Research and education at MRG never stop, even in Covid times. Originally planned as a project to be done in the field, WTP student Eileen Dockery (Harrison High School) worked out from home how to create the project using the popular iNaturalist app and with help from citizen scientists.
About the project in Eileen’s words:
Keeping tabs on dead animals helps protect living ones! The Mianus River Gorge needs your help mapping roadkill to help us find “hotspots” of wildlife mortality in Westchester, NY and Fairfield, CT Counties. Recording roadkill observations allows researchers to determine the causes of roadkill and reduce future incidents. With the help of citizen scientists, roadkill can be decreased and prevented.
Not only does roadkill decrease local animal populations, billions of dollars are spent each year on repairing vehicle damages, making roadkill an ecological and financial drain.
This project is focused primarily in the Mianus River Watershed (Bedford, Pound Ridge, North Castle, Greenwich, and Stamford) but we will map any submissions in Westchester and Fairfield Counties.
We prefer photographs to assist in species recognition — please be careful when taking pictures on roadways. Safety and following the law come first.
How you can help: Start by downloading the iNaturalist app to your smart phone if you don’t already have an account. Next, search for Projects and look for “Westchester Roadkill Roundup.” Select join. From there, you can add any observations you make to the project.
(This also can be done on the desktop website, but observations are most easily submitted via the app. Simply take a picture using the app and upload it.)
Click here to go straight to the iNaturalist project page.
Thank you for your participation!