Natural History Journal

American Robins are one of the most common and recognizable birds across the North American continent.  They may also be one of our most beloved.  Their largeish size, distinctive coloration, beautiful song and tendency to favor the open grassy habitat of lawns and parks all contribute to the American Robin's happy status as a bird that even non-birders know and appreciate. Robins are at home in every state of the Lower 48 for at least part of the year, as well as nearly all of Alaska and Canada, and much of Mexico as well!  They are either residents in their range, meaning they stick around all year, or short-distance migrants that move south out of Canada and expand down into the southwestern U.S. and Mexico for the winter months.   Male American Robin, carrying food back to his nest.  CO American Robins are members of the thrush family, Turdidae, along with bluebirds, solitaires and, naturally, the thrushes.  Confusingly, the Eurasian Blackbird (fo...

In the world of birding, " Big Days " are competitions to see how many species of birds a birder can find in a specified area in just one 24-hour period.  They range from formal to informal, and the competition may be shared with others or simply with oneself.  This month, Eric and I were excited to set aside a whole day for our own, unofficial, just-for-fun "Big Day," setting ourselves the challenge of finding 100 species (or more) in our own county.   Here in North America, January is not the time of year when most Big Day birding events take place.  (In fact,  Global Big Day , a birding event in which birders from around the world participate, takes place annually in May - a much more reasonable season to be out birding!)  At this cold and often dreary time of year, many birds across much of the U.S. have migrated south for the winter, and most habitats are just too iced over to yield a great deal of bird diversity.   But here in the Cent...

After visiting at least ten different Civil War battlefields in Mississippi, Tennessee and Georgia last summer ( which you can read about here ), Eric and I headed even farther east to spend a few days in beautiful Great Smoky Mountains National Park.  I visited this park 15 years ago, and I was eager to see it again - especially one of my favorite places, Cade's Cove.  A hotspot of biodiversity in the Southeastern United States, Great Smoky Mountains National Park is a naturalist's delight.  We did some birding during our visit to the park, but most of our time was spent hiking through lush forests and rambling around the many old cabins and homesteads that have been carefully preserved by the National Park Service.  A handsome American Black Bear: easy to see why these guys are everyone's favorite North American mammal! The most noteworthy mammals we encountered on our visit were, without contest, all the bears! American Black Bears are abundant in Great Smoky Moun...

Last July, my history professor husband and I took a trip to Mississippi, Tennessee and Georgia to visit a selection of Civil War battlefields that comprise the "western theater" of that great war.  From our starting point in Vicksburg, Mississippi, we drove north up the scenic Natchez Trace Parkway to Shiloh, Tennessee, then northeast to Fort Donelson, where we also contrived to visit the Tennessee National Wildlife Refuge.  We then made our way back to the southeast, where we visited the Nashville area and Murfreesboro before heading to Chattanooga and Lookout Mountain, ending our tour of battlefields with Chickamauga in Georgia.    If those places and names mean little to you beside hazy memories of your high school U.S. history class, fear not.  This is less about the history (sorry, Eric) and more about the wildlife that thrives in these historic places. The preservation of battlefields over the last century has led to the inadvertent creation of some excel...