Collections / BioBlitz
BioBlitz events are all about celebrating nature in the city. Teams of specialist biologists search an area for all the species they can find. Students, parents and other interested members of the public are encouraged to visit and make the most of these unique opportunities to learn more about the wild and wonderful, desirable and undesirable, secretive and shy species that are our unexpected neighbours.
BioBlitz 2010
Finding nature in the city – over 1500 species in 24 hours of searching, with a final tally of 1799 species!
2010 was International Year of Biodiversity, and has the tag line "biodiversity is life; biodiversity is our life". BioBlitz 2010, involving more than 50 biologists from Landcare Research , Auckland Museum and other agencies, took place in Auckland Domain during April.
It was the second time that a BioBlitz has been conducted in the Auckland Domain, but the first time that base-camp has actually been
inside the Museum. The last event in 2005 found over 1500 species in the 24 hour period, and 1776 species as last minute finds were later identified. Tthis time we recorded 1521 species but subsequent identifications of last minute finds took the total to 1799 species. The tallies are remarkably similar albeit the species lists are not exactly the same.
Setting up started at 7am on Saturday, with everything ready-to-go for the opening at 10am. The Hon Dr Wayne Mapp did the honours with a short speech, and then everyone worked through (with a few hours sleep) until official closing at 3pm on Sunday.
‘Base camp’ is where much of the identifications are made and all species recorded, and had a fine array of microscopes, display specimens, live spiders, leaf litter, fresh water fish and invertebrates, and interesting posters. The Atrium had wireless internet access so scientists had access to the databases they needed. While most
scientists worked off laptops, larger plasma screens faced the public visitors. This meant people could watch how databases were interrogated, discuss information resources available on the web, and watch on-line displays of interesting finds, beautiful photographs, and night-video footage of possums and rats. Other large screens displayed graphs of the overall species tally and taxa sub-tallies, updated at regular interval.
The Auckland Museum was very gracious about keeping the Atrium open for the BioBlitz ‘base camp’ out of hours and for sharing their staffroom upstairs with such an influx of ‘red shirts’ wanting food and drink …fuel to stay awake and keep on going. ‘Zekes Serious Coffee’ has been a long-time supporter of BioBlitz providing ample supplies of freshly roasted and freshly ground coffee beans
and coffee plungers. Needless to say, at 5am the coffee plungers were first to get some seriously strong attention. Armed with coffee, we made the most of some quiet time to progress identifications, update the nzBioBlitz blog and send off a raft of Tweets to Twitter.
As Sunday wore on, the pace of identifications picked up with the final thrust taking the tally to over 1500 species by closing time at 3pm. The official closing was assisted by several kids who announced the tallies for various groups of organisms (opening their envelopes Oscar award-style except they did thank their agents, directors, producers, friends and family, dog, cat and everyone else no-one cares about).
Then it was all over. And thanks to a massive cooperative packing-up effort, everything was down and packed away into vehicles by 5pm.
The next BioBlitz (2012) will be in the Auckland Botanic Gardens and Totara Park in Manurewa.
Acknowledgements
The principal organizers of this event were Landcare Research and Auckland Museum; Auckland Regional Council and DOC were also involved. ARC and the Lion Foundation provided direct financial sponsorship, without which BioBlitz would not have been possible. Forest and Bird Society, Ornithological Society, the Botanical Society, University of Auckland, Unitech, Plant and Food Research, Oratia Native Plant Nursery, MAF and WaiCare also participated. We also welcomed observers from the University of the South Pacific’s Regional Herbarium and BioNet International’s Pacific Loop.
BioBlitz – getting up close and personal with biodiversity
Young and old are fascinated, horrified and enchanted by what lives in their urban backyards. People discover creatures they may never have imagined.
BioBlitz brings the environment and biodiversity alive for people in many wonderful ways. It is an opportunity for the public to get up close and personal with all sorts of critters, plants, fungi and micro-organisms is a safe, reassuringly friendly situation. A full programme of guided walks (‘field trips’), demonstrations and hands-on activities ensures people have both a good time and a busy time.
BioBlitz is notable for the high numbers of primary school-aged children that visited with (very patient) parents. Many of these families stay for hours, go home for tea, and then back again all rugged up ready for the after dark activities … light-trapping moths and torchlight spider-spotting tours are always popular. Despite being way past bed-time for many littlies, there are no grizzles and grumbles … just lots of excitement at seeing thrillingly-large vagrant spiders out hunting and menacingly-large tunnel web spiders poised at the entrances of their tunnels, eyes gleaming in the torchlight. Some kids are finally bribed into going home with “we’ll come back again tomorrow”. Bug hunting expeditions, electro-fishing demonstrations and guided plant and fungi walks are popular during the day time.
Microscopes, magnifying glasses and bins of leaf litter never fail to appeal to young kids, especially if the leaf litter was full of millipedes that can be fished out and watched under the microscope. Lots of legs equals wild excitement! In fact anything that moves generates thrills and enthusiasm out of all proportion to the size of creature that moved. A few families get instructions as to where to buy cheap magnifying glasses so their kids could go out and hunt critters in the compost heap at home.
As scientists, we need to inspire people - especially children - about the natural world and about science. BioBlitz generates energy and enthusiasm, sparking an interest in our natural environment. There is proven evidence that early appreciation in children of the natural environment lasts a lifetime. Hopefully, each BioBlitz inspires a whole new cohort of future biologists.
The Landcare Research website has lots of posters that are free to download.
BioBlitz 2009 at Lincoln
The Lincoln BioBlitz took place on the 3rd & 4th of April. As usual in a BioBlitz, there were many surprises, including a native flatworm that had not been recorded in over a hundred years, and a European fungus of acorns never before collected in New Zealand.
More than 1500 species were recorded from the Liffey Reserve, including about 700 ‘species’ of bacteria (the microbiologists got a head start and cultured the bacteria before BioBlitz proper started).
None of the butterfly species unique to New Zealand were found. Only the European cabbage white butterfly and North American monarch butterfly were present. While most of the little invertebrates like mites and spiders were native species, the plants and fungi they crawled on were mostly wild exotic species.
While 20% of the plants were native, most of these have been recently planted. Of the wild plant species found, only 9% were native. This is a reflection of the massive transformation to the flora that has occurred on the Canterbury Plains in the past two centuries. It is promising that some natives have been recently planted back into the area but there is great potential for improvement.
Most birds were also wild exotics, a reflection of how much the Canterbury Plains has changed. Only four of New Zealand’s native land birds were found in the area: one singing bellbird, a grey warbler, several silvereyes and several fantails.
A number of good-sized eels (native species) were found in the stream.
Ruud Kleinpaste opened the event and took visitors on several entomology walks. There was plenty of enthusiastic participation at from the local community, with the night-time spot-lighting walks being so popular (and noisy) that any self-respecting mobile wildlife vanished until after the kids had gone home. Quite late in the evening, a number of parents were heard bribing their children with “if you come home now, then you can come back tomorrow.”
The event was organised by Lincoln University, Lincoln Envirotown and Landcare Research. Many Landcare Research staff joined in the searching along with many others from the university, NIWA, ESR, and other organisations.
Mana BioBlitz 2011
This map shows the Mana BioBlitz land and sea survey area in red / brown.
For more information, and updates check the BioBlitz website, www.bioblitz.org.nz or email Ali Burnett at bioblitz@forstandbird.org.nz, and you are welcome to join in - click here for directions.
WooHooo! BioBlitz is back!
(Well ... it will be back at the end of March 2012. This time it is in the Auckland Botanic Gardens, Manurewa)
WHAT?
BioBlitz is a two-day scientific race against time.
It’s fascinating, fun, family-friendly and its free!
The goal is to find and count as many species as possible in 24-hours searching time in a large urban park or reserve. We expect to find 1000-1500 species. This requires many teams of scientific experts. (In fact you seldom find so many biologists in an urban park but we don’t count each other). Each team specialises in one group of organisms or micro-organisms, and you’d be hard pushed to find something they don’t know about their group.
WHEN?
Friday 30th March 9 am – 11 pm
Saturday 31st March 7 am – 5 pm.
WHERE?
“Base camp” will be in a large marquee in the North West area of the gardens. Pedestrian and vehicle access is best from the Everglade Drive northern entrance to the Gardens, via Manakau / Redoubt Road motorway off-ramp.
Base camp is the hub of activity where identifications are made, species tallied, and public get to look down microscopes, chat with scientists, and 'ooh' and 'aah' over the beautiful, the curious and the downright thrillingly ugly. Field trips (guided walks) depart from here.
There will be the usual guided ‘walks & talks’ with experts, including the ever-popular night time events: moths with ‘Dr Robert’ (who uses a super bright special lamp to lure them in) and the nocturnal walk with ‘spider woman Grace’ (most spiders come out to hunt at night and their eyes shine in the torch light).
WHO CAN COME?
Everyone!
BioBlitz is suitable for people of all ages. It is a family friendly event. There is no charge.
- If you intend going on a ‘walk & talk’ with a scientist, please wear sensibl
e shoes and clothes. If you are coming on one of the ‘after dark’ excursions, please wear sensible warm clothes and bring a torch (families should bring several torches if possible).
- Specialist scientific equipment is loaned especially for the event. This equipment is very expensive and should be treated with care and respect at all times.
- Young children should be supervised by an adult.
- Dogs should be on leads and supervised by an adult.
- The Botanic Gardens & all that lives there must be treated with care and consideration.
WHO IS ORGANISING BIOBLITZ?
Landcare Research is a Crown Research Institute (CRI). We’ve been involved in organising BioBlitz events in New Zealand since 2004, and we partner with Auckland Museum, universities, other CRIs, local government, the Department of Conservation, and people from interest groups so that we get as many biologists participating as possible.
The principal organizers of BioBlitz 2012 are Landcare Research, the Auckland Botanic Gardens and the Manakau Beautification Charitable Trust. The Auckland Museum and DOC are represented on the organizing committee. Forest and Bird Society, Ornithological Society, the Botanical Society, University of Auckland, Unitech, Oratia Native Plant Nursery, and WaiCare are also participating.
BioBlitz events are conducted in many countries. We’d love to hear from others involved in BioBlitz events in other countries!