This project provides scientific and analytical support to South Africa’s major citizen science initiatives hosted at the FitzPatrick Institute of African Ornithology (University of Cape Town), including SABAP2, CAR, CWAC and SAFRING. We have a strong partnership with BirdLasser, the most popular mobile app for capturing data for SABAP2, where we benefit from supplementary information on species location, group sizes, habitat use and breeding status from those that subscribe to the ‘Threatened Species Cause’.
We develop analytical workflows, provide guidance to data users and contributors, and integrate citizen science data into national conservation assessments and planning processes. On the project management side, we facilitate meetings with major stakeholders and assist with fundraising efforts. We also lead two or more ‘atlas bashes’ per year to areas of the country with low coverage.
Your support helps sustain four of southern Africa’s most important bird monitoring projects:
SABAP2 – the Second Southern African Bird Atlas ProjectÂ
CAR – Coordinated Avifaunal Roadcounts
CWAC – Coordinated Waterbird CountsÂ
SAFRING – the South African Bird Ringing SchemeÂ
Together, these projects provide the long-term evidence needed to understand where birds occur, how their populations are changing, which sites matter most, and where conservation action is most urgently required.
South Africa is a large and environmentally diverse country, with birds occurring across deserts, grasslands, forests, wetlands, estuaries, mountains, agricultural landscapes, cities, and coastlines. No professional monitoring programme could, on its own, collect enough information often enough, and across enough places, to track the status of the country’s birds. Citizen science makes this possible.
BirdLife South Africa and its partners rely on three long-running citizen science projects that have become central to bird conservation in the region: the Second Southern African Bird Atlas Project (SABAP2), the Coordinated Avifaunal Roadcounts (CAR), and the Coordinated Waterbird Counts (CWAC). Together, these projects provide information on where birds occur, how common they are, and how their populations are changing.
SABAP2 is the primary source of fine-scale bird distribution information for South Africa and the wider region. Volunteer birders submit bird lists for pentads, which are grid cells of roughly 9 × 9 km. These records allow researchers to map species’ ranges, identify areas of high conservation value, detect changes in distribution, and support Red List assessments, protected area planning, environmental impact assessments, and ecological research. Because SABAP2 is ongoing, it does not only describe where species have occurred in the past; it helps track how distributions are changing now.
CAR provides a different but equally important view of bird populations. Through repeated road counts along fixed routes, volunteers monitor large terrestrial birds and raptors, especially in open landscapes such as grasslands, Karoo shrublands, agricultural areas, and savannas. Many of these species occur at low densities and over large areas, making them difficult to monitor through site-based surveys. CAR has therefore become especially valuable for species such as cranes, bustards, korhaans, Secretarybird, storks, and large raptors, many of which are of conservation concern.
CWAC focuses on waterbirds and wetlands. Volunteers count birds at dams, estuaries, rivers, pans, sewage works, and natural wetlands, generating long-term information on the condition and importance of these sites. These data help identify key wetlands, support Ramsar and Key Biodiversity Area processes, track changes in waterbird numbers, and improve understanding of drought, habitat change, disturbance, and water management impacts. In a water-scarce country where wetlands are among the most threatened ecosystems, CWAC provides information that would otherwise be extremely difficult to obtain.
The strength of these projects lies in their scale, continuity, and community. Thousands of observers contribute records from places that scientists and conservation agencies could never visit regularly. Over time, these records build into datasets that are powerful enough to detect national and regional patterns, while still retaining local detail. They help identify species in trouble, species recovering, places that need better protection, and landscapes where conservation action is most urgent.
Citizen science also builds a constituency for conservation. People who contribute to SABAP2, CAR, and CWAC are not simply collecting data; they are watching landscapes change, noticing local declines, documenting unusual events, and helping to keep birds visible in public and policy discussions. Many participants develop deep knowledge of their local areas, and this knowledge often strengthens formal conservation work.
These projects now underpin much of South Africa’s bird conservation evidence base. They inform Red List assessments, Key Biodiversity Area identification, protected area expansion,
species action plans, environmental reporting, research, and advocacy. Without SABAP2, CAR, and CWAC, South Africa would know far less about the status of its birds, and would be far less able to respond to the pressures they face.
Citizen science matters because conservation depends on evidence, and evidence depends on people willing to observe, record, and share what they see. Every atlas card, road count, and waterbird count adds to a collective record of South Africa’s birds. That record is one of the country’s most important conservation assets.
Citizen science data are valuable because they move conservation from opinion to evidence. Records submitted to SABAP2, CAR and CWAC are checked, analysed and combined with other information to help answer practical conservation questions: where species occur, whether their populations are changing, which sites are most important, and where conservation action is most needed.
One of the most important uses of these data is conservation assessment. SABAP2, CAR and CWAC provide evidence for Red List assessments by helping to estimate species’ ranges, population trends, habitat associations and changes over time. For some species, especially widespread or poorly studied birds, citizen science data may be the only information available at an appropriate national scale. These datasets help identify species that are declining, species whose ranges are contracting, and species that may need more urgent conservation attention.
The data also help identify important places for birds. SABAP2 records can show where species richness, endemism or threatened species concentrations are highest. CWAC counts help identify wetlands that regularly support large numbers of waterbirds or important populations of threatened and migratory species. These outputs contribute to the identification and review of Key Biodiversity Areas, Important Bird and Biodiversity Areas, Ramsar sites, and other conservation priority areas.
Citizen science data are also used in protected area planning. By comparing bird distributions with the existing protected area network, conservationists can identify species and habitats that are well represented, as well as those that remain poorly protected. This is especially important in landscapes such as the Karoo, grasslands and agricultural regions, where many species of conservation concern occur mainly outside formal protected areas. These analyses help guide protected area expansion, biodiversity stewardship, and other area-based conservation measures.
For environmental decision-making, citizen science data provide essential baseline information. SABAP2 records are often used to understand which species may occur in areas proposed for development, including renewable energy, mining, infrastructure and agricultural projects. While atlas data do not replace site-based specialist studies, they provide a broader context for assessing potential impacts and identifying species that may require targeted surveys or mitigation.
Long-term monitoring is another major contribution. CAR can detect changes in large terrestrial birds and raptors across open landscapes, while CWAC can reveal changes in waterbird numbers at wetlands over seasons, years and decades. These trends can alert conservationists to emerging problems, such as habitat degradation, disturbance, drought impacts, collisions,
poisoning, altered water regimes or changing land use. They can also show where conservation interventions are working.
The data are also used for research and modelling. Scientists use citizen science datasets to model species distributions, estimate reporting rates, investigate climate change impacts, examine land-use effects, and understand how birds respond to protected areas, agriculture, urbanisation and habitat transformation. These analyses turn thousands of individual records into information that can guide policy, planning and management.
Importantly, citizen science data help conservation organisations communicate clearly with decision-makers and the public. Maps, trends and site summaries are powerful tools for showing where birds are in trouble, where conservation is succeeding, and where investment is needed. They allow BirdLife South Africa and its partners to advocate from a position of evidence.
The value of SABAP2, CAR and CWAC increases with every new record. A single list or count may seem small, but together these observations build the long-term evidence base needed to conserve birds in a changing country. The better the coverage, the stronger the conclusions; the longer the time series, the clearer the trends; and the more people participate, the more powerful these projects become for conservation.
