SEATTLE — Editor's note: The above video was published in September 2019.
Seattle University and the Woodland Park Zoo are teaming up for important wildlife research on wolverines and other local carnivores, and they're inviting members of the public to assist.
"Anyone can become a community scientist and participate," the organizations said in a news release.
Both organizations are asking the community to help them identify more than 80,000 photos of animals detected by more than 65 camera traps, which are motion-activated in green and wild spaces throughout the state.
Each camera collects anywhere from 200 to 400 photos a month.
The photos provide "valuable data" for two research projects: the Seattle Urban Carnivore Project and the Washington Wolverine Project.
The Seattle Urban Carnivore Project was launched in 2019 for scientists to explore how carnivores, like bobcats, cougars and black bears, live and interact with people in the greater Seattle area.
“Up until now, the project coordinators and a few volunteers have been tasked with this process, which can be very time consuming given that there are thousands and thousands of images. But now we have a platform that offers a new and exciting opportunity to get our community involved in the camera photo coding process and you don’t even need a science or computer science degree to help us with this important research in our backyard!” said Robert Long, PhD director of Woodland Park Zoo's Living Northwest Program and a carnivore research ecologist.
Essentially, the organizations are looking for the public's help to pool data to understand why animals in different cities behave the way they do.
To participate, click here and select the "Woodland Park Zoo" button.