The Great Lockdown-slowdown of 2020
What did you see… or what didn’t you?
The world has experienced a bizarre situation over the last few months. One which some, but most would never have imagined. A pandemic that has forced us to stop and take notice as a collective.
While society’s priority and attention has been focused on trying to deal speedily with an unfamiliar disease and the extreme challenges and adversities it has created in its wake, nature has taken the opportunity to sigh a sigh of relief. Perhaps nature has forced us to stop and smell the flowers, some even calling it the ‘great pause’. Human activity has slowed down dramatically with an abrupt halt in people’s movements. This has led to the term ‘Anthropause’ being coined. During this time, nature has seemingly behaved a little unusually. Reports have been circulating of wildlife behaving differently or becoming more visible in urban areas, and environmental conditions changing.
This lockdown has presented us with a unique opportunity to capture this information and we are interested in hearing from you. SANParks have therefore put together a survey which we would like to appeal to the general public to participate in. We hope to put all these observations together through a collective citizen science project to learn as much as possible on how human presence and absence may influence wildlife movement and behaviour.
This historic shut-down of human activity is an opportunity to see how wildlife and the broader environment responds to this unusual situation.
Please take a few minutes to share your experiences with us!
