animals
How to survive a nor’easter if you are not human
That early fall nor’easter we had recently brought up the question: How did critters survive days of wind and rain? Read more Honk! Festival celebrates 21 years of street band activism with photo exhibit in Somerville Consider some of the creatures we frequently encounter in our neighborhoods: the birds in our trees and at our […]
Cat tour draws hundreds of ‘CATabridgians’ to Cambridgeport
Hundreds of people and their cats filled the streets of Cambridgeport Saturday afternoon for the first annual Cambridge Cat Tour, a city-backed event that drew far more attendees than organizers expected. Read more YWCA Cambridge celebrates local women making a difference In honor of Meet Your Neighbor Month in September, Mayor Sumbul Siddiqui collaborated with […]
‘Turkeys’ app invites Cambridge to consider our gobbly neighbors
Jeff Fossett had never seen a turkey fly. He hadn’t actually seen a turkey at all until he moved to Cambridge nearly a decade ago. Read more Central Square’s ‘Eleanor’ a Plum production But when the postdoc researcher moved into a ground floor apartment on Ware St. in Mid-Cambridge, he was visited by turkeys at […]
The worm stomping wood turtle is smarter than you think
Once upon a time, the wood turtle was the most common freshwater turtle in eastern Massachusetts. Today it is in severe decline. Naturalists Louis Agassiz and Henry David Thoreau documented their observations of this reptile in the mid-1800s. Read more This Cambridge physical therapist keeps dancers on their toes But these turtles have been around […]
Runners of the world, unite! Racers establish the People’s Republic of Danehy Park, if only for an evening
The third annual Guinea Pig One Mile race drew 175 runners — though none were actual guinea pigs — to the track at Danehy Park Saturday. The free run was organized by 25-year old Alex Sharp and his friend Ethan Weiner, 24. Sharp said it wasn’t so much a race as a revolution. “Our generation […]
Resilient red-tailed hawks face new threat
The red-tailed hawk (Buteo jamaicensis) is the most common hawk in the United States, with about three million breeding birds residing in North America today. They are also one of the largest North American birds: up to 24 inches long with a wingspan of nearly four feet. Their excellent eyesight helps them spot movement of […]
The many names of the wood louse
There are quite a few types of wood lice, but the Armadillidiidae family of wood louse is unique in that it can roll up into a ball, or conglobate (pronounced “con-glow-bate”). Many nonscientists have acknowledged this unique trait with their own descriptive names: pill bug, roly poly, basketball bug or curly bug. Read more Winding […]
Pesky rabbits and jumping spiders
A reader asks:Why do rabbits eat plants in my garden but not my neighbor’s garden? Read more Four new films explore war, gender, and crime true and comedic This is an excellent question, but unfortunately there is not an easy answer. It could simply be that you grow plants that are more attractive to rabbits. […]
The once familiar bobolink now in decline
A reader asked me recently about ground-nesting birds. Here is the story of one such bird, the bobolink. Bobolinks (Dolichonyx oryzivorus) breed in open grasslands and prairies. When European settlers arrived in North America, they cleared forests for hayfields, pastures and farms. Bobolinks, native to the Americas, thrived in hayfields, which were plentiful even near […]
If only humans could breathe like yellow-rumped warblers
Mammals, including humans, inhale oxygen and exhale carbon dioxide, which sounds like a fairly simple process. But compared to birds, we’re very inefficient. When we breathe, we inhale oxygen-rich air into our lungs. This fresh air mixes with old oxygen-poor air already in the lungs. When we breathe out, we breathe out this old stale […]