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The Trip: Benefits of the Big Trip

December 20, 2009 By Leave a Comment

Uluru (Ayer's Rock) - Northern Territories, Australia

Once you have selected your location for your Big Trip, the fun really begins.  I know that I thoroughly enjoy the prep and planning of each and every trip.  Something about the process of planning elevates a simple idea to something of incredible potential.  The trip moves beyond a chance to take some photographs and captures a life of its own.

The Trip becomes opportunities to document a spectacular event, an intricate bit of natural history, a rare species, or a vanishing landscape.  It’s a chance to discover a new world and share it with family, friends, and potentially a much larger audience.  The Trip is a time to create a work of art whether through photography, writing, or a combination of the two.  It is a chance to do something that feels bigger than you.

That’s at least how I feel as I prepare for a trip.  It is an opportunity of a lifetime and something unavailable to someone on a short weekend trip.

So how do we get there and what is different than a weekend visit?  For me, there are three main advantages total immersion, local familiarity, and removal of distractions.

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Deco Fish: An Intimate Portrait of a Bream

December 13, 2009 By 3 Comments

The Turks call it a Çipura.  If I were back home on the west coast of Florida, I’d call it a pinfish.  Scientists call it a Sparus aurata.  Whatever its name, it seems to be curious about me.  Not just one, but a whole school is circling my head as I float breathing pure oxygen 20 feet below the surface of the azure Aegean Sea.

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The Importance of Biodiversity

November 29, 2009 By 1 Comment

Orange-bellied Parrot - With only a few hundred of these parrots left in the wild, how does there presence or absence effect the conservation of biodiversity.

Biodiversity is a major buzzword these days, but my guess is that many people don’t grasp all that is rolled into that single word.  There are multiple measures of biodiversity and yet there is really only one commonly understood definition, the variety of life in any given area or ecosystem.

Yet for scientists, biodiversity can be understood on many levels.  For instance, let’s imagine three forests.  Each forest has 5000 individual birds flying around.  Forest #1 has 100 species of birds, each represented by 50 individuals; Forest #2 has 100 species of birds, 99 of which are represented by 2 individuals and the 100th species represented by 4,802 individuals.  Finally Forest #3 has 1 species with 5000 individuals.

If we are talking strictly about the variety of life, as stated above, then wouldn’t Forests #1 and #2 have the same biodiversity?  If we are talking abundance, well they all have 5,000 individuals.  So what exactly is biodiversity and why is it so important to conservation?  How can we distinguish between these different forests in a more meaningful way?  Let’s dive in and get our hands dirty.

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What is a Species, Part II: Why do we Care?

November 22, 2009 By Leave a Comment

Plumed and Wandering Whistling Ducks - Parry's Lagoon, Western Australia, Australia

Yesterday I spent the day in the company of 4 other excellent birders as we worked our way around Lake Cayuga, into the Montezuma National Wildlife Refuge, and back down the far side of the lake.  Over the course of the day, we tallied up 24 species of the Anatidae family that includes Swans, Geese, and Ducks.  Other birders were also covering the same areas we were and at least 4 more species were seen that we missed.  Two of these species were represented by 3 individuals among a flock of over 8,000 Canada and Snow Geese.  These two species are essentially smaller versions of the Canada Goose (Cackling Goose) and the Snow Goose (Ross’s Goose).

So why did we not spend the time picking through these huge flocks for these few unusual individuals?  What does that mean about my group’s interest in the species concept compared the other groups?  Does any of this matter to the birds themselves?  Ultimately, why do we care about classifying these birds so specifically?

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What is a Species, anyway?

November 15, 2009 By 1 Comment

Once considered a distinct species (Melithreptus laetior), the Golden-backed Honeyeater is now lumped with the Black-chinned Honeyeater (Melithreptus gularis)

Over the past few weeks I have been able to add several new species to my life list mostly because I have begun to pay extremely close attention to the identification of some difficult birds.  Since some of the species I have been looking for are so incredibly difficult to identify, I have begun to wonder about the definition of a species and why do we have this compulsion to classify animals.

Modern taxonomy started with Linnaeus in the 18th century and today we continue to expand on his systematic classification of plants and animals.  Taxonomy is the process of classifying a species within the context of other related species.  Closely related species for example are placed in the same genera while closely related genera are placed in the same family.  On and on it goes up through orders, classes, phyla, and eventually kingdoms.

Could this desire to classify and place each animal in a defined category be motivated by our attempt to seek order out of chaos?   This classification does provide evolutionary context for a species, which can valuable for scientists trying to study any particular species.  First, let’s back up a few steps to the very beginning…

What is a species?

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Hurricane Ike: Impact on Natural Areas

November 8, 2009 By 4 Comments

Debris field after Hurricane Ike - Anahuac National Wildlife Refuge, Anahuac, Texas

With the prospect of a late season hurricane hitting the Gulf Coast later this week, I wanted to post some images from a project I worked on this time last year.  In October 2008, Hurricane Ike slammed into the Texas coast, devastating coastal communities near Houston from Galveston to Sabine Pass and produced significant damage inland as well. The media was inundated with photographs and video of the damage to the coastal towns, but there was very little focus on the natural areas of the coast.  That is where I found my niche…

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Presidential Natural History and Exploration

November 1, 2009 By 1 Comment

Can you imagine reading the following headline in The New York Times?

“Former President Bush near death after exploring unknown Brazilian river”

No?  Sounds beyond absurd right?  Well, in 1914, it would have described Former President Theodore Roosevelt nearly perfectly.

For the past few weeks I’ve been listening to the audio version of the book, The River of Doubt: Theodore Roosevelt’s Darkest Journey by Candice Millard.  The book describes the journey of Roosevelt in 1913 down the totally unknown and unmapped River of Doubt, now the Rio Roosevelt, in South America The book is a fascinating portrayal of a former President who lived life large and advocated a life of hard work, particularly in the outdoors.

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Alley North: Science, Photography, and Subject Welfare

October 25, 2009 By 6 Comments

As you may know, the Florida Everglades are near and dear to me as I spent nearly two years dedicated to my project, Everglades Imagery: Intimate Detail of a Vast Landscape.  I have not spent any significant time in the region for quite a few years so I have planned to spend some time there in January.  As I have been planning this trip, I have spent a lot of time thinking about the experiences I had when I lived in the National Park during the first half of 2005.  One of those experiences was so unique that I thought I’d share it with you today.

On the morning of March 30, 2005, I found myself on an airboat headed out several miles into the open sawgrass prairie of Water Conservation Area 3, an area north of Everglades National Park. I was in the company of two students and their research advisor and we were trailing another couple airboats also loaded with researchers.  Our destination?  The Alley North Rookery.

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