Recently in Wildlife
Wildlife:
This lizard isn't just a pleasant companion on walks; it's one of the niftiest evolutionary curiosities the desert has to offer.
Botany:
A sea of sagebrush may appear monotonous to the casual observer, but it turns out sagebrush is a pretty complex thing.
Wildlife:
Woodrats are popularly called "packrats," and with good reason. They're forever collecting little pieces of their surroundings.
Commentary:
The deadly, highly contagious disease affects dozens of animal species, including coyotes. The virus is mainly spread through contact with infected bodily fluids, urine among them.
Commentary:
Few wild animals inspire in people the complex mix of affection and loathing that coyotes do. That's a shame.
Golden Green:
Wherein the author goes looking for gray whales and gets hooked by 19th-c. sailor-writer Richard Henry Dana.
Botany:
The deserts are largely unexplored, in a biological sense: much of our deserts' biological diversity is yet to be discovered and described. It's a floristic frontier out there.
Wildlife:
Unlike the six or so other rattler species in the California deserts, which possess the standard rattlesnake toxin that causes widespread internal hemorrhaging, the Mojave green adds a neurotoxin to the mix.
Commentary:
We have nothing to worry about from Brown Recluses in California. At least that's what the debunkers say. But even though those debunkers are correct, the situation is slightly more complicated than the facts might lead you to believe.
Golden Green:
Rep. Joe Baca doesn't understand that the Endangered Species Act actually saves humans from their worst impulses--that's a good thing.
Commentary:
It's no secret that wild things live in California's cities, but our non-human neighbors will reflect the landscape that was there before they were built.
Wildlife:
There's some good news for fans of the Peninsular bighorn sheep: the iconic desert critter's numbers seem to be up this year, at least in the environs of Anza Borrego Desert State Park.
Wildlife:
State officials this week identified what's behind the death of squirrels in the San Bernardino Mountains: mange.
'Slake' Video Project Puts Heat on LADWP Over Owens Valley
The story of the Owens Valley Water War is usually told in the past tense, but it still unfolds today, a century later. And a forthcoming video series intends to bring us all up to speed.
Watch
- Ballot Brief
The latest about elections in Southern California and across the state. - Rewire
Tracking renewable energy in California. - The Back Forty
News and views on land use, wildlife, and environmental issues in California. - Confluence
The latest in stories related to the revitalization of the Los Angeles River.
