Past Event

Citizen Scientists Activate! Join Friends of Kirke Park for a fun science challenge!

Saturday, August 30 is International Bat Night.

In celebration, Woodland Park Zoo and Bats Northwest have put together a special event — “Bat Count 2025: 30 min for Science” — in order to gather information about bats in our area. Data gathered will help protect these fascinating and beneficial creatures!

You can participate from wherever you are in the Pacific Northwest, but if you’re nearby we invite you to join us right here at Kirke Park! We’ll hang out in the park from 8pm to 9pm, sipping hot cider and watching for bat activity.

To prepare for participation:

1) Go to zoo.org/batactivity to download a participation packet and read project guidelines
2) On August 30th, just before sunset, find a spot you can see clear sky (like, for example, Kirke Park!)
3) At sunset (which, on August 30, will be at 7:52pm), watch for bat passes overhead
4) Keep a tally of your observations. At 9pm, FoKP will collect and submit data from our group
5) Know you made a difference for bats!!!

For more information, visit Bats Northwest’s “Bat Count 2025″ webpage. For downloadable resources, easy training videos, and lots more things to help you participate, visit Woodland Park Zoo’s Bat Activity Trends webpage. Inspired? Hankering for more? Get some more Bat Activity Trend events on your calendar!

Saturday, June 21, 4pm-Dusk

Join us for a Summer Solstice Celebration on Saturday, June 21!

Beginning at 4pm, we’ll have a (small) bonfire at the house across the street from the park, where we’ll provide fixin’s to roast s’mores over the fire! If you want, bring your own food to cook on the grill.

Festivities will wrap up at dusk.

Hope you can join us to celebrate summer!

---

Saturday, June 21, 1-4pm

Pollinator Week, June 16-22, is an annual celebration organized by Pollinator Partnership to appreciate and support our many pollinators friends (bees, butterflies, birds, bats, beetles, and other small creatures).

To join the fun, Kirke Park is throwing a Pollinator Party on Saturday June 21, from 1pm to 4pm in the Secret Garden. We’ll have information on local bees, hand lenses for closer observation, and a Pollinator Scavenger Hunt for the younger citizen scientists buzzing around. We’ll also join Pollinator Partnership’s international iNaturalist Bioblitz (a biological survey that documents as many species as possible at a specific time and place) — which means we’ll observe and identify pollinators and post pictures of them visiting flowers in the garden to iNaturalist.

More information can be found on our Pollinator Week page.

The Pollinator Project Bioblitz project on iNaturalist is easy to join, and consists of taking pictures of pollinators and the flowers they are visiting and uploading them to iNaturalist to be included in the dataset. iNaturalist has lots of information about how to Get Started — including video tutorials and how to start a project of your own.

For more information visit the Pollinator Partnership website.

For information about how to join the Pollinator Week Bioblitz project, download Pollinator Parnership’s Bioblitz Toolkit (PDF) or visit iNaturalist.org.

We hope to see you at the June 21 Pollinator Party — and the Solstice Celebration!

---

It’s here, pollinator-lovers: Pollinator Week (June 17–24, 2024)!

Pollinator Week is an annual celebration in support of pollinator health that was initiated and is managed by Pollinator Partnership. It is a time to raise awareness for pollinators and spread the word about what we can do to protect them.

Here at Kirke Park, we’re hosting a Bioblitz (survey of pollinators) on Sunday, June 23. To join in the citizen-science fun, stop by the Secret Garden between 9am and Noon to record observations of pollinators using iNaturalist.

For more information on Pollinator Week, visit the Pollinator Partnership’s website; to join iNaturalist’s Pollinator Week Bioblitz project, visit iNaturalist’s website.

---

Join your neighbors for a Solstice Celebration at Kirke Park!

Luminaria ~ Bonfire ~ S’mores ~ Neighborly Cheer.

Bring your own cup or mug, if possible.