(Photo by Robert Barossi)

By Robert Barossi

A number of stories on this blog have mentioned the work of citizen scientists. These everyday citizens, not scientists by trade or profession, are doing invaluable and essential work. They are collecting and gathering data which is necessary in dealing with the environmental problems of our time. Or, as this article says it, they are “key to keeping pace with environmental change.” As mentioned in the story, we may be at a point where the amount of data we need to be collecting and following far outweighs our ability to keep up with it. There are so many changes happening, so frequently and in so many places, that citizen scientists are only going to become more and more important as we struggle to keep up with what’s happening around us.