Welcome to my actual last real post for the semester 🙁 This week instead of going to my phenology spot for the usual update, I participated in the City Nature Challenge with some of my NR2 lab friends! We did not do anything crazy and just explored around campus for the challenge. It was relatively easy to sign into iNaturalist and join both the NR2 Burlington project and the one designated for our lab group, so we were able to get out and start exploring!
Being a group that easily looses sight of the original mission, we did not actually end up identifying and posting that many of our observations. We let curiosity be our guide and spent time looking at the buds of various trees. They were all erupting with color and looked gorgeous in the warm, sunny weather. We saw many dandelions, then got distracted and laid in a field picking them and making flower crowns. We climbed two trees, one being a Norway Spruce. We were unable to identify the other, so hopefully the community of Vermonters on iNaturalist can help!
I found the results coming in from other cities very interesting. It was very impressive that even though Burlington ranked 78th out of the over 600 cities that participated, we had one of the highest rates of ID per person coming in around 0.8 species per person! That may not seem like much, but when you compare it to somewhere like New York City, this statistic is actually rather impressive. That means that Burlington as a whole was able to mobilize and come together for this event. Even thought both my lab group and Burlington did not come out on top for this event, it was still amazing to see all the enthusiasm world wide for this event. Spring is such a beautiful and exciting time of year, and I cannot wait to see where else I explore this summer! I’m not good at goodbyes, but this post does mark both an ending and a beginning. It’s been a wonderful year and you best believe I will be returning to my phenology spot sophomore year.
