CaBA London 03 Alice Hall, Thames21

THAMES RIVER WATCH AND LOVE THE LEA

Thames River Watch and Love the Lea | 2nd October 2015 | © Thames21

Alice Hall

THAMES21’S WORK

1 Thames River Watch and Love the Lea | 2nd October 2015 | © Thames21

CITIZEN SCIENCE MONITORING


Many benefits of citizen science monitoring

• Improving understanding in the issues affecting London’s waterways

• Raising awareness through education work in schools

• Gathering really valuable data

- influence decisions about management of waterways

- communicate messages to a wider audience

Geographical areas

• Thames River Watch

• Love the Lea

• Ravensbourne

• Brent

LOVE THE LEA


THAMES RIVER WATCH: A NEW PROJECT

6 Thames River Watch | 14th July 2015 | © Thames21

Engaging Londoners in the tidal Thames

Citizen Science leading to an important data set for the tidal Thames

Understanding the health of the tidal Thames

THAMES RIVER WATCH: GETTING SET UP

7 Thames River Watch | 14th July 2015 | © Thames21

What to monitor?

Which monitoring equipment to use?

How to engage people, schools and businesses?

How to equip volunteers with skills for citizen science monitoring?

How to gather data from volunteers?

THAMES RIVER WATCH: GETTING STARTED


What to monitor?

• Water quality

• Litter

• Invasive non-native species



Which monitoring equipment to use?

• Appropriate for monitoring the

conditions in the tidal Thames

• Affordable to give to team of

citizen science volunteers

How to engage people, schools and

businesses?

• Thames21 works with over

20,000 volunteers each year

• Project identity and branding



How to equip volunteers with skills for citizen science monitoring?



How to gather data from volunteers?

THAMES RIVER WATCH: UP AND RUNNING


Project was launched in February 2014

Big Count events held in February 2015

• Celebrate the achievement of our citizen science volunteers,

• Worked with experts to analyse and interpret data

• Communicate the messages of the project to a wider audience,

• Recruit new volunteer to the project

THAMES RIVER WATCH: 2015 AND BEYOND


2015 • Core work continues - training new volunteers, delivering education

work, keeping the interest of the volunteers already involved

• Greater focus this year on litter monitoring

• Big Count events in 2016

What next? • Perhaps include laboratory monitoring of emerging chemicals, heavy

metals and micro-plastics

• Creating community hubs to bring citizen science volunteers together.

BLUE GREEN INFRASTRUCTURE


CaBA London 03 Alice Hall, Thames21

Environment

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