If you want to know (and would like to see up close) what kind of wildlife you have on your place—either in town or out in the country—just turn your grandkids loose and they’ll find it/them. I have a particularly inquisitive grandson, Daxon, who can find a needle in a haystack. He started seeking living […]
Natural World
Posted inOutside
The Lighter Side of Banding Eagles
When monitoring wildlife, the “call of nature” is just part of the game
Just having turned 90, it occurs to me that I’ve been working with golden eagles over 60-plus, years and it continues to be an adventure. I started reading about them in William L. Finley and Herman T. Bohlman’s great bird books in the late ’30s. I also recall back in the ’50s, when the U.S. […]
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An uptick in tick-borne illness
Got a tick? Here’s what to do—and how to know whether it’s the Lyme disease-carrying kind
Stories about Central Oregon tick encounters are popping up all over social media. Last month, Kaylin Landry, who studies social sciences at Oregon State University-Cascades, described her tick confrontation by posting, “Guess who had her ‘Oh god, that was a tick that fell off my neck and into my cleavage!’ virginity taken today?” Landry explained, […]
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Natural World
Bring On the Butterflies
I am one of those fortunate people who married into butterflies. When my wife, Sue, and I tied the knot I didn’t have a clue, until one day I discovered this beautiful woman was head over heels in love with those gorgeous, six-legged gossamer-winged insects and started dragging me out to meet them. Today, I go […]
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Hjelp humlene med bolplass!
Or how to help native pollinators in Central Oregon
I never know what my wife and I will come home with when we go out on our seasonal look-see at the 150+ golden eagle breeding sites we’re responsible for watching over. Sometimes we’ll come home with only one American badger sighting for the day, or none, which is very sad. Other times we’ll witness a […]
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Look out!
The Nature of our Earth is in big trouble
I‘m going to make a prophecy—though not quite as innocuous as Roger Tory Peterson’s of 1936, when he predicted the cattle egret, Bubulcus ibis, would someday populate the U.S. His prophecy was that the cattle egret, which had arrived in South America early in the ’30s—presumably after flying across the Atlantic Ocean in a storm, […]
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Why Not Sleep Through Winter?
The antics of hibernating critters
The longer I live, the more I wish scientists would succeed with “induced hibernation,” especially for old duffers like me. I hate winter! Well, not really. I do enjoy going out with my family getting in the winter wood, something I’ve been doing almost all my life, but not a much as I did when […]
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What to do about outdoor cats?
If you’re dealing with feral or outdoor cats in your own yard, here’s what to do—and what not to do
A somewhat recent news story featured a dead cat, hung over a fence for all to see. Very sad, but one-sided. Sure, the guy who did it was wrong—very wrong—and broke the law killing his neighbor’s cat. But what about the cat, who was trespassing on that neighbor’s and others neighbors’ private property? As readers of […]
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Natural World
The arrival of a new trumpeter swan in Sisters
Aspen Lakes, on the Cyrus family property near Sisters, is involved in an exciting wildlife project. The project is in cooperation with the Trumpeter Swan Society, Oregon Department of Fish and Wildlife, U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service and the benevolent people at Aspen Lakes. There are only three trumpeter swans in the breeding program in […]
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Bugging Out!
After a host of bugs come in, our Natural World columnist has something to say
Enough is enough, all you good people! I’m all bugged out! Thank you for the response to my request for the bugs mentioned in my kissing bug piece, published in the Source Feb. 14. Those of you who sent me notes about bugs in their lives—and especially those who sent me the actual bugs and […]