Biodiversity Days 2022

What is Biodiversity Days?

Biodiversity Days is a month-long event in May, to honour the International Day for Biological Diversity (May 22) with a series of engagement opportunities that aim to celebrate and raise awareness of the fragile species, genes and ecosystems that sustain our communities.

Take Action

Learn about 22 actions that you can do to support nature from the Convention on Biological Diversity.

Events to Celebrate Biodiversity

This year’s second annual Biodiversity Days includes a diversity of in-person and virtual events. Explore our many offerings to celebrate biodiversity in 2022:

Are you curious about how students are exploring research questions related to campus biodiversity? Join us to celebrate UBC student and community-led research on biodiversity! Students, faculty and community can learn and engage with a variety of biodiversity projects explored this past year on topics ranging from food procurement, urban forestry, social values and more!  

The SEEDS Sustainability Program brings students, faculty, staff and campus partners together to deliver important and timely research on topics related to campus biodiversity.  In this session, we will hear directly from some of the student researchers who have completed projects this past year and explore how they have helped deepen our understanding of on-campus biodiversity. We will explore innovative and creative ideas that may inform and advance UBC's sustainable commitments.  

Learn how you can actively be part of them! Don’t miss this opportunity to discover and help mobilize student-led research and collaborations.

Register Here: This will be a Zoom event; please register to receive the link. Register via zoom here.

How can art and design help to reimagine our ways of living with plants in a time of widespread environmental crisis? Join us for a conversation between Artist in Residence Erin Despard, and student architects Saige Michel and Jingzhou Sun.

Register Here: Eventbrite Registration

Join us for a biodiversity adventure at the beautiful UBC Botanical Garden. Fun for the whole family!  Participate in family activities around the Garden and learn about biodiversity and life on land by exploring education stations throughout the Garden.

Registration: Eventbrite Registration

 Join us in celebrating the works of Dr. Nancy Turner at Haida House with an Indigenous luncheon to follow.

Register here: Eventbrite Registration

Learn about the amazing native pollinators that help pollinate the plants and crops at the UBC Farm. This walk will provide an overview of native pollinator diversity as well as the opportunity to try your hand at capturing and identifying native bumble bee species.

Register here: UBC Farm Website

Learn about the bird diversity at the UBC Farm! Find out about the long-term monitoring of birds at the UBC Farm that Nature Vancouver has been completing for the last 15 years and how you can participate.

Register here: UBC Farm Website

 

Citizen Science Programs

Help us document biodiversity at the UBC Farm! During the month of May we are asking Farm visitors to download the iNaturalist app and use it to record any biodiversity that they encounter at the Farm. This can include plants, crops, birds, insects, mammals, fungi, and many others.

Register here: UBC Farm Website

In schools throughout BC | Kickoff with David Suzuki Foundation. This collective effort is part of the David Suzuki Foundation and is organized by the BIMBY Butterflies Community Science Project. Learn more here.

 

 

Why Biodiversity Days? 

UBC Vancouver is located on the traditional, ancestral, and unceded territory of the Musqueam People. The land has always been a place of learning for Indigenous People, who for millennia have passed on their culture, history, and traditions from one generation to the next on this site. 

Biodiversity is integral to past, present and future communities, yet we are losing ecosystems, species and genes faster than we can account for them.  The extinction crisis requires inclusive solutions to prevent ecological collapse.

Biodiversity Days is an annual event that aims to: 

  • Raise awareness of biodiversity and its importance to human and ecological health: 
  • Mobilize local and global action to stop the loss of biodiversity; and,
  • Build a generation of stewards, scientists and citizens that actively protect and restore biodiversity.

Biodiversity Days Organizers: Hosted by UBC Botanical Garden in collaboration with SEEDS Sustainability Program and CCUB Climate Crisis in Urban Biodiversity Initiative, this year’s celebration features family nature walks, a student showcase, tours, virtual events, practical workshops and more. Biodiversity Days is made possible with funding provided through the UBC Botanical Garden Community Outreach Fund.  

Questions? Contact us at: garden.programs@ubc.ca