Cape Town wins the iNaturalist City Nature Challenge 2019!

Friends of Meadowridge Common Committee member, Charmaine Oxtoby (second from left) was  part of the City of Cape Town Biodiversity team that organized the Cape Town 2019 City Nature Challenge. Well done to the team and to all participants. 

iNaturalist City Nature Challenge 2019

This year the City of Cape Town will be participating in the City Nature Challenge from 26-29 April 2019. To win across the board we just need 50,000 observations, 3,500 species and 2,000 observers! The 3 500 species should be the easiest. We are the Mother City, the Biodiversity Capital of the World. With 3700 indigenous plant species this should be a cake. But it is autumn – no annuals, few bulbs, nothing flowering: well we don’t want to embarrass everyone else. But it does mean we are going to have to hunt down our species, and the pics are going to have to be good to make an ID. So please start drawing up your target list and planning your four day’s activities. Don’t forget aliens, and insects, and fungi and our marine life! They all count: just no selfies, dogs or cats! And don’t worry about duplication. The game is to take them again if you see them after 500 m. This is about data for monitoring: where do our species occur?