Plant Club virtual BioBlitz

Our scientists need your help to learn more about the plants near you. What plants can you find in your local area?

Sometimes plants can be easy to miss. But when we take time to look a little closer, we see how exciting and important they really are!

Look closely at the shapes and textures of leaves and flowers and use the resources here to help you to tell different plants apart. Share your finds with scientists and other nature-lovers all over the world by joining and uploading photographs to our iNaturalist project. 

How to join

1. Sign up for a free iNaturalist account and join the Plant Club BioBlitz project

2. Between 27 July - 9 August 2020 take photographs of plants near you and upload to iNaturalist, or use the free iNaturalist app from AppStore or Google Play. You can download a guide (PDF 417KB) to using the app.

iNaturalist allows you to add multiple photographs for the same plant, so for the best chance of an identification, for each plant try to upload:

• A photo of the whole plant
• A close-up of the leaves
• A close-up of the flowers and/or fruits or seeds if present

3. See what others have found and try adding your identifications. Look out for comments on your IDs and a blog post on the results of the BioBlitz in mid-August.

Free identification guides

There are over 3,000 species of wild plants in the UK, and many more grown in gardens and parks, so identifying them can be tricky. These guides can help, but if you are stuck, you can still upload pictures and other people can help find out what they are.

• Download free Spotter Sheets from Plantlife for the top plants to look for in July and August
• Discover five common urban trees and download a tree identification key
• Do you have ferns growing on walls near you? The OPAL guide to common urban wall ferns can help you tell them apart.
• Post your plant photographs in the Museum’s Identification Service Facebook group or tweet @NHM_CitSci
• Keen to develop your plant identification skills further? Try the Botanical Society of Britain and Ireland (BSBI) flora.