City Nature Challenge

from Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

The City Nature Challenge (CNC) is an annual, global, friendly citizen science competition to document urban biodiversity . The competition is a kind of "BioBlitz" in which the population searches for and documents the plants, animals and other organisms living in the cities / urban areas. The aim of the Citizen Science event, which lasts several days, is to motivate the population to document biodiversity and to collect biodiversity data. Each year three awards are given to the cities with the most observations, the most species found and the most participants.

The observations of animals, plants and other organisms are mainly about the platform iNaturalist documented, with some cities other platforms for filing use of observations of nature, such as Natusfera in Spain, Waarneming.nl in Maastricht or the app Nature view in Berlin. The actual observation period is followed by a period of several days to determine the species and the winners. The participants do not need to have any knowledge of the species, as the identification of the observations is supported on the one hand by the automated species identification of iNaturalist and on the other hand by the users of iNaturalist themselves.

history

The City Nature Challenge was founded by Alison Young and Rebecca Johnson of the California Academy of Sciences and Lila Higgins of the Natural History Museum of Los Angeles County. The first City Nature Challenge took place in the spring of 2016 between Los Angeles County and the San Francisco Bay Area. Around 20,000 observations were documented by the participants on the iNaturalist platform. In 2017, the competition expanded to 16 cities across the United States, with more than 125,000 nature observations in five days. In 2018 the challenge took place in 68 cities worldwide. Within four days more than 441,000 observations of more than 18,000 different species were made; more than 17,000 people took part. In 2019, the number of participating cities more than doubled to 159. Around 35,000 observers reported almost 1 million observations of over 31,000 different species.

The international orientation of the City Nature Challenge was also visible in 2019 based on the results. Cape Town was the winner in the categories for most observations and most species. Three South American cities (La Paz, Tena and Quito) and two Asian cities (Hong Kong and Klang Valley) were in the top 10 cities with the most observations.

Due to the COVID-19 pandemic , the City Nature Challenge 2020 will not take place as a competition, but as a joint event.

City Nature Challenge in German-speaking countries

In 2018 and 2019, Berlin was the first city in the German-speaking region to take part in the City Nature Challenge. In 2019, 723 participants made 3,003 observations of 596 different species.

In 2020, Austria will take part in the City Nature Challenge for the first time with three cities. The participating cities are Graz including the Graz area, Krems and the Wachau World Heritage region as well as Vienna.

Switzerland has not yet participated in the competition.

Results

City Nature Challenge results by year:

year date Participating cities Total observations Species total Total participants Results
2016 14.-21. April 2 19,742 3.152 1,018
2017 14.-18. April 16 Over 125,000 8,600 Over 4,000
2018 27.-30. April 68 442,518 Over 18,000 17,329
2019 26.-29. April 159 963.773 Over 31,000 35,126
2020 24.-27. April

Winner per category per year:

year Most observations Most types Most of the participants Results
2016 Los Angeles County, California, USA (10,353) Los Angeles County, California, USA (1,601) Los Angeles County, California, USA (574)
2017 Dallas / Fort Worth, Texas, USA (23,957) Houston, Texas, USA (2,419) Los Angeles, California, USA (1,034)
2018 San Francisco Bay Area, California, USA (41,737) San Francisco Bay Area, California, USA (3,211) San Francisco Bay Area, California, USA (1,532)
2019 Cape Town, South Africa (53,763) Cape Town, South Africa (4,588) San Francisco Bay Area, California, USA (1,947)

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ a b c d e f g h i About the City Nature Challenge. Retrieved April 18, 2020 (American English).
  2. ^ Katherine Roth: Apps tap growing global pursuit of insect tracking. January 15, 2019, accessed April 18, 2020 .
  3. ↑ Pau Guzmán: 11 ciudades de tres países escogen Natusfera para participar en el City Nature Challenge 2019 | Natusfera - el blog. Retrieved April 18, 2020 (European Spanish).
  4. ↑ Waarneming.nl. Retrieved April 18, 2020 .
  5. ↑ a b c City Nature Challenge 2019 in Berlin. February 2, 2018, accessed April 17, 2020 .
  6. ↑ Alycia Crall: Competition Meets Collaboration: The City Nature Challenge. April 20, 2018, accessed April 18, 2020 .
  7. ↑ a b Veronika Schmidt: Observation of nature: “There is wild life in every apartment!” In: Die Presse. April 17, 2020, accessed April 18, 2020 .
  8. ^ City Nature Challenge a fun way to become a naturalist. In: Marin Independent Journal. March 24, 2017, Retrieved April 18, 2020 (American English).
  9. ↑ Deborah Netburn: Q&A: LA takes on San Francisco in the first City Nature Challenge. In: Los Angeles Times. April 14, 2016, Retrieved April 18, 2020 (American English).
  10. ^ Danny Lewis: Scientists Catalog Creatures in Every Corner of Los Angeles. Retrieved April 18, 2020 (English).
  11. ↑ City Nature Challenge 2016. Accessed April 18, 2020 .
  12. ↑ City Nature Challenge 2017. Accessed April 18, 2020 .
  13. ↑ City Nature Challenge 2018: A Win For Urban Nature Around the World | nhm. Retrieved April 18, 2020 (English).
  14. ↑ a b City Nature Challenge 2018 Results !! Retrieved April 18, 2020 .
  15. ↑ City Nature Challenge results in nearly 1 million wildlife observations. In: California Academy of Sciences. May 6, 2019, accessed April 18, 2020 .
  16. ↑ a b Leaderboard 2019 - City Nature Challenge. Retrieved April 18, 2020 (American English).
  17. ↑ COVID19 - City Nature Challenge. Retrieved April 17, 2020 (American English).
  18. ↑ City Nature Challenge 2020. In: Biodiversitatshub. Retrieved April 17, 2020 (German).
  19. ↑ a b City List 2020 - City Nature Challenge. Retrieved April 18, 2020 (American English).
  20. ↑ City List 2018 - City Nature Challenge. Retrieved April 18, 2020 (American English).
  21. ↑ City List 2019 - City Nature Challenge. Retrieved April 18, 2020 (American English).
  22. ↑ City Nature Challenge 2019 - Results are in! Retrieved April 18, 2020 .
  23. ↑ Leaderboard 2018 - City Nature Challenge. Retrieved April 18, 2020 (American English).