Was Your State a Slacker? - 2024 USA Observations Per Capita (Edit: Canadian data and European/African maps now in comments!)

Fellow iNatters!

Do you live in a magical land full of iNaturalist aficionados, or, instead, a vast cultural wasteland? Surely there is no in-between!

Perhaps you already know the answer to this question. But - what better place than the Internet to compare your lot in life to that of others?

And so - for your viewing pleasure on this cold winter evening - I have compiled the number of verifiable calendar year 2024 iNat observations per state, grabbed 2024 U.S. Census Bureau population data, and smashed them together in this nifty map.

Behold - 2024 USA observations per capita!

Good people of Vermont, you appear to be relatively well-stocked with cameras, time, and a desire to share what you saw outside!

I encourage the rest of us to catch up with them by submitting well-cropped, in-focus, excellently-documented submissions while those New Englanders are house-bound through mid-April (or whatever it is that happens up there)! :smile:

Or maybe being housebound is what gives them time to upload all their photos?

Happy iNatting, everybody!

As a table (listing all states)
State 2024 Verifiable Obs. 2024 Population Obs. Per Capita
Vermont 204,426 648,493 0.315
Maine 211,935 1,405,012 0.151
Alaska 99,918 740,133 0.135
New Hampshire 185,016 1,409,032 0.131
Oregon 531,372 4,272,371 0.124
Wyoming 69,090 587,618 0.118
D.C. 78,111 702,250 0.111
Hawaii 154,476 1,446,146 0.107
New Mexico 214,449 2,130,256 0.101
Massachusetts 600,184 7,136,171 0.084
Washington 662,330 7,958,180 0.083
California 3,213,048 39,431,263 0.081
Maryland 505,746 6,263,220 0.081
Montana 89,891 1,137,233 0.079
Delaware 78,426 1,051,917 0.075
Texas 2,324,247 31,290,831 0.074
West Virginia 127,435 1,769,979 0.072
Virginia 606,501 8,811,195 0.069
Colorado 392,557 5,957,493 0.066
North Carolina 723,762 11,046,024 0.066
Wisconsin 377,864 5,960,975 0.063
Rhode Island 67,538 1,112,308 0.061
Arizona 448,974 7,582,384 0.059
Idaho 116,376 2,001,619 0.058
Minnesota 324,562 5,793,151 0.056
Alabama 284,015 5,157,699 0.055
Arkansas 169,937 3,088,354 0.055
Utah 191,418 3,503,613 0.055
Ohio 626,972 11,883,304 0.053
Tennessee 381,664 7,227,750 0.053
Pennsylvania 649,832 13,078,751 0.050
Connecticut 171,177 3,675,069 0.047
Michigan 465,344 10,140,459 0.046
Florida 1,047,887 23,372,215 0.045
Oklahoma 172,489 4,095,393 0.042
South Dakota 38,350 924,669 0.041
Louisiana 185,199 4,597,740 0.040
Missouri 244,693 6,245,466 0.039
New York 775,563 19,867,248 0.039
Illinois 467,619 12,710,158 0.037
Kentucky 163,240 4,588,372 0.036
New Jersey 336,886 9,500,851 0.035
South Carolina 192,547 5,478,831 0.035
Indiana 231,613 6,924,275 0.033
Kansas 99,178 2,970,606 0.033
Mississippi 95,756 2,943,045 0.033
Georgia 357,529 11,180,878 0.032
Nevada 104,933 3,267,467 0.032
Nebraska 61,008 2,005,465 0.030
Iowa 94,324 3,241,488 0.029
North Dakota 19,743 796,568 0.025
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Surprised that PA is in the bottom 20, I guess outside of the cities it’s less popular than I thought

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It’d be fun - but somewhat labor intensive - to do a county-by-county breakdown!

I was surprised by the strength of the Mountain West. The other popular areas - West Coast, New England, the broad D.C. region - those I kind of expected.

I wonder how much vacationers have an impact on the numbers.

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Super cool! This made me curious so I went ahead and did a rough calculation for Canada and it seems all provinces/territories have at least 0.2 observations per capita, so not bad.

Ontario - 0.47
Quebec - 0.20
BC - 0.82
Alberta - 0.22 (surprisingly low?)
Sask - 0.21
Manitoba - 0.29
PEI - 0.83
NS - 1.01
NB - 0.55
NL - 0.24 (map boundaries weren’t set so I estimated obs numbers)
NWT - 0.58 (ditto)
Yukon - 3.21 (wow!)
Nunavut - 0.44

EDIT: oops, I didn’t realize the post was specifically about 2024 obs numbers, LOL

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I did the 2024 Canada numbers, too!

Prov/Terr 2024 Verifiable Obs. 2024 Population Obs. Per Capita
Yukon 33,822 46,948 0.72
Northwest Territories 24,697 44,936 0.55
Prince Edward Island 42,018 179,301 0.23
Nova Scotia 215,517 1,079,676 0.20
British Columbia 1,068,571 5,719,594 0.19
New Brunswick 105,878 857,381 0.12
Nunavut 3,975 41,258 0.10
Ontario 1,491,724 16,171,802 0.09
Newfoundland and Labrador 37,571 545,880 0.07
Manitoba 87,849 1,499,981 0.06
Alberta 282,130 4,931,601 0.06
Saskatchewan 53,683 1,246,691 0.04
Quebec 382,096 9,100,249 0.04

I was thinking about including Canada on the map, but in the end decided not to. There’s such dramatic variability in the population sizes of the Canadian regions!

I’ll update the Newfoundland/Labrador numbers as soon as I remember the work-around for the map boundaries issue. Edit: added them. (Have to input that location at the top bar on the browser and hit “View observations,” instead of just using the “Observations” bar).

It’d probably also be cool to do it for each year, and see how the comparative popularity of iNat has spread over time, but I don’t have the patience for that. :slightly_smiling_face:

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Woah BC is so close to Ontario in observations with 1/3 it’s population, that’s crazy

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@charlie - was that you bumping Vermont’s observations up so high?

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Oh, very cool visualization! You’re giving me ideas :thinking: for my area and seeing how it could be used as a guide to look for potentially less observed areas.

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I love it…I’m not a slacker!

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Great visualisation! I’d love to see something like this for Europe…

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I’m working on a rough first draft for France - I’m looking to make a similar one for Europe but I’m struggling to get all the numbers for roughly consistent bit of areas, since every country does it differently

@comradejon I don’t know if it’s been the same for you, but i’ve found the numbers quite surprising. France has a lot less observation per capita than both the US and Canada, now i’m curious to see how many users there are in France and if that has an influence

edit: on second thought, won’t hijack your subject, I’ll make my own post later ;)

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County-by-county would be interesting for PA… as a resident of one of the flyover counties, I’d bet that the cities are actually dragging down our state-wide numbers by being so heavily populated. I’d guess the Philly- and Pittsburgh-area counties are much pinker than counties like Bucks and Centre.

Actually, that might be a common theme in many states… the cities are quite pink, notwithstanding the thousands of robins and dandelions around high schools. :wink: Non-metro counties with big colleges - like Penn State in Centre county - could be pretty green. I wouldn’t be surprised if your greenest counties were more rural - there’s more to see out here, and fewer people in your way. :wink:

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Happy to have your map(s) in here if you’d like! If you add them, I’ll change the title of the topic to note they’re here!

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I agree–in south/central New York, I think the number & placement of iNat observations isn’t driven as much by strict population density as college impact. In 2024, Tompkins Co. (home of Cornell University, pop. ~26,000 students and a lot of extension and outreach activity, as well as 2 other colleges) had 53,648 obs for a population of 105,740 (2020) while Broome Co. (home of Binghamton University, pop. ~18,000 students and some recent outreach activity, plus 1 other college) had 10,196 obs for a population of 198,683 (2020).

That works out to 0.51 obs/capita in Tompkins Co. vs. 0.05 obs/capita in Broome Co.

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this can get you observations from iNat and population from Wikidata for countries in Europe:
https://jumear.github.io/stirfry/iNat_countries?parent_place_id=97391&stats=observations

this or another of the examples in this thread could be adapted to make a chroropleth, though you would need to find a source for a European map: https://forum.inaturalist.org/t/some-choropleth-maps-using-inat-data/21776/9. or a quick web search turns up many pages that can handle the visualization given user data or provides the country boundaries.

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In spite of the fact that our snow starts in November and often doesn’t end until April…

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The Vermont Atlas of Life (see https://val.vtecostudies.org/) has spent a lot of time over the last decade plus recruiting and encouraging folks to add data to iNaturalist (and other projects we support like eBird Vermont and e-Butterfly) to add to our ever-growing atlas. In fact, we completed a 10-yr Anniversary report (https://val.vtecostudies.org/val-reports/) where we show how Vermont leads in per capita for community science data. We are blessed with more naturalists and outdoors people per hectare than perhaps most places! Super thankful to all of you!

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Here’s the map! Population estimates from INSEE https://statistiques-locales.insee.fr/#c=indicator&i=tcrd021.estim_pop_ensemble&s=2024&t=A01, map made with Datawrapper https://app.datawrapper.de and tweaked by hand to add missing information.

All I can say is: go forth and observe!

Edit: had screwed up the data upload in the first map, every row was moved by one so nothing was right, thanks @ShotShot for pointing it out. Now it should all be ok - but please point it out if there’s a mistake! (I’m here to learn, whether it’s about nature or tech, whichever will bite me first)

Full numbers, in ascending order of Observation per Capita
Column 1 Column 2 Column 3 Column 4
Aisne 1,465 521,632 0.0028
Seine-Saint-Denis 4,810 1,701,072 0.0028
Mayotte 930 320,901 0.0029
Hauts-de-Seine 5,270 1,651,407 0.0032
Eure-et-Loir 1,743 430,422 0.0040
Moselle 4,315 1,055,259 0.0041
Val-de-Marne 6,878 1,433,927 0.0048
Indre-et-Loire 3,057 616,751 0.0050
Oise 4,118 830,176 0.0050
Cher 1,478 295,729 0.0050
Nord 13,522 2,614,334 0.0052
Allier 1,839 332,708 0.0055
Val-d’Oise 7,268 1,275,704 0.0057
Territoire de Belfort 800 137,235 0.0058
Pas-de-Calais 8,688 1,455,555 0.0060
Meurthe-et-Moselle 4,546 730,320 0.0062
Sarthe 3,640 566,096 0.0064
Haute-SaĂ´ne 1,613 232,523 0.0069
SaĂ´ne-et-Loire 4,124 546,695 0.0075
Bas-Rhin 8,995 1,170,551 0.0077
Loir-et-Cher 2,539 326,941 0.0078
Eure 4,758 598,339 0.0080
Yvelines 11,805 1,473,664 0.0080
Charente 2,815 349,856 0.0080
Loiret 5,585 689,581 0.0081
Loire-Atlantique 12,246 1,503,876 0.0081
Lot-et-Garonne 2,843 330,385 0.0086
Tarn-et-Garonne 2,386 267,619 0.0089
Marne 5,151 562,874 0.0092
Maine-et-Loire 7,880 834,135 0.0094
Ardennes 2,574 265,737 0.0097
Doubs 5,467 552,321 0.0099
Haute-Vienne 3,669 370,339 0.0099
La RĂ©union 8,861 885,700 0.0100
RhĂ´ne 19,305 1,926,989 0.0100
Essonne 13,450 1,331,827 0.0101
Loire 7,913 775,102 0.0102
Gironde 18,376 1,707,780 0.0108
Vosges 3,923 355,431 0.0110
Nièvre 2,219 198,936 0.0112
Paris 23,534 2,087,577 0.0113
Puy-de-DĂ´me 7,507 665,094 0.0113
Tarn 4,512 398,772 0.0113
Mayenne 3,482 304,981 0.0114
Vienne 5,046 440,921 0.0114
Calvados 8,307 706,605 0.0118
Creuse 1,346 113,922 0.0118
Haute-Garonne 17,741 1,487,804 0.0119
Corrèze 2,913 238,962 0.0122
Vendée 8,810 717,301 0.0123
Somme 6,982 562,126 0.0124
Haute-Loire 3,017 226,900 0.0133
Seine-Maritime 17,152 1,255,554 0.0137
Aube 4,516 312,730 0.0144
Pyrénées-Atlantiques 11,585 706,361 0.0164
Morbihan 13,574 782,348 0.0174
Charente-Maritime 11,758 674,439 0.0174
Martinique 6,119 349,925 0.0175
Manche 8,771 494,200 0.0177
CĂ´te-dOr 9,639 537,752 0.0179
Haute-Marne 3,074 168,200 0.0183
Landes 8,255 434,933 0.0190
Seine-et-Marne 27,943 1,464,783 0.0191
Isère 25,620 1,307,146 0.0196
Ain 13,389 679,498 0.0197
Ille-et-Vilaine 22,230 1,127,720 0.0197
Yonne 7,340 328,774 0.0223
Jura 6,095 257,483 0.0237
Indre 5,070 213,871 0.0237
Dordogne 9,797 413,192 0.0237
Cantal 3,480 143,567 0.0242
Haute-Savoie 21,652 866,490 0.0250
Deux-Sèvres 9,591 373,682 0.0257
Vaucluse 14,983 568,715 0.0263
Guadeloupe 10,027 378,561 0.0265
DrĂ´me 14,008 524,109 0.0267
Meuse 5,196 178,562 0.0291
Finistère 27,360 931,604 0.0294
Hautes-Pyrénées 7,221 232,534 0.0311
Haut-Rhin 24,566 769,047 0.0319
Lot 5,735 175,800 0.0326
Bouches-du-RhĂ´ne 68,300 2,078,397 0.0329
Orne 9,527 272,379 0.0350
Gers 6,789 193,695 0.0350
Var 40,395 1,121,506 0.0360
Aude 15,777 378,775 0.0417
Alpes-Maritimes 47,345 1,119,571 0.0423
CĂ´tes-dArmor 26,313 611,351 0.0430
Aveyron 12,123 279,470 0.0434
Pyrénées-Orientales 21,700 497,810 0.0436
Ardèche 15,156 336,501 0.0450
Gard 37,315 766,765 0.0487
Corse-du-Sud 8,820 167,658 0.0526
Ariège 9,980 155,813 0.0641
HĂ©rault 93,371 1,243,225 0.0751
Savoie 39,590 451,819 0.0876
Alpes-de-Haute-Provence 19,530 168,161 0.1161
Haute-Corse 23,379 187,870 0.1244
Lozère 12,750 76,647 0.1663
Guyane 54,869 295,385 0.1858
Hautes-Alpes 27,540 141,661 0.1944
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With it’s pleasingly-shaped counties (haha) and interesting urban/rural divides, I thought it might be fun to do a Pennsylvania county map.

This one does all-time verifiable observations:

And here’s a link where you should be able to hover over the county in the map and get its name ( pretty cool! ): https://www.datawrapper.de/_/HC7eo/

As a table (listing all counties)
County Observations Population Observations per Capita
Adams 24,842 106,748 0.233
Allegheny 349,866 1,224,825 0.286
Armstrong 28,650 64,074 0.447
Beaver 39,212 165,631 0.237
Bedford 22,084 47,350 0.466
Berks 79,434 432,821 0.184
Blair 16,386 120,273 0.136
Bradford 9,611 59,695 0.161
Bucks 183,365 645,984 0.284
Butler 52,395 198,413 0.264
Cambria 15,277 130,668 0.117
Cameron 6,025 4,380 1.376
Carbon 27,219 65,458 0.416
Centre 115,993 157,795 0.735
Chester 163,009 549,784 0.296
Clarion 28,272 36,970 0.765
Clearfield 14,875 77,090 0.193
Clinton 8,878 37,607 0.236
Columbia 9,456 65,439 0.145
Crawford 38,737 82,001 0.472
Cumberland 44,922 270,738 0.166
Dauphin 42,430 289,234 0.147
Delaware 104,634 576,720 0.181
Elk 9,022 30,198 0.299
Erie 91,509 267,571 0.342
Fayette 35,633 123,915 0.288
Forest 13,723 6,449 2.128
Franklin 16,387 157,854 0.104
Fulton 6,986 14,468 0.483
Greene 7,818 34,357 0.228
Huntingdon 42,304 43,514 0.972
Indiana 22,310 83,094 0.268
Jefferson 6,824 43,612 0.156
Juniata 4,131 23,243 0.178
Lackawanna 34,476 216,123 0.160
Lancaster 85,931 558,589 0.154
Lawrence 18,063 84,472 0.214
Lebanon 23,916 144,252 0.166
Lehigh 34,964 377,754 0.093
Luzerne 80,073 327,388 0.245
Lycoming 17,037 112,724 0.151
McKean 13,408 39,519 0.339
Mercer 17,546 108,503 0.162
Mifflin 3,765 45,922 0.082
Monroe 64,367 166,053 0.388
Montgomery 229,628 868,742 0.264
Montour 23,680 17,860 1.326
Northampton 44,553 319,091 0.140
Northumberland 7,406 90,120 0.082
Perry 14,075 46,083 0.305
Philadelphia 261,953 1,550,542 0.169
Pike 25,262 61,247 0.412
Potter 8,855 15,999 0.553
Schuylkill 18,706 143,786 0.130
Snyder 3,888 39,717 0.098
Somerset 24,406 72,197 0.338
Sullivan 7,386 5,834 1.266
Susquehanna 12,706 38,109 0.333
Tioga 10,933 40,840 0.268
Union 11,082 42,042 0.264
Venango 21,416 49,431 0.433
Warren 16,497 37,572 0.439
Washington 77,660 210,232 0.369
Wayne 14,984 51,262 0.292
Westmoreland 83,775 351,163 0.239
Wyoming 5,950 25,902 0.230
York 55,119 464,640 0.119
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The dominance of the Yukon ratio at the top of the “leaderboard” is almost certainly due to the efforts of previous Yukon Conservation Data Centre Coordinator Bruce Bennett in encouraging as many residents and visitors to use the app as possible.
@comradejon Do you mind if I share the numbers from the Canadian calculations with a few colleagues to highlight the role of iNaturalist in raising biodiversity awareness?

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