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I’ve worked at The Arboretum since the winter of my first year at the University of Guelph. I was an anxious over-achiever desperate for experience, money, and, well, money. I had worked the semester previous as a processing assistant at the Elora Crop Research Lab weighing and measuring bushels of barley seeds, and knew that another semester of commuting to Elora just to blow barley husks out of my nose wasn’t in the cards so I was ecstatic when I was offered an interview with The Arb.

My experience working at the Downtown Community Centre and being a current ENVS student scored me the job of Dedications Assistant and the rest has been history. Fighting tooth and nail for The Arboretum Student Engagement Fee Referendum, emceeing for years of Arb Expo, organizing a tribute to the late Jane Goodall that saw over 200 participants…It has been amazing. As green returns to The Arboretum, I find myself reminiscing now that The Sun has scared away winter’s chill. It’s a little hard to love every ounce of the job that involves walking down the long promenade that is coated in ice and snow for most of the cold season.

Needless to say, it’s been 3 and a half years since I started, and while I haven’t worked every single semester since then due to co-op, I like to think of myself as a bit of a student veteran.

My current position at The Arboretum is apart of the University’s Undergraduate Research Assistantship program where the University will pay for the students contract instead of the supervisor. This is to remove barriers for financially insecure students and financially insecure researchers wishing to hire said students. Generally, it is for mostly research positions, however, The Arboretum as a University body hires an Assistant Events Coordinator every year to assist in the organization of the annual Arb Expo Tree Day and Plant Sale which I have emceed at for the past few years. I am incredibly excited to fill this role, even though I am pretty nervous an event to such a big scale is being placed in my responsible (?) hands. I am still pretty new to spending the summer in Guelph too, as last summer I spent most of the day cooped up in Burlington, so it feels like every work term I am still experiencing something new. And for how long I’ve worked at The Arb, I feel like I am still learning every time I go into work or for a visit.

One big part of the Naturalist sector of The Arboretum is this little site called ‘iNaturalist’. iNaturalist, shortened to iNat, is a citizen-science platform that allows people from all over the world to capture pictures, and sound recordings of various organisms to create a network of observations that aid not only the citizens that contribute to this network, but also researchers, policy-makers, or anyone interested in what is being found where, and when.

“Citizen science is the practice of public participation and collaboration in scientific research to increase scientific knowledge. Through citizen science, people share and contribute to data monitoring and collection programs.” –National Geographic

Projects within iNat are collections of observations generally found within a specific location, or a type of observation. For example, all observations that are uploaded with the geographic location of The Arboretum are automatically posted to the University of Guelph Arboretum iNaturalist project. Back when I worked at Grundy Lake PP, all observations taken within the park were automatically posted to the Grundy Lake PP project, and I had made the top 10 list of observers with nearly 200 observations in the park (though, now I am down to a measly 14th place). Below are some examples of organisms I ‘observed’ and posted to my iNaturalist as apart of the Grundy Lake PP project.

You’d think that if I was able to get 200 observations at Grundy Lake in just 4 months that I’d have an astronomical amount of observations at The Arb after 3.5 years!

WRONG.

I am a total poser with only a measly 64 observations at a staggering 78th place in the University of Guelph Arboretum iNat project. In fact, to get anywhere close to 10th place, I’d have to increase my observations by a factor of 10. Triple what I had in Grundy.

Now, you may be asking, “Val, what does this even matter anyway? You can’t judge your passion for nature based on an arbitrary number of plants and animals you’ve seen.” And, you’re right. But, also wrong. It’s less about the number, and more about getting out there to see the sights to be seen. Hear the birds that you may not take the time to listen to, or stare at tree bark long enough that you notice some ridges and bumps are actually the chitinous ridges and bumps of a beetle you’ve never seen before.

And also it is about the number because, quite frankly, it’s embarrassing working here for so long and being so low on the totem pole.

So, what am I going to do about it?

Well, by the end of my contract, September 13th, I’d like to have risen through the Observer ranks in the University of Guelph Arboretum iNat project to be within the top 10 observers. Currently, 10th place is occupied by a user, the-creature, with 624 observations meaning I’d have to get at least 560 observations within the next 128 days. I’d have to average somewhere around 30 observations a week to hit this goal, which seems daunting but considering I am in 5 days a week for the entire summer, I do think it’s doable. Even just stepping outside today for maybe 15 minutes, I managed to see and properly photograph 5 unique things.

I think I will do monthly updates compiling any cool sightings and my progress to top 10. I’d also like to improve my identification skills in general, so instead of always relying on the ID suggestions by iNat, I will do my best to verify my own observations as well as others. That way I can also rise through the ‘Identifier’ ranks, where I am currently do not have a ranking at all.

Since Grundy Lake, I feel like I have fallen off the naturalist wagon. Of course, it’s easy to pursue more naturalist hobbies when you live in a provincial park compared to suburban Guelph and work mostly indoors at a desk. I won’t lie and say my mental health hasn’t also been a factor in my decline of doing things I used to find a lot of joy in. 2025 was a really tough year for me, and the last thing I had energy for was going outside, even though I probably would have benefited from it. I hope challenging myself like this will get me back in the saddle, and reignite the passion I have for the little things that often go unnoticed.

I encourage anyone reading this who likes to take pictures of nature to sign up for iNaturalist. You do not need to know everything, and it is incredibly helpful having a whole community of people with knowledge of even the nichest gall flies to help you identify the things you spot in your backyard. It is a great way to connect to the nature around you, and the other people around who enjoy it just as much as you do. It is completely free and as anonymous or not as you’d like it to be.

Here’s to the Journey to Top 10!

DATE: 08/05/2026
CURRENT OBSERVER PLACEMENT: 78
NUMBER OF OBSERVATIONS: 64