Welcome to our BioBlitz Project!

Hi all,

thanks for joining our iNaturalist project for the AppState Spring 2023 BioBlitz challenge! This is where we will collect all qualifying observations. Starting Monday next week! I can't wait to get out there and see what's blooming and crawling around campus.

We can use all the help we can get! Please share your excitement with your classes, friends and family. Everyone can participate! You can find more info and links to resources on our BioBlitz webpage. Feel free to share widely to recruit participants!

This time we are competing with two universities for the informal title of Most Biodiverse UNC Campus. Joining us are UNC Greensboro representing the Piedmont and UNC Wilmington representing the coast. I'm looking forward to seeing a nice collection of campus wildlife from across the state so we can compare and contrast what's living where! You will be able to find the leaderbord at the 2023 Campus Nature Challenge Project.

The rules are:
1) Observations need to be made on AppState property,
2) within the week of April 17th-23rd, 2023,
3) and need to be of wild organisms.

Q: How do I know where to go?
A: The map on the project page has the boundaries of all qualifying areas outlined. These are the same as for the Fall 2022 project and we shared some videos with more details for this, which you can find on this AppState BioBlitz YouTube playlist.

Q: I'm too busy - can I still post stuff after the official week?
A: Yes, you can! The critical date is the observation date (aka the date when you took the picture), not the upload date. If your time is limited, focus on taking pictures during the week of the BioBlitz to record your observations. You can process and upload them later when you have more time.

Q: What counts as "wild" organism?
A: Any non-human organism except for cultivated plants (planted/potted) and captive/domestic animals (including pets). Simply speaking, if a plant or animal was purposefully put there by humans, it does not count. However, a weed popping up on its own between those plantings, or lichen growing on a stone wall, or a tick you found on your dog would count as wild, so look carefully what else you can spot around the planted stuff in landscaped areas! A planted street tree might not qualify for the project, but you can often find a dozen other things on or around it that would count. You can use the iNat or iNot? google slide quiz to test your understanding of what would qualify for our BioBlitz.

Q: What features should I take pictures of so the species can be identified?
A: This will depend on what you are photographing. This iNaturalist Photo Guide has some really nice examples and guidelines what to focus on for various types of organisms.

Any other questions? Please let us know!

Posted on April 12, 2023 04:23 PM by annkatrinrose