Getting some help with bee ID

I thoroughly enjoyed the recent Woomargama Bioblitz event. You might be familiar with the Bioblitz concept – surveying an area for plants and animals and recording what is found. When you’ve got experts along to help, as they did in Woomargama, it’s a fantastic opportunity to improve your own knowledge as well as see things you might not otherwise notice or be able to identify. The data from this Bioblitz was uploaded into the national biodiversity aggregator, the Atlas of Living Australia. With so little known about so many of our Australian species, surveys such as this are invaluable for adding to our collective knowledge. 

But did you also know you don’t have to be an expert to make a contribution?

A new website developed by Museum Victoria, BowerBird.org.au, offers us all the chance to have our sightings of flora and fauna identified by experts and potentially added to the Atlas of Living Australia. 

Here’s how it works. After creating a free account, you can upload photos, a description and the location of what you’ve seen. You can identify the species yourself if you know. Or ask for assistance from the many experts involved with the site.

I uploaded some photos of native bees I took at an event at Wirraminna in Burrumbuttock. I tried to get close and took shots from various angles to provide much detail as possible for identification. A camera with macro is great, but even my pictures taken with my phone sufficed.

Dr Ken Walker from Museum Victoria identified the bees as Leioproctus versicolor on BowerBird and encouraged me to add other sightings. You bet!

Image: a screen shot from the BowerBird site of my submission and Dr Ken Walker's response.

Projects are another feature of the site. A project can be a place or an event, where everyone can add and view sightings. So ‘Nail Can Hill’ might be a project. Other users have set up projects of their backyards and schools, and yes, even Bioblitz events.

You can also ‘follow’ particular people, organisations or projects on BowerBird, so that you see the content that interests you most. You won’t be surprised to hear I’m following the ‘Australian bees’ project.

Want to know more? Dr Ken Walker will be presenting a series of ‘talks, walks and gawks’ in our area between November 5th and 7th, including sessions about the BowerBird website. For details see here. 

An edited version of this article appeared in the Living Lightly column of the Border Mail and online on Saturday 26th October.

BioBlitz 2013 at Woomargama

This year's local BioBlitz was a ripper, with some unexpected spring sunshine to keep us cheery and the bonus of a photography workshop with nature photojournalist Esther Beaton as icing on the cake.

In case you're not familiar with the BioBlitz concept, it involves a bunch of folks "surveying" a particular area and noting the various species that are spotted. An internet search for 'bioblitz' will show they are held around the world. This one was co-ordinated by the Slopes to Summit partnership within the Great Eastern Ranges initiative and involved a stack of partners and contributors. It was based in Woomargama, with surveys undertaken over three days, in the national park as well as on nearby private property.

A wander in these parts is enjoyable at any time, but this event provides an opportunity to share in the knowledge of the ecologists and specialists who participate ... and you'd be amazed how much more you'll see and how much you can learn by joining in a two-hour survey or two. In addition to surveys, both traps and cameras were also placed in the park with more than a few cute critters captured (and released!) or caught on film. On Friday and Saturday nights, spotlighting surveys also revealed some of the nocturnal residents.

The photography workshop was held at Slate Hill and drew on some of this private property's features, including woodland, orchids and spectacular views. Esther's tips were useful for both beginners and more experienced photographers alike and the four-hour session breezed past quickly as we chatted and clicked and laughed our way along.

Images: Some shots taken during the photography workshop, where we were encouraged to play with perspective, texture and light. Click the image to view more and/or larger pics from the BioBlitz.

It was also a treat to be in a survey group with Esther the next day, and to see her in action in the field photographing people, the landscape and the other species within it. 

Nigel Jones and Tiffany Mason from Nature Conservation Trust were on hand to enlighten us on this survey and gave excellent context to the Woomargama Station bush we visited and many of the species we spotted.

For me another highlight was seeing this lace monitor. It climbed one tree but decided we were still too close so it returned down the trunk, ambled along the ground and then up into the relative safety of a much taller tree. Our guess was it was at least 1.2 metres long. We marvelled at the "lace" pattern of its skin and its dinosaur-like features.

You can read more about this BioBlitz here or view some more of my photos at this event here.

Update on 2013-10-31 11:15 by Karen

Thanks to Sam Niedra from Slopes to Summit, I've also found out that you can view a selection of photos from many participants in the BioBlitz (and nature photography workshop) including some by Esther Beaton on Flickr here.