6.2 Well-curated data are gold
A key lesson is that long-term meticulously collected field data has an
inestimable value (Rosi et al., 2022). While ever more sophisticated
models can integrate insights, enhance process-based understanding, test
hypotheses and provide a basis for prediction; to be of most value, they
need to be grounded in high quality data (Blair et al., 2019).
It follows that careful management, quality control, documentation and
curation of data is crucial. Over long periods, staff, field methods,
instruments, data storage capabilities and analytical tools all change.
The accuracy and precision of data can therefore also change and there
can almost never be enough documentation of meta-data to help later
researchers utilise data effectively. Even where data are carefully
quality controlled and archived, it is often only when time series are
analysed in a robust manner that potential errors and biases become
apparent (Glover et al., 2019). In some cases, in the Girnock study
researchers have had to revert to original field notebooks to try and
understand and correct data inconsistencies in very time-consuming data
archaeology (Glover et al., 2020).