York City Nature Challenge 2024
Find out how you can get involved in this year's York City Nature Challenge at the end of April.
Take part in the first ever York City Nature Challenge from 26 - 29 April, 2024. You don’t need to be a wildlife expert. If you have access to a smartphone, tablet or camera and an internet connection then you’re good to go!
The City Nature Challenge began as a competition between two US cities in 2016. Since then it has become a global phenomenon: over 450 city-regions participated in 2023. This year, for the first time ever, York residents are able to get involved. Anyone can take part by using the free iNaturalist app to photograph and share images of wildlife and plants that they encounter in their daily lives during the four-day event. The data gathered is shared with a world-wide community of scientists and nature lovers, and helps to map biodiversity in urban areas.
SEI York Affiliated Researcher Smriti Safaya is one of those spearheading the York initiative, promoting not just the benefits for science but also for individuals. In a recent Q&A about the York CNC she explained, “research shows that spending time in nature is good for people’s wellbeing and encourages people to take more positive action for the environment”.
While living in Hong Kong, Smriti successfully organised similar events, taking the city to one of the top 5 in the world for the number of species logged during the challenge. Hoping to repeat the same success with York, she is encouraging as many people as possible to take part.
"If you submit records to iNaturalist between 26-29th April 2024 you’ll be helping York get to the top of the UK leaderboard, competing against 22 other UK cities!"
Smriti Safaya, SEI York Affiliated Researcher
Discover local group events you can join in with, learn more about recording your observations, get resources to help hone your wildlife identification skills, and even access tutorials about how to take great photos – all on the York CNC’s official website.