Wikiplantbase, a platform where academic and amateur botanists meet and have fun

The Wikiplantbase project, started in 2013, provides a framework where georeferenced floristic records from Italian administrative regions can be stored, updated and accessed through the Internet. The online software platform was designed to encourage data entry by non-academic collaborators: pull-down menus and auto-complete fields reduce the amount of typing required and the chances of typographical errors alike; geographic localities can be entered by point-and-click on a map. All records entered are checked by regional coordinators, who can validate, modify or reject them before making them accessible online. Both academic and amateur botanists have joined the projects which counts 114 collaborators – mostly non academic – from four Italian regions (Tuscany, Sardinia, Liguria and Sicily) as of 28 June 2017. As a result, the database now stores 211693 floristic records, 188657 georeferenced toponyms, 18273 taxonomic records, and 3910 bibliographical references. A fifth region, Friuli Venezia Giulia, is currently completing the steps to become a member of the project, with the collaboration of the regional Group for Floristic Research and Exploration (GREF). Besides data, within days of Wikiplantbase online launch, collaborators have started to provide an active feedback on issues arising from data entry, searching, and missing options. Their feedback spurred a progressive refinement of the software platform. The version 2.0 was launched in 2015, and contains several improvements suggested by the Wikiplantbase community. As regards communication and dissemination, Wikiplantbase community members has participated in the organisation of both traditional scientific meetings and social events, like Piant@Là – a science café organised in Sassari in 2015 – and Wikifestival, a meeting held in Pisa in 2017 where scientific communications mingled with quiz games, and participants received official Wikifestival t-shirts. Furthermore, each regional coordinator has created a Facebook page. Data from Wikiplantbase have been used to draft a paper on phylogenetic diversity of pteridophytes in Tuscany, which has been accepted for publication on a scientific journal. To benefit the wider scientific community, the Wikiplantbase dataset is being connected to data aggregator platforms like the Italian National Biodiversity Network, and the GBIF, by using the BIOCASE protocol. The online platform Wikiplantbase is ready to be replicated in other contexts, thus providing support to a network of regional floristic databases, suited to exploit the involvement – still largely untapped – of non-academic collaborators, as advocated by citizen science.