Category Archives: Life

Living creatures, plants and fungi

A photo of a dragonfly found in W.N.Y. wins a ‘Highly Honoured’ in the 2013 Nature Best Wildlife Photography Competition

You don’t have to travel in order to find good subjects for wildlife photography and competitions!

By pure chance, I found a page on a British wildlife photographer’s blog, showing his award-winning shot of what was, to him, an unusual species of dragonfly but to us in Western New York is a common species. So if — as he writes — he was only able to grab two photos of the ‘halloween pennant’ in question, imagine how much advantage we “locals” have when we can see it and photograph it up close, every summer!

Richard Peters’ photo was taken in Florida but there are certainly plenty “Halloweens” here in Erie County, and by happy coincidence one of my own shots of this species is currently the ‘feature photograph’ at the very top of the ‘Site Index and About Us‘ page on this blog.

See Richard’s photograph here.

White House Releases Strategy to Combat Wildlife Trafficking

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The White House released a National Strategy for Combating Wildlife Trafficking last week in an effort to address the increase in illegal wildlife trade, which threatens wildlife conservation and global security.

The U.S. is one of the world’s largest markets for both legal and illegal wildlife and wildlife products….

….The strategy aims to reduce illegal trade in wildlife not only in the U.S., but around the world by focusing on three main priorities: strengthening enforcement, reducing demand for illegally traded wildlife, and expanding international cooperation and commitment….

Read the full article, from the Wildlife Society

Nebraska Keystone XL Ruling Delivers Big Win for Landowners and Wildlife

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In an exciting development in the fight against the Keystone XL tar sands pipeline, a Nebraska judge on Wednesday struck down a 2012 state law which approved the route of the controversial project through the state. This is a huge win for Nebraska landowners, for clean drinking water, and for all of us who care about protecting America’s wildlife.

….The route approved under the now-void law would have crossed one of the nation’s largest aquifers, the Oglalalla — which provides drinking water for two million people in eight states.

The pipeline route would have also crossed the delicate Sandhills region, a native grasslands area that provides critical habitat to numerous wildlife species, including the whooping crane, greater prairie chicken, the red-winged black bird, and the ring-necked pheasant….

Read the full, important article here, from the National Wildlife Federation.

2013 ‘National Wildlife’ Photo Contest Winners Slideshow

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WHEN NATIONAL WILDLIFE INAUGURATED ITS ANNUAL PHOTO CONTEST 43 YEARS AGO, contestants submitted just a few hundred images, all of them documenting the harmful impact of pollution on wildlife. That year’s Grand Prize winner portrayed a dead, oil-soaked cormorant. This year the editors received more than 32,000 entries in seven categories ranging from Backyard Habitats to Baby Animals. Yet despite their greater diversity, many entries still mirror NWF’s conservation priorities. This year’s Grand Prize winner, for instance, features a polar bear, a species severely threatened by climate change. On the day this bear was photographed, the temperature on northern Canada’s Hudson Bay soared above 90 degrees F during a record-breaking heat wave.

View a slideshow of the winning images here and the stories behind each image are available here.

Great Horned Owls — Nesting Right Now!

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Here in North America, where much of the continent is battling ice, snow and bone-chilling cold, this may seem like a very bad time of year for a bird to nest. But to the great horned owl, February is the ideal month to breed, nest, incubate eggs and rear young….

Read the full article here, from the National Wildlife Federation.

Photographer Records an Epic Battle of Two Bobcats in a Tree

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Rebecca Sabac had an incredible wildlife sighting recently. While driving down Highway 27 in the Everglades, something caught her attention. Up in a dead tree snag, about 30 feet high, sat a cat. With the kindest intentions, she pulled over to see if the cat needed help. This was no ordinary cat, it was [a] bobcat….

See the photos and read the full article, from the National Wildlife Federation.

Crocodiles are able to climb trees, study reveals (including the southern USA)

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As far as discoveries go, this is a somewhat terrifying one, assuming one has a healthy respect for crocodiles on the ground: They can climb and perch in trees.

And they can really climb, with researchers spotting them more than a dozen feet from the ground. While anecdotal reports have placed the reptiles in trees in Mississippi, Colombia, and [in Egypt] along the Nile, only three references to such behavior appear in scientific literature….

Full article, from Fox News.