For the City Nature Challenge I explored my hometown, Barre Massachusetts. I explored my backyard, my forest and even went for walks down my road. The most memorable species I saw was a beaver. I was walking with my mom and dad and we heard rustling in the bushes and soon after a splash. We looked into the pond and saw two beavers swimming together. They soon reached shore on the other side of the pond and we got to watch them eat from a distance. Another memorable observation was when I saw three yellow finches eating at the bird feeder in my backyard. Yellow finches have such vibrant, beautiful feathers and they are now my favorite species of bird.
I really enjoyed using iNaturalist, I had never heard of it before taking this class, but I am now excited to use it in the future. I downloaded the app on my phone and I want to start using it to help me identify new species of plants and animals that I come across. I’ve already learned so much while using the app and I’m really excited to learn more.
I was really interested to see all the different types of species being observed for the City Nature Challenge. It’s incredible how many people are participating and that over one million observations have been made. I spent some time looking at observations from South America, it was fascinating to see how different their plant species are from ours and I loved learning about new plants. I also spent time looking at the reports from the City Nature Challenge in Cape Town and I was amazed with their observations, they currently have over 60,000 observations. Their species look so different from species in Vermont, it was great to see the diversity.
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