A ladybug flies in front of a car windshield in Sleepy Eye, Minnesota, October 18, 2019. THE WASHINGTON POST VIA GETTY IMAGES
Download an app to your smartphone, take a photo of your car's license plate before and after each journey, and in so doing, help measure the decline in insect populations? On Monday, April 13, France's National Museum of Natural History (MNHN) announced the launch of "Bugs Matter: les insectes, ça compte!" ("Bugs Matter: Insects Count!"), a citizen science project that was first implemented in 2021 in the United Kingdom by two wildlife conservation charities, Buglife and the Kent Wildlife Trust.
The idea is "simple and brilliant," said Grégoire Loïs, the co-director of Vigie-Nature, the MNHN's citizen science program. The project uses the journeys of thousands of drivers as small-scale data collection experiments. "The potential is enormous," added Loïs, "since there are 40 million cars in France traveling 500 billion kilometers every year on more than a billion kilometers of roads ." To participate, you just need to download the Bugs Matter app (now available in French), clean and photograph your license plate before your trip, and then take another picture at the end of your journey. The app automatically counts the number of insects that were smashed during the drive, transmitting data regarding the vehicle model (especially its aerodynamics), speed, landscapes crossed, weather conditions and more.
