6 Tricks for Better Species Identification
Learning how to identify plants and animals, especially when you are first starting out with a conservation project, can be seem pretty daunting at first.
Entries by Colleen Beaty
Caribou Who?
With the winter holidays fast approaching, I thought it would be fun to write about caribou, which most people know by their other name—reindeer.
A Breakthrough Discovery About White-Nose Syndrome
Finally, there is some hopeful news in the battle against white-nose syndrome! Last week a team of researchers from UC San Francisco and Brown University published a ground-breaking study in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences about white-nose syndrome. This disease, which is caused by the fungus Pseudogymnoascus destructans, has devastated cave-dwelling bat […]
Soils in All the Colors of the Rainbow
A rainbow of soil is under our feet; red as a barn and black as a peat. It’s yellow as lemon and white as the snow; bluish gray. So many colors below. Hidden in darkness as thick as the night; the only rainbow that can form without light. Dig you a pit, or bore you […]
Get Outdoors this Spring with Citizen Science!
Now that it’s finally spring and things are warming up and beginning to grow, it’s a great time to get your employees and your local community engaged in outdoor activities as part of your corporate conservation program. One great way to do this is by participating in a citizen science project. Citizen science is scientific […]
The Soil is Alive!
This is the second in a series of blog posts about soil. We often think of soil as nothing more than “the dirt beneath your feet,” but soil is much more complex than that. There’s a whole other world of living creatures beneath our feet! Soils provide habitat for a rich, dynamic ecosystem for organisms ranging from […]
Another Record Year for Snowy Owls
Last winter, the Northeast and Upper Midwest U.S. were treated to sightings of a bird species rarely seen so far south—the snowy owl (Bubo scandiacus). Snowy owls breeding in northern Quebec experienced a record nesting season the previous summer, believed to be linked to a boom of their prey, arctic lemmings. So when it came […]
Celebrate World Wetlands Day on February 2
February 2 of each year is World Wetlands Day, which marks the date that the Convention on Wetlands (also known informally as the Ramsar Convention) was signed in 1971. World Wetlands Day provides private and public entities alike with the opportunity to raise awareness about the importance and value of wetlands. Wetlands provide vital habitat […]
Designing the Ideal Project at Ricoh Group’s West Caldwell Site
When Yoko Perez started working for the Environmental Team at Ricoh Americas Corporation’s West Caldwell Office in June 2013, she started working to align their Wildlife at Work program with the priorities of Ricoh Group’s biodiversity policy, as well as to better engage employees in the program. She and her team recognized that working with […]
This Year’s Christmas Tree, Next Year’s Habitat
With the winter holiday season upon us and Christmas only a few days away, many living rooms and office lobbies are now decorated (or soon will be) with live evergreen Christmas trees. But once the holidays are over, what should we do with all of those trees? I suggest using them to create habitat! A […]