“Look closely at nature. Every species is a masterpiece, exquisitely adapted to the particular environment in which it has survived. Who are we to destroy or even diminish biodiversity?” — E.O. Wilson “ We're losing biodiversity globally at an alarming rate, and we need a cornucopia of different plants and animals, for the planet's health...
“ Water is a desert’s gold.” — Matshona Dhliwayo Wherever one lives, water is an essential ingredient of life. Where water is limiting, as it is in deserts, the amount and timing of rain dictates the abundance and richness of species to be found there. In deserts, early versus late winter rain, summer rain, and...
While desert fan palms, Washingtonia filifera, are confined to canyons and fault zones where water reaches the desert’s surface, they broadly define the extent of the Colorado Desert; they occur naturally nowhere else. Similarly, the range of Joshua trees is synonymous with the boundaries and core of the Mojave Desert; they occur naturally nowhere else...
“ The desert tells a different story every time one ventures on it.” — Robert Edison Fulton Jr. Wildfire in deserts should not happen. Before recent times there would only rarely be enough fuel to carry a fire more than a few meters beyond where perhaps a bolt of lightning struck a Palo Verde or...
“… in a desert you only regret the oasis you let pass.” Deserts challenge life to exist. Yet animals and plants residing in deserts offer an extraordinary number of examples of how natural selection has overcome these extremes of heat and aridity to let life happen — and in many cases thrive. But then there...
“ The diversity of the phenomena of nature is so great, and the treasures hidden in the heavens so rich, precisely in order that the human mind shall never be lacking in fresh nourishment." — Johannes Kepler You may have heard of C. Hart Merriam as one of our local chipmunks ( Tamias merriami), a...
"An adventure isn't worth telling if there aren’t any dragons in it." — Sarah Ban Breathnach Whether dragons are real depends on your perspective. On the island of Komodo (and adjacent islands) in the Indonesian archipelago, there are giant varanid lizards that eat cattle, deer, and occasionally people. They are dragons. One of its dragon...
“’Just living isn’t enough,’ said the butterfly, ‘one must have sunshine, freedom and a little flower.’” — Hans Christian Anderson Faced with the immense diversity of life, scientists and naturalists often specialize in one or maybe two groups to be able to name, and so understand, even a small fraction of that diversity. Scientists studying...
“ We abuse land because we regard it as a commodity belonging to us. When we see land as a community to which we belong, we may begin to use it with love and respect.” — Aldo Leopold In 1973, then-President Richard Nixon signed a series of laws that could have, should have, established the...
“ A snake knows more about what is happening around than any other creature, because it has no ears to listen to gossip — only direct perception.” — Jaggi Vasudev Ever since a serpent encouraged Eve to taste fruits from the tree of knowledge, snakes have been part of the fables, the lore, and culture...
“ Since 1995, the median number of natural history-related courses required for a BS degree in biology in US courses has been zero. Zilch. Zip. In other words, the people society depends on to know the most about life — people with college biology degrees — in nearly all cases have no obligation to learn...
“The desert smells like rain” – Gary Nabhan Rainfall, or rather the lack of rain, defines deserts. The rule of thumb is that if a region typically receives less than 10” (25 cm) of rain, then it is a desert. However, like everything in nature, it is more complicated than that. Aridity might be a...
“ A million years is a short time — the shortest worth messing with for most problems. You begin tuning your mind to a time scale that is the planet's time scale. For me, it is almost unconscious now and is a kind of companionship with the earth.” — John McPhee For many or us...
“ Preserve and cherish the pale blue dot, the only home we’ve ever known” — Carl Sagan Changes born of a warming planet are evident to anyone and anyone who takes the time to look. Rising sea levels, retreating glaciers, temperature records that are being broken every year, extreme weather events that were once rare...
The naming of species is a critical task allowing us (naturalists and community scientists and other scientists) to know what we are talking about when we say we saw a blue bird today. But was it a Western or an Eastern Bluebird, or was it a Blue Jay, a California Scrub-Jay, Woodhouse’s Scrub-Jay, a Stellar's...
“Climate change is the greatest threat to our existence in our short history on this planet. Nobody’s going to buy their way out of its effects.” — Mark Ruffalo “Never doubt that a small group of thoughtful, committed, citizens can change the world. Indeed, it is the only thing that ever has.” — Margaret Mead...
First you have to understand about rain….The gift of rain the Kokkos brings is like a blessing. Snow is a promise. – Virgil Wyaco, Zuni Tribe Virgil’s description a desert is in sharp contrast with the Oxford English Dictionary definition: A dry, barren area of land, especially one covered with sand, that is characteristically desolate...
“Study nature, love nature, stay close to nature. It will never fail you” —Frank Lloyd Wright A common trait of young naturalists, or many older naturalists as well, was (and is) a passion for collecting. Rocks, fossils, bones, leaves, seashells or seed pods would fill the empty niches in their rooms. Not too many decades...
“The one process now going on that will take millions of years to correct is the loss of genetic and species diversity by the destruction of natural habitats. This is the folly our descendants are least likely to forgive us.” - E. O. Wilson The term “habitat” is often misused. Habitats are places where something...
“Nature is not more complicated than you think, it is more complicated than you CAN think” ~Frank Edwin Egler Nevertheless, a goal of conservation-minded naturalists is to document and understand nature, at least enough to be able to identify patterns and drivers of biodiversity and abundance, and ideally to then be able to identify problems...