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2 weeks ago | 
idahomagazine.com | Mary Terra-Berns |Steve Bunk
A Long-Ago Dream DrownedBy Mary Terra-BernsI was making good time on my morning bike ride from Rose Lake to Harrison on the Trail of the Coeur d’Alenes. Other than waterfowl, I had the trail to myself. I glided through Medimont and onto the diked section that separates Cave Lake from the wetland and the Coeur d’Alene River on the other side.
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1 month ago | 
blog.nature.org | Matthew Miller |Cara Byington |Mary Terra-Berns
We hike up the wooded trail on a warm August day, as cardinals, blue jays and other songbirds dart back and forth into the brush. Within a few minutes, we see much larger wildlife. The forest opens, revealing a large meadow–once the site of a coal minefield–and our group looks out upon it. I’m here with colleagues from The Nature Conservancy as well as biologists from the Tennessee Wildlife Resources Agency (TWRA). Earlier in the day, they had noted we’d have a high likelihood of success.
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2 months ago | 
blog.nature.org | Cara Byington |Mary Terra-Berns |Natalie van Hoose |Matthew Miller
Next time you’re in need of an odd animal fact to fill a conversational lull, consider the nesting preferences of the Humboldt penguin. To protect their eggs and hatchlings from sun, heat and other elements, they dig nests and burrows out of the accumulated guano (poop) of generations of Humboldt penguins and other sea birds. Native to western South America, Humboldt penguins take their name from the Humboldt current that flows a few miles offshore.
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2 months ago | 
blog.nature.org | Jenny Rogers |Justine E Hausheer |Mary Terra-Berns |Matthew Miller
Ian Biazzo, then a University of Central Florida PhD candidate, was working on a controlled burn at The Nature Conservancy’s Tiger Creek Preserve in Florida when he noticed a single frog hop off a palmetto bush and land in a pile of ash. The fire was burning low and slow, and he watched as a few animals, like the frog, dispersed.
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Feb 1, 2025 | 
idahomagazine.com | Mary Terra-Berns |Steve Bunk
Over the Pass to a Different FutureBy Mary Terra-BernsSeveral years ago I worked on Idaho Fish and Game snorkeling surveys of fish above Avery on the upper Saint Joe River, which is federally designated as Wild and Scenic. Twenty-eight snorkeling transects were established in 1969, extending about forty-five river miles from Ruby Creek downstream to Avery. This part of “The Joe” is on the bucket list of anglers across the country.
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Jan 20, 2025 | 
blog.nature.org | Justine E Hausheer |Mary Terra-Berns |Matthew Miller
Dawn in south-east Queensland. I’m up early, before the stifling summer heat settles in and the thunderstorms storms brew up over the hinterland. I walk my usual route through the neighborhood, keeping a mental list of birds as I go: the tu-heer of a figbird, the short pee-pee-pee chime of a pale-headed rosella, an explosion of rainbow lorikeets, and the mournful cry of a Pacific koel perched high in a purple-blooming jacaranda. Thirty minutes and 30 birds in, I turn back for home.
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Dec 1, 2024 | 
idahomagazine.com | Mary Terra-Berns |Steve Bunk
Amid Teeth and ClawsBy Mary Terra-BernsPink and orange clouds hovered on the horizon as I pulled out of the Sawtooth National Recreation Area (SNRA) compound in the early 1980s on the critical mission to restock toilet paper in the outhouses around Alturas and Pettit Lakes in the Sawtooth Valley.
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Jun 1, 2024 | 
idahomagazine.com | Mary Terra-Berns |Steve Bunk
Canine Social MediaStory and Photos by Mary Terra-BernsAs soon as my dogs and I are out the door every day, usually before the sun is up, their noses are a nanometer off the ground, analyzing what you might call the social media posts left during the night. Knowing how much time I spend on interesting posts, I try not to hurry them on our walk in the outskirts of Coeur d’Alene when an intriguing message requires a few extra minutes for them to review. Think Sniffchat or Nosebook.
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Mar 19, 2024 | 
blog.nature.org | Justine E Hausheer |Cara Byington |Mary Terra-Berns |Lisa Marie Ballard
Rats don’t always get a good rap in Western culture. They’re infamous for transmitting disease, invading our food stores, and sending seabird populations extinct. And their very name was once invoked as a watered-down curse word. (“Oh, rats!”)But if we put our cultural prejudices aside, these much-maligned rodents are actually quite spectacular. Oceania is a particular hotspot for rodent diversity, with ample islands creating the right conditions for evolution to work it’s magic.
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Mar 1, 2024 | 
idahomagazine.com | Cc By-Sa |Mary Terra-Berns |Steve Bunk
A Big Kitty in the CoreStory and Photos by Mary Terra-BernsIDAHO magazine first featured Coeur d’Alene as a Spotlight City in our February 2004 issue. We figured it was time for a revisit. A few years ago, when I was working for Idaho Fish and Game, the ladies at the front desk got a call about a bobcat hunkered in the shrubbery at the Coeur d’Alene Chamber of Commerce building downtown. When they asked me to go check it out, I was skeptical.
