Insect Investigators is a citizen science project that collaborates with regional schools in Australia to document their local insect diversity. In March 2022, 50 regional schools ran Malaise traps for four weeks, with more than 39,000 specimens now DNA barcoded and added to public databases. Approximately a third of the schools were partnered with taxonomists to help name new species identified in the collections. Whilst the collection of specimens happened more than two years ago, we are still analysing the data, working with schools to name species, and evaluating the impact of the project on public databases. In this seminar I will give an overview of the project, present some biodiversity and taxonomy results and also some of the preliminary work we’ve been doing to evaluate the impact the project has made to public databases like the Atlas of Living Australia. I’ll also discuss some of the lessons we learnt during the project, and mention our hopes for future collaborations to document Australia’s dark taxa alongside citizen scientists.

Insect Investigators was recently awarded the 2024 Department of Industry, Science and Resources Eureka Prize for Innovation in Citizen Science.

Dr Erinn Fagan-Jefferies studies the biodiversity and taxonomy of parasitoid wasps in Australia and has a passion for communicating about biodiversity, insects and species discovery.