This week we continue our series on winter wildlife tracks with a look at man’s best friend, Canis familiaris; its cousin, Canis latrans, the coyote;…
Tracking – Dogs & Coyotes
Intro to Tracking
We all have ways of keeping up with current events. Some of us watch TV; some read the newspaper or online sources. Personally, I like…
Pseudoscorpions
When it comes to tiny arachnids, there’s one individual that grabs a disproportionate amount of the glory. We all know her, and the song that…
Starlings
Depending on how your holiday season is playing out, you may have, in the past few days, found a certain classic Saturday Night Live skit…
Whitetail Deer & Reindeer
Now that we’ve entered that interstitial period between Christmas and New Years, you may find yourself with a little extra time on your hands. Time…
Nature on a Train!
Nature on a train. I know, it sounds like an oxymoron. Or maybe the title of a toned-down Samuel L. Jackson movie. But it’s also…
Woodpeckers
With apologies to Edgar Allan Poe, I offer you the following recap of my Thanksgiving weekend: While I nodded, nearly napping, suddenly there came a…
Birds of Prey
Remember The Far Side, those classic bits of natural history humor by cartoonist Gary Larson? One in particular showed three hawks in a tree. All…
Black Squirrels – Part 2
Last week we embarked on a story of Kane County squirrels-specifically black squirrels, which are a dark form of our common gray squirrel, Sciurus carolinensis-and…
Kane County Certified Naturalists
Josh Libman, naturalist with the Forest Preserve District of Kane County, describes an ecological process during a KCCN field trip to Johnson’s Mound Forest Preserve in Elburn. Good Natured: Kane County Certified Naturalists November 27, 2019 Well, it’s that time of year again. The temperatures have dropped, the leaves have fallen, and the long,