Posts
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| White-crowned Sparrow / Photo by Tom Koerner/USFWS |
- Crows, like several other "spooky" creatures, do not deserve their poor reputation.
- If you lack a car, birding by public transportation is an alternative option (though this is easier in some places than others).
- Cryptic species like rails are an important part of wetlands but usually go unseen.
- Researchers are finding more examples of female bird songs, most recently in Dark-eyed Juncos.
- The calls of Little Penguins are influenced by the habitats where they live.
- A study found that there are only two subspecies of Weka (a New Zealand rail) instead of six.
- North American birders are asked to report color-banded Ipswich Sparrows, a subspecies of the Savannah Sparrow that winters along the East Coast.
- Avian Hybrids: Che Figata! New studies on the ecology and evolution of a hybrid species, the Italian Sparrow
- ABA Blog: ICYMI: Open Mic: A New Field Mark for Differentiating Stints and Peeps
- Bird Ecology Study Group: Purple Swamphen – Feeding behaviour, Snails
- Pioneer Birding: MA - Pink-footed Goose in Gill!
- Birding New Jersey: When Playback Goes Bad
- 10,000 Birds: Pink-headed Duck: The Search is On!
- Mia McPherson's On The Wing Photography: Differences in Photographing Greater Yellowlegs in Florida and Utah
- Only Natural: Myrmecomorphy in action!
- earthstar: The return of the tufties
- PLOS Ecology Community: Spooky Ecology 2017: The Weird and Wonderful
- The Digiscoper: Good fall for LeConte's!
- Bug Eric: Ok, Save Some Bugs
- Backyard and Beyond: Small Kites on the Loose
- A government climate science report concludes that it is extremely likely that humans are causing climate change and that annual global average temperatures will increase by 9°F if greenhouse gas emissions go unchecked.
- Another study concludes that climate change is already affecting public health (though its methods are controversial).
- Here is an interesting story on the saga of Oregon's Imnaha wolf pack and the biologists managing it.
- Fragmenting forests limits the number of species that can live there and promotes edge species at the expense of deep forest species.
- The Trump administration has proposed a fee increase to $70 per carload at 17 national parks, which could make visiting the parks unaffordable for many people. If you oppose this increase, please submit a comment to NPS by November 23.
- President Trump recently told Senator Hatch that he would reduce the size of Bears Ears and Grand Staircase-Escalante National Monuments, but nothing official has been announced yet. Paleontologists fear that mining at Grand Staircase-Escalante National Monument would destroy fossil beds.
- The House passed legislation that would gut protections for endangered species in national forests.
- Parks and reserves in the tropics can help reduce the effects of climate change.
- Butterfliers are concerned by how many migratory butterflies like the Monarch are staying north this fall. The Monarch Monitoring Project in Cape May will keep counting butterflies into November this year.
- A study last year identified 301 mammals most at risk from overhunting.
- Cliven Bundy and his sons are finally being tried for an armed confrontation with federal public lands officials.
