Science & Nature

The City Nature Challenge Is Here, So Get Out There and Have a Wild Weekend

The annual City Nature Challenge has rolled around again, and everyone's invited to join the effort to boost the Chicago region's standing in this friendly global competition.

Just head outdoors and upload photos of wildlife sightings — animals, plants or fungi — to the City Nature Challenge: Chicagoland Region project on iNaturalist, either on the web or in the app. The emphasis is on wild, so photos of domesticated animals and cultivated gardens won't count.  

The challenge runs Friday through 11:59 p.m. on Monday. Strike out on your own or join one of the dozens of group events that have been scheduled across the region, which encompasses all of northeast Illinois, northwest Indiana and Kenosha, Wisconsin.

During the 2025 challenge, nearly 1,300 participants in the Chicago region notched 13,391 observations and tallied 1,647 species.

Since it launched in 2008, iNaturalist has become an increasingly valuable tool for researchers, providing an ever-growing dataset of information on the planet's biodiversity. Scientists and land managers tap into this data to better understand not just which species are present in an area, but where and when.

Results will be announced May 13.  

Contact Patty Wetli: [email protected]

---