Hello AMC iNaturalist community! My name is Madelyn, and I started working with the Appalachian Mountain Club as part of the NPS Scientists in the Parks program. My goal is to challenge the divide between professional scientists in research environments and the ultimate consumers of scientific knowledge, the public. iNaturalist is a fantastic tool for bridging that gap and provides new answers to the questions around who and how scientific knowledge is produced.

I’ve been invested in phenology for as long as I can remember, diligently tracking the bloom of the DC cherry blossoms. Growing up around DC, the stakes of knowing the days of peak bloom were high- it was the difference between enjoying a casual walk and the finding yourself in a throng of tourists. Every year we complained that the trees bloomed earlier, and the traffic was worse. I don’t have any data about the traffic, but there has been a seven-day shift in the date of peak bloom since 1921.

Washington, DC Cherry Blossoms | Madelyn on left, friend on right

The stakes of tracking phenology along the AT corridor are less immediately obvious (Canadian mayflower blooming isn’t going to get you stuck in traffic for an hour), but much more important. As climate change continues to impact the seasonality of ecosystems along the AT, it is increasingly important to understand the influence of global warming on plant development. Thank you for your help so far, and I look forward to seeing everyone’s observations this spring!