City Nature Challenge 2023: West of England (Bristol and Bath)'s Journal

We like to think that our wildlife records can be used by ecologists, planners, conservationists and other organisations, but this isn’t always automatically the case. Fortunately, there’s an easy way to make sure your iNaturalist Records have an even bigger impact; and it’s as simple as changing a setting to make sure your wildlife records can be shared with those who need it.

The default licencing setting for your data on iNaturalist is “CC-BY-NC”. This means your record can be shared with researchers, but excludes access and use by many commercial organisations. This setting can prevent records being used by some wildlife recording schemes and local environmental records centres too. So, we highly recommend changing your iNaturalist settings to to an open licence such as “CC0” or “CC-BY”, which will enable your records to be used as widely as possible.


How to check which licence is attached to your observations
On Andriod phones: Open the iNaturalist App: Settings > Default Licenses
For iPhone users: Go to the desktop website for iNaturalistUK and log in: Account Settings > Content and Display > Licensing
For website users: Log onto iNaturalistUK: Account Settings > Content and Display > Licensing


What do the different licences mean?
There are 8 licencing options available when you open the "licencing" option on your settings. The top 2 (CC0 and CC-BY) are of most use outside of iNaturalist:

CC0 = No Copyright - This means you're happy for anyone to use these observations/photos/sounds for any purpose, and they can use them without crediting you as the owner. Other people can also create new material based on your work.

CC-BY = Attribution - This means anyone can use your observations/photos/sounds as long as they credit you as the owner. Others can create new material based on your work.

CC-BY-NC (default when signing up to iNaturalist) = Attribution, Non Commercial - This means anyone can use your observations/photos/sounds as long as they credit you as the owner. They cannot use your observations/photos/sounds in a commerical way (i.e. to make profit). This setting can prevent records being used by some wildlife recording schemes and local environmental records centres.


You can also can set your photo, sound and observations to have different licences. For example, if you're a professional photographer and you're happy for anyone to use your observation record but you want to protect your photos from being used commerically, you can set your Observation to CC-BY, and your Photos to CC-BY-NC.


It takes only a few seconds to make this change. You can find out more about what the various licencing options mean on this page: https://uk.inaturalist.org/blog/58298-licensed-to-share or find out more about what happens to biodiversity data here

Thank you for making your records of wildlife go even further and have even more positive impact!

We're excited to announce a fantastic range of wildlife recording events, walks, and activities happening across the West of England region that are all FREE for you to join during the City Nature Challenge!

Check out the full programme HERE

There will be over 40 expert-led nature walks in 18 confirmed locations, from the 28th of April to the 1st of May 2023. Join us at one of the City Nature Challenge activity hubs we have popping up across the region to take part in BioBlitz activities and help record our wildlife across the West of England. The activity hub locations include:

Grow Wilder
Westonbirt Arboretum
Tyntesfield Gardens
Frampton Cotterell
Stoke Park
Wild Place Project
Haydon's Batch, Somer Valley
Manor Woods Valley
Badock's Wood
Old Sneed Park
...and a range of wildlife walks across a variety of locations in Bath and Bristol city centres!!

Some of the walks, led by wildlife experts such as Ed Drewitt, require a sign-up via Eventbrite to reserve your place. You will find the details for this on our website

A massive thank you to all the organisations who are hosting events over City Nature Challenge this year including, Avon Wildlife Trust, Forestry England, National Trust, South Gloucestershire Council, Bristol City Council, Bristol Zoological Society, Bath and North East Somerset Council, RSPB's Bristol Group, Manor Woods Valley Group, Friends of Badock's Wood, and Action for Conservation.

We can't wait for you to join us and make this our biggest City Nature Challenge year yet!!

The West of England region is going to be packed with activities to do over the City Nature Challenge weekend (28th April - 1st of May). Although we’d love for you to join us at one of the many activity hubs (click here to find details of over 40 free nature walks in 18 locations!) , did you know you can also take part by recording wildlife in your local park or garden?

We’ve created a range of “Spotter Sheets” which can be used by all ages all across the region. We challenge you to find as many species as you can on each sheet! You can download them from our website for free HERE! .

You’ll find spotter activities for our wonderful pollinators, our terrific trees, and our lovely freshwater species, covering a range of habitats including gardens, grasslands, woodlands, and lakes, so you can take part wherever you are throughout the weekend.

The plants and animals on the spotter sheets range from “Easy” to find, to those that will be rather tricky to find (“Challenge” & “Expert”)! Many of the species listed are under-recorded in our region. In some cases, this is due to them being rare – so by recording them, you will be helping with efforts to better understand them and their distribution, which can lead to better conservation of the species.
Some of the species on here might be well-camouflaged and hard to find! Good luck - and do let us know if you find all 9 on any spotter sheet via @festofnature social media, we’ll be most impressed!

The Natural History Consortium’s 2023 Pollinator Spotter Sheets were created with support from the West of England Combined Authority Pollinator Fund.
The Natural History Consortium’s 2023 Trees in Spring Spotter Sheet was created with support from the Woodland Trust’s Emergency Tree Fund.

It’s DAY ONE of this year's global nature event and we can’t wait to get stuck into wildlife recording all the local species we can find. This year’s event takes place Friday 28 April – Monday 1 May and has over 485 cities taking part across 46 countries.

From trees and flowers, to butterflies and birds, every sighting counts! We need everyone across the region recording their wildlife sightings and uploading them to iNaturalist during this bank holiday weekend.


Nature activities in the West of England
Anyone can go out and record wildlife sightings during this weekend’s challenge, but if you’d like to get involved with some free family-friendly nature activities and expert-led outdoor sessions, there are over 40 nature walks in over 17 locations taking place!

Check out the programme of events across the West of England region 28 April – 1 May and sign up to some free walks!

Wildlife Spotter Sheets
This year, we really want you to search for and record pollinators and trees!

What is a pollinator? Pollinators carry pollen with them as they move from flower to flower, helping fertilise the plants. They include bumble bees, butterflies, moths, hoverflies, wasps, flies, and beetles.
Why look for them? Insect pollinator species are in decline as biodiversity loss around the planet accelerates. It’s important that researchers and conservation organisations know where pollinators are, to help increase their numbers.

We’ve made these handy Pollinator Spotter Sheets to help you search for, identify and record pollinators in the region.

Why record trees? Trees are crucial for humans and the natural environment to thrive. Recording your local trees helps researchers and conservation organisations monitor losses or gains to tree numbers, which can offer information about biodiversity, wildlife habitats and air quality levels.

Find our Trees in Spring Spotter Sheets here, to help you search for, identify and record trees in the region.

What happens to my City Nature Challenge data?
During this year’s West of England Region City Nature Challenge, wildlife recordings submitted to iNaturalist will be collected, processed and used by the Bristol Regional Environmental Records Centre (BRERC).

The Festival of Nature team visited BRERC to find out more about environmental data – and why it’s so important to submit it! Click here to watch the video to find out how your findings from City Nature Challenge can be used by BRERC.

If you've got Questions about challenge, please check out this year's FAQ guide!

Show us your sightings!
We'd love to see what you get up to this weekend and any exciting finds, so don't forget to tag @festofnature on twitter and instgram so we can re-share your post.