How many species can YOU find?
The 2020 SACNAS BioBlitz will be conducted virtually 14-18 October 2020. To participate, all you need is a smartphone, tablet, or a camera and computer.
To participate all you have to do is:
- create an account on iNaturalist,
- join the 2020 SACNAS BioBlitz project,
- and find some local biodiversity to document!
If you are using a smart phone or tablet download the app on Google Play or in the Apple Store. New to iNaturalist? Watch this 1.5 minute video on how to make an observation on iNaturalist.
***We are also hosting a free webinar kick-off on October 13th at 1:00 pm ET to introduce the iNaturalist platform. Register here. ***
Use the hashtags #SACNAS2020 and #SACNASBioBlitz to share your finds on social media! Let’s see what the SACNAS community can find! At the end of the bioblitz we will send cool SACNAS-related prizes to the people who were able to document the most biodiversity!
What is a Bioblitz?
Community science (also called citizen science) mobilizes volunteers to work alongside scientists to help answer big questions about the world. One of the largest ongoing community science projects is to document the biodiversity of the Earth. iNaturalist is an online social network of people sharing biodiversity information to help each other learn about nature. It’s also a crowdsourced species identification system and an organism occurrence recording tool. When a group of people get together and coordinate to document biodiversity in a short amount of time these efforts are called “bioblitzes.”
BioBlitz Rules
Participants must create an account on iNaturalist and contribute their observations to this project: https://www.inaturalist.org/projects/sacnas-2020-virtual-bioblitz
Observations can be dated from 12:01 Midnight on October 14th (EDT) to 12:00 Midnight (EDT) October 18th. BioBlitz champs will be announced during the conference through Twitter!
Observations must be entered into iNaturalist, and registered as either “Research Grade” or “Needs ID”. “Casual” observations will not be included in totals. To this end, inclusion of supporting evidence (usually a photo or sound recording) will be very helpful.
Need Help?
Need help in figuring out how to register for iNaturalist? This YouTube link is helpful: https://youtu.be/yJS63hdWGvs, and the iNaturalist tutorials will walk you through everything if you are unfamiliar with the app. You can find the tutorials here: https://www.inaturalist.org/pages/video+tutorials
Still have questions? Contact us.
Thank you to our sponsors of this event: Natural History Museum of Los Angeles County, Florida Museum, WeDigBio and iDigBio
