My Naturalist Goals for Larimer County, Colorado

Hey iNatters!

I've decided share a little about a very exciting and challenging new goal of mine. Previously, I have mostly focused on birding but there aren't a whole lot of new birds for me to find in my local area now. I don't intend to travel very far this year and I've really established myself here in Colorado. I got married last year and both of our families live here. I'm also working full-time in grocery and am a full-time student working on becoming a high school biology teacher! Due to a combination of these factors, I've decided to stay local for the most part this year. I think I would greatly benefit by shifting my focus from birds to other groups like mammals, herps, fishes, arthropods, and plants. My mission now is to attempt to thoroughly document the diversity of life within Larimer County, Colorado.

My home county (Larimer) is in north-central Colorado and borders Wyoming to the north. The eastern 1/3 of the county predominantly consists of arid grassland, agriculture, and urban areas. This area also contains the lowest elevation in the county of roughly 4800 ft. which is still pretty high honestly. To the west, the Front Range of the Rockies rising up gradually which contains habitats like arid shrublands, pine forest, pinyon-juniper woodland, and canyons. The western 1/2 of Larimer County is primarily mountains with a range of elevations all the way up to 13,500 ft. At the lower elevations, it is mostly pinyon-juniper and ponderosa pine forest, but if you get a little higher, spruce-fir and aspen forest becomes more dominant. At the highest elevations, above the timberline, there is alpine tundra which has a very unique community of organisms. I really look forward to exploring Larimer County's high elevations this summer! Along the Larimer River in the northwest part of the county near the border with Wyoming, there is sagebrush steppe which I do not think exists elsewhere in the county.

I am very excited about this new adventure I am embarking on. I look forward to learning from the iNat community and I thank you all for your efforts to help identify my observations.

הועלה ב-מרץ 31, 2022 02:31 לפנה"צ על ידי joshuagsmith joshuagsmith

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