By Meghan McCarthy McPhaul If the river otter is the most aquatic member of the mustelid family and weasels represent the terrestrial branch of the clan, the American mink is the adept middle child, taking advantage of its adaptations both in the water and on land to make a living. Like both otters and weasels,…

By Susan Shea “Jay, jay, jay!” Every morning last winter I awoke to the loud cries of a flock of 17 blue jays dancing around my feeder. They gorged on sunflower seeds and suet, scaring away smaller birds, then left, only to return in the afternoon. I ended up buying a second feeder for the…

By Kenrick Vezina Not to alarm you, but you’re surrounded. There, buzzing stupidly into the slats of your venetian blinds, is a house fly. Nearby, nestled in a crevice of the window-frame, a ladybug waits out the winter. In a corner overhead, a spindly house spider sits motionless in its haphazard web. Underfoot, bristly little…

By Joe Rankin Back in September, I put out the bird feeder. I try not to do it too early because, well . . . bears. My feathered friends emptied it in hours. A couple of refills later and I decided I couldn’t afford to put out the buffet that early. The weather was warm;…

By Patrick White You picked it out, maybe cut it down, brought it home, watered it, and decorated it. But do you know what species of tree that is, surrounded by presents in your living room? If you purchased your Christmas tree rather than cutting it out of the woods, chances are it’s either a…

By Madeline Bodin Mention carpenter ants, and Declan McCabe, chair of the biology department at St. Michael’s College in Colchester, thinks about the time he got a lungful of formic acid. He had taken a class into the field to survey insects. He saw a huge ant and sucked it up into his aspirator. Yes,…

By Ned Swanberg When I’m hiking, I like to watch for rock basins, sometimes as small as cupped hands, that appear along summits and ridgelines. These are “thin places.” When filled with water, these tiny quivering pools offer a deep plunge into time. Basins run the gamut from Star Lake, a half-acre tarn beside New…

By Elise Tillinghast House sparrows—those little brown and gray birds that flash mob the bird feeder—are common and easy to see. They’re quarrelsome, noisy, and when they’re on the ground, they move in vigorous hops that remind me of popcorn popping out of a pan. They’re also an invasive species, scavengers that have hitched their…

By Tim Traver As a kid fidgeting at my grandmother’s Thanksgiving table, I often wondered, what’s the point of cranberries? She had a live-in Irish cook who insisted on serving whole cranberries suspended in a kind of gelatinous, inverted bog. If I ventured to eat a berry I experienced the power of my gag reflex.…

By Declan McCabe Recently, my daughter participated in Odyssey of the Mind, a creative problem-solving competition devoted to ingenuity and team work. As an entomologist, I was thrilled to learn that the program calls its highest award the “Ranatra fusca.” Not only was the award named for an insect, but an aquatic insect, and a…

By Carolyn Lorié On the north end of my home is a nest site favored by eastern phoebes. Every year a pair shows up, sets up house, and raises a family. They arrive early in the spring, and I spend the long days of spring and summer watching them. At some point, the nest empties out,…

By Madeline Bodin Scenes from the West’s five-year drought are striking – the cracked mud at the bottom of a dry reservoir, forests in flames. Wonder what a drought would look like in Vermont and New Hampshire? Look out the window. This is the first time that any part of New Hampshire has been in…

By Michael J. Caduto We like to think that everything in nature has its own particular time and place. But nature is fond of throwing us curves. As a naturalist, a common question I’m asked during foliage season is, “Why are spring peepers calling in my woods at this time of year?” Even ardent students…

By Benjamin Lord “I’ve got a botanical question for you,” my friend said as he came into my classroom the other day. “Is black nightshade edible?” He’d found some growing near his chicken coop. “I took the tiniest bite,” he said. “I’m not sure if I felt funny because of what I ate, or because…

By Todd McLeish The big, meaty green caterpillars that many of us have been fighting to eradicate from our gardens this summer make plenty of people squirm. In part it’s because they are among the largest caterpillars in the region, sometimes reaching close to three inches in length, with reddish horns on their ends that…