The kestrel is the most common raptor in the city of Vienna. Since 2010, the "Vienna Kestrel Project" has been investigating how these falcons have adapted to city life. A key component of our research is knowledge about nest locations which allow us to access broods for further investigation. The Vienna Kestrel Project was initiated by Dr. Petra Sumasgutner and Priv.-Doz. Dr. Anita Gamauf as a cooperation between the University of Vienna and the Natural History Museum (Bird Collection) Vienna. The project was financially supported by the City of Vienna, the Austrian Academy of Sciences and the Vienna Science and Technology Fund (Hochschuljubiläumsstiftung), and has benefited incredibly from the continuous support by the media and the general public in Vienna. After the first calls to report nesting sites, more than 1000 reports were received by telephone in the first year alone. The active participation of the population in reporting occupied nests has been maintained over all these years and greatly facilitates our research with this charismatic falcon species. We post videos and photos keep the population involved and share the results of our research on our popular Facebook page.

Who can participate?

Anyone who can identify kestrels and can distinguish them clearly from other bird species (e.g. swifts, sparrowhawks).

The Kestrel Project is managed at the Konrad Lorenz Research Centre as part of the University of Vienna and is organized in the scope of PhD, MSc and BSc projects. The direct data collection with the handling of wild birds at their nesting site including the individual ringing, morphometric measurement and blood sampling is conducted by scientific staff and students in the project, as this requires special training and permitting.

The citizen science component refers to observations of the breeding cycle, since often a direct view into the breeding niche is granted from apartments or other buildings on the opposite side of the road. Thus, the time of egg laying, as well as the hatching and fledging of the young falcons can be documented exactly without causing any disturbance. In Vienna, over 500 kestrels breeding sites are known.

Personal data is only stored directly in the e-mail, WhatsApp and Facebook correspondence and is exclusively available to the project leader Dr. Petra Sumasgutner for further inquiries. They are limited to the extent to which they were disclosed by the respective reporting person during the data transfer.

The (anonymized) data management is regulated by MoUs (Memorandum of Understandings) with the respective cooperation partners: Natural History Museum Vienna (NHM); Vienna Environmental Protection Department (MA22); Austrian Ornithological Centre (AOC); BirdLife Austria; Bird:at.

Period

The project has been running since 2010 and is planned to continue until at least 2024. Messages can be sent to us at any time.

Where can you participate?

In the entire city of Vienna.

Which data will be collected?

If you discover nesting sites, we would be happy to hear about these locations!

As of 2020 we have received about 660 reports of kestrel nests; only approx. 60% of which are occupied per year. We were able to add new nest locations every year and count on our citizen scientists to keep the momentum going - we would be happy to receive any information about known breeding sites from you! The guidelines for the management of the nest site database are listed directly at MA22, the Wiener Umweltgut, at https://www.wien.gv.at/info/datenschutz/index.html.

We kindly ask you to provide us with the address of the nesting site with an exact description of the location  - you might have insights of a yet unknown kestrel nest! We would also appreciate to receive data on the breeding cycle, preferably with photos showing egg laying, hatching and fledging of the young falcons.

How can you participate?

Please send messages to:

This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.

+43 664 5666045 (phone and Whatsapp)

 Vienna Kestrel on Facebook

What is this project about?

With Picture Pile you can contribute to solving global problems as climate chance and malnutrition by sorting piles of pictures together with other players.

How can citizens participate in research?

Sorting the pictures is very easy and works in a similar way to other Apps. A question is asked about a displayed image, for example: “Is farmland visible in the image?”. Now the player can slide the picture to the right or to the left to answer the question with “yes” or “no”. Alternatively, you can slide the picture down, if you are not sure. Picture Pile can be viewed in the browser, on the iPhone, iPad and Android.

What will happen to the results?

All collected data (except private information such as the players’ e-mail addresses) are made freely accessible to everyone after a data check and can thus be used by scientists all over the world to answer important research questions.

What does the research contribute to?

Among other things, Picture Pile improves global landscape data sets that are used in a variety of environmental applications and sociological studies, for example for research into climate change damage, deforestation, or biodiversity. The contribution of citizen scientists is central to the validation and improvement of this landscape data.

Image gallery

With 653 years of age and almost 94,000 students, the University of Vienna is the oldest and largest university in Austria. Since it was founded in 1365, the University of Vienna is also the oldest university in the German-speaking world. The university is divided into 15 faculties with 4 centres, which together offer 187 courses of study.

The University of Vienna is very strong in the field of citizen science and also operates a special website for citizen science at the University of Vienna. This site presents all citizen science projects and also publishes information on the funding of citizen science and special events. Through WTZ Ost, numerous events and activities have already been carried out in cooperation with the University of Vienna. Examples are an ethics workshop and four videos on Citizen Science in Austria.

With almost 30,000 students and six faculties, the University of Graz is the largest university in Styria and with its foundation in 1585 the second oldest university in Austria. With the motto "We work for tomorrow", the University of Graz emphasises its commitment to research and teaching on various future issues. One of the flagship projects for 2023-2026 aims to provide innovative impetus to promote dialogue between academics and the general public.

Citizen Science has a long tradition in Graz, especially in bee research. In addition to national projects on bee health, several EU projects have also been funded in Europe in recent years, in which beekeepers from Austria and other countries have participated as citizen scientists. As part of several Sparkling Science projects, young people gain insights into a wide range of scientific fields: These include research into Latin inscriptions in the city of Graz, nutrition as part of socio-ecological change, changes in snow in Greenland and Austria as well as strengthening trust in science through participatory communication.

The Austrian Mycological Society (ÖMG) is a learned society. It represents the practical and scientific mycology and is open to all interested persons. The ÖMG has a long history dating back to 1919 and has been open to the public since its foundation. It was even founded especially to work closely with the population, because in the founding period there was a shortage of food, so mushroom picking was crucial for nutrition and the distinction between poisonous and edible mushrooms became extremely important.

The project "Database of mushrooms in Austria" makes it possible to document the distribution of mushrooms throughout Austria. The online version of the database offers the possibility to view the distribution patterns of the more than 7,700 mushroom taxa and to retrieve the current data status with more than 370,000 find reports from over 12,000 different sites throughout Austria. In addition to the most exact location and time information possible, each data set contains important information on the habitat and substrate of the mushroom records, on the identification and scientific documentation of the mushroom reports as well as on the origin and source of the stored data, which currently amounts to more than 6 million individual data items (website of the ÖMG).

The Centre for Social Innovation (ZSI) is a social science institute, located in Vienna and employs about 60 people. The ZSI was founded in 1990 and since then has carried out over 600 projects worldwide.

Citizen Science has also been part of the ZSI's research area for a long time. For example, staff members of the Institute have contributed to the White Paper on Citizen Science and have thus decisively influenced Citizen Science on a European level. ZSI was significantly involved in the EU project Captor and was working on the measurement of ozone together with citizens. Furthermore, ZSI is working with 18 other institutions on the quality criteria catalogue for Citizen Science projects on the platform Österreich forscht.

The Agency for Health and Food Safety GmbH (AGES) is a company of the Republic of Austria and was founded on 1 June 2002.

AGES runs its own citizen science projects, such as the project "Tea Bag Index", in which experiments on the decomposition process in soil are conducted with the help of tea bags in order to better understand the global CO2 cycle. With this tea bag method, even lay people around the world can make a valuable contribution to science and the environment: they simply bury tea bags in the ground, dig them up again after a while and weigh them. The weight loss indicates how much plant material, in this case tea, has been decomposed. This simple and cheap method for determining decomposition rates has been scientifically proven. With these experiments, comparable data can be obtained worldwide, especially from regions for which no corresponding information is available so far. On the project's website you can find more information about this project.

In addition, AGES in cooperation with the Citizen Science Network Austria as well as the FWF (Austrian Science Fund) organized the Austrian Citizen Science Conference 2017. Under the motto "Expanding Horizons" more than 200 scientists met from 2-4 March 2017 to learn about the latest developments in and around Citizen Science in Austria and around the world. 

BOKU University was founded in Vienna in 1872 and offers a wide range of courses in the natural and life sciences, which is currently used by more than 12,000 students. Through its applied study programmes, BOKU has a long tradition of cooperation with the general public. Thus, one of the university's main focuses is also the communication of new findings to the general public.

In the past, BOKU has carried out numerous Sparkling Science as well as Participatory and Transdisciplinary projects. Since 2013, a working group has been working intensively on Citizen Science, and in 2015 it also held the first Austrian Citizen Science Conference, which is now held annually. This working group is running the platform "Österreich forscht" and founded the Citizen Science Network Austria in 2017 to further strengthen the cooperation between scientific institutions and the general public.

Reporting and collecting dead songbirds

You find a dead songbird in your garden? Your cat brings home a dead bird? If you are in this situation, you can support a current research project of the University of Veterinary Medicine Vienna.

Avian malaria

Within the framework of the Citizen-Science project "Avian malaria", dead songbirds and woodpeckers from Vienna, Lower Austria, and Burgenland are collected by the Institute of Pathology at the University of Veterinary Medicine Vienna. The birds are examined scientifically to gain further knowledge about the pathological effects of haemosporidian infections in songbirds. Haemosporidians are unicellular blood parasites that are transmitted by mosquitoes and other bloodsucking insects. The researchers are particularly interested in the conditions under which the blood parasites proliferate strongly in the tissues of the birds and thus cause serious and sometimes fatal avian malaria diseases. The collection campaign is carried out in cooperation with StadtWildTiere, Wilde Nachbarn and Birdlife Austria.

Reporting and collecting dead birds

You can report the finding of a dead bird using a report form on the homepage of StadtWildTiere. Besides, you can send a photo of the bird found via e-mail to This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.. This makes it easier to check and confirm your report. Nearly all songbird species (except for blackbirds and crows) and woodpeckers are of interest. Information on the safe handling and storage of dead birds can be found on the project homepage.

How do the birds get to the University of Veterinary Medicine Vienna?

Shortly after your report, the project team will contact you (by phone or e-mail) to clarify whether the reported bird is needed and to arrange the pick-up of the dead birds in case of acceptance. To keep the effort for you as low as possible, the pick-up and transportation will be carried out by a transport service (Medlog). The transportation costs will be covered entirely by the Vetmeduni Vienna.

Scientific studies

The dead birds are subjected to pathological examination at the Institute of Pathology of the Vetmeduni Vienna and tested for the presence of haemosporidian parasites. In positive cases, the pathogen species are identified and tissue changes caused by the parasites are analyzed. In any case, the project team will inform you about the results of your finding, and the collected data will be published on the project homepage at the end of the study. All research-related data is stored in the internal patient database of the Vetmeduni Vienna.

The reporting and collecting campaign ran from June to October 2020.

Picture gallery

(Please click on the respective photo to enlarge it)

• Collect birds professionally (T Himmel) Collect birds professionally (T Himmel)
• Procedure of the Avian Malaria Project (VetMedUni PR) Procedure of the Avian Malaria Project (VetMedUni PR)
• Bird section (T Himmel) Bird section (T Himmel)
• Plasmodium Meronten (T Himmel) Plasmodium Meronten (T Himmel)
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