Audubon articles from September 1999

Audubon archives from September 1999

The Strains of Six Billion.(the effects of population)(Brief Article)(Editorial)
September 1, 1999... WHEN I WAS BORN, IN THE MIDDLE OF THIS CENTURY, there were about 2.5 billion people in the world. This year we pass the 6 billion mark. Predicting growth rates isn't easy, but demographers expect world population to climb through the middle of...

LETTERS.
September 1, 1999... I APPLAUD KARSTEN HEUER'S Determination to publicize the Yellowstone to Yukon initiative ["From Yellowstone to Yukon," July-August], but I fear the Y2Y initiative rests on a flawed premise: that the mountainous spine of the continent is an...

Holy Columbia.(Catholic bishops support environmental protection and the Columbia River)(Brief Article)
September 1, 1999... Those who believe that caring for the earth is humanity's higher calling have a new and extraordinary source of moral support. Roman Catholic bishops from the U.S. Northwest and British Columbia have released an early draft of a document that...

Oh, Canada!(scientists in Canada push for laws to protect endangered species)(Brief Article)
September 1, 1999... Canada has no federal legislation to protect endangered species. Now 640 Canadian scientists have signed a public letter to Prime Minister Jean Chretien demanding comprehensive legislation to protect the country's 339 imperiled species....

Alternative transportation.(bicycles)(Brief Article)
September 1, 1999... Fewer than 5 percent of commuters in the United States bicycle to work. Yet the over-all number of Americans who ride bikes has soared nearly 33 percent--from 61 million in 1991 to 81 million in 1995.

Tea'd-Off Prairie Dogs.(Celestial Seasonings comes under fire for poisoning black-tailed prairie dogs)(Brief Article)
September 1, 1999... CELESTIAL SEASONINGS FOUND ITSELF IN HOT WATER LAST spring. The herbal-tea manufacturer, based in Boulder, Colorado, was caught surreptitiously poisoning black-tailed prairie dogs that were building dens too close to its plant and headquarters....

Land-Swap Flop.(government re-examines the federal land exchange program)(Brief Article)
September 1, 1999... Under its controversial land-exchange program, the federal government has traded more than 1.5 million acres to private-property owners over the past five years; 700,000 more acres are slated tO be exchanged. The arrangement allows companies to...

The Egrets' Red Glare.(City of Carrollton, Texas kills birds, gets diciplined)(Brief Article)
September 1, 1999... Last year the city of Carrollton, Texas, responding to complaints about excessive bird excrement at a local park, bull-dozed part of a rookery, killing more than 300 egrets, herons, and other migratory birds. In doing so, city officials stepped...

The Wolves Are Coming! The Wolves Are Coming!(plan to reintroduce them to New York and New England)(Brief Article)
September 1, 1999... AS WORD SPREAD LAST SPRING that the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service was considering a plan to restore the gray wolf to New England and New York, the region growled with talk about big predators. John Harrigan--a newspaper publisher, farmer, and...

Every 20 minutes.(Brief Article)
September 1, 1999... Every 20 minutes the world loses at least one species of animal or plant life, which amounts to a total of 27,000 species per year, according to the renowned biologist and authority on biodiversity Edward O. Wilson.

Songbird Deathraps.(plants that kill birds)(Brief Article)
September 1, 1999... BIRDERS IN ROCK CREEK PARK, A national park in Washington, D.C., happened upon a grisly sight last September: four ruby-throated hummingbirds impaled on the thorny flower heads of burdock. The discovery prompted park scientists to try to...

Rhymes With Eco-Witch.(women wins ruling against Fish and Wildlife Service)(Brief Article)
September 1, 1999... Sally Stefferud, a U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service biologist in Arizona, had long beseeched her colleagues to do a better job of protecting the Gila topminnow, an endangered desert fish for which she wrote a recovery plan. But her male superiors...

A Fabiolous Goose Repellent.(controlling geese populations)(Brief Article)
September 1, 1999... To control exploding goose populations, scientists have experimented with everything from poison to nets. But Fabio, the supermodel and margarine promoter, may have found the most effective tool: his face. Last spring, while he was taking the...

It's a Cold, Oily World.(oil spill off Oregon coast threatens bird snowy plover)(Brief Article)
September 1, 1999... When the freighter the New Carissa spilled tens of thousands of gallons of oil along the Oregon coast last winter, the bird species that may have suffered the most was the threatened western snowy plover, which nests on the beaches of the...

Did you know.(U.S. oil consumption)(Brief Article)
September 1, 1999... In 1998, the UNited States consumed 9.8 million more barrels of oil a day than it produced.

Out of His Gourd?(man puts up gourds for purple martin bird nests)(Brief Article)
September 1, 1999... PEOPLE CALL ME THE PURPLE martin man," says Franklin Bidinger, a retired welder in Clinton, Kansas (population: 70). "These birds are so beautiful that I'm addicted to the little things." On a clear afternoon last spring, 300 people attended...

35 Billion Born?(population forecasting)(Brief Article)
September 1, 1999... ON OCTOBER 12 THE UNITED NATIONS OBSERVES "THE DAY OF 6 BILLION," symbolizing the day the world's population will reach that number. But it won't stay there for long. The Population Reference Bureau, a nonprofit research group in Washington,...

Ask AUDUBON.(various questions and answers)(Brief Article)
September 1, 1999... Is it true that the taipan is the world's deadliest snake? Andy Willson, East Aurora, New York IF YOU FALL VICTIM TO A TAIPAN'S venom, get thee to an emergency room posthaste. This snake, indigenous to Australia and Papua New Guinea,...

Whirling Hurricanes.(hurricanes can adversely affect animal population, plant life)(includes related article on nature of hurricanes)
September 1, 1999... With a huff and a puff, they can blow plants, trees, and animals down and all around to conquer new territory. IN MID-SEPTEMBER 1985, SOMEWHERE OFF THE COAST OF North Africa, winds from two different weather systems began bumping together....

The Tao of Wine.(wine maker believes in ecologically sound grape growing)
September 1, 1999... Vietnam veteran Richard Sanford has found peace in his organic vineyard--and conflict outside it. ON AN EARLY OCTOBER MORNING, RICHARD SANFORD is driving through an elfin forest of 28-year-old grapevines, the first he ever planted. The air...

The Cosmopolitan Cockroach.
September 1, 1999... These hardy invertebrates survived conditions that killed the dinosaurs. How can a mere human being hope to defeat them? WHEN I SAW THE FIRST COCKROACH IN MY KITCHEN, it took me less than 10 seconds to metamorphose from a nonviolent nature...

the NEW SAFARI the LAST SAFARI.
September 1, 1999... THE TEEMING SAVANNA OF KENYA'S MASAILAND. The dense cloudforest of Ecuador. South Georgia, a remote island in the South Atlantic. Once, these were places visited primarily by explorers and conquerors, whalers and hunters--men ranging from...

the UNTOUCHABLE WILD.
September 1, 1999... Are today's eco-trips really better for Africa's habitat than the shooting parties of Hemingway's era? We may have traded guns for cameras, but the essence of the safari is still the same: a hunt for the heart of the wild. Olng'anaiyo......

the SECRETS of the CLOUD FOREST.
September 1, 1999... Deep in southern Ecuador lies a lush forest where mountain tapirs and spectacled, bears prowl, where bromeliads encrust the trees, where new birds are still being discovered, and where the local people live well past 100. A crazy quilt of...

the ISLAND at the END of the EARTH.
September 1, 1999... Just 800 miles from Antarctica, South Georgia intrigued Captain Cook, delighted whalers, and saved Ernest Shackleton. Today it has one of the greatest concentrations of marine birds and mammals on earth. The ship sails from Ushuaia,...

A VIEW WITH A ROOM.(Brief Article)
September 1, 1999... The Lapa Rios lodge and preserve is at the forefront of a growing trend that benefits both nature and the local economy. AS THE MORNING sun sets the horizon aglow, the trees high above Costa Rica's glittering Golfo Dulce come alive with the...

THE WORLD'S ULTIMATE OUTPOSTS.(eco-travel)
September 1, 1999... HUNDREDS OF ECO-LODGES HAVE BEEN BUILT AMID TROPICAL JUNGLES, CLOUDFORESTS, and remote savannas since the early 1980s. In selecting some of the finest, Audubon used several criteria: Wildlife and wilderness must be plentiful. The accommodations...

New Bird on the Block.
September 1, 1999... The Eurasian collared dove arrived unheralded in Florida perhaps two decades ago, and now it's colonizing North America. THOSE BIRDS OF PEACE ARE FIGHTING AGAIN. I AWAKEN to that thought as two mourning doves grapple outside my window,...

Laying Out Winter's Welcome Mat.
September 1, 1999... By doing--and not doing--a few simple tasks, you can make your backyard a hospitable place for wildlife even in the coldest months. EVERY YEAR ABOUT THIS TIME I USED TO FAITHFULLY practice "fall cleanup." I'd meticulously remove annual...

Going Over the Mountain.(laws against logging in the Winema National Forest)(Brief Article)
September 1, 1999... THE AUDUBON SOCIETY of Portland, the Klamath Basin Audubon Society, and the National Audubon Society have won half of their two-part battle in the Winema National Forest. They and others had fried a lawsuit to stop a proposed timber sale on...

Point of Contention.(area off Cape Hatteras, North Carolina named as Important Bird Area and is hot spot for oil/gas exploring)(Brief Article)
September 1, 1999... THE NORTH CAROLINA AUDUBON SOCIETY HAS announced its first Important Bird Area: a patch of ocean off Cape Hatteras called the Point. Targeted for conservation, the Point is also a target of oil and natural gas exploration. At the Point,...

IN BRIEF.(News Briefs)(Brief Article)
September 1, 1999... Reward! Wildlife Watch, a division of the Audubon Society of Corvallis, in Oregon, is offering a $1,000 reward for information leading to the conviction of the person or people responsible for poisoning an immature bald eagle, a threatened...

Saltwater Menace.(protecting freshwater marshland in Savannah National Wildlife Refuge)(Brief Article)
September 1, 1999... WHAT WAS ONCE A 6,000-ACRE freshwater oasis swarming with more than 260 bird species has been reduced to a brackish-water wasteland by a century of dredging. The Ogeechee Audubon Society, in Savannah, Georgia, is working to protect the...

Jungle Nights.(Cockscomb Basin Wildlife Sanctuary, Belize)(Brief Article)
September 1, 1999... HERE THE WORLD SINGS AND SLITHERS, GROWLS AND GLINTS, CREAKS AND CRAWLS. At the Cockscomb Basin Wildlife Sanctuary, in southern Belize, park director Derric Chan leads us on a night walk. He shows us how to see animals in the dark: Hold a...

Un-Model Behavior.(environmental aspects of mall construction)(Brief Article)
September 1, 1999... ON DECEMBER 11, 1998, A JUDGE IN San Diego allowed a mall developer to pave over 66 vernal pools. These small seasonal wetlands are found atop mesas in San Diego County and are the only home in California to seven endangered species of plants...

New Releases.(books on nature)(Brief Article)
September 1, 1999... Speaking for Nature For more than a century, the National Audubon Society has stood at the forefront of the conservation movement in the United States. A new book, National Audubon Society: Speaking for Nature, chronicles the society's...

Trogons, Laughing Falcons, and Other Neotropical Birds.(Review)
September 1, 1999... Trogons, Laughing Falcons, and Other Neotropical Birds By Alexander F. Skutch. Texas A&M University Press, 222 pages, $29.95. In this fine collection of essays on the unique Central American species he has spent a lifetime observing, the...

The Complete Angler: A Connecticut Yankee Follows in the Footsteps of Walton.(Review)
September 1, 1999... The Complete Angler: A Connecticut Yankee Follows in the Footsteps of Walton By James Prosek. HarperCollins, 324 pages, $30. Artist and author James Prosek brings together his love of books and angling in this homage to Izaak Walton, whose...

Totem Salmon: Life Lessons from Another Species.(Review)
September 1, 1999... Totem Salmon: Life Lessons from Another Species By Freeman House. Beacon Press, 228 pages, $25. This thoughtful account of one rural community's attempt to restore the native salmon run of California's Mattole River is important on several...

Living on the Wind: Across the Hemisphere with Migrating Birds.(Review)
September 1, 1999... Living on the Wind: Across the Hemisphere with Migrating Birds By Scott Weidensaul. North Point Press, 420 pages, $26. Scott Weidensaul explores "the sweep and drama of bird migration in the Western Hemisphere" with passion and authority....

The Cowboy Way: Seasons of a Montana Ranch.(Review)
September 1, 1999... The Cowboy Way: Seasons of a Montana Ranch By David McCumber. Bard, 340 pages, $24. At age 43, David McCumber walked through the postcard prettiness of Big Sky country to take up the humble work of a rookie ranch hand for the better part...

Undiscovered Audubon.("Two Flycatchers" drawing)(Brief Article)
September 1, 1999... Artist: John James Audubon Subject: Two flycatchers When: May 22, 1811 Where: Henderson, Kentucky Medium: Mixed JOHN JAMES AUDUBON WAS in his mid-20s and trying, without much success, to make a career as a businessman when he drew...