Biodiversity of Alabama's Journal

Planning has begun for iNaturalist’s City Nature Challenge (CNC) 2020 http://citynaturechallenge.org, an annual event where cities around the world compete to see who can make the most nature observations, find the most species, and engage the most people during the event. The CNC began in 2016 with just two cities (Los Angles & San Francisco), and has grown each year such that more than 150 cities around the globe will be participating in this year’s challenge. This year I am once again organizing the 2020 Birmingham Metro Area iNaturalist Project to compete in the City Nature Challenge https://www.inaturalist.org/projects/city-nature-challenge-2020-birmingham-metro-area. This CNC project will include all iNaturalist observations made between April 24 - 27, 2020 from Bibb, Blount, Calhoun, Coosa, Culman, Etowah, Jefferson, Shelby, St. Clair, Talladega, Tuscaloosa, and Walker Counties. If successful, I’m hopeful in the future we can encourage other Alabama cites (e.g., Huntsville, Mobile, etc.) to create similar projects for future challenges.

The CNC competition takes place in two parts: first nature observations need to be made between April 24 - 27, and then from April 28 - May 3 there is a period for these observations to be identified by the iNaturalist community as best as possible before the challenge ends, and the final numbers are counted for each competing city project in the event.

I’ve tagged you in this journal post because you’re a top observer and/or identifier for past iNaturalist observations from one of the Alabama counties to be included in our 2020 CNC: Birmingham Metro Project. I'm really hoping you’ll participate in this year’s City Nature Challenge – while I know getting observations from as many people as we can is important, I also know that it’s top iNat observers like you that will really push this project ahead in the number of observations made, and especially the number of species found in the Birmingham Metro Area! Please consider joining the 2020 Birmingham Metro Area iNaturalist Project by clicking on the "Join" button on the top right of the project page https://www.inaturalist.org/projects/city-nature-challenge-2020-birmingham-metro-area. Once you join you will receive future posts from this CNC project including announcements of iNaturalist events (e.g., training sessions, bioblitzes, nature walks, ID parties, etc.) in the area that will be taking place as part of this year's competition.

Finally, please feel free to brainstorm about other ideas to increase awareness and public participation in this CNC project, ask questions, etc. in the comments – and definitely add others to this journal post via tagging them in the comments!

Thanks,

John Friel
Alabama Museum of Natural History

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