The Fishes of Texas Project (http://www.fishesoftexas.org) has compiled, and continues to expand and refine, a large database of museum specimen-based records of the the occurrences of the state's freshwater fishes. The data are being used in research relevant to fish and aquatic ecology, community ecology, endangered species, conservation, water resources management.
The data are all linked to museum specimens, and much of our work involves collecting, handling preserved specimens, cataloging them and making the data available. Thus anyone with an interest in Natural History Museum Collections and the Information Science related to data management and serving data to the world can also make valuable contributions via work in our collections.
Though our project is focused on Texas and its rivers and other aquatic habitats, our database and museum collection include records from all adjacent states and northern Mexico.
See also or Collection Assistants project - https://www.utexas.edu/research/eureka/project/view?project_id=131
interest in fishes (ichthyology) and/or aquatic ecology, conservation and natural resource management. Familiarity with databases, web database technologies and html, GIS, are all helpful skills but not required.
ongoing for foreseeable future.
duties range from data entry and mangement to georeferencing of historic collection localities to field collections of specimens using nets and electrofishing, sorting of specimens, specimen preparation and photography in the lab, retrieving specimens from the specimen for research or loans to researchers, etc.
There are many ways students with database, coding and GIS skills can use them to help us improve data quality for research, and/or to do original research or visualization projects utilizing the data.
