After finding our Burrowing Owls, we drove down to Miami-Dade County and stopped at a La Carreta Cuban Restaurant. We didn’t go for the food, though I would have loved to have tried the food there (I love Cuban food). We went to find cowbirds in the parking lot. It wasn’t long before we started […]
Category: Wildlife
POLL: Can ‘Bear-moving’ be a better way to reduce conflict in the Himalayas?
In the Indian Himalayas, threatened Asiatic black bears (Ursus thibetanus) are frequently drawn to energy-rich human food sources such as apple orchards and other crops. This resource-driven movement frequently brings bears and humans into close contact, increasing potential risks for either side that can end in retaliatory killings of bears by local people. Because of […]
My 2015 in imperfect hindsight
As is customary for many photographers of all genres during this time of year, I started glancing over my portfolio of work captured during the year in hopes of posting a “best of” collection. I have done so since 2010. Last year I took a very specific approach, only showing photos taken at a focal […]
Komodo dragon: one of Indonesia’s rare conservation success stories
The Komodo dragon – that giant monitor lizard inhabiting a few islands in Eastern Indonesia – is an exception. Biologically-speaking, of course, it is the world’s largest lizard, and a last survivor of monster lizards (bigger even than the Komodo) that once roamed a good portion of both Indonesia and Australia. But the Komodo dragon […]
Burrowing Owl at Brian Piccolo Park, 12/27/2015
My father and I just returned from a 3 day excursion through South Florida in search of birds we’ve never seen before. We had a very successful trip. We found 104 species over the three days, including 6 species I’ve never seen in Florida: Neotropic Cormorant, Western Spindalis (lifer), Egyptian Goose, Bronzed Cowbird, Red-wiskered Bulbul […]
POLL: Should African countries be allowed to sell elephants to China?
In October 2014, tens of young elephants were taken from their family groups in Zimbabwe’s Hwange National Park, where they were held in a capture unit for eight months until July 2015. That’s when 24 were flown to the Qingyuan quarantine facility in Guangdong Province before being transferred to Chimelong Safari Park, also in Guangdong. […]
Happy New Year!
My creature of the year award for 2015 goes to the neighborhood favorites — Brooklyn’s monk parakeets! The monk parakeet, Myiopsitta monachus, is also called Quaker parrot or parakeet and a few other names. There are colonies of them in Queens and Manhattan and elsewhere in New York City, but my favorite flock lives in […]
Wildlife catastrophe at Amazon dam a warning for future Tapajós dams
When the Balbina Dam was completed in 1986, it flooded primary forest in the state of Amazonas along Brazil’s Uatumã River, forming a massive reservoir speckled by 3,546 flood-induced islands. In 1990, the Reserva Biológica (REBIO) do Uatumã was established, protecting the entire 443,700 hectare (109,6427 acre) reservoir, dubbed Balbina Lake, along with the adjacent […]