Matsui, K. Miyamoto, M. Watai, and all users of the both databases for helping health managements. We also thank two anonymous reviewers for valuable comments. This work has been partly supported by Grants-in-Aids from Ministry of Education, Culture, Sports, Science and Technology, Japan (to Y. Miyazaki, no. 25·11038).

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Kanagawa Prefectural Museum of Natural History, 499 Iryuda, Odawara-shi, Kanagawa, 250-0031, Japan

    Yusuke Miyazaki & Hiroshi Senou

  2. Laboratory of Ichthyology, Faculty of Marine Science, Tokyo University of Marine Science and Technology, 4-5-7 Konan, Minato-ku, Tokyo, 108-8477, Japan

    Atsunobu Murase

  3. Uwajima Fisheries High School, 1-2-20 Meirin-chou, Uwajima-shi, Ehime, 798-0068, Japan

    Masato Shiina

  4. Zukan.com, Inc., 907 Suncuore Tower, 4-3-1 Nakano, Nakano-ku, Tokyo, 164-0001, Japan

    Kenichi Naoe, Ryosuke Nakashiro, Junichi Honda & Junichiro Yamaide

Authors
  1. Yusuke Miyazaki
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  2. Atsunobu Murase
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  3. Masato Shiina
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  4. Kenichi Naoe
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  5. Ryosuke Nakashiro
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  6. Junichi Honda
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  7. Junichiro Yamaide
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  8. Hiroshi Senou
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Correspondence to Yusuke Miyazaki.

Additional information

Communicated by Dirk Sven Schmeller.

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Miyazaki, Y., Murase, A., Shiina, M. et al. Biological monitoring by citizens using Web-based photographic databases of fishes. Biodivers Conserv 23, 2383–2391 (2014). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10531-014-0724-4

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s10531-014-0724-4

Keywords

  • Global Biodiversity Information Facility (GBIF)
  • Image
  • Internet community
  • Museum collection
  • Secondary source
  • Voucher

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