A new phenology monitoring effort will kick off later this month at the Grand Bay National Estuarine Research Reserve and National Wildlife Refuge. Grand Bay will be monitoring a variety of native and invasive species to better inform management practices at the Reserve and Refuge. 

We hope that this will serve as a pilot project for other NERRs and adjacent National Wildlife Refuges across the country. See more information on the Nature's Notebook training workshop for Grand Bay below.

A phenology monitoring program doesn't have to require a large investment of Refuge staff time. At St. Mark's NWR in Florida, Master Naturalist and Refuge volunteer Nancy Thomas has been collecting phenology data for the past few years. 

Nancy visits multiple individuals of 10 focal tree species near the Refuge visitor center on a regular basis. Nancy's data will provide useful information for the Refuge about leafing, flowering, and fruiting of these species, and how the timing of these phenophases changes from year to year.