Finnish fungal atlas as a conservation and education tool

Abstract

Fungi are a challenging organism group to study and often amateurs need extensive help to be able to correctly identify their fungal collections. Fungi could be used for an example as indicators of environmental changes and as a tool to evaluate the conservation value of endangered biotopes. However, all this requires reliable and extensive observation databases on fungi. If citizen scientists are not well enough educated, their contribution may be even harmful due to decreased data quality. To achieve more reliable information of habitat requirements, distribution and risk status of fungi in Finland we started a citizen science project called Sieniatlas (Finnish Fungal Atlas) in 2016, and opened a new databased fieldtrip form for the season 2017. Our aim is to inspire amateurs to report their observations and to deposit better specimens to the natural history museums and their databases. We organize short courses (e.g. how to collect a specimen or use a microscope) and survey trips for amateurs to inspire them and increase their skill level. Observations are reported through a form in the internet. We also conduct analyses on the data already during the project to further prove to amateurs the value of their efforts. Moreover, we organize thematic events, for example focusing on the mycobiota of a certain threatened habitat or on a certain threatened species. The first year of active data collection was an immense success. We had for example a thematic call on one globally red-listed species, Witches Cauldron (Sarcosoma globosum) and received about seven times more observations than the recent yearly average. Another call on Macrolepiota and Lepiota species yielded very similar results. Finnish fungal atlas has already now changed the culture of collecting fungal observation data in Finland. In the presentation we will show our first results and outline our most important plans for the future.