out wildlife and road mortality. Many state and regional programs throughout the country are now following the lead of the California Roadkill Observation System, by creating online networks for citizens and scientists alike to photograph, identify and map wildlife roadkill.
A handful of artists have made roadkill awareness their platform of choice including Pennsylvania photographer Joy Hunsberger, whose work focuses on portraits of roadkill animals, and University of Central Arkansas art instructor Carey Voss who constructs papier-mâché models of roadkill animals filled with wildflower seeds that she installs on country roads. Some artists are taking things even farther, including British artist Adam Morrigan who literally creates art out of roadkill near his home using indigenous methods of taxidermy. There are also some clever biocreative projects coming from groups such as the W.A.T.E.R. Institute at the Occidental Arts & Ecology Center in Sonoma County, California which produced the faux-news video below to raise awareness of the effects of roads on migrating California tiger salamanders. One of my favorite instances of Frogger-related biocreativity is from a couple of technology hackers who created a remote control Frogger with a Roomba vaccum cleaner and drove it across 6th Street during the SXSW festival in Austin, Texas back in 2006. I’m fairly certain it wasn’t in the name of roadkill awareness.
Interested in throwing your biocreative hat in the ring? Save The Frogs, a non-profit organization dedicated exclusively to amphibian conservation, hosts annual art and poetry contests to raise awareness of Frogger’s plight. The submission deadline is October 15, 2011. An entire page of the Save the Frogs website is dedicated to increasing awareness of the effects of roads on amphibians.
Getting back to Frogger, can popular video games be one way to increase science literacy? In this high-tech era it is becoming increasingly easy to design games and apps that could be used for this purpose. Perhaps there is a biocreative programmer out there who could design a new generation of Frogger that would educate players about road ecology, with a broader emphasis on many species and the diverse impacts of roads on wildlife. What if such a game could be come as educational as it was popular? While we’re waiting for that to happen, you can play Frogger online. And, if you want to be impressed by wicked Frogger-playing skills (i.e. not mine), you might enjoy this video.
What biocreative games have you discovered that may help increase scientific literacy?