Citizen Scientists Learn from Flowers

Project Budburst volunteers record the opening of flowers as a way to monitor the effects of climate change.

Photo by Janice Lorentz

People across the country are learning what plants say about global warming.

Project Budburst sends citizen scientists outside to record the dates when local plants open their leaves, flower, bear fruit, and go dormant or die. As the climate warms, the timing of each event changes. “Scientists can’t be everywhere.

We need people to tell us what they see,” says Carol Brewer, a co-founder of the project and biology professor at the University of Montana. Check out budburst.org.

 

More radical acts of education...

Roadtrip Nation		Kids Take Charge		Santa Fe Tells Its Stories		Teens Listen to 90-Somethings		Melia Reschools		Horses as Teachers
Youths Face History		Citizen Scientists		Volunteer Teachers		Climate Activists		Life-long Learning		A City Learns
Parents Who Listen

 

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13 Radical Acts of Education are part of Learn as You Go, the Fall 2009 issue of YES! Magazine.

 

YES! Magazine encourages you to make free use of this article by taking these easy steps. Purser, H. (2009, September 01). Citizen Scientists Learn from Flowers. Retrieved February 12, 2012, from YES! Magazine Web site: http://cms.yesmagazine.org/issues/learn-as-you-go/citizen-scientists-learn-from-flowers. This work is licensed under a Creative Commons License