Citizen science data on urban forageable plants: a case study in Brazil

This paper presents two key data sets derived from the Pomar Urbano project. The first data set is a comprehensive catalog of edible fruit-bearing plant species, native or introduced to Brazil. The second data set, sourced from the iNaturalist platform, tracks the distribution and monitoring of these plants within urban landscapes across Brazil. The study includes data from the capitals of all 27 federative units of Brazil, focusing on the ten cities that contributed the most observations as of August 2023. The research emphasizes the significance of citizen science in urban biodiversity monitoring and its potential to contribute to various fields, including food and nutrition, creative industry, study of plant phenology, and machine learning applications. We expect the data sets presented in this paper to serve as resources for further studies in urban foraging, food security, cultural ecosystem services, and environmental sustainability.

Leveraging citizen science for monitoring urban forageable plants

Urbanization brings forth social challenges in emerging countries such as Brazil, encompassing food scarcity, health deterioration, air pollution, and biodiversity loss. Despite this, urban areas like the city of São Paulo still boast ample green spaces, offering opportunities for nature appreciation and conservation, enhancing city resilience and livability. Citizen science is a collaborative endeavor between professional scientists and nonprofessional scientists in scientific research that may help to understand the dynamics of urban ecosystems. We believe citizen science has the potential to promote human and nature connection in urban areas and provide useful data on urban biodiversity.

Urban Human-Coyote Conflicts: Assessing Friendliness as an Indicator of Coexistence

Human-coyote sightings and interactions are becoming more frequent in urban areas across North and Central America. While many species have lost territory, the coyote range has expanded. Relatively recently, ecologists have coalesced around the idea that coexistence is the most promising avenue to reduce human-coyote conflict in urban areas. Despite this, calls for the eradication of coyotes continue. We apply and extend the theory of survival of the friendliest to evaluate how the media is framing coyotes and management strategies and what the implications of this framing might be. Through a content analysis of newspaper articles from three different urban areas in the US (Los Angeles, CA; Seattle, WA; and Boston, MA), from 2000 to 2022, we find that friendly language is used to promote coexistence, while unfriendly language (threat, hostile, unfriendly, and danger) is used to justify eradication. We also find considerable variation in the type of coverage and consistency with scientific consensus across cities, likely reflecting the cities' varied histories and cultural understandings of the species. Given the media's influence on the public's views of coyotes and their support for management strategies, these findings suggest that the media plays a central role in shaping coyote-human relationships and management strategies.