Invertebrates (animals without backbones—think bugs, snails, and even starfish), are one of the most diverse and abundant groups of animals in
world. We have hundreds of thousand species of native invertebrates species, busy across Australia, pollinating, nutrient cycling, ecosystem engineering, and providing food for other native animals.
Unfortunately, there are also invertebrate species that have entered Australia from overseas; some of which are wreaking havoc on our biodiversity, natural landscape, communities, and agriculture – we call these ones ‘invasive’. We know of other invasive invertebrate species from around the world have also been identified as particularly bad, if they were to arrive in Australia. We have an opportunity to use the activities of citizen science – groups of interested people who are bushwalkers, birdwatchers, regenerators, and others, out in the environment and looking at what is there. If this network of potential biosecurity investigators can be coordinated and data used by government agencies, Australia will enjoy an enhanced surveillance capability and potentially have an early warning system looking out for these damaging pests.
Invertebrates are usually small, and often tricky to find, and identify. Some of them are only out and about in very short periods over a year. All these things make recording, or surveying for particular invertebrates difficult. This also means that it’s hard to know where invasive invertebrates may have spread to across our large country.
Citizen scientists have alerted authorities of several high priority invasive invertebrates across Australia. For example, community reports of new outbreaks account for more than 70% of total detections of red imported fire ant nests in south-east Queensland.
