With the joy of birding comes the fear of getting dropped on. Recently, my seven-year-old daughter carefully watched a pair of Canada geese sitting on an old ponderosa pine snag. She was looking for an owl’s nest below, turned to me and wondered: “Why is bird poop white?”

Field Notes from the Montana Natural History Center

Everywhere You Look, Birds Are Dropping Clues

My eyes open at 5:00 a.m. I see my breath billow towards the top of my tent as I sigh at the blaring intrusion of a battery-operated alarm clock. I must hustle if I want any shot at boiling the pot of water necessary for a hot breakfast. Fumbling around for my least stench-ridden set of clothes, the reality slowly creeps into my head: I am a field biologist.

Hare, Kitty, Kitty: Studying Canada Lynx Through Their Prey

Moon dogs have many names: lunar halos, moon rings, or winter rings. Their scientific name is “paraselenae” and they are made visible by a combination of specific circumstances.

'Field Notes:' How 'Moon Dogs' Are Made

A couple of weekends ago, some friends and I got up early to drive into the Flint Creek Range near Anaconda. We planned to hike through an area that we’d been told was home to some 800 elk, 150 big horn sheep, 30 mountain goats, black bear, and moose. We walked up the trail with great anticipation for a day of spectacular wildlife viewing.

When Wildlife Remain Elusive, Follow The Clues

Tracking And Animal Sign

This summer, while watching white-crowned sparrows, pine siskins and Cassin's finches feeding on the sunflower seeds we’d scattered on the rail of the cabin porch, I had the experience of a black-capped chickadee eating out of my hand as I sat, statue-like, palm out, lifted and flat.

A Half-Ounce Black-Capped Chickadee Is A Winter Heavyweight

I've seen white-tailed does and fawns in my yard all spring and summer. But just last week I saw two bucks. Why would bucks show up now, when it seemed that only does and fawns lived in the area? Well, if spring is for the birds, then fall would have to be the season for ungulates.

The Ungulate Mating Calendar Demands Tight Timing

A small dark blur upslope materialized into a loping wolverine, coming straight toward us! Afraid this wolverine wanted to share our lunch, we left our backpacks where they lay, and hurried out of its path.

Wolverines: Wild Weasels Of The Alpine

Lichens are a combination of fungi and algae living together in a symbiotic relationship. In this symbiosis, the fungi and algae benefit from each other. This evolutionary adaptation allows lichens to grow in some incredibly harsh environments: in deserts and in the Arctic, on barren tundra and on bare rock. Lichens grow in such rugged environments that some early naturalists thought they existed on nothing but air and sunlight.

Whether Lichens Conceal Or Reveal Depends On What You're Looking For

Thirty-plus years ago when I was studying wildlife management at Oregon State University, we learned that Ceanothus was a highly preferred forage plant for deer and elk during the winter. I knew that Ceanothus was the genus name of a large group of western shrubs and I even knew enough to recognize a few of the individual species back then.

Ceanothus: Life From The Kiss Of Fire

How devastating are wildfires to deer and elk? Can most of them outrun or outflank a rapidly spreading fire? And what about the survivors when they return to a burned forest? Isn’t their habitat destroyed?

'Field Notes' Explains How Wildfires Impact Deer And Elk

When most people think of the threatened or endangered species of Montana, they tend to focus on the iconic animals of the West: the grizzly bear, the wolf or the Canadian lynx. But there's far less attention placed on the rarest Montana mammal and the only ferret species endemic to North America.

'Field Notes:' It's Not Easy Being A Black-Footed Ferret

Braving horseflies the size of quarters and the searing afternoon sun, I ramble on a steep hillside like a bear, gorging for her long winter's nap. What could inspire such action? Huckleberries, of course. A recent trip to Glacier Park proved I wasn't alone in my obsession.

Huckleberries, Montana's Little Icons, Retain Their Mysteries

Bats are wonderful, mysterious creatures: they swoop gracefully through the night, and sometimes through our nightmares. We fear what we don't understand, and most of us know little about bats. They behave in strange ways: only breeding when it's rainy, giving birth upside down, and sharing as a group the responsibility of nursing young.

Bat Moms Do A Lot Of Hanging Around

Last summer I was helping teach a geology field camp near Dillon. On our way back to the Birch Creek Outdoor Education Center each day, after long hours in the August sun spent identifying and mapping incredible exposures of rock, we would drive past a few crumbling cabins beneath an unweathered cliff face footed by large piles of scree. This was once the town of Farlin – a long-abandoned copper mining camp at the base of the Pioneer Mountains. Shortly after the dawn of the 20th century, it was home to hundreds of men, women, and children. Inextricable from the experience of Montana, ghost towns like this one now dot the landscape they once extracted.

'Field Notes': The Saga Of Farlin, 300 Million Years In The Making

Nature notes and inquiry from the Montana Natural History Center.

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Field Notes from the Montana Natural History Center

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