Science and Nature for a Pie is on Facebook! Visit www.facebook.com/scienceandnatureforapie and click “follow” for photos, facts, and notices about new blog posts! Though winter is here, plenty of animals are still active. And not just the ubiquitous squirrels or sparrows, either. Fox. Owls. Turkeys. They’re still around, hunting for food, making a living; just trying to survive. They prowl the night, or hunker under a bush for shelter […]
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No Comments Last week, we covered bird feeder topics including choosing a feeder, what seeds work, and where feeders should be placed. If you missed it, check the archives. And don’t forget to follow SaNfaP on Facebook! 4. BREAD IS NOT GOOD FOOD FOR BIRDS. Sorry, but it’s true. Bread comes with several problems: it gets moldy, which is not good for birds at all. Second, like bread for humans, it’s really […]
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No Comments Science and Nature for a Pie is on Facebook! Click the “Follow” button for photos, facts, and other goodies. http://facebook.com/scienceandnatureforapie . Local winters can seem like a photo of a parade from a century past: long lines of gray, slightly out of focus, and vaguely depressing. Leaves are long gone, flowers are a memory. Is there any life outdoors in winter? The answer is yes. One of the best ways […]
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No Comments At 65 mph, the car is zipping too quickly down route 95 to observe much, and overcast skies obscure most color. The car passes beneath a light pole. At the top, a bird roughly the size and shape of a football perches, eyes fixed on the grass below. There’s a black line, a “belly band”, across its middle. Nearby is an open patch of grass. Is it a pigeon? A […]
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No Comments It seemed like the right move at the time. Big factories like textile mills in the 18th and 19th centuries needed power, and when there was no such thing as electricity, there was one major source: water. Use the power at hand to make a factory generate products. Build a factory by a river. Dam the river, turn it, shape it, bend it to the needs and turn that enormous […]
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(Photo: http://naturallycuriouswithmaryholland.wordpress.com/2014/11/27/wattles-caruncles-snoods/) I don’t know how that turkey ended up dead on the side of the highway. It’s possible that his tiny mind was occupied with the pursuit of a female. (Human males are prone to similar, sometimes fatal distractions, of course, but that’s another story.) Perhaps he was particularly despondent and, lacking easy access to a nearby bridge, leapt out in front of a tandem trailer. Or perhaps, […]
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Do oysters cause disease? Or, can oysters be the magic bullet that cleans up polluted waters? Which is better for fish habitat: an oyster bed, or one of eel grass? Dr. Robert Rheault, Executive Director of the East Coast Shellfish Growers Association (ecsga.org), discussed those questions in conjunction with the showing of the film “Shell Shocked: saving oysters to save ourselves” at URI recently. The event was sponsored by […]
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Note: SaNfaP is on Facebook! Go to facebook.com/scienceandnatureforapie and click on “Follow” to receive pictures, facts, and more about the natural world. Then suggest that your friends do the same. They’ll thank you. -HM “I take everything away that isn’t a bird, and what’s left is a bird.” Hmmm… if that instruction on bird carving sounds a bit too simple to be true, that’s because it is. And champion […]
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2 Comments Note: SaNfaP is on Facebook! Go to facebook.com/scienceandnatureforapie and click on “Follow” to receive pictures, facts, and more about the natural world. Then suggest that your friends do the same. They’ll thank you. -HM It takes Captain Tom Puckett a moment to decide on the most unusual fish he’s brought aboard the URI research vessel Cap’n Bert. Tall, lanky, and sporting curly gray hair, Puckett has been responsible for […]
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5 Comments It’s dusk. A dirt parking lot (well, more like a clearing of dirt) retains a few cars, and further back there is a small circle of people sporting binoculars. They wear the full palette of the bird watcher’s color wheel: khaki, tattered khaki, dirty khaki, spanking new khaki, and new khaki stressed to look old. (We are nothing if not consistent.) A bearded young man in the circle speaks to […]
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