This, like many things lately, is a different type of content from The Wild Life. Who knew you could learn so much about authentic expression and finding yourself from producing a podcast? In this episode, I go out for a birding excursion with a major time constraint and ponder on my relationship with time itself. … Continue reading On Birding and Time
“Sharks, Lies, and Videotape: A content analysis of 32 years of Shark Week documentaries” is a stunningly comprehensive report on the ways in which Shark Week, arguably the largest source of shark information consumed by the masses, mixes real science with spectacle and salacious stories.
Life is full of branching points on the tree of animal life. The coelom is the next stop on our journey of how to build an animal..
There really is no shortage of ways to build an animal, but there are rules to be followed. What better place to start than the beginning?
There really is no shortage of ways to build an animal, but there are rules to be followed---rules with deep roots.
Horseshoe crabs are a biological oddity, a valuable one at that, especially to drug companies who look to them to ensure medicines and vaccines are safe for all of us. And the key is in their blood.
The Mola mola is one bizarre looking fish, but they are more than meets the eye. Learn more in this short episode from The Wild Life!
In 2021, we produced 41 episodes (42 if we get this next one out in the next 3 days) with 12,635+ downloads across 78 countries!
2021 was, indeed, a year. Now, it's finally almost over with a new one about to begin. I decided to sit down and take a look at some of The Wild Life's stats for the year as a way to reflect on what worked, what didn't, and what to keep going into the future. Here … Continue reading The Wild Life’s 2021 Blog Top 10’s
How fast can fish really be? Faster than you'd probably expect.
Not every reindeer has a red nose. After all, that's part of what makes Rudolph so special—and he's not alone.
"Do fish blink?" is a reasonable question to ask, but it raises another— “do fish have eyelids?”
When you get hot, you sweat. When Elephants get hot, well, they don't sweat. So what's a 13 foot tall and 13,000-pound animal to do?
In her article for The New York Times, “Dead Forests and Living Memories”, Helen paints a picture of a lost landscape, the struggles of restoration and conservation efforts, and the continued threat of globalization on native ecosystems.
Teaching about abstract concepts like antibiotic resistance can be a difficult undertaking. That's why it's important to utilize a variety of comprehension strategies, especially at the secondary level. The attached google slide presentation provides examples of two of my favorites: the Discussion Web, and Intra-Act. Discussion Web It is a cooperative strategy in which students … Continue reading Comprehension Strategies: Antibiotic Resistance
Dragonflies and Damselflies are both super similar to each other, but there are some key differences! (most of the time)
These two little woodpecker species are notorious for their visual similarity, but there are some key differences that can tip you off!
The Tawny Emperor (Asterocampa clyton) Butterfly may be beautiful, but their food sure isn’t. Finding an adult on a flower isn’t likely. Instead, you’ll find them on dead animals, poop, mud, and sap, slurping up broths of minerally goodness.
This here is a froghopper. They can jump distances over 100 times their body length, accelerate at 4000 m/s^2 (nearly 9,000 mph), and experience 400 Gs while doing it. For context, a typical human could withstand no more than 9 Gs of force, and the average bullet travels at nearly 2000 mph. Where are the … Continue reading The Froghopper | DFS #11
Have a nature question you want to be answered? Come on the show to have it answered by Devon (and maybe even a special guest) Comment below or email your questions to hello@thewildlife.blog
This is not a Turkey-tail. It’s a false one! Stereum ostrea, or False Turkey-tail, is a plant pathogen and wood decay fungus. The species name, ostrea, comes from Oyster in reference to its shape. It really is a pretty little fungi 🍄
The wind doesn’t always blow, and the sun doesn’t always shine—and not always equally or consistently. Even in the sunniest of places, like deserts, “the amount of sunlight can vary from minute to minute.” (The Economist, 2014) On the flipside, demand itself is also irregular, and times of highest demand won’t always match with highest … Continue reading Grid-Scale Storage
Fairly certain this is an American Nursery Web Spider (Pisaurina mira). This was one that caught me super off guard while rummaging through a portion of priory while leading a Tiny Nature hike with @hikehoppers. P. mira is most well known for its sexually cannibalistic behavior and extensive use of the silk web in mating. Before … Continue reading Dispatches From Somewhere 8: American Nursery Web Spider
Weird plants are the best finds. On a camping trip this August with my brother, we came across a bunch of Purple Pitcher Plant (Sarracenia purpurea) in a bog! Similar to the Venus Fly Trap, it too is a carnivorous plant, trapping insects inside its pitcher. One of my favorite things about them actually is, … Continue reading Dispatches From Somewhere #7: Pitcher Plants
One of my favorite finds from our trip to #Oahu, an Indo-Pacific Rock-Boring Urchin (Echinometra mathaei).
Giraffe Social Circles and What They Mean for Conservation November 14th, 2021 Photo Credit: Steven Gerner CC BY-SA 2.0 What do Sabrina the Teenage Witch, Gilmore Girls, and Giraffes have in common? The women are the stars of the show. Despite being one of the most popular animals on Earth, giraffes are not studied as … Continue reading Giraffes Need Friends, Too
Short for hydraulic fracturing, fracking was introduced into the oil and gas industries in the late 1940s as a method of extracting petroleum or natural gas. Nowadays, it is estimated that “90% of the natural gas wells in the United States” (Dunlap, 2019, 97) employ fracking as a method of extraction. To put it simply, … Continue reading No Fracking Way
Any major socioeconomic transition is going to have its costs and trade off’s, and renewable energies are certainly no exception. A major argument regularly used against renewable energies is their high cost in comparison to their more traditional, fossil fuel-based counterparts. Many of these costs, however, are not so much an artifact of the cost … Continue reading Why is Renewable Energy So Expensive?
Before you sit down with us to learn all about platypuses, join us for a glimpse Behind the SCiENcES with Dr Gilad Bino. Dr Bino is passionate about conservation and science. He seeks to address the ongoing biodiversity crisis by understanding the underlying processes that shape biodiversity at multiple spatial and temporal scales to inform … Continue reading Behind the SCiENcES with Dr Gilad Bino
First, an ask: please excuse the audio quality, and focus on the content 🙂 Devon Bowker here, I wasn't originally going to post this. This was a recorded conversation that we had when talking about the reasons behind our upcoming series 'Us', an ongoing series examining our connections and impact on the environment, sustainability, and … Continue reading Series Preview: Why Us?
