Community members are invited to participate in the first ever Sunshine Coast BioBlitz. A celebration of biodiversity, a BioBlitz is a 24-hour count of everything that grows, creeps, crawls, hops, flies or slithers. Part contest, part festival, part educational event and part scientific enterprise, a BioBlitz brings together scientists, naturalists and community members to count as many species as they can in a 24-hour survey.
The Sunshine Coast BioBlitz will take place on the weekend of Saturday and Sunday, May 24 and 25, to coincide with the worldwide International Day for Biological Diversity (May 22). The survey will take place within a five-kilometre radius of the Iris Griffith Interpretive Centre (15386 Sunshine Coast Highway). It will begin at noon on the Saturday and conclude at noon on Sunday.
The Iris Griffith Centre will serve as the BioBlitz base camp, equipped with microscopes, computers and other scientific tools of the trade. The base camp is where insects are pinned, fungi sorted and pond water examined, where identifications take place, species are recorded, discoveries are made and the tally of species is recorded. Community members will have the opportunity to interact with scientists at the base camp and also join the experts out in the field as they undertake a variety of field sampling activities.
In addition to participating in the field survey activities, the public is invited to attend a diversity of special public programs over the course of the weekend. Scientists and naturalists participating in the BioBlitz will each lead different organized interactive events for community members of all ages to enjoy, such as Herp Hunt, Butterfly Count, Wonderful Wildflowers, Wildlife Night Hike and Bat Mist Netting, Pond Dipping, Meet the Mollusks, Wildlife Stories, Dawn Bird Walk, Mushroom Madness and much more. Visit the Lagoon Society's website at www.lagoonsociety.com for a detailed schedule of public BioBlitz events and locations. If you would like to volunteer, or become an event sponsor, taxonomic group leader or guest speaker, please contact Katie White at 604-740-2542.
