A site is the area within which you will look for your chosen animal species, and which encompasses any plants you choose to observe. When you select a site, such as your yard or a nearby natural area, consider these guidelines:

Convenience: You will be visiting your site(s) regularly, so it should be convenient and easily accessible. Consider your yard or another area that your visit frequently.

Representative location: As much as is practical, the selected site(s) should be representative of the environmental conditions for your area. More...

Uniform habitat: The conditions of your selected site(s) should be relatively uniform across the site. If you would like to observe two adjacent but distinct habitats, please document them as separate sites. For example, a wetland adjacent to or surrounded by a drier grassland or forest should be documented as a separate site from the grassland or forest.

Appropriate size: A site should be no larger than 15 acres (6 hectares or 250 x 250 meters, the size of a pixel from a land surface satellite image), a square with sides the length of 2 ½ football fields. A site can certainly be smaller than this, and larger areas can be divided into multiple sites. More...

Proper permission: If you do not own the property where the site is located, you must get permission from the landowner before marking the site, the plants or reporting the site location information (such as latitude/longitude coordinates). More...

You may want to mark your site, so that you can find it again in the future. More...

Click below for more information in Video or PowerPoint format.

Add a New Site using the "My Sites" box on the left side of your Observation Deck, and use the map interface to locate your site. You can locate your site using an address, which will be automatically geo-located on the map, by selecting your site on the interactive map, or by typing the latitude and longitude into the boxes below the map. Additional information on this page about your site is optional. 

Add a New Plant using the "My Plants and Animals" box on your Observation Deck. Select the correct site from dropdown list of sites. Then click the 'Add new plant' link and begin to type the name of your species in the 'Plant species' box. Click on one of the suggestions that drops down and then fill in the answers to the remaining questions. 

Create an Animal Checklist using the "My Plants and Animals" box on your Observation Deck. Select the correct site from dropdown list of sites. Then, select animal species from the 'Species Available' window on the left. You can filter the animals in this list using the 'State', 'Species group', and monitoring 'Partner' dropdown menus. Click the 'Add to Checklist' button in the middle to add the species to your list. Be sure to save your checklist before you switch any filter choices. Once you are finished adding animals to your checklist, click the  'Save checklist' button in the lower left corner of the screen.

Sort your plants and animals using the "My Plants and Animals" box on your Observation Deck. Move your plants and animals by clicking on them and then using the 'First', 'Up', 'Down' and 'Last' buttons.

To make your phenology observations you will need the following items:

• Phenophase definitions and instructions: Check the profile page for each of your selected plant and animal species to see the list of phenophases for those species and instructions on how to recognize them.
• Datasheets, clipboard, pencil: You can download and print a datasheet for each plant or animal from the profile page for that species, or generate a personalized datasheet packet from your Observation Deck. More...
  OR
• Mobile Apps: Download our Nature's Notebook app for iPhone or Android and make paperless observations.
• Binoculars are optional, they are helpful for observing animals as well as phenophases in tall trees

For animals

Look and listen for all of the species on your animal checklist. You can do this by one of four methods:

• incidental (chance sighting while not specifically searching)
• stationary (standing or sitting at a single point)
• walking (a single pass or transect through your site)
• area search (multiple passes through your site, possibly crossing the same point more than once)

If you are using one of the last three search methods, try to spend about the same amount of time looking for animals at each visit. We recommend three minutes as a standard, but you can spend as much or as little time as you like. You will probably not see most, or any, of the animals during each visit, which is ok. More...

For each visit when you make an observation, record the amount of time you spent looking and which of the four methods you used (there is no need to report time for incidental sightings). Record whether or not you saw or heard each animal species on your animal checklist, and for each animal you did see or hear, you will need to fill out the animal phenophase datasheet. On this datasheet record the date and time, and for each phenophase, circle one of the following choices:

• Yes (y) – if you saw or heard that the phenophase is occurring
• No (n) – if you saw or heard that the phenophase is not occurring
• Uncertain (?) – if you were not certain whether you saw or heard that species or that phenophase
• Do not circle anything if you did not check for the species or phenophase

It is very important to record this information, even if you did not see a particular animal species! Knowing when an animal is not present, or when an animal is not in a given phenophase is just as important as knowing when it is. More...

For most animal phenophases you can also report on the intensity (or abundance) that you observe, like the number of individuals you see feeding or the degree of overlap in frog calls. Phenophase intensity choices vary by species and can be found on the profile page for each species. More...

If a phenophase, like mating or nest building, begins and ends while you were not observing, you can make a note of it in the comments section. More...

If you are watching for a phenophase and it does not seem to be starting when you expect it would, continue to watch for it and record that it is not occurring. This could mean the phenophase is occurring later or not at all in a given year, and this could be very valuable information. More...

Once a phenophase has ended you should continue to look for it and record whether or not it occurs again. Sometimes phenophases will occur a second or third (or more) time in a season, whether because of rain, pests, or changing climate. More...

If there are phenophases and/or intensity measures on which you do not want to report for a species because you find them too difficult to observe, just ignore them. You can cross them out on your datasheets, and do not circle or enter anything for them when you enter your data online.

Click below for more information in Video or PowerPoint format.