Wild Turkeys O, peace! Contemplation makes a rare turkey-cock of him: how he jets under his advanced plumes! – Shakespeare, Twelfth Night Here in the United States, we are on the precipice of Thanksgiving, which falls on the fourth Thursday of November. Traditionally, the protein of choice at feasts and banquets far and wide is […]
Sand Cats Today we celebrate Felis margarita. No, not a cat named after a tequila cocktail, but a species named after the French general Jean Auguste Margueritte. May I introduce the adorable Sand Cat, also sometimes dubbed the Sand Dune Cat. Sand Kitty – photo by Payman Sazesh This small, wild cat resides in the sandy and stony
Moose, Meese, Mooses Way back in the 42nd episode of the newsletter, we explored the gorgeous Gekko gecko, otherwise known as the tokay gecko. I came upon that beauty through photographs but loved the nearly identical scientific nomenclature, which got me thinking about tautonyms. A tautonym is the term for a doubled taxonomic name, and its
Moose, Meese, Mooses Read More »
Nature’s Mothers This weekend is Mother’s Day. To celebrate I thought it might be fitting to send you some videos of mothers and children in the natural world. But how do you narrow that to a few examples? It’s like typing in “cat” or “dog” in a search engine and trying to rummage through the
Snapping Shrimp As submarines became a staple of battle in the World War era and sonar matured into a necessary tool, humans began to notice something odd in the depths. Something very weird was messing with our ability to hear sufficiently underwater. It wasn’t a Kraken; it wasn’t dolphins; it wasn’t whales. It was a
The Grand Canyon as Evolutionary Force* Certain spots on the globe are well known for their geographic isolation. The concept is easy to visualize simply by imagining an island. If an area is physically isolated from other spots very often there will be a drastic effect on the evolution of life in the region. Two
The Grand Canyon as Evolutionary Force* Read More »