Terrestrial Surveillance Development and Analysis (TSDA) is a partnership between JNCC, the UK Centre for Ecology & Hydrology (UKCEH) and the British Trust for Ornithology (BTO). The partnership aims to develop and enhance biodiversity monitoring schemes involving volunteer recorders, and the uses of their data to address policy-relevant questions about biodiversity. The work seeks to serve the needs of UK governments, country nature conservation bodies (CNCBs) and volunteer recording schemes which are represented by JNCC’s UK Terrestrial Evidence Partnership of Partnerships (UKTEPoP). The TSDA partnership enables exploration of common challenges faced by the sector – working across partners, partnerships and datasets – to find and implement effective solutions.
The TSDA partnership was established in 2017 and comprises two phases: Phase 1 (2017 to 2022), and Phase 2 (2022 to 2027), with outputs for these two phases captured below. At present, the TSDA partnership is working towards the aims set out in the TSDA Strategy 2022 to 2027.
Partnership publications
A catalogue of all outputs from Phase 1 and Phase 2 of TSDA can be found on our Resource hub:
Collaborating with TSDA
We welcome discussion and collaboration with other organisations as we work on different analysis and development challenges.
Our current work programme is as follows:
Analytical tasks:
| Task | Details |
| Using freshwater species data to assess lake and river health | A workshop was held in 2025 exploring freshwater data sets and data requirements across stakeholders. Steered by this workshop this task seeks to collate and map freshwater biological data from across monitoring schemes, and integrate them to create summary statistics. |
| Mapping across monitoring schemes | We have developed a map showing the locations of TEPoP monitoring scheme sites, to showcase these schemes to potential data users. This map will be published, and annual update processes developed. |
| Ecosystem Health | TEPoP monitoring datasets will be analysed together to develop and test possible metrics of ecosystem health. |
We are also finalising reports focusing on:
- Improving estimation of the impacts of interventions on species’ distributions
- Climate change adaptation indicators development
- Quantifying the contribution of protected sites to long-term population trends
Tasks Supporting Recording:
| Task | Details |
| Bioacoustics | JNCC has recently established a UK bioacoustics working group. This task seeks to build on and compile existing metadata initiatives, to develop a user-needs metadata guidance document for bioacoustics monitoring. |
| Improving verification using new technologies | Exploring the challenges and potential solutions for automated verification systems for biological records. Working with focus groups of recorders and verifiers. |
| Volunteer retention rates in citizen science | We seek to analyse volunteer retention rates in different monitoring schemes and the factors affecting them. By doing this, we hope to identify opportunities for schemes to share learning on how drop-outs could be minimized. |
| Communicating about data products derived from TEPoP schemes | As part of a wider JNCC review, we aim to run a workshop with TEPoP analysts to explore the communication and alignment of data products derived from TEPoP schemes. |
| Dealing with bias | TSDA has conducted a series of tasks on spatial bias in recording, and statistical methods to deal with it when producing trend assessments. We will organise a training workshop and develop resources for TEPoP schemes to discuss past work, and showcase options to diagnose and deal with bias. |
We are also finalising reports focusing on:
- Exploring the impact of automated personalised feedback for volunteers
- The benefits and drawbacks of co-locating species monitoring
- Monitoring habitats with citizen scientists
Alongside these tasks, the TSDA partnership will be undertaking an evaluation of the work undertaken since 2022.
If you are interested in the work of the TSDA or would like to discuss any of these tasks, please get in touch at TEPoP@jncc.gov.uk.
Our current work phase is focused on three grand challenges facing the biodiversity sector; adapting to new requirements for evidence, exploiting new data streams and developing a volunteer-centred approach to the evolution of TEPoP schemes.
A number of these tasks have been discussed by UKTEPoP, these events have been recorded and can be found on the UKTEPoP YouTube channel.
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