Plitvice joins City Nature Challenge

Plitvice Lakes National Park and Croatia’s Lika-Senj County will join the City Nature Challenge on April 24-27, 2026, opening a four-day public count of local wildlife. (np-plitvicka-jezera.hr) The park said residents and visitors can take part by recording wild plants, animals and fungi in the area during those four days. The local effort is part of the global City Nature Challenge, which runs on the same April 24-27 schedule in 2026. (np-plitvicka-jezera.hr) (citynaturechallenge.org) The global event has a second phase after the observation window: identifications are made from April 28 to May 3, 2026, as participants and experts sort submitted sightings. The City Nature Challenge site says city registration for 2026 has already closed. (citynaturechallenge.org) The challenge works like a crowdsourced wildlife census. Participants upload photos of living organisms, and the iNaturalist platform turns those observations into records that can be reviewed and identified by other users. (inaturalist.org) (citynaturechallenge.org) That matters for places like Plitvice because protected areas still need current species data, not just old inventories. City Nature Challenge organizers say observations help scientists, land managers and communities track what species are present and where they are found. (citynaturechallenge.org) Croatia’s 2026 effort is being coordinated by the Institute for Environment and Nature of the Ministry of Environmental Protection and Green Transition, according to the Croatian-language park announcement. The same notice said the number of co-organizers expanded this year to cover 12 counties, with Plitvice Lakes National Park and all of Lika-Senj County among the additions. (np-plitvicka-jezera.hr) Plitvice is not a minor site joining a niche app project. The park says it is Croatia’s oldest and largest national park, first proclaimed on April 8, 1949. (np-plitvicka-jezera.hr) The City Nature Challenge has grown far beyond its original city-against-city format. Organizers now describe it as a worldwide community-science biodiversity census, and partner pages for 2026 say the event spans hundreds of cities. (inaturalist.org) (citynaturechallenge.org) (nature.org) For Plitvice and Lika-Senj, the immediate next step is simple: get outside between April 24 and April 27, photograph wild species, and upload the sightings for review. (np-plitvicka-jezera.hr) (inaturalist.org)