Join the Borough of State College in the 2026 City Nature Challenge to help document and celebrate the wildlife, plants, insects and fungi that call our community home. The City Nature Challenge is one of the largest community science events in the world, held annually to document urban biodiversity. This friendly global event encourages people of all ages to find and photograph as many wild organisms as possible in their cities. The observations you upload contribute real ecological data that researchers and conservation groups use to better understand and protect biodiversity.

How to Participate: Observation Period (April 24-27)

· Take photos of wild organisms within State College Borough (wild = not planted, placed or cared for by people).
· For a better chance of finding wildlife, explore urban trees, street gardens or one of the Borough’s 13 parks and parklets.
· Upload your observations to iNaturalist between April 24–27. All observations made within the Borough during the observation window will automatically be included in this project.
· Join this project on iNaturalist to keep up to date on any announcements (optional).

Upload and Identification Period (April 28 – May 10)

· Please upload everything to iNaturalist by May 10 so it can be counted.
· Help identify observations made during the challenge. Every ID improves data quality and supports the global effort.

iNaturalist Tutorials:
Observing species using iNaturalist: https://youtu.be/F65MVZO7dYE?si=8Yzus4rcUn3oBZwi Identifying species in iNaturalist: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ow5_AKRrtnY