Visualising Victoria’s Biodiversity workshop

Posted on 21 February, 2019 by Tanya Loos

Connecting Country’s major monitoring project over the next two years is our Habitat Health Check (click here for more information), funded by the Helen Macpherson Smith Trust. This project aims to review our long-term monitoring programs, to shift to a monitoring model that empowers our community to conduct robust biodiversity monitoring, and, importantly, to ensure that the data we collect is being shared and used appropriately.

To meet this third goal, we will be working with Centre for eResearch and Digital Innovation (CeRDI) at Federation University Australia. CeRDI has developed many award-winning web-based spatial information and knowledge portals that provide public access to data sets that are often hidden from view. The team at CeRDI have two great resources that are relevant to us at Connecting Country and are well worth checking out.

State Wide Integrated Flora and Fauna Teams

Firstly, The State Wide Integrated Flora and Fauna Teams (SWIFFT) is a network for knowledge sharing and information exchange that supports conservation and management of threatened species, biodiversity and the natural environment across Victoria. You can explore a map displaying the range projects that are part of the network (click here), or see a list of their projects (click here). As part of Habitat Health Check we will be making sure that Connecting Country has a presence on this fantastic website.

Visualising Victoria’s Biodiversity

Secondly, CeRDI has developed the Visualising Victoria’s Biodiversity (VVB) tool (click here). VVB consolidates access to spatial environmental datasets and information – created and managed by government agencies, organisations, community groups and individuals – into a user friendly and interactive platform. You could use this platform to view, for example, records of mammals or birds near your property. CeRDI is one of many places for sharing and visualising nature data in Victoria – you can see a wonderful infographic on how these interact by clicking here.

Want to know more? We’ll be running a workshop with CeRDI (Date to be confirmed) to learn about the power of the Visualising Victoria’s Biodiversity tool.

More information to come soon – watch this space!