Insects & Us vs BOBeetles

Insects & Us invites you to explore a virtual, animated environment and engage with the interwoven stories of its inhabitants. Insects serve as food for other animals, pollinate our crops, act as natural pest control agents and play a crucial part in turning dead organic matter into fertile soil. The numbers and diversity of insects have been in sharp decline though over the last few decades. If the trend continues it will dramatically affect human welfare. Watch crickets, dragonflies, butterflies, beetles, and ants make their simple, yet vital contributions for a functioning ecosystem - whilst listening to four scientists talk about why they matter and what can be done to help. Start exploring by scanning a well-lit, textured surface (like a table or a floor) with your smartphone or tablet. 'Tap and Hold' to place the virtual ecosystem on that surface. Once the Insects & Us story-world appears, select (‘Tap and Hold') one of five sparkling insects to start a story. Featured Scientists: Dr. Anne Sverdrup-Thygeson, PhD, Dr. Jessica Ware, PhD, Dr. Andreas Segerer and Peter Smithers. Insects & Us was designed and directed by Kris Hofmann and produced by Animate Projects. All 3D content was created and animated by R5 Region Five Media GmbH. Code by WAMMS, sound and music by Marian Mentrup. The project was funded by the AWS Austrian Wirtschaftsservice and the FFF FilmFernsehFonds Bayern.

Have you ever seen two stag beetles fighting? Are you interested in insect behavior? Are you curious about nature and insect life? Then this app is made for you!  Come join us in the first behavioural study on protected insects in Europe! You will get to observe beautiful big beetles in natural areas, reporting their activities! Don’t worry, you don’t have to be an expert to do so, we will guide you through the process, providing all necessary information on the app and on the linked website, and you will soon become a BOB App volunteer! The project has three targets, all very easy to recognize on the field (they are flagship species!): we are talking about the stag beetle (Lucanus cervus), the rosalia longicorn (Rosalia alpina), and the funereal longhorn beetle (Morimus asper). These three beetles have two main things in common: they are all protected under the European Habitats Directive and they all rely on dead wood as a source during the larval stages for their development (known as ‘saproxylic’). Observations are really easy to perform: once you find one of the project targets, observe it for 5 min and fill in the requested information on the app. Ta-da, you contributed to our project! If you are not sure about the beetle species you are looking at, don’t worry, you can still contribute to the project by uploading pictures and describing what you see: our expert will take care of the rest. Get to know more about beetles, especially protected ones: download the BOB App! The BOB App is running on the SPOTTERON Citizen Science Platform at www.spotteron.net.