user307: I'm asking because of the general lack of  activity on this site. If things stay the way they are, it doesn't seem likely to make it out of Beta, considering the depressing asking rate (or is it just me?). Should this be a legitimate and immediate concern of ours? What are some concrete actions that we can take to prevent this from happening and to rejuvenate our community?

user1278: One way to improve the content is for the experts on this site to ask questions and self-answer.

user69: I think that as Mad Scientist points out, this has a lot to do with the time of year.  

Chemistry, for example, is also on exactly 2.1 q/day at the time of writing.  
CogSci is on a lower 1.3 q/day.
CompSci and Linguistics are also both tracking below us at the moment.  

I certainly don't think that there is a danger of us imminently falling to the scrap heap!  
Furthermore, if we look at the four most recently graduated sites and the questions per day they crossed the line:

Mathematica - 12 Q/Day ("Okay")
Role Playing Games 3.4 Q/Day ("Needs Work")
Skeptics - 5.7 Q/Day ("Okay")
Judaism - 6.6 Q/Day ("Okay")

With the exception of Mathematica, none of the above were achieving drastically more than we were before the academic holiday (as Mad Scientist notes, a rate of roughly 5 Q/Day).  Indeed the only property defined as "Excellent" for all four freshly graduated sites was the "Active Users" metric, which Biology will soon green up itself.  
Without being able to see statistics about Q&A on other Science sites (which I'm fairly sure will have activity variation with the academic calendar) it is difficult to be sure if this is "normal" for Bio.SE however if people are interested we can liase with the moderators of the other sites and see if we are fitting a trend - if we are then I don't think we have any reason to be concerned. 
Perhaps if we get to mid September and it hasn't picked up, then we can start to take more serious actions.  

user6: I don't think we're in any acute danger, and our question volume is not as bad as the current value seems to imply. There is a sharp drop in question and answer volume since about a week ago, maybe people being on holiday or something. 
We were averaging around 3-5 questions before that drop, I assume we'll get back to that value. We certainly need some more activity to get out of beta, but we're not in a region where we are in danger of being shut down.
My larger concern is that we still have a pretty limited number of experts on the site. My subjective observation is that we're struggling a bit to cover all the major areas of biology. But with a subject as large as biology, this problem is to be expected, and it should get a lot better when the site grows larger.

307: <p>I'm asking because of the general lack of  activity on this site. If things stay the way they are, it doesn't seem likely to make it out of Beta, considering the <a href="http://area51.stackexchange.com/proposals/12502/biology">depressing asking rate</a> (or is it just me?). Should this be a legitimate and immediate concern of ours? What are some concrete actions that we can take to prevent this from happening and to rejuvenate our community?</p>
 1278: <p>One way to improve the content is for the experts on this site to ask questions and self-answer.</p>
 69: <p>I think that as Mad Scientist <a href="https://biology.meta.stackexchange.com/a/313/69">points out</a>, this has a lot to do with the time of year.  </p>

<ul>
<li><a href="https://chemistry.stackexchange.com/">Chemistry</a>, for example, is also on exactly <a href="http://area51.stackexchange.com/proposals/4964/chemistry">2.1 q/day</a> at the time of writing.  </li>
<li><a href="https://cogsci.stackexchange.com/">CogSci</a> is on a lower <a href="http://area51.stackexchange.com/proposals/2149/cognitive-sciences">1.3 q/day</a>.</li>
<li><a href="https://cs.stackexchange.com/">CompSci</a> and <a href="https://linguistics.stackexchange.com/">Linguistics</a> are also both tracking below us at the moment.  </li>
</ul>

<p>I certainly don't think that there is a danger of us imminently falling to the scrap heap!  </p>

<p>Furthermore, if we look at the four most recently <strong>graduated</strong> sites and the questions per day they crossed the line:</p>

<ol>
<li><a href="https://mathematica.stackexchange.com/">Mathematica</a> - <strong><a href="http://area51.stackexchange.com/proposals/37304/mathematica">12 Q/Day</a> ("Okay")</strong></li>
<li><a href="https://rpg.stackexchange.com/">Role Playing Games</a> <strong><a href="http://area51.stackexchange.com/proposals/2208/role-playing-games">3.4 Q/Day</a> ("Needs Work")</strong></li>
<li><a href="https://skeptics.stackexchange.com/">Skeptics</a> - <strong><a href="http://area51.stackexchange.com/proposals/12612/skeptics">5.7 Q/Day</a> ("Okay")</strong></li>
<li><a href="https://judaism.stackexchange.com/">Judaism</a> - <strong><a href="http://area51.stackexchange.com/proposals/22435/jewish-life-and-learning">6.6 Q/Day</a> ("Okay")</strong></li>
</ol>

<p>With the exception of Mathematica, none of the above were achieving drastically more than we were before the academic holiday (as Mad Scientist notes, a rate of roughly 5 Q/Day).  Indeed the only property defined as "Excellent" for all four freshly graduated sites was the "Active Users" metric, which Biology will soon green up itself.  </p>

<p>Without being able to see statistics about Q&amp;A on other Science sites (which I'm fairly sure will have activity variation with the academic calendar) it is difficult to be sure if this is "normal" for Bio.SE however if people are interested we can liase with the moderators of the other sites and see if we are fitting a trend - if we are then I don't think we have any reason to be concerned. </p>

<p>Perhaps if we get to mid September and it hasn't picked up, then we can start to take more serious actions.  </p>
 6: <p>I don't think we're in any acute danger, and our question volume is not as bad as the current value seems to imply. There is a sharp drop in question and answer volume since about a week ago, maybe people being on holiday or something. </p>

<p>We were averaging around 3-5 questions before that drop, I assume we'll get back to that value. We certainly need some more activity to get out of beta, but we're not in a region where we are in danger of being shut down.</p>

<p>My larger concern is that we still have a pretty limited number of experts on the site. My subjective observation is that we're struggling a bit to cover all the major areas of biology. But with a subject as large as biology, this problem is to be expected, and it should get a lot better when the site grows larger.</p>
