By Susan Shea Hikers climbing the Northeast’s highest peaks will traverse several different vegetative zones along the way. On the summits, they’ll likely encounter plants so hardy that many also grow in the Arctic, thousands of miles to the north. Many hikes begin in a northern hardwood forest dominated by beech, yellow birch, and sugar…

By Declan McCabe The opossums that show up on my students’ trail cameras at Saint Michael’s College sometimes look out of place, with their naked tails and frostbitten ears that seem so poorly suited to Vermont weather. These amazing consumers of ticks did, after all, come from a different continent — or at least their…

By Declan McCabe I was sitting poolside with my children on a summer day when another parent hustled her son out of the water because of a swimming cockroach. The “cockroach” turned out to be a giant water bug (family Belostomatidae), the largest of the hemipterans, or true bugs. These insects are typically found in…

By Susan Shea Decayed wood crumbled underfoot as I stepped on a mossy log. The ground was almost hidden by a lush, diverse growth of wildflowers and ferns. Brown scapes of wild leeks poked up above mottled leaflets of Virginia waterleaf and heart-shaped leaves of wild ginger. A green canopy of mostly sugar maple and…

By Rachel Sargent Mirus Last summer while working in the garden, I was startled when a fast-flying wasp dropped a plump pumpkin spider on the soil in front of me. The wasp landed, grabbed the spider, and wiggled backwards into a small hole I hadn’t noticed, quickly covering the entrance as if to say, “Nothing…

By Frank Kaczmarek Sunlight exposes a palette of colors To quote the French dramatist Jean Giradoux, “The flower is the poetry of reproduction. It is an example of the eternal seductiveness of life.” Flowering plants fill our summer fields and gardens, bring bright spots of color to our woods, and, since their arrival on the…

By Declan McCabe Occasionally I get an email from a camp, school or even my local Rotary asking if I can present an insect program. So it was not unusual last week for me to be handing insect nets to excited Cub Scouts. I led them toward some ash trees and made sure each scout…

One summer day, I was relaxing on the bank of a secluded pond watching mallard ducks forage when a dark shape broke the stillness of the water. It was a North American river otter, swimming with its head and back emerging from the surface, sleek body over two feet long, tapered tail trailing behind. It…

By Lee Emmons Walking down my road on an early June afternoon several years ago, I spotted a snake attempting to cross into the underbrush. Covered in colorful splotches, it quickly slithered across the pavement and out of sight.  I knew this wasn’t a garter snake, a familiar visitor to my garden, and later identified…

By Frank Kaczmarek In 1860, a year after publication of his seminal work on the origin of species, Charles Darwin wrote to a friend, “At the moment, I care more about Drosera than the origin of all the species in the world.” Darwin maintained a lifelong fascination with carnivorous plants, including members of the genus…

By Susan Shea I never tire of watching the aerial acrobatics of swallows as they swoop over fields, darting back and forth to snap up flying insects. With their smooth, flowing flight and pointed wings, they are beautiful, graceful fliers. Tree swallows and barn swallows are the most abundant and widespread of our six northeastern…

By Rachel Sargent Mirus Picture a robin, out in the morning and hopping around the park. It finds breakfast in the form of a worm, but out of the nearby trees swoops a bigger bird. The bigger bird acts threatening, and the robin surrenders its worm like a kid giving up their lunch money to…

By Laurie D. Morrissey Irises, with their large, exotic-looking flowers waving atop tall stems, are among the showiest early summer blooms. Most of North America’s nearly 30 native iris species are found in the southeastern states and on the Pacific coast; but a few irises grow in the northern woodlands. The most common are the…

 By Lee Emmons This spring, as you walk outside, keep an ear open for two distinctive bird songs: “zee zee zee zee zo zee” or “zee zee zo zo zee.” If you hear them, you’ve identified a black-throated green warbler (Setophaga virens), a bird that is often heard but rarely seen. The first song is…

By Hanna Holcomb I often watch out for stinging nettles (Urtica dioica) while hiking in central Vermont. As you might guess from its name, brushing against this plant causes a bee sting-like burn that can last for hours. Despite this irritation, humans have used stinging nettles for centuries as food, fiber, and medicine, including as…