giannamaria's Journal

Goldenrods are at their best in September in Michigan, and I was happy to see a lot of different insects on the goldenrod, including a lifer for me, Polistes dominula! Goldenrods are some of my favorite flowers, mostly because they attract so much wildlife, but they also have a bright color and smell heavenly. I remember seeing my first goldenrods when I was a four/five year old living in New York, and was very excited to learn about them.

I need to get better at IDing this genus, for now most of my observations are at genus level.

I realized when looking at observations of one of my favorite birds ever- the Northern Bobwhite- that many were not annotated. I want to work on annotating these observations a bit at a time, which will take awhile as there are thousands where even things like gender aren't annotated. I may start a project for the Bobwhites of North America to better sort observations, if there isn't one already.

Mar 14 2024

The vernal pool I have been monitoring since before I joined iNaturalist is doing well, and I started a project to monitor the species I see. This winter has been odd and warm, so the herps are all out already. I saw garter snakes, bullfrogs, and turtles at a pond nearby a few days ago. I tried to record some chorus frogs last night at the pool, but it didn't pick up any of the audio, so I'll probably try again later.

I am already finding fingernail clams at the pool which is great, and I am also finding some copepods and mosquito larvae too.

Hopefully I will be able to document plenty of species at the vernal pool this year!