Dear USA-NPN,


I hope your new year is starting off well and that you are all staying safe from extreme weather wherever you may be! Things have been very busy here at the NPN between our mobile app revamp project, new activities including herbarium scoring as part of our Time to Restore: Connecting People, Plants, and Pollinators project, and prepping for a workshop we will have this week with several Local Phenology Leaders to create better guidance and resources for your data collection. We look forward to sharing more details about these projects in future newsletters!


In the meantime, I hope you will enjoy some new phenology books and podcasts, phenological research summaries, and some free items from a couple of our partners, below. Also, don't forget to complete your 2024 LPP Annual Survey, if you haven't already! When you do you'll get a sneak peek at our brand new Phenophase Primer, which will be posted on our website at the end of this month, as well as a chance to win Nature's Notebook merch!

Sincerely,

What's new at Nature's Notebook and USA-NPN

Two new Phenology books

USA-NPN Director Theresa Crimmins' first book, Phenology, will be published as a part of the MIT Press Essential Knowledge series just in time for spring, on March 4! This basic primer on the topic of phenology provides a thorough summary of what phenology is, how it is changing, why we should care. Her hope is that it will be a helpful resource for Local Phenology Programs, students and educators, and anyone interested in gaining a deeper understanding of the topic. You can preorder the book now on AmazonBarnes and NobleBooks a Million, and more. Read a excerpt of the book here.


Theresa will give a webinar during Phenology Week to share anecdotes and stories from the book as well! Join her on March 19 at 3pm Eastern / 2pm Cen / 1pm Mtn / 12pm Pacific.


The second book is a third edition of Phenology: An Integrative Environmental Science, edited by Mark D. Schwartz, with contributions from over 60 phenological experts. This book is a great resource for scientists and students covering data collection, current research, methods, and applications of phenology.


Learn more about Phenology, by Theresa Crimmins »


Learn more about Phenology: An Integrative Environmental Science, edited by Mark D Schwartz »

New Phenology Podcast episode

USA-NPN Director Theresa Crimmins also recently joined The Evergreen Thumb, a podcast from Washington State University Extension Master Gardeners and Master Gardener Foundation of Washington State. She explains how you can use phenological cues to enhance your gardening practices and discusses the importance of observing natural patterns, and the impact of climate change on seasonal rhythms, and explains how phenology ties into broader environmental stewardship.


Listen to the podcast »

Global AI Alliance for Climate Action

Last year, the USA-NPN database reached 40 million records! What a great time to dive into the data you all have submitted so far to identify which species and phenophases are the most useful for studying climate change impacts. We were recently selected for a project with the Global AI Alliance for Climate Action to do just that! We will be working with AI experts to leverage the power of AI to determine a list of indicator species that we can encourage our observers to track in Nature's Notebook.



Learn more about AI for Climate »

Be part of the app development team

Work is going full steam ahead on developing the new and improved Nature's Notebook app! We are working hard to ensure that the new app is inviting, engaging, and accessible to everyone who wants to connect with nature's rhythms and document phenological changes. We are still looking for people to join our Participant Pool, where we will send progress notes and ask for your feedback to ensure that we are creating the best user experience to suit your needs. All members of the participant pool will even earn an exclusive badge when the new app releases!


Learn more and join »

Recent happenings in the field of phenology

Are plant and animal species responding differently to climate change?

The advance in the timing of spring events is well documented in scientific research. However, changes have not been the same for all species and can even differ among populations of the same species in distinct locations. A team of researchers compiled an extensive dataset of phenology observations from the published literature and from phenology networks including USA-NPN. They estimated whether the average date that a life cycle stage occurs has shifted since 1980, assessed the extent to which those shifts were driven by changes in temperature or precipitation, and explored whether climate change was increasing the likelihood of phenological mismatches for species that occur in the same location.


The authors found that for plants, spring and summer events like leaf out, flowering, and fruiting are occurring earlier than they did 40 years ago, with later stages like flowering and fruit ripening advancing faster than earlier stages. Climate had much weaker effects on the timing of animal activity, which has implications for mismatches in the timing of plants and animals that rely on synchronization of their life cycle stages.  


Read the Publication Summary »

Snowmelt cues caribou migration

Lots of mystery surrounds the migration of majestic caribou from northern Canada to the Arctic tundra. New research suggests that snowmelt is an important cue for when to move. This information can help researchers understand the impact that changing snowpack and snowmelt may have on caribou movements and populations.


Learn more »

Especially for Local Phenology Leaders

The LPP Annual Survey is open!

Each year, we ask Local Phenology Leaders to complete a short survey about your Programs so that we can get a better sense of how you are using Nature's Notebook and how we can help you achieve your goals. Your feedback helps us grow and improve Nature's Notebook and provides inspiration for other Programs like yours. Plus, when you complete the survey you'll be entered into a weekly raffle to win USA-NPN merch and get a sneak peak at the new Phenophase Primer, out later this month!


We would greatly appreciate all survey responses by January 31, 2025.


Take the survey »

Join the Nature's Notebook community

We are giving our LPL Monthly Calls a refresh for the new year! Major changes include new call times to offer more opportunities to connect with your fellow Leaders and focused topics of interest. We are also opening up our calls to all Nature's Notebook observers! Our new Community will involve two different types of calls:


Nature's Notebook Nest - Bring your questions and observations and chat with USA-NPN staff and fellow observers and Local Phenology Leaders! These will be standing monthly meetings, date and time TBD.


Monthly Murmuration - Flock together with us in focused discussions including Q & As with experienced Leaders, instructional webinars, and focus groups to give your input on key features in the new mobile app. These will be scheduled several weeks in advance and you can select which calls to attend based on topics of interest to you. Make sure you sign up so you don't miss out!


Sign up for the Community »

New, updated LPL Certification Course

Our online, interactive, 10-week Local Phenology Leader Certification course walks you through how to plan and implement a long-term phenology program for your organization or group. The course also provides an in-depth look at all of the USA-NPN resources available to you. We are currently updating the course in the Moodle platform, which will provide more interactive content and opportunities to engage with your fellow LPLs in training.


You can sign up on our Interest List to be the first to know once applications open this spring.


Sign up for the LPL Certification Course Interest List »

Annual reports help track your progress

It's a great time to put together an annual report to document your progress toward meeting your goals over the last year! We have several resources to assist you in creating an annual report, including:

  • The Annual Phenology Report Guide walks through suggested components of an annual report. Pick and choose the sections that are most useful to you!
  • Local Phenology Program Dashboards show you graphs of your observation quantity and observer activity
  • Your Local Phenology Program Profile page (searchable from the LPP map) has additional resources; just look for the Data tab for a custom link into the Visualization Tool where you can visualize your LPPs phenology data


Looking for Annual Report inspiration? Check out some of our recent favorites!

Related resources

Free milkweeds for restoration projects

Free milkweeds are available for habitat restoration projects in the Eastern and Western breeding range of the monarch butterfly. Free milkweeds are for large-scale (two acres or more, ¼ acre or more in California) native habitat restoration only. 


Learn more and apply »

Free Bio Art from NIH

The National Institutes of Health has a new collection of free, high quality science and medical visuals. These images can be used for presentations, educational resources, and more.



Learn more »

Contact

Erin Posthumus

Partnerships & Projects Manager

erin@usanpn.org


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