Calling all self-proclaimed naturalists! If you are a mushroom hunter, fisherman, birder, or just like walking the trails and discovering the diversity of our parks, we need YOU! To help us learn about the diversity of organisms in our park, we are competing with other parks in a state-wide Bio Blitz competition!

To participate, download the iNaturalist app on your phone, create an account, and start uploading observations found in your favorite parks! iNaturalist is a free citizen science project application that allows users to locate and identify organisms anywhere in the world! You don't have to be an expert to join, simply take photos of organisms in the parks you visit (or your own backyard) and upload them to iNaturalist - all of which is done in the app itself. It's very user friendly and can help scientists discover new populations of organisms and track those that may be declining. It really is an awesome tool for research!

To get started, visit https://www.inaturalist.org/home and create your account. Then, simply visit our park in June and upload sightings within the park! They will automatically be submitted as part of the Bio Blitz. The more sightings, the more chances our park will win, so record everything!

Rules for submissions are as follows:

• Recordings of birds and frogs are acceptable, as long as they are clear enough to recognize. You can upload merlin recordings as well through a PC.
• Time and date stamps should be visible. Honors system on this one!
• Plants must be WILD in your park. We will not accept garden grown plants/trees this year. It’s too easy to stand in a butterfly garden and grab dozens of species without moving. They need to be growing wild, whether they are native or invasive. This goes for natives in butterfly gardens as well. I would like to know where these species are growing wild, not where they’ve been planted. If you’re not certain, you can include it, but make note of its uncertain origin.
• No dead animals. Let’s not include roadkill, and absolutely no taxidermy.

No pets or “escapees”. The bobwhite running around your park is not wild, and neither is the loose dog