היומן של ninastavlund

2023 was a strange year, on just every level from personal experiences to worldwide weather.
Going to Norway for three months was awesome, but I was also rained on most of the time there. Never have I seen the kind of flooding we had that summer, especially in Nesbyen. Then, while in Norway, Canada was on fire. With a heavy heart, I watched the wildfires taking control in other parts of the world. Having experienced wildfires in Greece in December 2007, I was horrified.

My iNat year started with the City Nature Challenge where I tried to cover a big section of the Greater Ottawa Area, and to my surprise, I managed to get 1st place in the iNat project for the Greater Ottawa Area: https://inaturalist.ca/projects/city-nature-challenge-2023-greater-ottawa-area
with 237 species observed and 447 observations logged.

In June, I left Canada for Norway and I was away for 3.5 months. During this time, I wanted to relearn and rediscover Norwegian flora & fauna so I created a project "Norway Summer 2023": https://inaturalist.ca/projects/norway-summer-2023 where I got 426 species and recorded 730 observations. Thanks to all the 188 iNat members for helping me identify many of my observations.

Then I tried to beat my 2022 personal record in the project Discord iNaturalist Yearlisting, and in 2023 I ended up as of Jan 1st, 2024 on 86th Place. Incredibly awesome as I planned to get within the top 100.
For some reason, the CNC numbers and my overview using the calendar do not display the same numbers which I do find a bit strange as both periods are Jan 1st to Dec 31st, however, my overview as of today shows 1124 species total and 2394 observations logged in 2023 compared to 1013 species and 1888 observations in 2022.

I doubt I'll do much better in 2024, but that remains to be seen.

I am very happy with my accomplishments. I wish I didn't have to work so I could do iNat all the time, but of course, that is not how the world works.
I especially appreciate having SEEK. This helped me a lot this year especially while in Norway. Sadly, I had to delete the app from my phone and re-install it, losing all my observations and badges due to a hick-up with the application. For about three months Seek wouldn't work well, hang, and freeze. The app also messed up all my challenges showing 0% when I had finished the challenge. I hope that reinstalling the app will help.

Cheers

I am clearly seriously hooked.
I started using iNat back in 2019 and only logged 32 species and 45 observations that year.
In 2020 I logged 156 species and 201 observations. Last year in 2021, I thought I did very well with 524 species, and 820 observations. I was quite proud of that achievement and decided to compete with myself to get higher numbers every year.
This year, 2022, I rocked it! I had hoped I would beat my 2021 record, and so I did with flying colours! I logged 1013 species and 1888 observations in 2022!! Yay & Yikes! How on earth am I going to beat this record in 2023? I better roll up my sleeves and get to "work" :)
The most important part, though, is to learn something in the process. I join a few organized outings when I can and always learn a lot when I do. Also, the repetition of seeing the same species and logging them, again and again, is very helpful to the learning process.
I'm excited trying to beat my own 2021 record and seeing how many names, species and families I can remember from previous sightings.
2023, here I come!
My most favourite sighting in 2022 was this one:

I started using iNat only a few years ago.
In 2021, I discovered not only the year list challenge but also the City Nature Challenge, which I dove into with both my feet.
As for the CNC in 2021, I worked terribly hard all weekend and was pretty proud of myself when I ended up with 86 observations and 55 species. Sadly, I saw that my effort was waaaaay down the list compared to other participants, so I decided to at least try for a hundred observations and species for 2022.
And so it started, I entered into competition with myself.
To my surprise, I did manage to get my goal of a hundred species and observations this year for the CNC 2022. My effort was focused on two main areas, Richmond and Britannia Conservation areas on the Ontario side. The numbers are still being adjusted depending on IDs, however, right now as of May 11, I'm at 270 observations and 165 species. Pretty well done, and I'm giving myself a pat on the back. Nevertheless, it also means I have to do better next year!
The best with this challenge is that I learn what's in my local patch of green space.
Registering, looking up and logging the same species over and over, makes you learn them in the end. And that's not all, slowly I'm starting to also see right away, the differences in shape, colour and texture in various moss for example. This is amazing! I love this!
To share my love for this project, I also conducted a free volunteer CNC walk for the OFNC (Ottawa Field-Naturalists' Club) at Shirley's Bay and a walk through my company at Mud Lake where participants would learn how to use iNaturalist.
My favourite observations during the CNC 2022: