You are excited about having your IPM on the same platform as your environmental data, so how do you use it?
Let's start by taking a look at the IPM dashboard.
1. Pest monitor
As you can see in the screenshot above, when you go into the Pests section of the Conserv Cloud platform with the left-hand navigation bar, the first tab on the top left is the Pest Monitor tab. This is the tab where you will organize your pest monitor locations in the same hierarchical way that you organize your data loggers.
It is not currently possible to drag and drop the pest monitors in the same way as the data loggers, but you can change their location by clicking into each monitor and changing the Space Name property in the description.
2. Observe
Once you have all your monitors setup in their locations, you can move on to going around and taking pictures of what you've caught. You can do this from your desk or with your phone (or at your desk with your phone!). The fastest way we recommend is to take all the photos with your mobile app. For more detailed step-by-step instructions on how to get your observations into the platform, check out this other article: How do the pest observations work?
Hot tip: Do your pest monitors mysteriously disappear every now and then? Check out this conversation in the community on tips and tricks to help you make sure your monitors are not being moved or thrown out by colleagues.
3. Identify
Now that you have all your monitor set up, and you've gone through adding photos of what you've caught in them, you need to go through the identify tab. This can only be done through the web browser platform at the moment.
If you have any observations that are pending identification, you will be able to see this easily as the IDENTIFICATIONS column will either say how many types and total counts you have, or it will say Needs ID.
Important: Be aware that any monitors that say "Needs ID" will not show up in your Analyze graphs. If you stop to think about it, it makes a lot of sense. How could they show up if they do not have any catch information associated to them?
4. Analyze
The analyze tab will show you all the nice graphs you need to make reports. You will also be able to download .csv tables of your IPM data from there.
The Manage List tool
The Manage List tab allows you to pick which pests you'd like to show up as options when you are doing your identifications. We strongly recommend that you take a few minutes to make this list your own (once you have become familiar with your usual pest suspects). Why?
The general list is drawn from the Museumpests.net database. This database is very extensive and will have insects and other animals you may literally never run into in your particular neck of the woods.
Once you have become familiar with the types of intruders and pests you normally find, customizing your list will help you avoid having to browse through the complete database when you are going through your identifications. How much you can personalize this list will depend on your version of Conserv Cloud.
Custom pest list
For the custom pest list, you can add a common name, a scientific name and a photo of the animal in its correct lifecycle stage. This is appropriate when you have a catch that is simply not in the Musetumpests.net list. Read more about how to add additional pests to the pest list.
Note: If you are paying for Conserv Essentials software only or are a Conserv subscriber with a pro account (you have Conserv sensors), you can use both the custom pest list on the left and the MuseumPests.net list on the right. If you are on the completely free version of Conserv Cloud, you will not be able to make a custom pest list.
Museumpest.net list
The Museumpests.net list is available to all for free. We suggest you check the boxes only of those animals you are used to finding. This will keep your identification list clean and make it faster for you to use.
The Pest database
The pest database tab is a view of an embedded Airtable version of the Museumpests.net database. It's a great tool to help you become familiar with pests and read more information on them to help you figure out what they eat and what they need to survive. This valuable information will help you determine which of your collections are most at risk from them and which environmental conditions may be causing your populations to rise and fall.
Tip: Watch this video if you'd like to see how all this plays out on the web platform!
Troubleshooting issues
Pests not showing up in the analyze tab
If you look at how we have written this article, you will notice we added a numbers 1-4 for the first tabs in the IPM module. This is because all four steps are essential for your information to display correctly. If you are not seeing your recorded pests in the graphs in the Analyze section, make sure first you have correctly gone through steps 1-3.
- Make sure you are checking the correct space for the pest monitors you are looking for.
- If the information still does not show up, make sure your observations are present in the Observe tab.
- If your monitors are correct and the observations are in the Observe tab table, make sure you have actually gone through and identified the pests in the monitors using the Identify tab. This can be an easy step to miss!
If you go through steps 1-3 and your pests still not show up or you have other issues that have not been addressed in this article, please send us a support ticket and we will be happy to work with you to get it resolved.