The Arthropods of San Francisco (and beyond)
What's that crawling under your bed... sitting in your light fixture... lurking in your cabinets? Perhaps it's a new insect species! The Arthropods of Our [...]
Invasion of the House Finch
Once upon a time, House Finches (Haemorhous mexicanus) only lived west of the Rocky Mountains. Then, in 1940, a group of captive birds flew to [...]
Gnarly Trees
Branches of the live oak (Quercus virginiana) loop and twist their way toward openings in the forest canopy. Many branches sag down to the ground [...]
Help locate the coughing frog!
You may have heard of a newly described species of leopard frog, the Atlantic Coast leopard frog (Rana kauffeldi) -- also known as the coughing frog [...]
Cold Feet, Warm Heart
Raleigh has had a fit of cold, snowy (and icy) weather this week. So while I watched this snow-covered Canada Goose (Branta canadensis) swim around [...]
Look but don’t touch
Watching Out for Nesting Birds Look but don’t touch. This was a lesson I learned early on as a young boy, staring intently along with [...]
The Fashionable and Practical Turkey Vulture
Turkey vultures (Cathartes aura) remind me of 16th century European royalty (you know those “ruffs” they wore around their necks?). That regal appearance results from [...]
Who’s in My House?
Tiny rustling noises arise from our kitchen garbage can. I tip-toe up to it and out pops a little fuzzy face with a twitching nose. [...]
Talking Turkey Parts
The male wild turkey (Meleagris gallopavo), weighing in at around 20 pounds, is one of the largest birds in North America. By comparison, many domestic turkeys [...]
A Study in Scarlet
No doubt you’ve been wowed this autumn by the crimson colors of the red maple (Acer rubrum)! This tree, native to eastern North America, has [...]
Spooky Spider
I love Halloween. It’s the time of year when I can leave all the spider webs up around the front stoop and call them decorations. [...]
June Beetle Boogie
Because I’m an Entomology graduate student, meeting people is often like this: Me: Hi, my name is Emily. New friend: Hi Emily, what do you [...]
A Tale of Two Hemlocks
I have never poisoned anyone. I recently learned that if I were to try, I would be very bad at it. The hemlock I thought [...]
A visit from the garden spider
This past week I noticed something other than Brussels sprouts in my garden -- a beautiful garden spider! I did what any curious entomologist and [...]
Warts & All!
Double, double, toil and trouble; Fire, burn; and cauldron, bubble. Shakespeare’s witches open Macbeth by tossing a toad into their cauldron, along with parts of [...]