Take the City Nature Challenge!

Frequently Asked Questions

What is the City Nature Challenge?

The City Nature Challenge is a global “BioBlitz” event that takes place at the end of April each year. A BioBlitz is a type of community science project where community members work together to record as many species as possible in a set location and time period. 

The 2021 City Nature Challenge will take place from April 30th through May 3rd all over the world, including the Coachella Valley, which is part of the Inland Empire participating region.

How can I participate?

Species are recorded for the City Nature Challenge using the iNaturalist platform, a joint initiative of the California Academy of Sciences and the National Geographic Society. It is free to participate - just create an iNaturalist account and add observations using the free iPhone or Android apps, or add observations on the web at iNaturalist.org. 

Use iNaturalist to make observations of any wild organisms you see - birds, insects, flowers, reptiles, spiders, mushrooms, trees, and slime molds all count. Even if you don’t see the organism itself, evidence like footprints, bones, feathers, or fallen pine cones are all good observations.

Avoid adding observations of pets, animals, in zoos, or potted plants, or similar organisms that aren’t wild. 

Do I need to make observations in a city?

Observations don’t necessarily need to take place within city limits - think of it as the City and Nature Challenge. Coachella Valley residents’ observations will be added to the Inland Empire project, which includes all of Riverside and San Bernardino Counties. Observations from your backyard, local parks, and favorite local hiking trails will all count. 

Part of the goal of the City Nature Challenge is to celebrate and document the amazing biodiversity of our world and to embrace the healing power of nature, wherever you might find it. The Coachella Valley is an important biodiversity hotspot and is part of the “Wildland Urban Interface” (WUI) between cities and urban areas and the wild deserts and mountains beyond, from Joshua Tree National Park, to the peak of Mount San Jacinto, to the shores of the Salton Sea.

What kinds of observations should I make?

Any wild organisms that you are curious about, or just plain enjoy, make great contributions to the Challenge. Observations can include plants and animals you already know and things you aren’t sure about. 

iNaturalist includes a “computer vision” system that can help you identify the things you observe by comparing them to all of the other observations added to iNaturalist - more than 60 million so far!

Whether you add your own identification to your observation or use the computer vision system, other users in the iNaturalist community will then have the opportunity to either confirm or help you improve the observations’ identification, if they don’t think it’s correct. By working together, the community has identified hundreds of thousands of species all over the world.

As a rule of thumb, you can add one observation of each organism you find per day. For example, if you make an observation of a hummingbird visiting a flower in your yard on Friday, you can make another observation of the exact same bird if it comes back on Saturday. In fact, these kinds of repeated observations over time can help scientists discover changes in patterns in nature, like bird migrations happening at a certain time of year, of flowers blooming after more or less rainfall.

You can also add multiple observations of different individuals of the same species, like each member of a flock of birds, or every tree in a stand in the forest. However, unless you have a specific research question in mind, you may find it more useful to limit your observations to only a representative sample. For example, you might make 3 observations of a herd of 12 bighorn sheep: one for the adult male ram, one out of the group of adult female ewes, and one for the young lamb born this year.

What are the benefits of participating?

The goal of the City Nature Challenge is to get outdoors, connect with nature, and discover some of the things that make our world such an incredible place. 

The extreme conditions of our desert have led to some amazing plant and animal adaptations for survival, are partly responsible for our status as a biodiversity hotspot, and are home to many plants and animals found nowhere else on Earth! We hope you’ll connect to the desert, and reach a deeper appreciation of the special place we all call home.

Where are some of the places I can go to make observations?

Anywhere in Riverside or San Bernardino counties! This includes not just protected natural areas, such as national and state parks, but also city parks, your backyard, or the parking lot at the grocery store. Here are some of the popular natural areas to visit within the Coachella Valley: