Asking for kids' help in BioBlitz inventory

Calling all St. Louis area kids! You can help this month make a unique inventory of all living things in Forest Park.

The 24-hour event is called the St. Louis BioBlitz. It will run from 3 p.m. Friday, Sept. 10, through 3 p.m. Saturday, Sept. 11.

The goal is to inventory "all living organisms in Forest Park in the city of St. Louis."

Marguerite Garrick is co-chair of the Bioblitz. She said, "We know we can only do a snapshot of the park's bio-diversity in a single 24-hour period. But, we will gather baseline information for management of the rejuvenated Forest Park."

About the role of kids, Garrick said, "We want to put them to work on teams that will be identifying and counting. They can be the eyes and ears to help the scientists and naturalists."

The goal is to identify every plant, animal, insect and water creature in Forest Park. .

Kid volunteers from the St. Louis Junior Academy of Science as well as boy and girl scout groups already have been signed up. But, there is still an opportunity for individual kids and their families to join in the BioBlitz.

To learn more, visit the BioBlitz website at www.stlbioblitz.com. There's a place to signup to participate on-line. Also, there is an address where you can send snail-mail requests.

Among the search groups will be ones looking for birds, mammals, bats, snakes, aquatic insects, beetles, bees and wasps, plants and lichens, dragonflies and fish.

Other groups will be trying to identify the different types of soil in Forest Park.

After the one-day BioBlitz, teams of scientists and college students probably will continue the inventory for as long as a full year.

She said the park managers need to know exactly what living organisms are in the park. Then, they can manage the park to provide for the widest bio-diversity.

One recent example of managing the level of park wildlife involved a roundup of some resident geese. "There definitely was an over-population of them," Garrick said.

Another new specie of wildlife that has shown up in the park recently has been coyotes. As a result, the Wild Canid Center or Wolf Sanctuary will be one of the agencies that will participate in the BioBlitz.

Ms. Garrick said the idea of an organism inventory in urban public spaces isn't new. She got the BioBlitz idea from a similar inventory done in New York City's Central Park.

Forest Park is even larger than Central Park.

The local park also is nearly done with a multi-million dollar improvement campaign. Taking a new inventory of the park's wildlife and plant "residents" after the improvements is very appropriate now, she said.

For instance, many lakes in Forest Park now are connected in a way that water will circulate throughout the park. Previously, most of the lakes were separate ponds.

With circulating water, a wider range of water organisms can be sustained.

Park managers need to know what organisms are there now. Then, they can introduce new ones that can live well with those already there.

The two main sponsors of the St. Louis BioBlitz are the St. Louis chapter of the Explorers Club and the Gateway Wildlands organization.

The Explorers Club is an organization that helps organize exploration trips worldwide. The Gateway Wildlands group is a combined effort of the Missouri Botanical Garden and the Missouri Department of Conservation (MDC).

Other sponsors include the Saint Louis Zoo, the St. Louis Science Center, Forest Park Forever, the World Bird Sanctuary and the St. Louis City Department of Parks.

In addition to the inventory teams, there will be many free public demonstrations. These demonstrations will range from the MDC and the Illinois Department of Natural Resources to the information on mushrooms from the St. Louis Mycological Society.

For last minute additions to the search teams and public demonstrations, you can check the BioBlitz website right up to the time of the event.

Ms. Garrick has had a life-long involvement in wildlife issues. She is the daughter of Marlon Perkins, a former St. Louis Zoo director. Perkins had an international reputation through the TV series, "Wild Kingdom." She also was a lobbyist for wildlife issues in Congress and worked for the National Zoo in Washington, D.C.