Action Alerts Local Chapters Membership Programs, Etc. New Mexico State Parks is pleased to showcase a variety of natural and cultural resources through special events called Discovery Weekends . Discovery Weekends satisfy vital needs in parks. Answers to these questions can help in better management of park resources. Professional scientists and distinguished amateurs assemble for Discovery Weekends to inventory plants, birds, mammals, butterflies, reptiles and amphibians, dragonflies, invertebrates, prehistoric and historic cultural resources and geological phenomena.
Visitors come to parks to connect with the natural world with the cultural past.
Experts that gather for Discovery Weekends offer their knowledge to visitors through a wide variety of educational and interpretive programs. Past programs have included evening slide shows, guided walks, formal counts, and hands-on demonstrations. Having experts from a variety of disciplines helps visitors make important links, like between flowering plants and pollinating insects, predators and prey, or between native plants and cultural medicinal traditions. Five Discovery Weekends held in 1999 and 2000 featured Oliver Lee Memorial, Oasis, Rockhound, Clayton Lake and Bottomless Lakes State Parks. During these first trial events we established a core group of experts and learned what makes these events successful.