Birds
Rare Copy of Audubon's Birds of America for Sale
John James Audubon's Birds of America holds the record as the world's most expensive book. Not to buy, but to publish. Audubon had to raise more than $115,000 in the early 1800s ($2 million in today's dollars) for a print run of the multi-volume, large (39 x 26 inches) work that contained 435 hand-...
September 10, 2010 |
By Sarah Zielinski
A Close Encounter With the Rarest Bird
Newfound negatives provide fresh views of the young ivory-billed woodpecker
September 2010 |
By Stephen Lyn Bales
Don't Get Strung Along by the "Ropen" Myth
Growing up, I often heard that there might still be dinosaurs living in some distant, tropical jungle. In television documentaries and some of the less-reputable "science" books carried by my elementary school library, rumors of long-lost prehistoric creatures abounded, and I could not help but hop...
August 16, 2010 |
By Brian Switek
Should Oiled Birds Be Cleaned?
Dead birds smothered in icky, gooey brown oil are the iconic images of most any oil spill, including the ongoing one in the Gulf. Even a small amount of oil can kill a bird. Oil sticks to feathers, destroying their waterproofing ability and exposing the bird to extremes of temperature. And ingested...
June 11, 2010 |
By Sarah Zielinski
Extinct Bird Key to Dating Australia’s Oldest Cave Art
When humans first set foot on Australia’s northern shores, a bird three times the height of an emu, would have been on their menu
June 02, 2010 |
By Brendan Borrell
Seven Endangered Seabirds Around the World
In the June issue of Smithsonian, Michelle Nijhuis documents the efforts to restore Atlantic puffins to the Maine coast after their almost complete disappearance at the beginning of the 20th century. Puffins aren't a threatened or endangered species, but the techniques developed to restore them to ...
June 01, 2010 |
By Sarah Zielinski
A Puffin Comeback
Atlantic puffins had nearly vanished from the Maine coast until a young biologist defied conventional wisdom to lure them home
June 2010 |
By Michelle Nijhuis
Squawking Duets of Puerto Rican Parrots
Last Friday, David Logue, an old friend and biologist from the University of Puerto Rico-Mayagüez took me out to see the island’s imperiled parrots and explain how deciphering their duets could improve efforts to save them.The Puerto Rican parrot (Amazona vittata) is the only extant parrot native t...
May 18, 2010 |
By Brendan Borrell
The Little Owls That Live Underground
Burrowing owls can thrive amid agricultural development and urbanization—so why are they imperiled?
May 13, 2010 |
By John Moir
X-Rays Give a New Look at Archaeopteryx
Scientists have known about the feathered dinosaur Archaeopteryx for over a century and a half, but scientists are using new techniques to get a better look at this creature and its close relatives. Within the past few months alone, paleontologists have described how they have used laboratory techn...
May 12, 2010 |
By Brian Switek
Waiting (and Watching) for the Eggs to Hatch
Because I live in an apartment in the city, there's zero chance I'll ever look out my window and watch a bird build a nest or tiny eggs hatch inside. My backyard is a concrete wall. But I can watch nests all over North America through nest cams.The Cornell Lab of Ornithology is a great place to sta...
May 12, 2010 |
By Sarah Zielinski
Bald Eagles Reveal Complexities in Saving Wildlife
Bald eagles have made a remarkable comeback. They were nearly wiped out in the mid-twentieth century due to DDT (the chemical causes female birds to lay eggs with thin shells), but following the 1970s ban on the chemical, the birds have recovered so well they were taken off the Endangered Species L...
May 04, 2010 |
By Sarah Zielinski
Exceptional Fossils Record Dinosaur Feather Changes
Over the past decade and a half paleontologists have found the remains of numerous feathered dinosaurs, but, as announced in this week's edition of Nature, a new pair of specimens may show how the feathers of some of these dinosaurs changed as they grew up.Among birds, feather growth is relatively ...
April 29, 2010 |
By Brian Switek
Bringing a Dryptosaurus Back to Life
In reaction to my post about Dryptosaurus the other week, paleo-artist Michael Skrepnick told me about the efforts of his colleague Tyler Keillor to create a fleshed-out restoration of the dinosaur. I immediately e-mailed Tyler about the project, and he was kind enough to answer a few of my questio...
March 22, 2010 |
By Brian Switek
"Bird" Wrists Evolved Among Dinosaurs
If there is one persistent gripe that paleontologists have with dinosaurs on screen, it is that their hands are usually wrong. From Tyrannosaurus to Velociraptor, predatory dinosaurs are time and again shown with their hands in a palms-down position, something that would have been anatomically impo...
March 03, 2010 |
By Brian Switek
A New Use for Blacklights: Finding Dinosaur Feathers
Since 1996 paleontologists have found so many feathered dinosaurs that it has been impossible to keep up with them all. There are scores of exceptionally preserved specimens that have yet to be fully studied and published upon, but, according to a new study in PLoS One, there is still plenty to le...
February 24, 2010 |
By Brian Switek
Not Everyone is Happy With Feathered Dinosaurs
Time and again I have used this blog to describe what I think is one of the most fascinating recent discoveries in paleontology: that birds are dinosaurs.Not everyone is happy with this fact, though. The blog io9 recently posted sample images from a feathered dinosaur protest group who prefer their...
February 18, 2010 |
By Brian Switek
New Commentary Stirs Dino-Bird Brouhaha
The chicken on the table, the pigeon on the street, the parrot in the zoo: all of them are living descendants of dinosaurs. Over the past ten years a flood of fossil evidence, from evidence of bird-like breathing apparatus to remnants of pigments in preserved feathers, has confirmed beyond a reason...
February 16, 2010 |
By Brian Switek
Winter Birds: Saved by the Suet?
There's nothing like 30 inches of heavy, sticky snow to concentrate a flock of birds at a bird feeder. I've seen more than a dozen different species at my backyard feeder since the storm hit. I like to think all that seed and suet is helping them survive a miserable winter, but is it true?Apparent...
February 08, 2010 |
By Laura Helmuth
Dinosaurs, Now in Living Color
For the first time ever, paleontologists can look at dinosaurs in color.In last week's issue of the journal Nature, scientists described the discovery of melanosomes, biological structures that give feathers their color, in the wispy "dinofuzz" of the small theropod Sinosauropteryx. Not only did ...
February 05, 2010 |
By Brian Switek
