Journal archives for December 2020

03 December, 2020

Good news! The small park I frequent is doubling in size! :) Thanks, iNat!

iNaturalist may not be the sole reason for a purchase of land, but I think it adds some powerful fuel to an argument for the preservation of wild spaces!

In the far east side of Fort Worth, my home city, there's a park that I enjoy visiting called Cobblestone Trail Park. https://www.inaturalist.org/observations?place_id=163142
It's relatively small -- about 25 acres, but the wild part of the park includes some really neat intact post oak forest. Recently, there was some interest from developers to...well... develop the 24 acres to the east. The City of Fort Worth purchased this land on Monday and will extend the area of the park! I can't wait to explore this section of extended post oak forest.

I wrote a letter to city council not for the advice of purchase but just to inform of the species that reside in the current area. So far, over 400 species that we've documented seek out this park as a refuge: https://www.inaturalist.org/observations?place_id=163142&view=species
I know it was a lot of neighborhood interest and letters to keep this area wild, but I'm so grateful to have a tool like iNat to show others how important wild spaces are, and how much we seek out these areas to engage with nature. :)

If you find yourself on the east side of Fort Worth, you should visit this park! There is a trail on the north east side that takes you into the forest some more. :) I think it's similar to what the early settlers experienced, if just on a minute scale:

“I shall not easily forget the mortal toil, and the vexations of flesh and spirit, that we underwent occasionally, in our wanderings through the Cross Timber. It was like struggling through forests of cast iron,” Washington Irving writes in 1832
https://www.americanforests.org/magazine/article/cross-timbers-ancient-forest-americas-crossroads/

In the midst of bad news of 2020, here's something that I'm celebrating. :)

Posted on 03 December, 2020 04:28 by sambiology sambiology | 26 comments | Leave a comment

23 December, 2020

Year in Review!!! You need to check out your stats!

Year in review is up! You've got to check it out:
https://www.inaturalist.org/blog/44876-year-in-review-2020
The iNat folks have obviously done a lot of work to put this together. Really interesting to see the data in these charts and graphs and stuff.

You can go to the bottom of the year in review of all of iNat:
https://www.inaturalist.org/stats/2020

Then go to "view your 2020 stats."

So neat to see your year in review -- highly suggested! :)

Posted on 23 December, 2020 21:39 by sambiology sambiology | 4 comments | Leave a comment