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Citizen science (CS) has gathered an impressive wealth of open biodiversity data over the last decade, with demonstrated significant scientific contributions in biology and conservation science. However, the contribution of CS in botanical research, and more particularly regarding inconspicuous taxonomic groups such as cryptogams remains largely unexplored. Here we assess the current status and contribution of CS in botanical research, with a special focus on non-vascular "cryptogams" (bryophytes, lichens, fungi, and algae). We conducted a literature review for the period 2012 to 2022 to synthesize the use of CS in botanical studies. We found an increasing trend in the use of CS for botanical research (average annual increase of ∼40%), although highly biased towards vascular plants (246 papers). Cryptogams remained strongly underrepresented (58 papers), although receiving slightly growing attention since 2018. The inconspicuousness nature, high diversity, challenges with species identification, and low public perception of cryptogams not only restrict the contribution made by non-experts but raise concerns about the reliability and robustness of generated data. This is fueled by the scarcity of foundational methodological studies in cryptogams, which seems to undermine the scientific confidence in engaging volunteers for their research or using open data from CS platforms and tools. Despite this, our review showed a gradual adoption of CS approaches for cryptogam research, which is particularly led by mycologists. We highlight the versatility and potential of CS approaches for advancing cryptogam knowledge across various research subjects at spatial and temporal scales otherwise unfathomable by researchers, and provide insights on the opportunities of application and possible solutions to the discussed limitations. We hope our work motivates mycologists, phycologists, bryologists, and lichenologists to further embrace CS, and increase public awareness on these highly sensitive and ecologically important taxa. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Natural disturbance‐based management (NDBM) is hypothesized to maintain managed forest ecosystem integrity by reducing differences between natural and managed forests. The effectiveness of this approach often entails local comparisons of species composition or diversity for a variety of biota from managed and unmanaged forests. Understory vegetation is regularly the focus of such comparison because of its importance in nutrient cycling, forest regeneration, and for wildlife. However, larger scale comparisons between regions with distinct species assemblages may require a trait‐based approach to better understand understory responses to disturbance. We compared the long‐term effects of retention harvesting on understory vegetation in two large experimental study sites located in eastern and western regions of the Canadian boreal forest. These sites included the Sylviculture en Aménagement Forestier Ecosystémique (SAFE) experiment and the Ecosystem Management Emulating Natural Disturbance (EMEND) experiment, located in the eastern and western regions of Canada, respectively. EMEND and SAFE share common boreal understory species but have distinct tree communities, soils, and climate. Both experiments were designed to evaluate how increasing tree retention after harvest affects biodiversity. Here, we examined taxonomic richness, functional diversity, and functional composition (using community trait mean values) of understory plant communities, and also examine intraspecific trait variability (ITV) for five species common and abundant in both experiments. We observed the limited impacts of retention level on richness, functional diversity, and functional composition of understory plants 20 years postharvest. However, ITV of leaf morphological traits varied between retention levels within each experiment, depending on the species identity. Common species had different functional responses to retention level, showing species‐specific reactions to environmental variation. Our result suggests that understory plant communities in the boreal forest achieve resilience to disturbance both in terms of interspecific and intraspecific functional trait diversity. Such diversity may be key to maintaining understory biodiversity in the face of future disturbances and environmental change. Our results reveal the significance of ITV in plant communities for understanding responses to forest harvesting and the importance of choosing appropriate traits when studying species responses to the environment. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]