Sudden oak death (Phytophthora ramorum) citizen-science leaf monitoring — Bay Area & North Coast California / southwest Oregon.

Survey California bay laurel leaves for the trained sudden oak death lesion pattern and submit labeled samples to the region's official SOD Blitz program. Phytophthora ramorum has killed tens of millions of oaks and tanoaks across coastal California and southwest Oregon, and bay laurel carries and spreads the spores for years before a nearby oak shows any sign. A trained volunteer walking a known route during the program's own spring survey window turns an ordinary neighborhood or park walk into a real data point the Garbelotto Lab's genetic testing can act on. It is the same citizen-science network that caught a more aggressive pathogen genotype in 2024.

Offer to pay $150. The receipt lands onchain once the proof is approved.

What it looks like

A trained volunteer stoops beneath a bay laurel at a trailhead, turning a leaf over to check its tip for a chlorotic-haloed brown lesion before bagging it and logging the GPS point.

A description of this kind of work, not a record that it happened here.

Where

Coastal California from roughly Big Sur north through Humboldt County, and southwest Oregon's Curry County (SOD Blitz / Oregon SOD Program survey areas). Open the map

Pay

$150 proposed

This job is not funded yet, so this figure is a proposed price, not money held for the worker. If a buyer funds it, approved proof settles that price onchain. If nobody funds it, approved proof earns provable credit toward the work instead of cash: recorded, and readable any time at vealth.net/labor/credit/(your wallet). You see which before you claim, never after.

Proof

SOD Blitz or Oregon SOD Program training completed before surveying + Bay laurel leaves checked for the trained lesion pattern + GPS location with collection date recorded per sample + Nearby oak or tanoak trunk canker signs reported by name, never diagnosed + Sample set submitted through the program's own channel, date recorded + No host material moved out of the survey area

This is exactly what gets it approved. Nothing settles without it.

Level

entry: anyone can start here

Open until

2026-12-22

Posted by

0x034F…6c89

The creator wallet. Its signature is what approves proof and settles the wage.

Field surveillance only: never diagnose, treat, cut, or remove any bay laurel, oak, or tanoak, and never move host material out of the survey area. Watch for poison oak, ticks, and uneven ground; route a hazardous dead or leaning tree to an ISA Certified Arborist.

The full safety list for this job:

• Phytophthora ramorum is a federally regulated quarantine pathogen (7 CFR 301.92) with parallel state quarantine programs; bay laurel, oak, or tanoak leaf, wood, or nursery material is never moved out of the survey area regardless of visible symptoms.
• A trunk canker sign on an oak or tanoak (red-brown to black bark discoloration bleeding dark sap, typically 1-2 m above ground on otherwise intact bark) is reported by name to the program's regional coordinator or state agency, never diagnosed, treated, or felled by the observer.
• A lesion pattern the volunteer cannot confidently match to the trained bay-laurel symptom is still collected and submitted, with an honest uncertainty note rather than discarded.
• Wear appropriate footwear and clothing for uneven forest and brush terrain, and know how to identify and avoid poison oak, common throughout the survey range.
• This is trained citizen-science field surveillance only, never a diagnosis and never a treatment: no sanitation cutting, no preventative chemical treatment, and no bay laurel or oak removal is ever performed or recommended from this packet.
• A hazardous-looking dead or structurally compromised tree near a survey target also cross-routes to this library's urban_tree_visual_health_check packet.

Three separate acts, never one: a vote is a free signed preference that moves no money; a pledge is free signed backing intent, balance-checked, that moves no money and never marks the packet funded; funding is a real payment, made by the payer straight to the worker, with no Vealth fee. Paying Vealth is closed: Vealth takes no new card or wallet payment for a job. To fund a job, offer to pay the worker directly, then pay them yourself when you accept the proof, from your own wallet or by your own card or bank. From a wallet: prepare_token_offer, sign, submit_token_offer; after the proof is accepted you pay the worker on chain and the worker records it (prepare_token_settlement, or POST /labor/settle for USDC on Base). By card or bank: prepare_direct_offer, sign, submit_direct_offer; you pay the worker yourself and the worker records it with prepare_direct_settlement. Both are free, need no gas, and move no money through Vealth.

Claiming is free. You sign to prove the wallet is yours: no card, no deposit, no fee. Vote, Pledge and Fund are three separate acts: a vote is a free preference, a pledge is free signed backing intent that moves no money, and funding is a real payment.

An agent can claim this for you with one call to POST /labor/claim, documented at /llms.txt.

Every stage this packet actually passes, claim to settlement, is public in its receipt trail. A stage that has not happened is not claimed.

Posted pay is not paid pay: settlement follows accepted proof, never the other way around. Vealth does not employ or vet workers, and claiming is not a promise of payment. See how proof and receipts work.