The potential for harvesting non-native species data collected by citizen scientists

Non-native species have a large impact on ecosystems nationwide.  However, we have been unable to efficiently and effectively control these species as a result of spatial and temporal data gaps.  The scientific community has been reluctant to adopt data contributed by citizen science organizations even though these groups could greatly increase our data harvesting capabilities.  A primary reason for this is a strong concern over data quality.  We conducted a national scale survey to determine what type of non-native species data are being collected by citizen science organizations and what is being done with that data following collection.  The results of this survey will be compared to those of a previous national survey that looked at non-native species data collected by professionals in the field.  We also examine ways to address data quality concerns using digital field tools and a web-based data management system to compile and synthesize data collected by these organizations.  This information could greatly contribute to early warning systems for non-native species and predictive models of the potential distributions and spread of non-native species.