Blue Planet Journey

  A mother and her baby (joey), collected and displayed. One of the sad things about scientific collections is that young mammals and birds are also collected. In the famous wildlife dioramas at the Denver Museum of Nature and Science, there are numerous examples of young animals being collected. It's important to note that most if not all of these young animals were collected decades ago, when the sentiment regarding the collection of young was not negative. I wonder about the actions and conversations of these collectors of yore. Did they go out looking for young to trap or shoot? Did they wake up in the morning with a "to do" list that included the collection of young wildlife? Did they collect orphaned young as a humane alternative to predation or starvation? Whatever the case, the result is that there are young - some very young - mammals and birds in the dioramas. It's not my intent to chastise these collectors from the 1940s-1970s, but rather to note that colle...

Standing underneath the red fir, about 50 feet off the trail, the coyote stood still.  We were panting, having ridden our bikes up the steep climb to the Twin Falls overlook in the Inyo National Forest.  We stopped, and the coyote remained in place, yellow eyes focused on us. After a full minute, it turned and seemed to saunter away without a care. Caroline, my partner of 30 years, had tears in her eyes. Hands clasped to her chest, she whispered, “She’s such a beautiful animal.” This rare glimpse of a shy and elusive predator was a treat for both of us, and I’m a wildlife biologist. We both felt very lucky to see this animal on its terms, in the wild.   California coyote And so too, of course, was this coyote. Near the California resort town of Mammoth Lakes, it was probably safe from humans, although there were no guarantees. Had we been home, then in northern Utah, any coyote showing its face was not long for this world, given the $50 bounty authorized by Utah's Predato...