On March 10th 2018 during the monthly bird walk at LLELA, participants were thrilled to observe a Rough-legged Hawk (Buteo lagopus ssp. sanctijohannis). Photo by Brian Standley was posted by iNaturalist user lisa58 and can be seen here:
https://www.inaturalist.org/observations/10207142
This is a first entry to iNaturalist of this species at LLELA. Going to be a great year 2018!
Calling all LLELA iNatters: Mike Fox and Jennifer Linde have secured the use of the display case at the Lewisville Public Library for the month of August specifically for the purpose of displaying photographs of LLELA iNat observations! The display case is located near the entrance of the library, and will be a great way to promote iNaturalist and LLELA.
We are now looking for contributions from LLELA’s iNaturalist project. The case is quite large, so we have room for a lot of pictures. We are looking for your best pictures of anything and everything found out at LLELA: plants, snakes, birds, fungi, molds, mammals, turtles, insects- we want to show Lewisville what a broad range of species we have found right in their backyard!
If you choose to contribute a photograph (or two, or more), contact Michael Fox to “reserve” your species (we want to make sure we have a good variety, not 100 pictures of great blue herons) and then you can deliver a hard copy photograph (8 X 10 preferred, but we can work with other sizes) to the LLELA gate house. Please place the photo in an envelope to protect it, and put Michael or Jennifer’s name on it. Include your name and what the picture is of. If you want your photo returned, include your address. If you need to mail it, contact Michael Fox.
We will be taking contributions between now and July 1.
April 1st 2017 we will be surveying everything from bats and beetles to frogs, toads and fresh water mussels, to trees, shrubs, grasses, and wild flowers. There will be nearly 50 different activities to get involved in. So we have opportunities for lots of volunteers. Our hope is to have volunteer observers and recorders on every activity.
We will be making full use of the iNaturalist app and database.
Activity descriptions, schedules and volunteer signup information will be posted on www.llelafriends.org starting March 6th. We will likely be adding activities until late March so people should check back to see if anything new pops up.
The official announcements and details for LLELA's very first Bio-Blitz will be released this coming Monday. As soon as they are out we'll be sharing them here.
There will be a pre-blitz workshop to go over iNaturalist basics covering Profile creations, observation uploading and navigation to view the Bio-Blitz results.
I am in need of a few volunteers to man the iNaturalist upload station we'll have on the day of the Bio-Blitz. Please reply here or message me if you are interested in helping out.
Mark you calendars! April 1st LLELA Bio-Blitz
THIS IS GOING TO BE SUCH A BLAST!!!!!!!!!!!
Mark your calendars. LLELA will have it's very first Bio-Blitz this coming April 1st. The event is being presented by the Friends of LLELA group and looks to be an exciting time. Friends of LLELA has worked hard to arrange a large group of Biologists, both Phd and Grad Students, to assist. I've been told there will be experts in ants, worms, fish, all types of plants, small mammals (including bats!), Odonates, Lepidoptera and of course Avians.
I'll be posting more here as the details become available but wanted to get your attention early for that date. Hope to see you all.
Michael Fox
When visitors first come to the Lewisville Lake Environmental Learning Area (LLELA), situated right in the middle of the DFW Metroplex, they might see a deer, a great blue heron, a monarch butterfly or a cardinal – all common observations even for the casual observer. It might be hard for them to envision that, since its beginning, the intrepid observers for the LLELA iNaturalist project have documented 869 different species of life, with over 6100 total observations and counting. In 2016, a total number of 2405 observations were entered into iNaturalist for the LLELA project.
Even better, the species count continues to grow. 2016 was an incredible year for first observations out at LLELA. 119 new species were recorded, including 54 insects, 30 plants, 16 birds, 9 reptiles, six fungi/lichens, and one each of amphibians (western narrow mouthed toad), fish (white bass), mammals (nutria) and mollusks (globular drop).
Butterflies and moths accounted for 13 of the insect finds. Common mestras (jblinde) made an appearance, and then seemed to be everywhere for a few weeks, along with the tailed orange. Odonata accounted for another six of the insect observations; Mchlfx observed a swift river cruiser which also happened to be one of the first documented observations in Denton County.
The nine reptiles documented for the first time included a Texas blind snake (freiheit) and a prairie lizard (christianroberts). The sixteen birds included a merlin (k8thegr8) and a ladderbacked woodpecker (naturemom).
The thirty plants included in the LLELA inaturalist project included the osage orange (wildcarrot), Eve’s necklace (dturnerfish) and a tiny white flower, corn gromwell, first observed by aguilita. That dainty wildflower you walk by on the trail every weekend might not yet have been documented so get it into iNaturalist!
The LLELA iNaturalist project contributor list continues to expand, as well. Twenty-six observers each recorded a first species; the top three observers were jblinde (26), mclfx (21), and sambiology (10).
What is in store for 2017? Who knows what else is out there on LLELA’s 2000 acres, waiting to be documented for the first time by an intrepid iNaturalist? As interest in iNaturalist continues to grow and LLELA becomes more well known throughout the Dallas- Fort Worth Metroplex, 2017 could be another great year for observations.
jblinde
Wow! I am loving this new observations page! The ease and power of it's filtering is everything I ever wished for at iNaturalist. Thanks to all the great developers and support and special thanks to Sam Kieschnick for pointing out the cool features.
I've created a few filtered pages to post to Facebook and received lots of 'likes' and 'comments'. I've shared them with groups like 'Birds of Texas', Dragonfly and Damselfly and DFW Urban Wildlife and hope it will prove useful to other Nature Lovers.
Here are the first few from LLELA Observations:
Dragonflies and Damselfies of LLELA - http://www.inaturalist.org/observations?hrank=order&lrank=species&place_id=63542&project_id=llela-lewisville-lake-environmental-learning-area&quality_grade=research&subview=grid&taxon_id=47792&view=species&iconic_taxa=Insecta
Perching Birds of LLELA - http://www.inaturalist.org/observations?place_id=63542&subview=grid&taxon_id=7251
Hawks, Eagles and Kites of LLELA - http://www.inaturalist.org/observations? http://www.inaturalist.org/observations?place_id=63542&subview=grid&taxon_id=5067&view=species
After two years of Beginning iNat workshops I'm going to try and have a new workshop on Navigating and Mining the data at iNat.
Just reminding everyone we're soooooo close to the 800 mark on species count. I for one am headed out Saturday to see if I can push us over the top.
This is such a great way to document species. I even had the opportunity to provide a trail map for some visitors using observation filters. Loving this new format here.
First observations added to the LLELA Project for June 2016:
2016-06-04 21:08:29 UTC mchlfx http://www.inaturalist.org/observations/3386825 Pseudemys concinna River Cooter
2016-06-10 22:54:16 UTC jblinde http://www.inaturalist.org/observations/3430156 Cantharellus cibarius Chanterelle
2016-06-12 11:38:00 UTC brennan3909 http://www.inaturalist.org/observations/3448939 Ixobrychus exilis Least Bittern
2016-06-18 13:13:14 UTC mchlfx http://www.inaturalist.org/observations/3479101 Hemipenthes sinuosa Sinuous bee fly
2016-06-22 23:35:01 UTC jblinde http://www.inaturalist.org/observations/3504936 Alaus oculatus Eastern Eyed Click Beetle
2016-06-24 13:45:02 UTC mchlfx http://www.inaturalist.org/observations/3518865 Melissodes bimaculata
2016-06-26 13:03:54 UTC mchlfx http://www.inaturalist.org/observations/3528753 Megischus bicolor
brentano http://www.inaturalist.org/observations/3540425 Sympetrum vicinum Autumn Meadowhawk
Our next Photo Safari at LLELA is this coming Sunday at 4:30pm. We'll be meeting at the Pavilion.
Last Photo Safari we had a good turn-out with many new faces and fist time visitors to LLELA. This next outing should be even better with Spring well under way and the trails starting to dry a bit. The bird migration is on and the Dragonflies and Butterflies are really starting to appear in numbers. it should be a great outing for observations and photographs!
Depending on trail conditions we'll either do the BlackJack Trail with focus on Ebony Jewelwing damselfly or the Bittern Marsh Trail if still passable. A return trip to the Bird Banding area with hike to Bittern Marsh from the East is also a possibility, depending on trail conditions.
If you plan on attending please register online or drop me a message with contact info. We like to call out in the case of hike cancellation.
PS Wear long pants and boots if you have them.
