From Weed to WonderPhoto Essay 03.11.2023Once dismissed as an underwater nuisance, scientists are beginning to see seagrass meadows as vital to marine and coastal health.
What Conservation Sounds LikeArticle 02.17.2023New bioacoustic tools are revolutionizing scientific research and enabling much quicker conservation efforts around the globe.
Washington’s Runaway Snow GeeseArticle 01.24.2023Mae West said too much of a good thing is wonderful. But she’d never seen the beautiful, marauding snow geese that swoop in each fall to take over Washington State’s Skagit Valley.
Making Nature Less PredictableArticle 12.02.2022In their fight against the homogenization of nature, scientists and farmers are walking well-worn paths and using innovative approaches to help bring native pollinators back to California.
A Way Forward with WolvesArticle 09.10.2022Washington state’s long-running conflict between wolves and ranchers mirrors our society’s bigger ideological rifts. Some are trying to bridge the gap—using both horse and technology.
The Saguaro SolutionArticle 08.18.2022Can a massive effort to replant cacti in the Sonoran Desert restore an ecosystem ravaged by fire?
Past the SaltArticle 07.14.2022In San Francisco’s salty South Bay, an ambitious wetlands restoration project is seeking to balance a return to the ecological past with the realities of a changing future.
Atonement in the KitchenArticle 06.03.2022One way to make sense of the senseless slaughter of roadkill? Salvage it for food.
The Tale of the Trojan TroutArticle 02.21.2022Can the introduction of a modified invader save the West’s native fish?
City Owl, Country OwlSpotlight 01.21.2022Unlike their more iconic cousins, diminutive northern pygmy owls occasionally manage to raise families in urban forests—some little more than a stone’s throw from the local café.
When Turtles FlyArticle 11.30.2021A massive human-assisted migration lands stranded sea turtles back in warmer seas.
Bringing out the DeadArticle 10.28.2021By sinking a wide array of carcasses into the deep ocean and studying what turns up when they fall, scientists are learning about some of the world’s most exotic scavengers and the roles they play in the darkness.
A River’s Right to FlowArticle 10.22.2021Indigenous communities and conservationists around the world are challenging the view of water as a human commodity, and fighting to keep this precious resource in the ecosystems it sustains. Can the same approach work in the arid Southwest?
Letters Between TreesArticle 09.09.2021With a pandemic and record-breaking fire season raging, two individuals, seemingly worlds apart, find solace in their connections with one another and within the ecosystems they call home.
Signs of the TimesArticle 07.08.2021Despite their perceived abundance, the periodical cicadas that emerged across the eastern United States this summer point to a growing set of threats facing both the insects themselves and the ecosystems they help support.
Into the WildArticle 06.18.2021North America’s rarest wolf subspecies is finally reclaiming its native territory in the Southwest, thanks in part to a fostering program that places captive-born pups into wild dens.
A Grand Experiment on the GrasslandsImmersive 03.13.2018A decades-long debate over protection of the lesser prairie-chicken could usher the Endangered Species Act into a new and very different era.
Nature’s LumberjacksSpotlight 04.26.2016Tree-felling is dangerous business, so naturally a mother shows her young kit how it’s done.
Skeleton TreeSpotlight 04.26.2016Gray foxes climb into the trees to grab a few feet of vertical advantage.