By Lee Emmons I first became acquainted with my neighborhood red-bellied woodpecker (​Melanerpes carolinus) when it visited my bird feeders last winter. Sporting a black-and-white-striped back with a red nape, this medium-sized woodpecker certainly made a visual impression. Its call was also memorable, a loud ​kwirr ​that sounded nothing like the other birds in my…

By Susan Shea There was a sucking sound as my rubber boot sank into the deep black muck. Naturalist Jon Binhammer and I were standing in the middle of a hardwood swamp in central Vermont. Above us, dainty red flowers clung to the still-bare branches of red maple trees and fat black buds encircled the…

The Outside Story By Rachel Mirus As you swat away blackflies this summer, look closely; it may be that not all those flies are flies. Some of them might be tiny sweat bees, members of the Halictidae family, which gets its common name because some species will lick sweat from human skin. Sweat bees are…

By Meghan McCarthy McPhaul We were touring the neighborhood backroads one summer evening when the kids noticed a sleek movement through a small pond. At first, we thought it was a beaver, but its smaller size and – once we got a closer look – slender tail revealed this swimmer as a muskrat. It went…

By Declan McCabe Large fishing spiders walking on water can be fascinating – or terrifyingly unnerving. The latter reaction is common among Saint Michael’s College students as we sample Vermont’s streams and ponds. On one occasion, a normally macho student screamed, dropped his net, and leaped from the stream to avoid a particularly large specimen.…

By Susie Spikol Each fall, thousands of broad-winged hawks soar across the New England sky in flocks known as kettles, on their way to wintering grounds in South and Central America. The sky swirls with hawks bubbling up on thermals of hot air and then streaming southward. It is enough to take your breath away…

By Michael J. Caduto There’s a story about an early tourist from New York City who stopped his horse and buggy to watch a farmer harvesting a spring crop of rocks from his land. The farmer was loading rocks onto a sledge drawn by oxen. The stranger called him over and asked, “Where did all…

The Outside Story By Susan Shea I grew up on a street lined with tall, stately elms. While walking to school one day, I found a bird’s nest that the wind had blown down. The nest was a beautiful, silky gray pouch. My teacher helped me identify it as a Baltimore oriole’s nest. Over the…

The Outside Story By Rachel Mirrus Many of us avoid close encounters of the eight-legged kind, but if you’ve ever come eye to eye with a spider, you’ve probably noticed they have several more eyes than we do: most have four pairs. What do they do with so many eyes? Well, it depends on the…

The Outside Story By Susie Spikol Some people have life birds, species of birds they’ve waited their whole lives to see in the wild. I don’t have one of these, but I do have a life mole. I’ve been waiting to catch a glimpse of Condylura cristata, the star-nosed mole, ever since I learned about…

By Laurie D. Morrissey Once, when I was little, I was so thrilled to come across a gorgeous, dark-red trillium that I picked it and placed it in a vase in the house. I was disappointed when it quickly wilted. Not only that, but it smelled bad. Such is the dual nature of this spring…

The Outside Story By Olivia Box As spring arrives, so do… bats. Like many other naturalists, I spend lots of time during this season looking for migrating salamanders and blossoming bloodroot. I’ve never thought much about what bats are doing this time of year. It turns out these flying mammals, who retreated into hibernation back…

By Laurie D Morrisey One of the first spring wildflowers you’ll see – perhaps even before the last shaded patches of snow disappear – is the violet. This common flower, which blooms from April through June, is widely known and easily identified. There is more than one violet, however. The genus Viola contains some 500…

By Rachel Mirus This May, while we thank the human moms around us, I’ve been thinking about the many dedicated moms throughout nature, too. Nurturing mothers come in many unexpected shapes and sizes, including a few diminutive examples – like spider moms. All spiders lay eggs and wrap them with silk into some kind of…

By Michael J. Caduto Anyone who has shared a home with a dog or a cat has learned something about the silent language of tails. Wild and domesticated animals may use tails for everything from communication to courtship, balance to locomotion, and defense to swatting flies. Tails can range from short to long and be…