Spotting the spotted wintergreen: Research on rare woodland plants in Ontario
A tagged spotted wintergreen plant (Photo by Amy Wiedenfeld/NCC staff)
As summer approaches, I look forward to getting out into the field. This includes visiting many of the spotted wintergreen populations in Ontario for my PhD research, supported by the Weston Family Conservation Science Fellowship Program. Spotted...
Close encounter with a barred owl
Barred owl at night (Photo by Quincin Chan/NCC staff)
This blog was written by Damien Cheung (with the help of his mom, Quincin Chan). I went to Arrowhead Provincial Park in Ontario for the Fire and Ice Night event with my family on a weekend in January and stayed in a cabin in the park. We had...
And owl…will always…love you!
A barred owl perched on scaffolding on a roof that’s being re-done. (Photo by Rebecca Clarke)
As an avid nature lover, I am constantly in awe of the beauty and diversity of the natural world, but there's one species that holds a special place in my heart: barred owl. Have you ever heard the distinctive call of a barred owl at night and...
Hop into the new year with these Canadian lagomorphs
Eastern cottontail (Photo by Alain Mochon, CC BY-NC 4.0)
Rabbits are one of the most easily observed species in my suburban neighbourhood. Even during winter here in southern Ontario, you can find hints of their presence. My two young kids gleefully alerted me to a set of eastern cottontail tracks...
A close encounter with ticks that I won't forget
Adult deer tick (Photo by Scott Bauer/Wikimedia Commons)
Anyone who knows me knows I am not a morning person, by any stretch of the imagination. But on this particular morning, it was 8 o’clock, and I’d already stripped the bed and sofa covers, done a load of laundry, and taken a long, hot...
Leaves like a familiar face
The breathtaking Backus Woods in Ontario. One of the best examples of Carolinian old-growth forest in the country. (Photo by Ann Tipper and Zach Melnick)
When you think of wild spaces filled with tall, deciduous hardwood trees tilting in warm winds, frost-free days late into the fall, an abundance of reptiles and amphibians shifting between swamps and marshes, and words like sassafras, Kentucky...
Check out these amazing finds from the 2022 Big Backyard BioBlitz
Monarch butterfly on Joe-pyeweed (Photo by NCC)
Over the July 28–August 1 weekend, thousands of volunteers joined the Nature Conservancy of Canada’s (NCC’s) annual Big Backyard BioBlitz. Together, we were able to contribute a total of over 50,000 observations of more than...
Hey [name I don’t yet know], mind if I take a picture of you?
Two crane flies on a wild bergamot leaf (Photo by Wendy Ho/NCC staff)
The other week while checking out the wild bergamot in my backyard for powdery mildew, I noticed a big insect perching motionless on the plant’s long serrated leaf. I thought it was a giant daddy long-legs (aka cellar spider). Upon closer...
The buzz about bumble bees
Western bumble bee (Photo by sydcannings, CC BY-NC 4.0)
The western bumble bee is a medium-sized (measuring one to two centimetres in length) bumble bee, with a band of yellow hair across its thorax (the area between its head and abdomen), in line with the base of its wings. It also most often has a...
Intertidal life
An intertidal zone on Clayoquot Island (Photo by NCC)
Water flows in the fabric of West Coast culture. For those of us steeped in the maritime life, resisting the pull of the ocean is as futile as trying to still the tides. In my twenties, I experimented with living away from coastal British...
