News
Monday, May 18, 2009
BioBlitz at Indiana Dunes
Jim McLister (Biology) led three of the teams surveying the amphibians and reptiles at the 2009 BioBlitz held May 15-16 at the Indiana Dunes National Park. One of the teams that he led was featured in the National Geographic blog about the event. The photograph taken by Jim of the blue-spotted salamander (in the hands of one of the volunteers) is also featured on the 2009 BioBlitz homepage.
Jim was one of 150 scientists leading species inventory teams. There were 2,000 school children (from Gary, Chicago, and surrounding areas) that took part in the event on Friday, and over 1,000 community volunteers who joined in the species inventory. The final species tally will take another week due to the time involved in identifying insects, invertebrates, and fungi. At this point the species tally is near 1,000.
BioBlitz is a 24-hour event in which teams of scientists, volunteers, and community members join forces to find, identify, and learn about as many local plant and animal species as possible. National Geographic is helping conduct a BioBlitz in a different park each year throughout the decade leading up to the U.S. National Park Service Centennial in 2016. In 2008, BioBlitz took place in the Santa Monica Mountains National Recreation Area. The public found and identified more than 1,700 unique species in the park, plus several that have not yet been identified. In 2007, Rock Creek Park in Washington, D.C. was the BioBlitz site. Teams found and identified 661 unique species in the park, plus several that have not yet been identified.
