Chronolog is a citizen science

environmental monitoring Environmental monitoring is the processes and activities that are done to characterize and describe the state of the environment. It is used in the preparation of environmental impact assessments, and in many circumstances in which human activit ...

platform that enables public participation in time-lapse photography projects. It is used by parks, nature centers, wildlife organizations, schools, and museums to document ecological changes over time. Visitors to participating locations take photos at designated stations and submit them via email, contributing to crowdsourced time-lapse sequences. As of 2024, Chronolog operates in 48 U.S. states and 10 countries and has collected over 100,000 submissions since its launch in 2017.

History

Chronolog was founded in 2017 by Jake Rose and Ky Wildermuth. The platform began with a small number of photo stations in state parks in Maryland, United States. Since then, it has expanded to include sites across the

United States The United States of America (USA), also known as the United States (U.S.) or America, is a country primarily located in North America. It is a federal republic of 50 U.S. state, states and a federal capital district, Washington, D.C. The 48 ...

and internationally. Chronolog has been adopted by national organizations in the United States such as the

National Park Service The National Park Service (NPS) is an List of federal agencies in the United States, agency of the Federal government of the United States, United States federal government, within the US Department of the Interior. The service manages all List ...

and

Bureau of Land Management The Bureau of Land Management (BLM) is an agency within the United States Department of the Interior responsible for administering federal lands, U.S. federal lands. Headquartered in Washington, D.C., the BLM oversees more than of land, or one ...

Technology

Chronolog citizen science tool - Humboldt Park Chicago

Participating organizations–like

state State most commonly refers to: * State (polity), a centralized political organization that regulates law and society within a territory **Sovereign state, a sovereign polity in international law, commonly referred to as a country **Nation state, a ...

and

national park A national park is a nature park designated for conservation (ethic), conservation purposes because of unparalleled national natural, historic, or cultural significance. It is an area of natural, semi-natural, or developed land that is protecte ...

s, wildlife preserves, museums, schools, local and state governments, nature conservancies, and wildlife nonprofits–install fixed photo stations at specific locations, typically overlooking landscapes of ecological interest. These stations guide visitors to align their smartphone cameras at a consistent height and angle. Users then email the photos to Chronolog, where software extracts

metadata Metadata (or metainformation) is "data that provides information about other data", but not the content of the data itself, such as the text of a message or the image itself. There are many distinct types of metadata, including: * Descriptive ...

and assigns the image to a corresponding time-lapse sequence. Each contributor receives an automated response with information about the site and the ecological changes being monitored. The aggregated photos form visual records that help track changes in

vegetation Vegetation is an assemblage of plants and the ground cover they provide. It is a general term, without specific reference to particular Taxon, taxa, life forms, structure, Spatial ecology, spatial extent, or any other specific Botany, botanic ...

, wildlife activity, water levels, and other environmental features. Long-term ecological monitoring projects often face challenges related to cost, staffing, and continuity. Chronolog's crowdsourced model has been adopted as a low-cost method to collect consistent visual data over time at participating sites.

Applications

Chronolog is used by land stewards, restoration practitioners, and environmental educators to document ecological trends, track ecosystem health., measure the impact of conservation interventions, and engage the public in

science education Science education is the teaching and learning of science to school children, college students, or adults within the general public. The field of science education includes work in science content, science process (the scientific method), some ...

. Chronolog has been used to monitor habitat restoration, controlled burns, removal of

invasive species An invasive species is an introduced species that harms its new environment. Invasive species adversely affect habitats and bioregions, causing ecological, environmental, and/or economic damage. The term can also be used for native spec ...

, planting of

native species In biogeography, a native species is indigenous to a given region or ecosystem if its presence in that region is the result of only local natural evolution (though often popularised as "with no human intervention") during history. The term is equi ...

, ghost forests, wildlife activity, and

climate resilience Climate resilience is a concept to describe how well people or ecosystems are prepared to bounce back from certain climate hazard events. The formal definition of the term is the "capacity of social, economic and ecosystems to cope with a hazardou ...

efforts. Chronolog has also been used to monitor events such as

wildfire A wildfire, forest fire, or a bushfire is an unplanned and uncontrolled fire in an area of Combustibility and flammability, combustible vegetation. Depending on the type of vegetation present, a wildfire may be more specifically identified as a ...

recovery, water levels and quality, snowpack, seasonal changes, and storm impacts

References

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External links

Official website
Citizen science 2017 establishments in the United States Photography equipment