iNaturalist's City Nature Challenge 2021 and Prince William County's SGCNs.

This post explores the utility of iNaturalist’s City Nature Challenge 2021 (April 30th to May 3rd) to harness community science observations in order to support observing Virginia’s Species of Greatest Conservation Need (SGCN). Prince William County Focus!

The City Nature Challenge is iNaturalist’s massive spring bioblitz and the Washington DC area participates. The DC challenge includes the Washington DC metropolitan area so for Virginia, these counties (and cities within) are included; Alexandria, Arlington, Fairfax, Loudoun, Manassas, Manassas Park, Fauquier, Prince William, Stafford, Fredericksburg, and Spotsylvania.

Virginia’s SGCN effort is divided into planning regions. The Northern Virginia Planning Region includes significant county overlap with iNaturalist’s City Nature Challenge. This planning region includes the following counties; Alexandria, Arlington, Fairfax, Loudoun, Manassas, and Prince William, and the cities within.

This post spotlights Prince William County. Prince William County is within Virginia’s Northern Virginia Planning Region. Let’s take a look at what SGCNs were observed during the City Nature Challenge 2021.

During the city nature challenge, 125 observers recorded 4,397 observations of 1,095 species in the county. Eleven species of great conservation need (SGCN) were observed during the City Nature Challenge.

• Gray Catbird (Dumetella carolinensis), 8 observations


• Field Sparrow (Spizella pusilla), 2 observations


• Northern Flicker (Colaptes auratus), 2 observations


• Yellow-billed Cuckoo (Coccyzus americanus), 1 observation


• Belted Kingfisher (Megaceryle alcyon), 1 observation


• Green Heron (Butorides virescens), 1 observation


• Northern Rough-winged Swallow (Stelgidopteryx serripennis), 1 observation


• Wood Thrush (Hylocichla mustelina), 1 observation


• Brown Thrasher (Toxostoma rufum), 1 observation


• Eastern Hognose Snake (Heterodon platirhinos), 1 observation


• Eastern Whip-Poor Will (Antrostomas vociferus), 1 observation

The surge of community science observations during the iNaturalist City Nature Challenge 2021 adds to the understanding of Virginia’s identified species of greatest conservation need. For Prince William County’s SGCNs, and including this year's bioblitz, 256 observers have documented 40 SGCNs with 786 observations in iNaturalist.

Posted on 13 de maio de 2021, 11:48 AM by tca12345