About

Invented by community science staff, Lila Higgins at the Natural History Museum of Los Angeles County (NHM) and Alison Young and Rebecca Johnson at the California Academy of Sciences (CAS), the City Nature Challenge is an international effort for people to find and document plants and wildlife in cities. It's an annual four-day global bioblitz at the end of April, where cities collaborate to see what can be accomplished when we all work toward a common goal.

How it all got started

Started in 2016 for the first-ever Citizen Science Day, the community science teams at NHM and California Academy of Sciences dreamed up the City Nature Challenge as a fun way to capitalize on their home cities’ friendly rivalry and hold an event around urban biodiversity. The first City Nature Challenge was an eight-day competition between Los Angeles and San Francisco, engaging residents and visitors in documenting nature to better understand urban biodiversity. 

In its first year, over 20,000 observations were made by more than 1,000 people in a one-week period, cataloging approximately 1,600 species in each location, including new records for both areas. During the 2016 CNC, there was so much excitement and interest from people in other cities that the organizers knew they couldn’t keep the fun just to themselves. In 2017 the City Nature Challenge went national, and in 2018, the CNC became an international event!

Director, Center for Biodiversity and Community Science and City Nature Challenge co-founder
California Academy of Sciences (iNaturalist username @rebeccafay)

Dr. Rebecca Johnson directs the Center for Biodiversity and Community Science and the Thriving California Initiative at the California Academy of Sciences. She and her team focus on designing equitable, inclusive, and meaningful events and campaigns to gather biodiversity data and mobilize those data to understand climate change and stem biodiversity loss in California. She is passionate about building partnerships and coalitions around place-based nature connection, biodiversity data use, and on-the-ground action for positive change. She co-founded the City Nature Challenge and Snapshot Cal Coast. Dr. Johnson is on the California Biodiversity Network Steering Committee and leads the Academy’s biodiversity work with the City of San Francisco. She is the board chair for Bay Nature Magazine and a TOGETHER Bay Area board member. Dr. Johnson earned her B.A. in Integrative Biology from the University of California, Berkeley, her M.A. in Systematics and Ecology from San Francisco State University, and her Ph.D. in Ecology and Evolutionary Biology from the University of California, Santa Cruz. She lives in San Francisco with her family. 

Associate Manager, Community Science and CNC Managing global organizers
Natural History Museums of Los Angeles County (iNaturalist username @amyjaecker-jones)

Amy joined the Community Science Program at the Natural History Museum of Los Angeles County in 2018. Her primary responsibility is coordinating the City Nature Challenge at the local and global levels. Other projects she has worked on include the Backyard Bat Survey, co-creating a bilingual pollinator guide with a local elementary school, and field-testing community science kits at several Los Angeles County parks. Amy is a California Naturalist, a Certified Interpretive Guide, and a graduate of Occidental College.

Associate Manager, Center for Biodiversity and Community Science and City Nature Challenge Managing global organizers
California Academy of Sciences (iNaturalist username @jesscarvs9)

Jessica joined the Academy in 2025 as a Community Science Associate Manager. Jessica brings a background in environmental education, program management, and workforce development. Before joining the Academy, Jessica managed the SEI Climate Corps Fellow Program and coordinated the County of Marin's Zero Waste Schools Program. Earlier in her career, she worked at the San Lorenzo Museum of Natural History and the University of California, Santa Cruz Kenneth S. Norris Center for Natural History, where she led museum exhibit development, research projects, and educational initiatives to expand community engagement in natural sciences. With a degree in Environmental Studies focused on natural history and environmental and social justice, Jessica is passionate about connecting people with nature and fostering accessible science engagement.

Administrative Assistant for Research & Collections and CNC Global Administrator
Natural History Museum of Los Angeles County (iNaturalist username @cielramon)

Ciel joined the Research & Collections Department at the Natural History Museum of Los Angeles County in 2024, where they are assisting the R&C office and staff with a variety of tasks. Ciel has worked within the entertainment industry as a closed captions/subtitles editor for almost three years, where they oversaw a team of editors and ran quality control. They have also previously worked as an administrative assistant for the Honors Program at CSU Northridge, where they developed and refined their skills in grammar, clerical work, and product management. Ciel has a BA in Linguistics and is currently studying to get their Master’s in Speech Language Pathology.

Program Manager, Community Science and CNC Global Organizer
Natural History Museums of Los Angeles County (iNaturalist username @lamador2)

Liz joined the Community Science Department at the Natural History Museum of Los Angeles County in 2026. Her primary roles include supporting CNC along with other community science programs. Liz is a Chicana and California Native from Garden Grove. Her research has taken her up north to study the central coastline in Monterey Bay and to Maine where she studied flowering across the U.S. She is interested in the integration of community science and long-term monitoring methods within coastal and terrestrial ecosystems. In her free time she enjoys crafts, hikes, and free diving.

Marine Campaigns Coordinator, Community Science and CNC Global Organizer
California Academy of Sciences (iNaturalist username @bnature_lia)

Lia is the marine campaigns coordinator for the community science team at Cal Academy! Lia grew up in Central Oregon and attended UC Berkeley as an undergrad, where she majored in environmental biology and minored in Chinese language and journalism. From 2021 - 2026, Lia worked for Bay Nature Magazine as a writer, fact-checker, editorial assistant, outreach fellow, and most recently as events manager. In her spare time, Lia enjoys painting animals, going for long walks, tidepooling, looking for insects, and eating snacks.

Coordinator, Community Science and CNC Global Organizer
California Academy of Sciences (iNaturalist username @louisaluvsplants)

Louisa works as a Community Science Coordinator at the California Academy of Sciences, where she supports campaigns such as the City Nature Challenge. She joined the team in April 2026, bringing a background in horticulture, native plant conservation, environmental policy, and private land conservation, with experience across public, private, and academic sectors. She is passionate about connecting people with nature in their local communities and empowering individuals to take action to support the environment. Louisa earned her B.S. in Environmental Science, Policy, and Management with a minor in Spanish from the University of Minnesota, Twin Cities.

CNC Spanish Language Global Organizer
Museo Argentino de Ciencias Naturales "Bernardino Rivadavia" MACN-CONICET

Dr. Anabela Plos has a PhD in Natural Sciences from the National University of La Plata, performs her duties at the "Bernardino Rivadavia" Argentine Museum of Natural Sciences as a member of the National Research Council Scientific and Technical (CONICET)

Since 2015, she has managed the Argentine node of the Global Biodiversity Information Facility (GBIF). Within the GBIF community, she served as Regional Representative of Latin American and Caribbean Nodes (2016-2021) and as a committee member of the Biodiversity Information for Development program for the Caribbean (BID), financed by the European Union, coordinated by GBIF. Anabela also coordinates and promotes activities related to open and participatory science, such as the City Nature Challenge, the Great Southern BioBlitz and various activities in the Wikimedia community in Argentina and the Latin American and Caribbean region.

CNC India Regional Organizer
Head of Citizen Science & Engagement, The Naturalist School

Ram Dayal Vaishnav is an Environmental Researcher and a seasoned professional in the conservation space, and a well-known advocate for citizen science, including as a TEDx speaker. As the Head of Citizen Engagement at The Naturalist School, he leads citizen science programs and has been instrumental in expanding the City Nature Challenge to all corners of India and Asia. On an international scale, Ram Dayal serves as a Working Group Secretary for Citizen Science Global Partnership, where he collaborates with various UN agencies. He also holds the role of Education Director at CitizenScience.Asia, where he founded the Asia Nature Challenge. He is also a PhD Scholar at TransDisciplinary University, studying Citizen Science for Biodiversity Documentation. His comprehensive efforts to advance citizen science for species Red List assessments and other biodiversity documentation include past work with organizations like IUCN, iNaturalist, National Biodiversity Authority and WWF-India, along with his involvement in initiatives like Tiger Beetle Watch.

City Nature Challenge co-founder

Lila is Director of Education and Horticulture at the California Native Plant Society (CNPS), where they lead education, horticulture, and public engagement initiatives that connect people with California's native plants and biodiversity. Their fascination with nature started early; they grew up on a farm in the U.K. where they spent their time chasing butterflies, playing in hollow trees, and pretending to be a badger. An educator and community science leader with nearly two decades of experience, Lila previously spent 17 years at the Natural History Museum of Los Angeles County and co-founded the global City Nature Challenge. They are also the author of Wild L.A. and hold degrees in entomology from UC Riverside and environmental education from California State University, San Bernardino.

City Nature Challenge co-founder

Alison is the Director of Outreach Programs at iNaturalist, where she builds programs and partnerships — including the iNaturalist Ambassador program and a multi-year collaboration with the Association of Science and Technology Centers — that grow and inspire the platform's global community and turn everyday nature encounters into usable conservation data. Before iNaturalist, she spent 13 years at the California Academy of Sciences co-leading their Community Science program. Alison co-founded and co-directed the City Nature Challenge from 2016-2024. Her own background is in intertidal ecology, and she can still be found in the tidepools searching for nudibranchs whenever she gets the chance.