National Wildlife articles from February 1999

National Wildlife archives from February 1999

Taking Us To High Places.
February 1, 1999... Les Line has been fascinated with bird migration and seasonal changes in avian populations ever since the early 1960s, when he first volunteered to band birds attracted to his feeders in Michigan. "The more I learned, the more amazed I was by...

As Species Disappear: A Time for Bold Action.
February 1, 1999... "Holocaust" is not a word to be used lightly, but it is the term chosen by conservation strategist Norman Myers to describe human behaviors that are destroying Earth's other forms of life (see page 30). Our planet is losing species faster than...

You Can Become Active in Your State.(National Wildlife Federation addresses)(Brief Article)
February 1, 1999... The National Wildlife Federation has affiliates in most states and in the Virgin Islands. These affiliates take the lead in state and local conservation issues and also conduct NWF grass-roots activities on national issues. For more information...

Playing It Smart in the War Against Disease-Causing Bacteria.
February 1, 1999... Antibacterial." The word is suddenly all over the place--on soaps, household cleaners, toothbrushes, lotions, toys and even socks. It's enough to make you think germs are waging war on us. And you would be right. Disease-causing bacteria have...

Testing The Depths Of Life.(research on elephant seals)
February 1, 1999... Northern elephant seals migrate farther than any other mammal, spending much of their time at bone-crushing depths. How do they do it? It's late february, early morning. Strong northerly winds blow across San Miguel Island, one of the...

TO SAVE A REEF.(monitoring activities off the shores of southern Florida)
February 1, 1999... For everyone from tourists to fishermen, understanding the coral necklace off of Florida's southern tip is the first step to conserving it The air is warm, the water warmer. The roll of the ocean is gentle. I float on the surface, face...

How to Get Your Garden Growing In the Middle of Winter.
February 1, 1999... The weather outside may be frightful, but you can still exercise your green thumb during winter. "This is the best time to plan your garden and decide what you want to grow," says Maureen Heffernan, director of public programs at the Cleveland...

NWF Teams with Lyons Falls Paper Company To Pioneer SmartWood Paper Production.(Brief Article)
February 1, 1999... The success of Lyons Falls serves as an example for other pulp and paper mills that good business and environmental stewardship can go hand-in- hand. Alan Calfee, NWF's SmartWood coordinator The National Wildlife Federation and a small...

NWF Opposes Lack of Protection For Sea Turtles.
February 1, 1999... NWF is pressing the U.S. State Department not to weaken its law protecting endangered sea turtles from death in shrimp nets, despite a final ruling by the World Trade Organization (WTO) that the law violates international free-trade rules. ...

Congress Rejects Road Plan for Huge Copper River Delta.
February 1, 1999... Thanks to intense lobbying by NWF and a coalition of six other environmental and Alaska Native organizations, Congress has refused to sanction a 30-mile road across Alaska's Copper River Delta, the largest wetlands complex on the Pacific Coast...

Annual Meeting Set For March 18-21 In Houston, Texas.
February 1, 1999... NWF's 63rd annual meeting will celebrate the 25th anniversary of the Endangered Species Act and the continuing challenges facing threatened species around the world with the theme, "Keep the Wild Alive." General sessions and workshops will...

"Keep the Wild Alive" Wildlife Week Theme for 1999.
February 1, 1999... Introducing school children to nine of North America's most endangered creatures and inspiring them to get involved in activities to save imperiled species is the goal of Wildlife Week 1999, to be celebrated April 18-24. This year's theme:...

Dubious Days in the DELTA.(Mississippi Delta)
February 1, 1999... U.S. taxpayers may spend millions of dollars on projects in the Mississippi Delta that destroy natural resources while benefiting few people From the 1930s to the early 1960s, my grandparents owned a wilderness retreat in the heart of the...

NWF Takes Action Protecting the Delta's Resources.
February 1, 1999... As part of its ongoing efforts to protect the nation's wetlands, the National Wildlife Federation, working with Trial Lawyers for Public Justice (TLPJ), has taken the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers to court to stop the Big Sunflower River...

Birds Keep Track of Time.
February 1, 1999... If you leave a glass of milk in a warm place for a day, you know to throw it away without bothering to taste it. That's because humans have an ability called episodic memory--an ability to recall events in the past that involves what, where and...

The Fast Bat Gets the Worm.
February 1, 1999... Bats' sonar abilities are three times sharper than scientists had thought. That's what neuroscientist James Simmons at Brown University School of Medicine found recently when he recorded sonar sounds from big brown bats and then played back the...

Land Ho!
February 1, 1999... Of all the ways animals might reach islands to colonize them, boating has long been a controversial option. In a recent letter to the journal Nature, biologist Ellen Censky and colleagues wrote that many critics have considered the idea of...

Cold and Toxics: Lasting Relationship.
February 1, 1999... Canada's Inuit (right) and other native peoples of the Far North might seem as far away from pollution as they could get. But scientists have long known that the atmosphere carries toxics to the region from elsewhere in the world. Cold...

Hairy Chemists.
February 1, 1999... Joe is the hungry insect that tries to dine on a squash beetle pupa. The bright yellow creature is easy enough to find and may appear defenseless, as it has no effective mechanical weaponry such as a mean bite. But suspended on the tips of its...

Crushing Experience.
February 1, 1999... How does a cownose stingray, with no bones in its jaws, chomp on hard- shelled prey such as mussels and snails? In the same way a fossilized animal becomes hard as rock: with minerals, reports biologist Adam Summers of the University of...

Why Birds Love the Big Apple.(birds in New York City)
February 1, 1999... New York City is among hundreds of places now designated as Important Bird Areas Few York City is an important bird area? To outsiders, such a question may sound like a contradiction of terms. But for many New Yorkers, it seems perfectly...

Can Oiled Seabirds Be Rescued, Or Are We Just Fooling Ourselves?(damage from oil tankers)(Brief Article)
February 1, 1999... I am standing in a steamy shower stall with a tall man and a distressed duck at a special California facility at Humboldt State University. I hold the duck, a female white-winged scoter, while Rich, the tall stranger, rinses her with hot water....

SNAKE CHARMER.(diamondback rattle snakes)
February 1, 1999... After two decades of studying eastern diamondback rattlers, the author finds that America's deadliest snake is surprisingly timid Kneeling motionless on the ground, I watched as a husky eastern diamondback rattlesnake slid from my 5-gallon...

How to Spy on an Albatross.(tracking birds)
February 1, 1999... With the help of tiny transmitters and orbiting satellites, scientists are discovering that birds have some astonishing destinations There are stories--perhaps apocryphal, perhaps not--about ultrasecret spy satellites that can discern small...

How Satellites Track Birds.
February 1, 1999... French-American Argos satellites, dedicated to monitoring Earth's environment, collect data on every orbit from several hundred platform terminal transmitters (PTTs) attached to birds ranging in size from condors to ducks. Typically, a PTT...

A Corps For Tomorrow.(the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers)(Brief Article)
February 1, 1999... For decades they've fought to conquer nature. Now it's time for the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers--the federal behemoth of public-works construction projects--to redefine its mission from reworking nature to restoring it. Despite heartening...

States Log Key Conservation Wins In Election '98.(Brief Article)
February 1, 1999... In last fall's election, there were some big wins--and a few losses--for conservation measures endorsed by NWF and its state affiliates. For example: * Florida: In a major win for one of NWF's affiliates, the Florida Wildlife Federation...