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Field Notes

English, Nature/Natural sciences, 1 season, 55 episodes, 3 hours, 21 minutes
About
Nature notes and inquiry from the Montana Natural History Center.
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The Mysterious Call of Great Horned Owls

Throughout history, people have been captivated by owls. There are 260 species of owls across the planet. They can be found on every continent except Antarctica.
9/18/20244 minutes, 16 seconds
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Thunder Chickens

I’ve always been fascinated by ruffed grouse. For such a small, skittish-seeming bird, they have a hugely outsized presence in the soundscape of the forest.
9/11/20243 minutes, 35 seconds
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Of Nighthawks & Memories

It’s easy to see how the nighthawks’ idiosyncrasies make them a crowd favorite, but what I love most about them are the cherished memories they resurrect.
9/6/20244 minutes, 19 seconds
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Standing Alone; Moving Together

A lone Sandhill Crane stood at the edge of the marsh feeding, its bill dipping repeatedly through the mud with a series of rapid, steady bursts reminiscent of a sewing machine’s insistent motion.
9/4/20244 minutes, 43 seconds
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Buried Breath

Earthworms use their entire body to breathe. Burrowed deep in the ground — slow moving, slow metabolizing — their long frames tighten and relax and pull the air they need from soil.
9/4/20240
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Oriole Nests: Relics of Summer

They looked like bulging stockings decorating a mantle at Christmastime. They were certainly gifts of a sort for our winter-weary senses. These were the unique nests of Bullock's Orioles.
8/28/20245 minutes, 28 seconds
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The Dinosaur in the River

In the natural world, how to persist—how, even, to improve—in the face of limits and uncertainty can be a punishing question.
8/21/20245 minutes, 36 seconds
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Where Do Forest Seedlings Come From?

As I drove home from Missoula, I was alarmed to see wildfire smoke across the freeway from my house in Frenchtown. Even more concerning was the convoy of pickups pulling stock trailers.
8/14/20240
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Snake Serendipity

We have three species of garter snakes in Montana. The snake couple I saw were the terrestrial species, Thamnophis elegans, who can lack the colorful markings of the other two.
8/14/20240
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Dermestids, Death, and Pandemic Ponderings

In late 2020 I’m spending mornings masked, working in a lab in the University of Montana Zoological Museum. The museum houses research collections of natural artifacts like skins and skeletons. But behind the scenes museum staff tend a single living collection: a colony of dermestid beetles, the meticulous scavengers that scour flesh from bones before a skeleton can be installed in the museum.
11/1/20235 minutes, 18 seconds
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“Spooky” Turkey Vultures Deserve Respect

Why are they so feared and misunderstood? If a bird popularity contest were held, Turkey Vultures would not fare very well. A spooky bird contest, on the other hand? Dead winner.
10/25/20234 minutes, 29 seconds
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The Wasps Came In To Die

First one, buzzing and bumping into the living room window, who was soon joined by a few sisters. Within an hour, there were more than 40 sinisterly striped yellow jackets (Vespula alascensis) zooming from one window to another in pursuit of light, and I was outnumbered.
10/18/20234 minutes, 21 seconds
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Banding Together

As I watched Rob Domenech, executive director of the Raptor View Research Institute, and his research biologist Brian Busby carefully load the three chicks onto the lift, and heard Harriet’s chirps of protest from above, I considered the importance of this work.
10/11/20234 minutes, 54 seconds
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An Osprey Story: Superpowers, Struggles, & Survival

At Lee Metcalf National Wildlife Refuge, I saw an Osprey dive into the deepest section of white water and emerge with nothing to show for its effort, and then retreat to a cottonwood branch to watch for another opportunity in the dark, boiling water.
10/4/20234 minutes, 36 seconds
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Spotted Tussock Moth: The Fuzzy Orange Spot of Fall

A small spot of orange in the middle of the trail caught my eye. It wasn't a leaf or a berry; it was tiny and moving! As I neared the curious sight, I discovered it was a fuzzy caterpillar.
9/20/20234 minutes, 57 seconds
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What Happens After a Wildfire?

Despite the harsh and stark appearance, all is not lost after a wildfire. In fact, there is much to be found when you look about.
9/15/20235 minutes, 4 seconds
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Journey to the Bighorn Basin

Let me take you on a journey. It’s just a few miles, but over that short distance we’ll be transported not only to a dramatically different landscape, but also back through hundreds of millions of years of Earth’s history.
8/31/20234 minutes, 23 seconds
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Living in Sandhill Crane Country

The first sound we hear these early summer mornings is the prehistoric, other-worldly call of Sandhill Cranes. It rises deep from their impossibly long necks, climbs into the sky, and stretches for miles across the countryside.
8/31/20234 minutes, 39 seconds
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If A Tree Falls...

We’re wandering around the mostly evergreen woods nearby the ghost town of Garnet, Montana. we reach a sunlit clearing: a bright green patch with just a handful of trees.
8/16/20230
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Speed on the Prairie

Usually, pronghorn will dash away when they see a truck coming. However, at times they race toward me, accelerating, seemingly intent on crossing the road ahead of me.
8/9/20230
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Bittersweet: On memory, my mother, and chokecherries

My sister and I struggle to keep up with our mother. Today, we carry gallon-sized Ziploc bags, rolling the nearly-black berries from their stems to our palms to our bags.
8/2/20230
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Coulee Country

This Montana prairie holds a secret. This is coulee country, a landscape peppered with gullies waiting to be explored.
7/19/20230
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Please Don't Touch the Bison

A visitor to the Yellowstone National Park helped with a calf struggling to cross a river. After, the calf began approaching people and cars, hazardous for all concerned.
7/12/20230
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Wondering About Wind

Wind has a way of blowing in and cutting short an adventure. It can ruin a picnic. It can wreak havoc on the best-laid plans. At its worst, it can be dangerous and even deadly. But it also creates the breeze that shakes the leaves of quaking aspen. It carries the seeds of black cottonwood and the wings of Red-tailed Hawks to new destinations.
7/5/20230
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Fungus Flowers

Most plants conduct photosynthesis and make their own food from sunlight, carbon dioxide and water. Fungus flowers, however, cannot conduct photosynthesis, making them not only look bizarre but function in a bizarre manner.
6/28/20234 minutes, 39 seconds
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Terrible & Beautiful (Tyrell's Tufted Jumping Spider)

Tyrell’s tufted, along with most jumping spider species, is not aggressive. Jumping spiders actively hunt their food using their speed, the hunters of the arachnid world.
6/26/20230
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The Dancing Loon: A Close Call

We continue walking, giving the shoreline a wide berth to avoid scaring any loons that might be around. Now we're on the opposite side of the lake and—we see them. Two adult Common Loons. Oh, they're lovely: streamlined, low-slung bodies, perfect for diving. Sleek black heads, red eyes, and characteristic black-and-white coloration that makes it easy to identify them.
6/21/20235 minutes, 3 seconds
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Find the Toads, Count the Toads, Save the Toads

It’s June and I’m in a dreamy meadow deep in the backcountry of Mount Rainier National Park, looking for toads. My mission: find the toads, count the toads, save the toads—in that order.
6/14/20234 minutes, 36 seconds
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Crawfish: Camouflaged and Colorful Crustaceans

Crawdads have specialized cells in their exoskeletons that allow them to change color to adapt to their surroundings. The cells, called chromatophores, work to either concentrate or disperse pigment. Similar cells in chameleons and octopuses allow for a quick color change. But, for crawdads, the process is slower.
6/9/20234 minutes, 22 seconds
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Northern Harriers

Northern Harriers are considered one of the most elusive raptors, and some of the most accomplished wildlife photographers admit how difficult they are to photograph. Male Harriers, with their white underside and opaque gray-back plumage, seem to be even more challenging to photograph than the brown and much larger females. For that reason, many birders and photographers call male Harriers “Gray Ghosts.”. One moment they’re in your viewfinder, the next, they’re gone.
5/31/20234 minutes, 20 seconds
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Is That A Moose?

I was delighted to observe such an unusual visitor, but he had a bigger surprise for me. As I watched him forage through my yard he did something unique I had never seen, heard of, nor even imagined!
5/26/20235 minutes, 22 seconds
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Tufted Evening Primrose

Tufted evening primrose is one of the loveliest native plants found in dry climates across western and central North America. Its botanical name translates to “wine seeker, densely clumped,” which is apt for a low-growing, mounded plant with very fragrant, citrus-scented flowers.
5/17/20234 minutes, 43 seconds
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We Speak In Smells

I could not articulate what pulled me off the trail, but I followed the urge all the way to the base of the towering tree, a western redcedar. I stood, neck bent back to take in its shading canopy of soft, scaly leaves. We greeted one another in an exchange that predates my ancestors taking human form: the mammalian exhale of carbon dioxide and inhale of oxygen from the trees.
5/10/20235 minutes, 32 seconds
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Sandhill Spring

On this lazy Sunday just outside Missoula, I can hear only two cranes from the former flock. Perhaps these are the late sleepers, the teenagers, left by the wayside as the larger family group launched back to the migratory grind and headed north to their breeding grounds. Spring is the season of courtship, and what I’m listening to may well be the first pairing of lovers who will mate for life.
4/19/20234 minutes, 18 seconds
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Deathwatch Beetle

Found in the eastern portion of the United States, deathwatch beetles typically inhabit the hardwood timbers of old buildings or the decaying wood of very old trees. The larvae bore into the wood, feeding for anywhere from one to ten years before pupating and emerging as an adult. And while their wood-boring lifestyle can weaken the structural integrity of some infested buildings, if you believe the superstition, that’s the least of your worries.
4/16/20231 minute, 38 seconds
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Sandhill Cranes

I’ll never forget the first time I heard the call of a Sandhill Crane. It was early June, and I was halfway through an eight-day backpacking trip in the Sapphire Mountains. Sitting in a meadow one evening and refilling my bottle at the oxbow of a quiet creek, I began to hear a sound unlike anything I’d ever heard. It was part elephant, part jackhammer, and part squeaky door hinge. One thing seemed clear: no way had that sound been made by a modern animal, and certainly not by a bird.
4/5/20235 minutes, 26 seconds
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Beaver Neighbor

I noticed a wide flat tail propelling the shadowy animal forward, and suddenly its head popped up above the water. Two large black eyes considered its surroundings as it meandered upstream. I watched excitedly through my binoculars as it dove smoothly under willow roots and resurfaced near a boulder. After two years of living along this creek, I had finally seen the ever-elusive beaver! I hadn’t really known what beaver signs to look for though as just a novice beaver enthusiast.
3/26/20234 minutes, 7 seconds
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Jumping Spider Paddle Battle

I love paddling my kayak, to get away even for just an hour or two. Sitting in my kayak one morning on a detention pond close to home, I watched a small, tan spider hopping on my paddle. I quickly took a picture, hoping to identify it later. Before I could enjoy watching this new-to-me spider too much, however, another spider—large, black, and hairy—emerged from under my paddle, ran up to the smaller spider, bit it, and started dragging it off!
3/25/20234 minutes, 1 second
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Keeper of the Woods (Pine Squirrels)

Then, it happens. A pine squirrel wakes up. First one, then another, then three hundred, then five thousand, and before long the evergreen canopy is buzzing with their banter. From that moment forward, my pre-dawn slyness is a distant memory. There is no unwatched, uncriticized movement in these woods anymore. Any step I take is met with angry feedback from above.
3/24/20234 minutes, 44 seconds
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The Gall of Kinnikinnick

We pause our berry gathering to more closely examine the kinnikinnick. On many parts of the shrub, the smooth, leathery green leaf margins are accented by bulbous, yellow-red growths. Unmistakably, these are galls, tumor-like growths of the leaf tissue. Each gall was induced by a manzanita leaf-gall aphid (Tamalia coweni), a female aphid who probes along the leaf to form a tiny home.
3/20/20234 minutes, 42 seconds
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Meet the Rubber Boa, Montana's Tiny Boa Constrictor

The cottonwoods and alders on the left and ponderosas and perennial grasses on the right framed the trail as if it were the subject of a painting, drawing our eyes up the valley. Mary was celebrating the variety and vigor of the riparian understory when I saw Iris sidestep a stick ahead of us. Iris leaves no stick unturned, so my curiosity was piqued. As we approached, I could see it was a rubber boa!
3/19/20235 minutes, 7 seconds
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Grasshopper Glacier

As a teenage boy on the farm in Iowa, I experienced a horde of grasshoppers while unloading a wagon of oats. The surface was covered with grasshoppers! It was not difficult to grab one, and when I did, it would “spit tobacco.” I have since learned that spitting a dark liquid is a defense mechanism. Memories like this one have stuck with me, and in part fueled my interest in the mass of grasshoppers that somehow ended up in Rocky Mountain glaciers.
3/18/20230
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Freaky Fungus with an Affinity for Fruit

You’ve probably seen it before, even if you didn’t know exactly what you were looking at: some black, woody growth on cherry or plum trees. Black knot fungus, or Apiosporina morbosa, is a fungal agent that invades young trees of the Prunus genus, including most hard-pitted, fruit-bearing trees like cherries, plums, apricots, and peaches.
3/17/20234 minutes, 49 seconds
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Belted Kingfisher Community Science: Aerial Ramming of a Nest Bank

For seven years, I pursued the jay-sized birds on Rattlesnake Creek in Missoula, Montana. That quest to observe a nesting pair turned out to be challenging. Belted kingfishers are loners, skittish, and fiendish to study. However, the rewards of a difficult journey are many—like finding something never recorded before.
3/13/20235 minutes, 4 seconds
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Elk Neighbors

Straightening the quilt on one of the cots, I glimpsed movement through a window and rushed - barefoot - to the narrow deck to see what it was: a herd of 200 elk galloping along each rise and dip of the valley below the treehouse.
3/12/20234 minutes, 49 seconds
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A Garden for Wildlife

Spending time in nature with its wild creatures has always been a way for me to rejuvenate my creativity, to fill my soul with happiness, tranquility, and relaxation. A way to let go of stress and worries, even for just a little bit. Recently I wondered how I could give back to the wildlife that makes itself at home around our five acres, to help it co-exist and thrive. Wanting to keep this little ecosystem as natural as possible, I came across the web page of the National Wildlife Federation’s Garden For Wildlife.
3/11/20234 minutes, 7 seconds
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Mountain Goats: Fond of Salt, Snow, & Steep Slopes

Mountain goats, which aren’t actually goats but are considered “goat-antelopes” and whose closest relatives live in the Himalayas, prefer to live above the treeline and in high alpine meadows, beyond the usual range of predators like mountain lions. Beyond the range of many humans, too. They are one of the least-studied large mammals in North America.
3/10/20233 minutes, 27 seconds
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Gluttony, Wisdom, and Wonder

I was ahead of my husband when I spotted a bear standing in clear view, close by on the gentle slope that led away from the trail. I stopped and smiled as my brain tried to make sense of why the bear was so short and broad…and why were its legs and back darker than its tawny sides? My jaw dropped when the synapses connected. It wasn’t a bear. It was a wolverine!
3/9/20234 minutes, 30 seconds
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How I Fell in Love with Bitterroot Plants

One June about seven years ago, my husband brought home a bitterroot plant. It was stuck to his irrigation shovel by the clay soil from the hay fields near our house in the Helmville Valley. I marveled at the beautiful hot pink blooms and planted them in the flower bed, where they rarely reappeared.
3/6/20234 minutes, 11 seconds
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A Wondrous Pandemonium (Great Horned Owls)

Early in April, I had just spied a fox squirrel eating pine seeds from a ground cache when I felt a shadow gliding overhead on silent wings. I looked up yet saw nothing. When I looked back, there was an indistinct gray form, an apparition, in the shadows where the squirrel had been. The apparition turned its head toward me and peered with two large golden eyes. Tufted horns now held erect confirmed it was a Great Horned Owl.
3/5/20234 minutes, 12 seconds
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Birds of an (Iridescent) Feather Flock Together

What do tree swallows, starlings, pigeons, hummingbirds, and mallard ducks all have in common? Besides being birds, of course, each of these species sports iridescent feathers that glimmer and shine when the light hits them.
3/4/20234 minutes, 15 seconds
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The Plains Spadefoot Toad: Singer, Burrower, and Essential Part of the Water Cycle

As spring rains tame the dust of the Montana plains and rinse the grasses briefly to green, spadefoot toads (Spea bombifrons) will stir for the first time in a year and clamber from burrows beneath the soil’s frostline to the surface. There they will congregate in pools of snowmelt and rainwater, and they will sing.
3/3/20234 minutes, 17 seconds
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A Diving Songbird?

After several long moments the bird erupted out of the water, landing on its stone while droplets rolled off its tightly woven feathers, a look of nonchalance twinkling in its chocolate-brown eye. I blinked. A diving songbird? I thought I knew water birds: ducks, ospreys, bald eagles, kingfishers. But here was a robin-sized bird using river stones as diving boards, doing who knows what in currents too strong for me to cross.
2/27/20234 minutes, 44 seconds
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I Have a Window, and I See...Anting?

One warm, sunny day I saw a crow squatting low on a large ant hill, head high, wingtips outstretched and fluttering softly on the ground. I had never seen this behavior before and I wondered if she might be injured. I watched her with concern before she stood up, briefly picked at her feathers, and flew away.
2/26/20233 minutes, 50 seconds
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Close Encounter with a Red-Winged Blackbird

One afternoon while balcony-bird-watching, my attention was captured by a tiny black speck aggressively pursuing much larger birds, undeterred by the threat of sharp beaks and deadly talons. With equal measure, he intimidated crows, Osprey, eagles, vultures, and herons away from his territorial claim along the riverbank. With my binoculars and guidebook in hand, I identified him as a male Red-winged Blackbird after he flashed the telltale red and yellow striped epaulets on his shoulders, and loudly sang, “CONK-LA-REEEEE!” when he settled on a shoreline tree branch.
2/25/20235 minutes, 47 seconds