Environmental professionals can’t cover every inch of New York State to look for invasive species, which is why the NY Natural Heritage Program is thankful for all the volunteers who contribute data to our invasive species database! iMapInvasives has community science efforts that anyone can join this winter.

Returning for it’s 4^th year, our annual hemlock woolly adelgid (HWA) winter mapping challenge aims to track the leading edge of HWA populations in New York. These insects threaten the health of our eastern hemlocks, trees that provide important ecosystem services for forests and streams throughout the state. The challenge began on Feb 1^st  and ran until March 15^th. Additional information about the challenge as well as a recording to the kick-off webinar is available on the iMapInvasives website. 

Confident in your invasive species identification skills? You can get involved in the data confirmation process for some of the data submitted to iMapInvasives. Volunteers can apply for permission to review unconfirmed reports for common invasive species. If the photograph submitted with the record matches up with the listed species information, you can confirm the record and have it show up on our database! iMapInvasives receives tens of thousands of records every year, so we appreciate anyone willing to review some of the incoming data.

There are plenty more ways to get involved with iMapInvasives throughout the year, so remember to check in to see what’s new (learn more)!