2022 Wildflower Weekend & BotanyBlitz
For over 30 years the Kentucky Native Plant Society, in partnership with Natural Bridge State Resort Park, has held a Wildflower Weekend at the park, offering wildflower hikes, as well as evening presentations. In 2020, due to COVID-19, we were forced to cancel Wildflower Weekend for the first time ever. Last year, with the pandemic still disrupting in-person activities, we all participated in a virtual Wildflower Week.
This year we are incredibly excited to be going back to an in-person Wildflower Weekend, April 8th-10th at Natural Bridge State Resort Park. This year’s Wildflower Week will be a hybrid of in-person and online activities. The week prior to Wildflower Weekend, we will be hosting an online, week-long BotanyBlitz on iNaturalist from April 2nd-9th.
Wildflower Weekend 2022 at Natural Bridge SRP
KNPS’ 2022 Wildflower Weekend is scheduled for April 8, 9, & 10. The weekend will offer wildflower hikes Friday and Saturday, led by some of the best botanists in the state. These hikes will explore the region’s rich natural history and resources in the state park and the Red River Gorge. Friday evening there will be a campfire social gathering at the group campsite near the Middle Fork Campground to meet your fellow native plant enthusiasts. Our Saturday night the keynote speaker will be Mike Homoya, former Indiana State Botanist/Plant Ecologist and author of numerous excellent botanical field guides. His presentation is titled, “Rare Plant and Natural Communities along the Ohio River, from Cincinnati to the Mississippi River.”
We are still in the process of lining up folks for the wildflower hikes. We are also looking for folks to help the hike leaders so that we can allow for more people on each hike. If you are interested in leading or helping on a hike, please send us an email at WildflowerWeekend2022@knps.org.
This event is open to the public and kid-friendly. Admission is $10 for adults, $3 for ages 13-17, and free for ages 12 & under.
As COVID-19 will still be a concern, we will be making every effort to minimize potential exposure for everyone:
- Pre-registration: attendees will be able pre-register for the event as well as the guided hikes. This will better help us make arrangements for social distancing, as well as reduce crowding at hikes. Pre-registration will be opened online several weeks before Wildflower Weekend. Members of KNPS will be allowed to register before the registration is opened to the general public.
- Meet-up locations for hikes: each hike will have a separate designated meeting point outside of the lodge, and we ask that everyone head straight to those outdoor locations rather than congregating together in the lodge lobby.
- Social distancing: as much as possible, we will keep our group interactions outdoors. However for the Saturday evening presentations in the Woodland Center, we will reduce the number of chairs and spread them out so folks can easily socially distance.
- Masks: in all cases, we will abide by the public health rules of our host, Natural Bridge SRP. To that end, we request that folks wear masks when indoors.
We appreciate your help in keeping this event as safe as it can be!
BotanyBlitz 2022 on iNaturalist
Leading up to Wildflower Weekend will be our week long BotanyBlitz, which will run from Saturday, April 2, through Saturday, April 9, and be hosted on the iNaturalist website. A BotanyBlitz is a community-science event that focuses on finding and identifying as many plant species as possible within a designated location and time period. At the end of the week, the observations of all participants will be tallied and awards given for Most Species Observed and Most Observations.
Beginning on Saturday, April 2, we are encouraging everyone to visit parks and natural areas throughout the Commonwealth, to find and photograph native plants (with an emphasis on those in bloom), and upload them to our BotanyBlitz project. Expert botanists and people with a keen identifying eye will be watching the observations roll in and can help with ID tips and tricks, so if you love wildflowers but aren’t always sure how to identify them, this project is definitely for you!
If you are interested in participating in this community science project but are unfamiliar with iNaturalist, we can help. On Saturday, April 2, at the beginning of the KNPS Wildflower Week BotanyBlitz, several iNaturalist tutorial hikes will be held at parks across Kentucky. These hikes will be lead by local botanizers who are also experienced iNaturalist users, who will demonstrate the basics of the app. Groups will then set out on an easy nature walk to practice uploading iNat observations, troubleshoot questions when possible, and of course, admire the wildflowers. We will open registration for these walks in early March. Members of KNPS will be allowed to register before the registration is opened to the general public. In the meantime, make sure to download the iNaturalist app and create a user account!
We have set up a page for Wildflower Weekend 2022 & BotanyBlitz 2022 where we will post the most current information about the events over the next several weeks. Be sure to visit the page and bookmark it!
If you have any questions about Wildflower Weekend or the BotanyBlitz, send us an email at WildflowerWeekend2022@knps.org Hope to see you in April.