Ten citizen scientists got their hands dirty and their minds blown as they documented wild life and plants in an urban environmental outing on Aug. 8. The event, dubbed #BioBlitzLA, co-hosted by Los Angeles City Councilman Paul Koretz and the Los Angeles County Natural History Museum is part of a year-long effort to bio-diversify the city.

Nicole Rudenky, 11, of West Hollywood College Preparatory School, studied insects at the #BioBlitzLA event on Aug. 8 at Los Angeles City Hall. (photo by Rosalind Helfand)

Scientists from the Natural History Museum trained the citizen scientists on what to look for in Grand Park and surrounding city hall, then set them loose with their phones and cameras to photograph their discoveries for social media. Their observations were  logged into the Natural History Museum’s iNaturalist website that maps all of the data throughout greater Los Angeles for the public, and also helps scientists to gain a better understanding of nature in the city.

“Before this weekend, there were only two observations from the city hall area, but now we have close to 150,” said Lila Higgins, manager of the citizen scientist program at the Natural History Museum. “There is so much living there and we walk by it on a regular day and don’t even realize it. I would like to go back a month, or even a year from now, to see what all has changed and how it compares.”

The information that is collected by the citizen scientists through these programs is very valuable to the Natural History Museum, its scientists and urban developers as they seek to build a city that is better for both humans and wildlife in the future. To date, more than 1,000 citizen scientists have submitted their observations.

“As a changing climate becomes more and more apparent, through the drought, wildfires and increasing extreme storm events, it is vital to catalog the plants and animals with whom we share Los Angeles, so we know what else we have to lose if we do not take action more quickly,” Koretz said.

The opportunity to be a citizen scientist in Los Angeles is very special, according to Higgins, as the city is one of only 35 biodiversity hotspots in the world, including destinations like Madagascar and the Andes.

“Most people have no idea that there are more than 1,500 plants here that exist nowhere else in the world, along with animals that rely on those plants and live only is Los Angeles,” Higgins said. “Additionally, our biodiversity hotspot is under threat because of the city around us, and it is important to us to save it.”

Dr. Brian Brown, head of entomology at the museum, recently set up malaise traps in and around city hall in preparation for #BioBlitzLA, resulting in a collection of more than 100 species of insects. Of their findings, Higgins was most excited about micro-wasps, which are about the size of a pen-head and have metallic, alien-like features.

“Because we had no traps in the middle of downtown Los Angeles, we wanted to show all of the species that exist in that area. There is even a possibility of a new species existing there,” Higgins said. “Even as a nature advocate who is always walking around the city, there were way more species than I thought would be there.”

While the citizen scientist events typically receive a higher attendance, Higgins was happy with the turnout – especially in the case of Michael Gronwold, a seasoned citizen scientist with a specialty in butterflies, and Rosalind Helfand, a West Hollywood College Preparatory School teacher that brought four teenage students with her.

“It was heartwarming to me that [Gronwald] wanted to come to this new project and take the knowledge he acquired about butterflies to the children, it shows me that it is not just us scientists that get excited about sharing the knowledge,” Higgins said.

Helfand said that bringing her students to the #BioBlitzLA events is important because they get to contribute by recording species in an urban environment, which could ultimately help with making decisions in regards to preserving the city.

“Kids in an urban environment are typically way too disconnected from nature, and it is really important for them to have that connection. The Natural History Museum is getting out this idea that you do not have to take your kids into the deep wilderness for them to experience nature, but instead they have checked it out in their backyards. It creates awareness of biodiversity and the natural environment within the urban environment,” Helfand said.

#BioBlitzLA began on June 27 with the goal to collect 5,000 observations from citizen scientists for their data map by Aug. 31. The movement has already exceeded their goal and now aims to collect 10,000 observations from the greater Los Angeles region for the iNaturalist project by the end of the month.

The Natural History Museum will host its last #BioBlitzLA event on Aug. 29 at the nature gardens at Exposition Park and hope to document the plant and animal life in the area.