Arkansas Master Naturalists

We are volunteer educators, citizen scientists and stewards of the environment striving to protect and preserve Arkansas' natural beauty.

Inspired by Nature

Citizen Scientists

Stewards for Nature

Educating All Ages

August is National Water Quality Month

National Water Quality Month is dedicated to making the most of the relatively small amount of fresh water we have, because having clean water is vital to our individual health, our collective agricultural needs, and the needs of our environment.

Arkansas Master Naturalist contribute to maintaining water quality by helping with Stream Teams, which monitor the health of selected streams, litter and trash removal from land and water and participating in education of the public on water quality issues.

Butterfly Research

A citizen science project between the Botanical Garden of the Ozarks, the University of Arkansas and YOU!

Butterflies, birds, flowers and a wide variety of animals and plants come in a spectacular range of colors and shapes. One of the main goals of biology is understanding why this variation exists, and how changes in color and shape influence behavior, such as feeding, resting and predator avoidance.

The Botanical Garden of the Ozarks has teamed up with University of Arkansas professor Dr. Erica Westerman and the Northwest Arkansas community to study whether butterfly wing pattern (color & size) can be used to predict butterfly behavior; particularly what flowers they visit, what time of day they are active and what weather conditions they fly in. Dr. Westerman has deployed temperature and light sensors around the gardens, and we have compiled a checklist of butterfly wing patterns and behaviors.

The data you collect will be compiled with that of other garden visitors and UARK researchers. Your data will help scientists address questions concerning animal behavior, diversity, and NWA pollinator community health.

Staying home? You can still participate! Just click below to fill out the “at home” butterfly data form.
At home collection form
For more information or to learn more about Dr. Westerman’s research, visit her website.

What do Master Naturalists do?
Our motto is keeping the Natural State natural, but what work do chapters actually do to achieve this?

We record hours in trailbuilding, education, habitat restoration, native garden maintenance, outreach, bird box monitoring, citizen science data collection and analysis, invasive species removal, natural area maintenance and more. Chapters sometimes have big projects and sometimes its just two or three dedicated individuals who work together on a garden or trail.

Left are examples of projects that chapters are involved in. Much depends on the part of the state the chapter is located in, who are local partners are and the terrain. To read in detail about this projects, please visit the page linked below for stories about each one.

We hope this inspires you to find your own work to do to help keep things natural.

AMN Projects

Become a Master Naturalist

Want to learn about the natural world and participate in volunteer projects that contribute to conservation in Arkansas? Arkansas Master Naturalist chapters statewide are recruiting new members to participate in their spring Naturalist in Training courses. Classroom and field sessions led by expert naturalists and professionals in their fields will cover topics from trees to birds to geology to stream ecology. Completing the course is the first step to becoming a Arkansas Master Naturalist.