Audubon articles from November 2008

Audubon archives from November 2008

Audubon view.
November 1, 2008... WE KNOW THAT NEW YORK HAS CENTRAL PARK AND SAN FRANCISCO HAS GOLDEN Gate Park. But who knew that Dallas has the Great Trinity Forest, the largest urban bottomland hardwood forest in the nation? Until now, many Dallas residents didn't know...

Hooray for jays.(Letters from our readers)(Letter to the editor)
November 1, 2008... Bravo to Les Line for his article on the oft-maligned, unfairly loathed blue jay ["Slings and Arrows," September-October]. I share his affection for this bird and do my best to attract them to my bird feeders. They may be "bullies" to some...

Vermonters unite.(Letters from our readers)(Letter to the editor)
November 1, 2008... We enjoyed the Vermont section of "A Tale of Two Habitats" [July-August] and appreciate such people as the Parkers and the Hotchkinses for their efforts to preserve land for the wood thrush. We think it might have been nice if the article also...

Lights. Camera. Nuisance.(Letters from our readers)(Letter to the editor)
November 1, 2008... I agree with the observations in "True Blue" [One Picture, July-August] about the increasing lack of authenticity of digital photography. As a diver who still uses film, I'd also like to mention the negative impact that digital underwater...

Beetle battle.(Letters from our readers)(Letter to the editor)
November 1, 2008... I read with interest the article "Beetle Juice" [Field Notes, July-August]. The potential use of the beetle's mechanism to propel mists, etc. is intriguing. However, I am having difficulty understanding the comment that Professor McIntosh was...

Smart asses.(field notes)(jaguar shooting)(Brief article)
November 1, 2008... Ranchers in Belize have long dealt with jaguars the way their northern counterparts once dealt with wolves: They shoot them. Tired of the public relations problem this approach generated, ranch manager Santiago Juan took a different tack three...

Expediting extinction.(ENDANGERED SPECIES)
November 1, 2008... [ILLUSTRATION OMITTED] Imagine, for a moment, a particular North Pacific right whale. Now 50 feet long and weighing almost 100 tons, it has been "endangered" since 1970, witnessed an international moratorium on commercial whaling in 1986,...

Getting to know you.(SEA LIFE)(Brief article)
November 1, 2008... [ILLUSTRATION OMITTED] With an estimated million different species swimming the seas, it's easy to understand why humans are familiar with only a small fraction of them. "We probably know less than 10 percent of what actually lives in the...

Trash course.(field notes)(Brief article)
November 1, 2008... To draw attention to pollution in the Pacific Ocean, Marcus Erikson and Joel Paschal added more waste to the waters. Temporarily, that is. This summer the duo strapped 15,000 plastic bottles to a Cessna fuselage, added a sail, and steered...

Birds of a feather.(CITIZEN SCIENCE)(Kathleen Anderson and Andrew Brissette)
November 1, 2008... [ILLUSTRATION OMITTED] The predawn December light is gray and hazy as Kathleen "Betty" Anderson, 85, steers her car down an icy road in the southeastern Massachusetts town of Middleborongh. In the passenger seat, her grandson, Andrew...

SCAT marks the spot.(field notes)(owl habitats)(Brief article)
November 1, 2008... In what's likely an effort to mark their territory, eagle owls have come up with their own "No Trespassing" signage: squirting feces and piling feathers in strategic places near their nests. Researchers Vincenzo Penteriani and Maria del Mar...

Lost in migration.(field notes)(sea turtles)(Brief article)
November 1, 2008... To the diners' surprise, about 60 newly hatched loggerhead sea turtles wandered into a pizza restaurant on a beach in southern Italy this past August. The restaurant's lights, rather than its menu, drew the threatened reptiles, says Paolo...

Bullish on the planet.(BUSINESS)
November 1, 2008... [ILLUSTRATION OMITTED] Since the mortgage crisis hit last summer and panic swept Wall Street this fall, much of the American economy has gone into a tailspin. But worldwide, the green energy sector is booming, in large part because of...

Deep seal diving.(field notes)(elephant seals)(Brief article)
November 1, 2008... If you want to know how climate change is affecting the Antarctic, ask a southern elephant seal Researchers glued sensors to the heads of 58 of them to track depth, temperature, and salinity in parts of the Southern Ocean that humans, because...

Top notch.(Good News)(South Carolina's Francis Beidler Forest)(Brief article)
November 1, 2008... [ILLUSTRATION OMITTED] Audubon South Carolina's Francis Beidler Forest, which encompasses the largest old-growth cypress-tupelo swamp on the planet, has joined distinguished company. The 16,000-acre sanctuary became the 23rd U.S. addition...

Out with the coal.(Good News)
November 1, 2008... Colorado's largest energy provider, Xcel Energy, is the first company in the country set to shut down power plants voluntarily in order to meet greenhouse-gas reduction targets. In August state regulators verbally approved the company's...

Puffin along.(Good News)(puffins colony restoration)(Brief article)
November 1, 2008... [ILLUSTRATION OMITTED] The world's first seabird colony restoration project has reached a new milestone. For 13 years, beginning in 1973, Audubon scientist Steve Kress and his Project Puffin team transplanted 954 young Atlantic puffins...

Against the drain.(Good News)(flood control)(Brief article)
November 1, 2008... Wetlands were regarded as wastelands back in 1941 when Congress authorized the Yazoo Backwater Project--a Dracula-like flood-control plan that, 67 years later, calls for pumping more than six million gallons of water a minute from some of the...

Southern comfort.(birding trails at southeastern United States)
November 1, 2008... [ILLUSTRATION OMITTED] The Fountain of Youth--that was Ponce de Leon's quest in the early 1500s when he arrived in what is now the southeastern United States. Or at least that's what the legends say. We know more about the intentions of...

'Okay, you want to fight back?' Lois Gibbs found her voice at Love Canal. Thirty years later, in her latest crusade, she has Fortune 500 companies rolling over faster than she can create her hit list.(Profile)
November 1, 2008... [ILLUSTRATION OMITTED] In 1978 Lois Gibbs was a 27-year-old housewife with two young children, living in a subdivision in Niagara Falls, New York. Her husband worked in a nearby chemical plant, which emitted an acrid smoke that crept over...

Green guru: advice for the eco-minded.
November 1, 2008... [ILLUSTRATION OMITTED] What are some ways to deice my front steps without killing nearby plants? Jacqueline Fox, Hartsdale, NY When temperatures dip below freezing and walkways become ice slicks, lots of people pour on the salt. But...

Snow patrol: a writer and her family embark on a cross-country ski quest to see wild reindeer in a powdery, wind-swept Norwegian National Park that nearly conquered one legendary explorer.(Green Travel)(Cover story)(Travel narrative)
November 1, 2008... HE FELL ASLEEP IN THE SOOTHING calm of a snow cave but awoke in the suffocating silence of a tomb. Outside Roald Amundsen's improvised shelter lay Norway's Hardangervidda Plateau, a desolate, wind-blasted piece of tundra so vast and...

Bay watch: one year ago a major oil spill in San Francisco Bay marked the latest insult to a waterway already reeling from 150 years of degradation. But one of the most ambitious projects of its kind in the world continues to lift hopes for the bay's renewal, even among die-hard skeptics.(Restoration)
November 1, 2008... [ILLUSTRATIONS OMITTED] Dawn was just breaking over a pillow of pale gray clouds as Brooke Langston began prowling the Richardson Bay beach north of California's Golden Gate Bridge. Spotting an oddly blackened bird, she clambered through...

Cry for joy: John Muir was a plant lover whose collections, brought to life in a new book, celebrate America's botanical magnificence.(Photo Essay)
November 1, 2008... [ILLUSTRATION OMITTED] IN THE SPRING OF 1864, John Muir began a walking tour through the Ontario countryside. One day, tired and wondering if he would emerge before dark from a remote bog, he came upon what he later called "the rarest and...

There goes the neighborhood: they vomit all over the place, urinate on themselves to cool off, and feed on the dead. Now they're disgusting and even frightening suburban homeowners. But vultures are amazing creatures that are a key part of the food chain, and they reveal a lot about wildlife's ability to adapt to us.(Horror Show)
November 1, 2008... [ILLUSTRATIONS OMITTED] "Here they come!" The shout goes out from the far side of a tulip poplar, in the backyard of a slate-roofed house in the historic district of Leesburg, Virginia, about 40 miles northwest of Washington, D.C. I look...

Pain in the glass: each migration season, millions of birds die in cities by crashing into buildings. Now a growing trend toward sustainable design could open the door to safer passage.(Solutions)
November 1, 2008... [ILLUSTRATION OMITTED] Annette Prince sidles along the exterior stretch of lobby windows that line a downtown Chicago office building, eyeing a tawny speck on the ground. Suddenly the speck--actually it's a type of warbler called an...

Audubon living.
November 1, 2008... You've done it--you created the perfect outdoor oasis. Now lilting birdsongs are your alarm clock; your double-decker birdhouse seldom has a peak-season vacancy; and "the restaurant"--otherwise known as the feeding station--practically...

Why I Came West.(Brief article)(Book review)
November 1, 2008... Why I Came West By Rick Bass Houghton Mifflin, 256 pages, $24 [ILLUSTRATION OMITTED] Rick Bass is tired. Though his writing still breathes with earthy richness and maneuvers with sinuous turns, Bass is exhausted from a life...

Central Park in the Dark: More Mysteries of Urban Wildlife.(Brief article)(Book review)
November 1, 2008... Central Park in the Dark: More Mysteries of Urban Wildlife By Marie Winn Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 304 Pages, $25 [ILLUSTRATION OMITTED] In Central Park in the Dark, Marie Winn and her band of fellow naturalists take readers...

Food fight: from instant coffee to breakfast cereal, an author takes a hard look at the costs of industrial-scale farming and the causes of a current global crisis.(ESSAY)(The End of Food)(Book review)
November 1, 2008... The End of Food By Paul Roberts Houghton Mifflin, 390 pages, $26 [ILLUSTRATION OMITTED] Wander into any supermarket across the country, and the bounty you'll find is almost overwhelming: glistening New Zealand apples and...

The Lizard King: The True Crimes and Passions of the World's Greatest Reptile Smugglers.(Brief article)(Book review)
November 1, 2008... The Lizard King: The True Crimes and Passions of the World's Greatest Reptile Smugglers By Bryan Christy Twelve, Hachette Book Group USA, 241 pages, $24.99 [ILLUSTRATION OMITTED] U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service special agent...

Wild Tracks! A Guide to Nature's Footprints.(Brief article)(Book review)
November 1, 2008... Wild Tracks! A Guide to Nature's Footprints By Jim Arnosky Sterling Publishing, 32 pages, $14.95 (Ages 6 and up) [ILLUSTRATION OMITTED] Finding a footprint embedded in a muddy path or a snowy bank poses a mystery kids can...

Our Living Earth: A Story of People, Ecology, and Preservation.(Brief article)(Children's review)(Book review)
November 1, 2008... Our Living Earth: A Story of People, Ecology, and Preservation Photography by Yann Arthus-Bertrand/Text by Isabelle Delannoy/Illustrations by David Giraudon Abrams Books for Young Readers, 160 pages, $24.96 (Ages 8-14) ...

Go-to Guy.(One Picture)(Tom Vezo)(Obituary)
November 1, 2008... [ILLUSTRATION OMITTED] The photo editor of a national magazine like Audubon looks at thousands of pictures a year. They include the work of professionals, often shot on assignment for these pages, as well as submissions from accomplished...