Crowdsourcing Meets Ecology: Hemisphere-Wide Spatiotemporal Species Distribution Models

Broad-scale environmental and ecological systems originate as simultaneous processes operating across a range of spatiotemporal scales. To study and conserve these systems it is crucial to understand the multi-scale structure of underlying processes. For example, consider some of the processes affecting birds during migration. Climatic phenomena, like El Niño southern oscillation and the North Atlantic oscillation (Grosbois et al. 2008) can affect migration timing and direction at hemispheric spatial scales for years at a time. Regional migration pathways are affected by mesoscale spatial processes that define boundaries between major ecosystems like prairies and forests (Fortin and Dale 2005). At a local scale, individual foraging decisions may be based on the availability of specific plants or insects within small habitat patches (Bonter et al. 2009).