BioBlitz 2026: Counting What Lives at Muni

For one day in June, the quietest players at Muni were the ones everyone came to see.

On June 11, Friends of Asheville Muni held its second annual BioBlitz, a full day spent finding and counting the living things that share the course. It opened at 8 in the morning with a bird walk led by Nancy Casey, the Beverly Hills Bird Lady. At 2, Bee City USA-Asheville led a Pollinator Safari through the community garden above the 11th green. The evening brought a happy hour at the clubhouse, with food, games for kids run by First Tee, and a last walk out onto the course as the light went down. Scout Troop 4 turned out. So did board members, neighbors, and families.

A BioBlitz is a good time, and it is also real science. Everything found gets logged, building a growing inventory of the plants and animals living at Muni. Every sighting, from a warbler passing through to a bee working the coneflowers, goes into a shared record of the plants and animals at Muni. That inventory is part of why the course is working toward certification as an Audubon Cooperative Sanctuary, and it is proof of something FOAM says plainly: a municipal golf course can be a fun place to play the game we love and a place where nature thrives, both at once.

The first BioBlitz, in 2025, drew 82 people and placed Muni second in the world in Audubon International's community engagement category.

The BioBlitz is becoming a Muni tradition, and it will be back.

Join the Friends and be part of the next one.