Animals

Last week I posted an Endangered Species Glossary, discussing what the differences are between an animal that's endangered, threatened, etc.  The next question is, how does an animal fit the criteria for being put on the endangered species list?

It's not as easy as I initially thought it would be.  It takes careful observation and lots of crunching numbers.

For an animal to be considered critically endangered, the animal must be at least an 80% reduction over the last 10 years (or three generations).  For an animal to be considered endangered, the reduction percentage must be at least 50%.  For vulnerable, it's 10%.... read more

As a little kid in a sorta rural area of New Jersey, I loved fireflies.  We'd catch 'em in jars, watch them light up, and set them free.  I moved to California (where they don't have fireflies) in 1997, and then back to the Northeast in 2004.  Since moving back here, I've seen very few fireflies.  At first I thought that maybe Massachusetts was too far north to have fireflies, but even when traveling down to New Jersey or New York, I saw few fireflies.  I kept wondering why.  What happened to all the fireflies?

Today, I stumbled upon a website about the lack of fireflies.  It's true, firefly populations are indeed declining.  I learned that fireflies did typically live in Massachusetts.  (Read about where they live)  But why?  And what can we do about it?... read more

What is Aquaponics? 

It is a closed-looped, symbiotic process involving fish and produce where fish waste provides a food source for the plants and the plants provide a natural filter for the water the fish live in. So that means you can raise your own fish and grow your own produce in a self sustaining nutrient system.... read more

During my last trip to Cape Cod, my husband and I were walking along the beach and we saw these cute little birds all over the place that we hadn't really seen elsewhere.  We took a video of them walking around and then later in our trip we learned that those cute birds are called piping plovers.  These birds are so precious to Cape Codders that some beaches on the Cape are actually closed to protect the breeding habitat of the piping plover!

Piping plovers are shorebirds that migrate to the Cape in the spring from the coasts of the Southern US and Caribbean.  They can also be found in the Great Lakes Region and parts of Canada.

They nest in little depressions in open flats, laying four eggs to a clutch. When the chicks hatch, they can run around and feed themselves within just a few hours.  Impressive, huh?

Piping plovers nesting in the Great Lakes are listed as endangered and piping plovers nesting along the Atlantic Coasts and in the northern Great Plains of the US and Canada are listed as threatened.  In Massachusetts, the plovers are protected under the Federal and Massachusetts Endangered Species Act.

... read more