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4 days ago | 
blog.nature.org | Justine E Hausheer
More than 15 years ago Montana-based photographer Ami Vitale first photographed a story on the northern white rhinoceros. The animal—a subspecies of the white rhino—was on the verge of being declared functionally extinct. The story was tragic, and it left an impression.
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1 week ago | 
blog.nature.org | Matt Miller
After a day viewing conservation projects and forest restoration activities, forester Britt Townsend has saved the best for last. She leads a group to a rocky knoll that provides a big-picture view of conservation. We’re at Bridgestone Preserve at Chestnut Mountain, a 5,763-acre Nature Conservancy project in central Tennessee. The view from the large rock includes 60,000 additional acres of protected public lands and the Caney Fork River.
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1 week ago | 
blog.nature.org | Justine E Hausheer
Grey dawn light filters into the sky as I search the tree tops. I huddle against the truck, propping my elbows on its side to steady the thermal monocular in my hands. Peering through the viewfinder, the trees on the other side of the river transform from dark shapes to a tangle of glowing color: purple, magenta, oranges and yellows. But I’m looking for white — the bright white glow that indicates a group of bat pups huddled inside a tree hollow.
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1 month ago | 
blog.nature.org | Justine E Hausheer
Conservation is in no small part about shaping what we want the world to be. Books have long helped shape that vision. They have played an instrumental role in launching the modern U.S. environmental movement, in particular Rachel Carson’s Silent Spring and Aldo Leopold’s A Sand County Almanac. Notably, both Carson and Leopold were dedicated field scientists. Their big ideas originated from their experiences and observations.
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1 month ago | 
blog.nature.org | Justine E Hausheer
Asking a birder to name their favorite species is like asking a parent to pick their favorite child. For most of us, it’s an impossible task. But if you ask me to name my favorite type of bird? Well then, things get a bit easier. I’ll be the first to admit that I’m absolutely besotted with parrots. They’re colorful and charismatic, but also strange, secretive, and highly adaptable.
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1 month ago | 
blog.nature.org | Justine E Hausheer
I’m on a quest to catch a fish in each of the 50 U.S. states – and to use each adventure as a means to explore conservation, the latest fisheries research and our complicated connections to the natural world. It was a pleasant June morning, a bit of humidity in the air, as we headed down a little path through eastern hardwood forest. I carried a light fiberglass fly rod. The sound of a mountain stream tempted me, but I followed my new friend, who was taking me to his secret pond.
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1 month ago | 
blog.nature.org | Justine E Hausheer |Matthew Miller |Natalie van Hoose
It’s a dark, rainy night in the beech forests of New Zealand. As the rain patters on the leaf litter, a slow-motion chase plays out on the forest floor. A predatory snail is on the hunt. The size of a lemon, it slides along the forest floor, leaving a glistening slime trail in its wake. It’s prey: an unsuspecting earthworm, wriggling along the snail’s path. A pause, and the snail lunches forward, grasping the worm in its mouth and slurping it down like a long, saucy strand of spaghetti.
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1 month ago | 
blog.nature.org | Cara Byington |Matthew Miller |Justine E Hausheer
New research published in Global Food Security shows that the paths to sustainable livestock production in systems around the world require a better understanding of environmental, economic, and social and cultural factors at scales small enough to be locally relevant, but broad enough to inform effective policy and funding interventions.
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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.