The Outside Story: Meet New England’s musical fish, the burbot
A relative of the cod, burbot in winter move into shallow waters typically under ice to spawn with males using sounds including clicks and buzzes to attract mates.
The Outside Story: Winter wonders – Icicles, snow rollers, hair ice
Along with the challenges of icy roads and snow shoveling, winter offers a host of wonders if you take the time to look.
The Outside Story: Water boatmen forage beneath the ice
If you get a chance this winter, take a peek through the icy window of a pond surface. You may see water boatmen – Hemiptera corixidae – clinging to the pond floor
The Outside Story: Yes, deer help spread invasives
Deer are an important part of the ecosystem, but their foraging behavior can wreak havoc in forests, where browsing may contribute to the spread of invasive plants – and decrease species diversity.
The Outside Story: There’s more to fur than meets the eye
A flash of orange streaks across the meadow – a red fox, like a starburst in the snow.
The Outside Story: South Carolina state bird moves north
In mid-December, a small, reddish-brown bird with an upturned tail, a white eyebrow-stripe, and a long, slender, down curved bill was on the deck below our feeder.
The Outside Story: Balsam woolly adelgid is a foe to firs
’Tis the season for balsam fir, the fragrant evergreen that adorns our homes through the winter holidays.
The Outside Story | Eastern Dwarf Mistletoe: A bomb-bearing botanical vampire
Have you noticed the cheery evergreen sprig with pearly berries, currently perched over the doorways of Yankee traditionalists and those desperate to be kissed?
The Outside Story: Food of Santa’s reindeer
Santa’s reindeer need fuel to pull that sleigh full of toys, and one of their primary winter foods is reindeer lichen, also known as reindeer moss.
The Outside Story: What does all that noisy squirrel talk mean?
Even if you’ve never ventured further into the forest than an urban park or a college campus, you’re probably familiar with Sciurus carolinensis, the Eastern gray squirrel.
The Outside Story: Asiatic bittersweet is festive but invasive
Despite its festive appearance however, this plant – Celastrus orbiculatus, more commonly known as Asiatic bittersweet – is an exotic invasive that has wreaked havoc in both urban and forested environments.
The Outside Story: Behind the grand spectacle of Canada goose migration
The musical honking of Canada geese and their V-shaped flocks streaming overhead are classic signs of autumn.
The Outside Story: Rodenticides solve one problem, create another
Last autumn, around the same time I was laying the winter quilt on our bed, my cat became very interested in the space beneath the kitchen sink. Unsurprisingly, a mouse was huddled down there, seeking shelter in the warmth.
The Outside Story: Prevent spreading pests through firewood
For many of us, this season involves hunting, gathering, and preparing for a long, cold winter.
The Outside Story: Migration time for eastern red bats
Swift and apparently silent, a lone bat traces the contours of the woods’ edge at dusk, floating through canopy and meadow. In the last daylight, a sharp-eyed observer might catch a glimpse of white armpits, indicating that this is no barn bat or attic bat.
The Outside Story: How to spin a spider web
One neighbor calls our house “the spider house” because so many orb weavers spin webs outside our large living room windows.
The Outside Story: the tangled tale of the ash-tree bolete
If the enemy of my enemy is my friend, then surely the friend of my enemy is my enemy. This inverted cliche is one way to characterize the tangled relationship between ash trees and the ash-tree bolete.
The Outside Story: The gall(s) of hackberry
A student plopped a leaf on my desk, pointed to several green lumps on its underside, and asked, “What are those green growths?”
The Outside Story: Freshwater marshes are biodiversity hotspots
Sunlight glinted off the water as we paddled our canoe along a winding channel that led through a marsh of tall grasses and wild rice.
The Outside Story: Brown thrashers rely on thickets
The brown thrasher (Toxostoma rufum) lives out its days in relative seclusion.