Hello, VMNs. Hope everyone is enjoying spring so far. When you have time, take a moment to catch up on the Bi-weekly emails.
This email includes:
20th Anniversary Updates
#Treemendous 20th Update
To celebrate the VMN Treemendous 20th anniversary, we are encouraging every VMN volunteer to do at least one service activity in 2025 that directly relates to and benefits trees and/or forests. To date, 17 VMN volunteers have already reported their #Treemendous20th service in Better Impact! Their work has included leading a tree walk on a nature trail, helping to plant 200 longleaf pines, staffing an outreach booth about native trees for a community festival, reporting tree phenology data for Nature’s Notebook, and more! Can we get to 100 volunteers completing and reporting their #Treemendous20th service by our next bi-weekly email? Arbor Day is coming up! And, remember, we have several new Virginia Department of Forestry citizen science activities we are launching as part of the effort.
More details at http://www.virginiamasternaturalist.org/home/do-a-treemendous-20th-service-activity-in-2025
Long-running Project Spotlight?
As part of our VMN 20th anniversary activities, we want to highlight some of your volunteer projects. We are looking for stories of VMN-led projects that either have been going on for more than 15 years or projects that your chapter completed more than 15 years ago that we can look back at in kind of a “where are they now?” sort of way.
If your chapter has a long-running project or a project from a long time ago that we can look at retrospectively, we’d like to hear about it! Please send a high-quality photo (if possible) and a description of what the project is/was, when it started, and any impacts it has had to our intern, Abi Mountford, at [email protected] and CC Michelle Prysby at [email protected]. We’ll be using these stories in social media posts, reports, presentations, and possibly an online StoryMap.
Road Show info
We are coming to a picnic shelter near you this summer! As part of our 20th Anniversary celebrations, we are going to host four Roadshows across the state. All VMNs are welcome at any of the Roadshows. Each Roadshow is a come as you are, arrive and leave when you can, rain or shine event.
Roadshow Dates and Locations*, 1:00-3:00pm on each date
Southwest – Saturday, June 7 @ Christiansburg Huckleberry Park in Christiansburg, VA
Central – Sunday, June 8 @ Pleasant Grove Park in Fluvanna, VA
Southeast – Saturday, July 12 @ Machicomoco State Park in Hayes, VA
Northern – Sunday, July 13 @ Ellanor C. Lawrence Park in Chantilly, VA
*Venues are subject to change, but the event date and time will remain the same and the event will be in the same general area.
Thank you for your photos and videos!
Thank you so much to everyone who contributed material for our new VMN video! We have so much great content! I don’t know yet what will get used in the 3-minute video, but we will be using as much of the rest of the material as we can in other ways this year (social media posts, etc.) It has been an amazing crowdsourcing effort!
Even though we are closing the window for contributing for this particular video, please know that the VMN state office welcomes your photos and videos anytime, especially high-resolution material that shows VMN volunteers in action. We use these in presentations, reports, media requests, and so many more places, and we always need current, high-quality material!
May VMN Continuing Education Webinar: Butterfly population trends in America north of Mexico and their most likely drivers
Date: May 5, 12:00-1:00
Description: Mounting evidence shows that insects are declining world-wide, leading to the so-called "insect apocalypse". Unfortunately, this is also true for butterflies in America and Canada. Leslie Ries will present the evidence showing patterns and trajectories of butterfly declines here in American north of Mexico. She will also summarize a recent study examining the most likely drivers. This story is complicated, but she’ll show that in the 10 years following the 2003 release of seed-coated neonicotinoids, that class of pesticides appears to have the biggest impact on butterfly population declines. She will also be emphasizing an often untold part of this story which is that the only reason scientists can do this research is the efforts of thousands of on-the-ground volunteers who participate in monitoring programs like the North American Butterfly Association's count program and regional networks that do more intensive surveys, including new programs in the Carolinas and Blue Ridge Mountains. With the efforts of community scientists, we will be able to continue to amass the evidence we need on declines and causes that will hopefully allow us to turn the tide on this tragic loss of biodiversity.
Presenter: Leslie Ries is an associate professor at Georgetown University studying how global change impacts biodiversity with a focus on butterflies in America north of Mexico. In addition to carrying out lab, field, and "big data" research on butterflies, she is the co-director of the North American Butterfly Monitoring Network, which provides data management support for the vast majority of groups that run programs where volunteers collect structured survey data. She is also excited to be a new board member of the North American Butterfly Association. Leslie is a native of the DMV, growing up and now living in suburban Maryland.
Leslie Ries is a co-author of the recent study you may have seen in the news showing widespread butterfly declines in the United States using volunteer-collected data sets–including butterfly counts that many of our VMNs have contributed to!
Registration: Pre-registration required to participate in the live Zoom. As with all our VMN CE Webinars, the recording will be available to anyone on our website within a few days of the event.
Volunteer Opportunity: City Nature Challenge
The City Nature Challenge starts April 25, 2025. This is an annual bioblitz focused mainly on urban metro areas (though not exclusively) and it is a friendly competition amongst participating areas. April 25-April 28 is the observing period, and April 29-May 4 is the additional time added to identify what was found and posted to iNaturalist. This year, Virginia has 9 different City Nature Challenge areas. Some of our chapters are holding special educational events and activities. If you are in one of the locations below, City Nature Challenge is a great opportunity to hold an educational event for the public in your community; please consider organizing something or helping one of your local partners do so! As always, please check with your chapter leaders for service activity approvals and directions on how to report in Better Impact.
Alleghany and Shenandoah Mountains: Alleghany, Augusta, Bath, Highland, Rockbridge counties and Covington, Buena Vista, Lexington, Waynesboro, and Staunton cities.
Charlottesville Region: Albemarle, Nelson, Louisa, Orange, Greene, Fluvanna Counties and Charlottesville City
Eastern Shore: Accomack and Northampton Counties
Greater Richmond Metro Area: Richmond City, Petersburg, Charles City, Chesterfield, Goochland, Hanover, Henrico, New Kent, Powhatan Counties
Roanoke: Roanoke city and county
Southwest Piedmont: Danville city, Martinsville city, Franklin, Henry, Patrick, and Pittsylvania counties
Southwest Virginia: Bristol city, Norton city, Buchanan, Dickenson, Lee, Russell, Scott, Smyth, Tazewell, Washington, Wise counties
Virginia Pinelands: Franklin, Hopewell, Emporia, Williamsburg cities, Greensville, Isle of Wight, James City, Prince George, Southampton, Suffolk, Surry, Sussex counties
Washington D.C. Metro Area: View the full map of areas included at the link. Includes part or all of where our Fairfax, Arlington Regional, Merrimac Farm, Central Rappahannock, Old Rag, Shenandoah, and Banshee Reeks are active.
This email includes:
- 20th Anniversary Updates
- Thank you for your photos and videos!
- Continuing Education Opportunity - VMN webinar
- Volunteer Service Opportunity - City Nature Challenge
20th Anniversary Updates
#Treemendous 20th Update
To celebrate the VMN Treemendous 20th anniversary, we are encouraging every VMN volunteer to do at least one service activity in 2025 that directly relates to and benefits trees and/or forests. To date, 17 VMN volunteers have already reported their #Treemendous20th service in Better Impact! Their work has included leading a tree walk on a nature trail, helping to plant 200 longleaf pines, staffing an outreach booth about native trees for a community festival, reporting tree phenology data for Nature’s Notebook, and more! Can we get to 100 volunteers completing and reporting their #Treemendous20th service by our next bi-weekly email? Arbor Day is coming up! And, remember, we have several new Virginia Department of Forestry citizen science activities we are launching as part of the effort.
More details at http://www.virginiamasternaturalist.org/home/do-a-treemendous-20th-service-activity-in-2025
Long-running Project Spotlight?
As part of our VMN 20th anniversary activities, we want to highlight some of your volunteer projects. We are looking for stories of VMN-led projects that either have been going on for more than 15 years or projects that your chapter completed more than 15 years ago that we can look back at in kind of a “where are they now?” sort of way.
If your chapter has a long-running project or a project from a long time ago that we can look at retrospectively, we’d like to hear about it! Please send a high-quality photo (if possible) and a description of what the project is/was, when it started, and any impacts it has had to our intern, Abi Mountford, at [email protected] and CC Michelle Prysby at [email protected]. We’ll be using these stories in social media posts, reports, presentations, and possibly an online StoryMap.
Road Show info
We are coming to a picnic shelter near you this summer! As part of our 20th Anniversary celebrations, we are going to host four Roadshows across the state. All VMNs are welcome at any of the Roadshows. Each Roadshow is a come as you are, arrive and leave when you can, rain or shine event.
Roadshow Dates and Locations*, 1:00-3:00pm on each date
Southwest – Saturday, June 7 @ Christiansburg Huckleberry Park in Christiansburg, VA
Central – Sunday, June 8 @ Pleasant Grove Park in Fluvanna, VA
Southeast – Saturday, July 12 @ Machicomoco State Park in Hayes, VA
Northern – Sunday, July 13 @ Ellanor C. Lawrence Park in Chantilly, VA
*Venues are subject to change, but the event date and time will remain the same and the event will be in the same general area.
Thank you for your photos and videos!
Thank you so much to everyone who contributed material for our new VMN video! We have so much great content! I don’t know yet what will get used in the 3-minute video, but we will be using as much of the rest of the material as we can in other ways this year (social media posts, etc.) It has been an amazing crowdsourcing effort!
Even though we are closing the window for contributing for this particular video, please know that the VMN state office welcomes your photos and videos anytime, especially high-resolution material that shows VMN volunteers in action. We use these in presentations, reports, media requests, and so many more places, and we always need current, high-quality material!
May VMN Continuing Education Webinar: Butterfly population trends in America north of Mexico and their most likely drivers
Date: May 5, 12:00-1:00
Description: Mounting evidence shows that insects are declining world-wide, leading to the so-called "insect apocalypse". Unfortunately, this is also true for butterflies in America and Canada. Leslie Ries will present the evidence showing patterns and trajectories of butterfly declines here in American north of Mexico. She will also summarize a recent study examining the most likely drivers. This story is complicated, but she’ll show that in the 10 years following the 2003 release of seed-coated neonicotinoids, that class of pesticides appears to have the biggest impact on butterfly population declines. She will also be emphasizing an often untold part of this story which is that the only reason scientists can do this research is the efforts of thousands of on-the-ground volunteers who participate in monitoring programs like the North American Butterfly Association's count program and regional networks that do more intensive surveys, including new programs in the Carolinas and Blue Ridge Mountains. With the efforts of community scientists, we will be able to continue to amass the evidence we need on declines and causes that will hopefully allow us to turn the tide on this tragic loss of biodiversity.
Presenter: Leslie Ries is an associate professor at Georgetown University studying how global change impacts biodiversity with a focus on butterflies in America north of Mexico. In addition to carrying out lab, field, and "big data" research on butterflies, she is the co-director of the North American Butterfly Monitoring Network, which provides data management support for the vast majority of groups that run programs where volunteers collect structured survey data. She is also excited to be a new board member of the North American Butterfly Association. Leslie is a native of the DMV, growing up and now living in suburban Maryland.
Leslie Ries is a co-author of the recent study you may have seen in the news showing widespread butterfly declines in the United States using volunteer-collected data sets–including butterfly counts that many of our VMNs have contributed to!
Registration: Pre-registration required to participate in the live Zoom. As with all our VMN CE Webinars, the recording will be available to anyone on our website within a few days of the event.
Volunteer Opportunity: City Nature Challenge
The City Nature Challenge starts April 25, 2025. This is an annual bioblitz focused mainly on urban metro areas (though not exclusively) and it is a friendly competition amongst participating areas. April 25-April 28 is the observing period, and April 29-May 4 is the additional time added to identify what was found and posted to iNaturalist. This year, Virginia has 9 different City Nature Challenge areas. Some of our chapters are holding special educational events and activities. If you are in one of the locations below, City Nature Challenge is a great opportunity to hold an educational event for the public in your community; please consider organizing something or helping one of your local partners do so! As always, please check with your chapter leaders for service activity approvals and directions on how to report in Better Impact.
Alleghany and Shenandoah Mountains: Alleghany, Augusta, Bath, Highland, Rockbridge counties and Covington, Buena Vista, Lexington, Waynesboro, and Staunton cities.
Charlottesville Region: Albemarle, Nelson, Louisa, Orange, Greene, Fluvanna Counties and Charlottesville City
Eastern Shore: Accomack and Northampton Counties
Greater Richmond Metro Area: Richmond City, Petersburg, Charles City, Chesterfield, Goochland, Hanover, Henrico, New Kent, Powhatan Counties
Roanoke: Roanoke city and county
Southwest Piedmont: Danville city, Martinsville city, Franklin, Henry, Patrick, and Pittsylvania counties
Southwest Virginia: Bristol city, Norton city, Buchanan, Dickenson, Lee, Russell, Scott, Smyth, Tazewell, Washington, Wise counties
Virginia Pinelands: Franklin, Hopewell, Emporia, Williamsburg cities, Greensville, Isle of Wight, James City, Prince George, Southampton, Suffolk, Surry, Sussex counties
Washington D.C. Metro Area: View the full map of areas included at the link. Includes part or all of where our Fairfax, Arlington Regional, Merrimac Farm, Central Rappahannock, Old Rag, Shenandoah, and Banshee Reeks are active.
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