The Planting has received support from an Advance Queensland, Engaging Science Grant provided by the Queensland Government. The funding will support Woodfordia’s BioQuest – engaging patrons with bio-experts in biodiversity research, using the QuestaGame mobile app as a biodiversity research and mapping tool.
Woodfordia – home of The Woodford Folk Festival – was once a cleared and degraded dairy farm. Since the first Planting Festival in 1997, the site is under continual revegetation program through community efforts.
It is remarkable to see what happens when people come together to restore the landscape. With community efforts we have created bio-diverse rain forest habitats in less than twenty years! Woodfordia is now home to bioluminescent mushrooms, the vulnerable Richmond Birdwing Butterfly and the threatened Glossy Black Cockatoo.
Author of Create More Butterflies and Woodfordia’s Butterflies project leader Helen Schwencke, has made a tremendous contribution to Woodfordia’s butterfly diversity. Helen has added caterpillar specific food species to the site and created educational posters for each host plant-caterpillar-butterfly lifecycle.
Bio-experts specialising in insects, spiders, frogs, fungi, birds and plants will be supporting participants (BioQuesters) in finding and documenting creatures that call Woodfordia home. The QuestaGame team headed by co-founder David Haynes, will be assisting BioQuesters with using the free app while bio-experts will be sharing their expertise. David describes QuestaGame as, “a global social enterprise that believes in working (and playing) together to make this planet more healthy and sustainable. We think technology should enhance human collaboration and our engagement with nature.” This one of a kind real-world nature gaming adventure platform allows anyone with a smart phone to contribute to biodiversity research world-wide.
Several BioQuests are scheduled across the weekend to cater to morning, afternoon and evening lifestyles of wildlife and patrons. Robert Whyte, the co-author of CSIRO publication, A Field Guide to Spiders of Australia says, “It is very likely that we will find a new spider species at Woodfordia.”
The wider the community engagement in BioQuests, the greater the likelihood of discovering new species. BioQuesters will learn how to find, photograph and identify wildlife, and to submit their findings through the QuestaGame app for further identification by biologists. All findings will contribute to mapping Australian’s biodiversity.
To learn more about QuestaGame click here.
Follow these instructions to join the Woodfordia Clan:
- Download free QuestaGame from App Store or Google Play
- Open menu (top left icon) and select ‘Clans’
- Scroll down to ‘Woodfordia’
- Click on ‘Woodfordia’ and hit ‘Request Invite’
- In ~24 hours you will receive an invitation to join
- Follow steps 2-4 and hit ‘Join’
- ‘Woodfordia’ is now in ‘My Clans’
- Start submitting your finds
For further information please contact info@woodfordia.com.
