In the dim December light on Causeway Beach on Sober Island, N.S., Robin Metcalfe and a group of other citizen scientists set up an east-pointing instrument under the sand.

This beach profiler—made of wingnuts, curtain rods, and a pocket surface tied with elastic bands—is measuring the slope of the beach, to gauge how it’s changing over time. is

It’s part of a series of measurements that Metcliffe, the crew’s captain, and other citizen scientists are using to document changes along this stretch of coastline. Metcalfe also keeps an automated weather station and rain gauge at his home five minutes down the road to monitor the weather and rainfall.

“The social aspect is really important because it’s getting people out to the beach in December,” he says. “It takes a certain amount of commitment.”

The measurements are part of a monitoring project that began over the summer, collecting weather data and monitoring four beaches in the Sheet Harbor area.

“The idea with our project is that people will begin to understand the coast,” says Dalhousie associate researcher Camilo Botero.

Botero, who is from Colombia, started the project after realizing that there was little citizen science monitoring of Nova Scotia’s beaches.

“If we really want to move climate action, and we really want people to start preparing better, and if we want to improve coastal management, we need people to participate. is, (and) the best way is… directly on the beach.”

‘It builds community’

In its initial phase, the project was largely funded by the Anglican Church.

Rev. Marian Lucas-Jefferies, coordinator of the Diocesan Environmental Network, an environmental group for the Anglican dioceses of Nova Scotia and PEI, says supporting the project was in line with the church’s commitment to environmental values.

Lucas-Jefferies says the network helped secure funding from the church for weather stations and other aspects of the project, and provided connections to parishes on the East Coast. Building these connections—as well as connections with others doing similar work in remote locations, such as Argentina and the Solomon Islands—is an important part of the network’s role.

“One of the things about citizen science… is that people learn how to take action in times of climate change. It’s empowering and it builds community between people, and those are some of our goals.”

In its first six months, the project involved building coastal climate teams to measure beaches using beach profilers and other observations, and weather data from people’s homes on the East Coast. can be recorded.

Botero says the main takeaway from the project so far has been how little is known about one of the wildest parts of Nova Scotia’s coastline.

“The biggest surprise about the data was that there was no data at all. It was incredible.”

Before the project, the area from the Kenso Causeway to the Eastern Passage had only two Environment Canada stations, two weather stations and one rain gauge.

Information on the biodiversity of native coastal vegetation was also lacking. In a scan of scientific databases, Botero could find no scientific information on plant species found on the East Coast.

Lack of data is also an opportunity, says Botero. The East Coast has now tripled the number of weather stations and quadrupled the number of rain gauges, and teams are completing monthly surveys of the four coasts.

“There was a big gap,” he says. “Now we have — not as much data as we’d like to have — but at least we have more data than before.”

Next year, Botero says the plan is to add more parameters to monitor, including waves and animals, and add more coastal climate teams along the East Coast.

Ultimately, Botero says, the growing data about changes in coastlines not only provides scientific information, but also their Increases people’s knowledge about the environment.

“It’s changing the information we have but also the identity of when people relate to the coast,” he says. “Our plan is that in two or three years we’ll have enough information to start identifying different patterns so that communities can better prepare for climate-related events.”

Moving forward, the project aims to add more monitoring teams. It will also be part of a multi-year research project involving the universities of Nova Scotia and Quebec.

Kate Sheeren is director of the School for Resource and Environmental Studies and co-leader of the Dalhousie University TransSECT project, which consists of 14 smaller projects in the region.

She says the east coast monitoring work was a good fit for TransSECT, which is investigating how coastal communities are responding to climate change, including by developing their own solutions.

“Anything that puts people in greater interaction with a changing ecosystem is really good,” she says. “One of the challenges we have with people being willing to make significant changes or accept policy changes … is in people’s own experience of those changes, even if they witness those changes themselves. have been and to what they attribute these changes.”

Nova Scotia’s coast is fading. Similarly, few people have confidence in his environmental policy.

Coastal property owners and researchers are expressing frustration with the provincial government’s approach to coastal protection. Some say more leadership is needed from the province after abandoning the Coastal Protection Act.

A project like the Eastern Shore Monitoring Project can encourage people to take a systematic look at what’s going on, Sherin says.

“Helping people become more aware or see their landscape differently, I think, is powerful.”

As for Metcalfe, he says he plans to be a part of the monitoring project for the foreseeable future, and that he’s already seen a community build around information sharing.

“Protecting the environment is in all our interests, but we have to do it in a way that helps people live with the environment, including earning a living.

“With coastal monitoring, that means we have people in the community who are directly involved in collecting data and seeing what’s going on with climate change.”

Ultimately, Metcalfe says, it can foster hope, even at a time when changes in the environment can feel dire.