Wild Life Wonders: Great Blue Heron Rookeries
June 1, 2025Great blue heron’s rookeries can be hard to reach for a good reason. These big birds don’t like intruders, especially during their nesting season....
One Photograph: In the Darnedest Places—NESTS
March 1, 2025Some birds are unshakably consistent in their nesting ways, and good for them, I say. It’s heartening to know that some lives can sustain such constancy, and thrive....
Connecticut River Critters: The Mudpuppy
March 1, 2025Mudpuppies gushing out of fire hydrants onto the streets of Albany, New York....
The 125th Annual Christmas Bird Count
December 1, 2024It’s hard to believe, with our commercialized, extended celebration, that Christmas was banned by the Puritans and did not become a federally recognized American holiday until 1870....
Bank Swallows
December 1, 2024A healthy river system is dynamic and dramatic, and many river critters have evolved to live amidst this energy and change....
One Photograph: The HAPPY Accidents
December 1, 2024Luck: the blessing and the curse. In finding, let alone in photographing any wild and free-willed creature able to absent itself by lying low or swimming, diving, stealing off on foot, or blasting off in flight, you need that blessing....
Wild Life Wonders: The Secret Life of Bumble Bees
December 1, 2024It’s not an accident that the phrase, “busy as a bee” became popular. Bees have always had the reputation for being hard workers by pollinating plants,...
One Photograph: Writ Small
September 1, 2024To some of us, the best birds going are those famous for their speed and predatory punch (the falcons, goshawks, eagles, and the like), while others are most taken by those with the brightest colors (warblers, finches), or the most beguiling songs (the thrushes and some wrens, some sparrows). And to others still—the “listers,” generally—the only birds worth seeing are the rarities....
One Photograph: By EAR
June 1, 2024“You can observe a lot just by watching,” noted the great 20th-century thinker, Yogi Berra; and he might have said with equal perspicacity that you can hear a lot by listening....
Below the Surface: Spawning Below the Surface
June 1, 2024As our days grow longer in the Connecticut River watershed, many a young fish’s fancy turns to love. These spawning fish have unique ways of reproducing....
Connecticut River Critters: The Puritan Tiger Beetle
June 1, 2024One of the many species of beetles that live in the Connecticut River watershed is the Puritan tiger beetle....
Wildlife Wonders: Are Coyotes Living Near You?
June 1, 2024Hiking last summer in Barn Island Wildlife Management Area, a beautiful 1,000-acre preserve in the southeast corner of Connecticut, my eyes spotted movement about fifty feet off to my right in the shadows of the forest....
One Photograph: Three “Wish Birds”
March 1, 2024As a Massachusetts boy who had been seeking out new birds for better than a year, I was possessed by an unwritten “wish list” of some ten or fifteen species I’d tried desperately but failed to see....
Below the Surface: Atlantic Salmon, a New England Icon
March 1, 2024The Atlantic salmon is a near mythical creature, long prized by indigenous people, royalty, anglers, artists, and gourmands....
The Fascinating Life Cycle of Dragonflies
March 1, 2024Warm breezes, the shimmer of light reflected off gentle ripples on the surface of a pond, the melodic trill of summer cicadas, and the translucent glimmer of dragonflies as they perform their aerial ballet—all of these images conjure thoughts of summer in New England....
Wildlife Wonders: Green Herons
March 1, 2024It’s well known by birdwatchers that green herons (Butorides virescens), who are common in the Connecticut River watershed, use their daggerlike bills to seize prey....
Below the Surface: Let’s Not Lose More Fish Species
December 1, 2023The Connecticut River ecosystem has a complex food web below the surface....
One Photograph: Birds? Why BIRDS?
December 1, 2023One day my younger brother put it to me. “How do you get interested in birds?” he asked. “Just how do you get interested in birds?”...
Wildlife Wonders: Here Come the Monarchs
December 1, 2023Each fall, as we all know, tens of thousands of monarch butterflies (Danaus plexippus) fly from the Northeast to the central mountains of Mexico, where they huddle together and overwinter with other monarchs from across the country....
American Shad: The Iconic Fish of the Connecticut River
September 1, 2023Many areas in this country have icon species that add richness to their sense of place. The Texas Gulf Coast is busy working to restore the iconic Kemp’s ridley sea turtle, and we have here in the Connecticut River watershed the American shad (Alosa sapidissima)....
The Most Dangerous Animal in America
September 1, 2023Connecticut is at the infestation epicenter of a beast that kills some 200 Americans a year; injures at least 10,000 others; is annually responsible for billions of dollars in property damage; trashes native ecosystems; and spreads an infection that causes fever, headache, fatigue, and, if untreated, injury to joints, heart, and brain....
In the Darnedest Places: Rails
September 1, 2023In the marsh, the wilderness makes its last stand.” So wrote the eminent New England bird man, Edward Howe Forbush, now more than a century ago....
One Photograph- Where the Sea Breaks Through- at Griswold Point
June 1, 2023“Head for the inlets, where the sea breaks through,” wrote Roger Tory Peterson,* “if you wish to see birds by the hundreds”; and this 14-year-old had dearly wished to do just that. I asked my dad, who had grown up here at the mouth of the Connecticut, and he knew of exactly such an inlet....
Below the Surface- A Fishway for the Tunxis (aka Farmington) River
June 1, 2023Like a tree trunk dividing upward into branches and small twigs, our river systems have incredible complexity. The Connecticut River drains a vast, 11,000-acre watershed with many tributaries. Species of migratory fish ascended most of these, to differing degrees, depending upon which species and which tributary....
Wildlife Wonders: Be a Citizen Scientist and Enjoy the Fun
June 1, 2023Examples of citizen science at work might be as simple and meaningful as sampling water quality in a local stream for the Nature Conservancy or helping wildlife biologists count salmon that are using fish ladders to get around hydro dams and leap upstream to spawn in rivers like the mighty Connecticut River....
A Tenuous Success Story
March 1, 2023Ten meters above the water a herring gull glides and casts a dark shadow that cannot be a shadow, cannot be directly below him nor as cleanly defined in the absent brightness of not-yet-day....
Wildlife Wonders: Blue Jays
March 1, 2023They might be called all sorts of unkind (and unjust) names, like “bully,” “nuisance,” or “thief,” but I still like blue jays....
One Photograph- Great Island
December 1, 2022But from the first few dreamy days of April on well into May, where better to discover springtime than in one’s own patch of cozy, quaint New England woods?...
Peregrine Falcon Recovery
December 1, 2022The word peregrine is derived from pilgrim or wanderer. A fitting name for a species that may travel as much as 15,000 miles in a year to complete its migratory journey....
Helping Those Who Need Help in the Wild
December 1, 2022How many times have you seen an injured animal or bird and wanted to assist it, but didn’t know where to turn?...
One Photograph- The BIG Camera
August 31, 2022But from the first few dreamy days of April on well into May, where better to discover springtime than in one’s own patch of cozy, quaint New England woods?...
Celebratory Ecology- My Appreciation of the Brant
August 31, 2022Streamside walking connects us with the splendors of flowing water on our Water Planet....
Wildlife Wonders- Soaring with Red-Tailed Hawks
August 31, 2022As black bear populations continue to grow in the Connecticut River Valley and beyond, now more than ever there’s a need for people and public officials to work together to sustain a healthy bear population....
Wildlife Wonders- In Awe of White-Tailed Deer
May 31, 2022Years ago, I had a close encounter with a big antlered buck, or male white-tailed deer, that I will never forget....
One Photograph- Last Stand
May 31, 2022But from the first few dreamy days of April on well into May, where better to discover springtime than in one’s own patch of cozy, quaint New England woods?...
Wildlife Wonders- Red Squirrels
February 28, 2022Years ago, I had a close encounter with a big antlered buck, or male white-tailed deer, that I will never forget....
One Photograph- Little Bird, Big Song
February 28, 2022But from the first few dreamy days of April on well into May, where better to discover springtime than in one’s own patch of cozy, quaint New England woods?...
Snowy Owls
December 1, 2021Snowy owls have always fascinated me. Not only are they stunningly beautiful, but I’ve heard they are incredibly fast, powerful predators....
The Hartford Christmas Bird Count
December 1, 2021The Hartford portion of the Audubon Christmas bird count is unlike any other in the Connecticut River Watershed....
Why Do People “Love or Hate” Eastern Coyotes?
September 1, 2021Meet the bobcat, an elusive, captivating animal that is prevalent in the Connecticut River Valley, yet one that many of us—myself included—have rarely seen in the wild....
The Beaver
September 1, 2021It’s hard to believe that a furry rodent could drive exploration of an entire continent, but that is the case with the beaver....
Following the Fishers in Connecticut
May 31, 2021Katerina “Kat” Gillis has dedicated the last two years of her life on a mission to help Connecticut wildlife officials prevent the loss of fishers, a medium-sized animal that inhabits our forests....
Searching for Spruce Grouse
May 31, 2021What a striking bird against the boreal forest greenery. His black breast feathers dipped in pearl white. His back vermiculated with petite black and white stripes that accented the contrast with his mottled brown wings lying flat against his body....
Underwater Frenzy
May 28, 2021It seemed like just another spring day when we stopped at the Salmon River, a tidewater tributary of the Connecticut River that splits the towns of Haddam and East Haddam, Connecticut....
Spring Stunners
March 1, 2021Few birds can match the eye-popping beauty of the male Baltimore oriole or the flying prowess of the ruby-throated hummingbird....
Up and Over, Clearing Obstacles to Reach Habitat
March 1, 2021Historically, each spring throngs of migratory fish from the ocean surged up the Connecticut River and its tributaries as far inland as they were able....
Introducing a Regular Column About Migratory Fish in the Watershed
November 29, 2020Some of the most historical and ecologically-significant migrations of the Connecticut River are missed by most. These are the annual migrations of fish—specifically diadromous fish....
The Elusive Bobcat
November 29, 2020Meet the bobcat, an elusive, captivating animal that is prevalent in the Connecticut River Valley, yet one that many of us—myself included—have rarely seen in the wild....
Living Fossil
September 1, 2020Few fish can rival the longevity or storied ancestry of shortnose sturgeon, a primitive animal that can live up to seven decades or more, and whose ancestors literally swam with the dinosaurs. “Recently, paleontologists found a fossil record, showing remnants of a mass dinosaur killing, and there were sturgeon and paddle fish carcasses, stacked together,” Micah Kieffer, a fisheries research biologist said....
A Great Gathering
September 1, 2020In countless numbers they assemble in the sky, in the quickening September dusk, to perform a swirling synchronized ballet. It is mesmerizing and indescribable; words cannot prepare the viewer....
Lonely Hunter
September 1, 2020Their insistent “KEE-aah” has woken us up at daybreak as they screech across the hayfield trying to scare up breakfast. They’re noisy neighbors, our resident pair of red-shouldered hawks....
The Many Gifts of a Crow
June 1, 2020There are not many creatures in the animal world that can outwit a crow. For that matter, humans have had a tough time outsmarting them, too....
Wildlife Wonders
March 1, 2020As black bear populations continue to grow in the Connecticut River Valley and beyond, now more than ever there’s a need for people and public officials to work together to sustain a healthy bear population....
In Awe of the Osprey
March 1, 2020During the month of March, the onset of spring in New England is revealed by the arrival of a conspicuous coastal and estuarine raptor—the Osprey. It may be blowing hard on Connecticut salt marshes with temperatures hovering in the 40s, but for Osprey, this time is ripe for reproduction....
Bald Eagles of the Connecticut River
March 1, 2020Dead drifting my canoe along a stretch of the upper Connecticut River a few miles upstream of the Wilder Dam, a flash of white against the dark green pine background revealed the perching spot of an adult Bald Eagle....