Zach Lyon Creative · 2016–2022 · Lake Tahoe & the mountain West
Hive Science
Two citizen science apps that turned thousands of volunteers into field researchers for Lake Tahoe and the mountain West, and the platform we're building from what they taught us.
- Role
- Product ownership, brand, UX & UI design, front-end development
- Platforms
- iOS & Android apps, progressive web apps, admin dashboards
- Partners
- UC Davis TERC, Desert Research Institute, Keep Tahoe Blue, Lynker Technologies, University of Nevada, Reno
- Stack
- Angular, Vue, Ionic, Capacitor, Firebase
- 15,000 Lake Tahoe observations from volunteers by 2022
- 10,000+ precipitation reports in Mountain Rain or Snow’s first winter
- NASA funded through the ROSES Earth Science program
- 6 years of continuous service to the research teams, 2016–2022
The problem
Scientists studying Lake Tahoe and the snowpack of the western mountains need more eyes in the field than any grant can pay for. Algae blooms, invasive species, water clarity and whether a storm falls as rain or snow all change by the hour and by the mile. Volunteers are out there anyway, hiking, paddling and skiing. The challenge was turning their phones into reliable research instruments.
Each project brought together several organizations with their own scientists, questions and data needs, all of which had to fit into one simple app.
Citizen Science Tahoe
Working with UC Davis Tahoe Environmental Research Center, Desert Research Institute and the League to Save Lake Tahoe, we rescued the first version of the app from a database shutdown, then rebuilt it as a geolocated survey app for iOS and Android. A password-protected dashboard let each organization build its own surveys with any mix of question types, then export the observations for analysis. No developer needed.
A bug that became a feature
Early on, the exported data didn't match what volunteers had submitted. The cause turned out to be very human: researchers were editing survey questions in the middle of a season. We added a survey lock to protect live surveys. That led to survey duplication, which in turn made annual survey versioning easy.
Each year also brought new iOS privacy rules that added location-permission steps to an otherwise streamlined flow. We redesigned around every change to keep reporting fast.
Mountain Rain or Snow
Desert Research Institute liked the platform enough to bring us onto a NASA-funded study with Lynker Technologies and the University of Nevada, Reno. Their question was simple and important: during a storm, is it raining or snowing where you are? The answer helps climatologists model the snowpack that feeds western water supplies.
With a fixed budget and a few months, we built on the Citizen Science Tahoe platform instead of starting over. We simplified it to a single, fast observation, explored several brand directions, and added text-message alerts so researchers could ask for reports as storms moved through.
Results
- Citizen Science Tahoe logged 3,000+ observations in its first winter, and nearly 15,000 by 2022
- Mountain Rain or Snow collected 10,000+ precipitation reports in its first winter
- Opt-in volunteer profiles gave researchers email and SMS lists to rally observers during events
- When grant funding tightened, both teams moved to off-the-shelf survey tools. That gap, between custom apps and generic forms, is exactly where Hive Science fits
What's next: Hive Science
Organizations across the country asked for apps like these. Hive Science turns everything we learned into a white-label platform that grant-funded teams can actually afford.
Survey builder
Any question type, locked once live, versioned every season.
Built for the field
Geolocated, offline-first observations with photos, synced when signal returns.
Data researchers can use
Clean exports and an API, so observations flow straight into analysis.
Agent-powered setup
AI agents handle the custom branding and configuration, keeping each launch affordable.