Spring 2024

Audubon Magazine

Connecting People with Nature

Audubon Magazine1 min read
Meals on Fields
For millennia seasonal wetlands dotted California’s Central Valley, providing crucial habitat for millions of shorebirds to rest and refuel during migration. But as farms and towns have taken over the landscape in the past 150 years, nearly all of th
Audubon Magazine2 min read
Life Support
IT WAS CERTAINLY NOT WHAT I expected to find while walking home from the candy store. “Look!” my son said, pointing to a black-and-white feathered lump on the sidewalk. “Use the app.” I opened Seek, which we typically point at mushrooms on hikes, and
Audubon Magazine2 min read
Spring Into Action
AS I SIT BY MY WINDOW, admiring the beauty of two Eastern Bluebirds flitting through the trees, I am delighted to share this edition of Audubon magazine with you. It coincides with the return of our feathered companions from their winter retreats acr
Audubon Magazine2 min read
Audubon Magazine
Susan Bell Chair of the Board George S. Golumbeski Kathryn D. Sullivan Vice-Chairs Victor Hymes Treasurer Susan Orr Secretary Anne Beckett Rodney L. Brown, Jr. Shelly Cihan Johanna Fuentes Elizabeth Gray Kevin R. Harris Jessica Hellmann Richard H. La
Audubon Magazine2 min read
Inbox
Sporting an imposing crown of feathers and talons the size of bear claws, the Harpy Eagle is one of Latin America’s most fearsome predators. The powerful birds require a lot of habitat, which once stretched from southern Mexico to northern Argentina.
Audubon Magazine3 min read
A Matter of Scale
IT’S BEEN MORE THAN THREE decades since the U.S. government first tested the waters of offshore fish farming. In 1990 a company received a federal permit to raise nearly 50 million pounds of Atlantic salmon a year in pens anchored some 50 miles off M
Audubon Magazine3 min read
Aerial Allies
WESLEY BROWN WAS STANDING on the desert floor last spring, watching his friend ascend a towering Utah cliff, when a Golden Eagle soared overhead. It was Brown’s first close encounter with a raptor since becoming a climber steward, a role that include
Audubon Magazine2 min read
Flight Lessons
OF THE THOUSANDS OF SPORTS THAT humans have invented, paragliding may be the most birdlike. Racers fly in groups known as gaggles, suspended from parachutes and powered solely by columns of warm, rising air called thermals. For vultures and other soa
Audubon Magazine2 min read
Habitat—for Humanity
LAST YEAR, THE NONPROFIT Kestrel Land Trust put a picturesque piece of property in western Massachusetts under contract. The 53-acre parcel in Easthampton contains a mix of meadows, hayfields, and forests along the Manhan River, a habitat corridor fo
Audubon Magazine2 min read
Lawn Order
EVEN AS HER BLACK-EYED Susans and milkweed bloomed, Melinda Soltys didn’t consider herself a gardener; she just wanted to see more wildlife. After learning how native vegetation improves habitat for the animals she hoped to attract, Soltys grew a hav
Audubon Magazine16 min read
Must Add Water
RYAN CARLE COULD USE A NAP. Bleary and hunched on a boat dock, he sounds nearly defeated. “It’s feeling like a bit of a boondoggle,” he tells me, not much louder than Mono Lake lapping beneath us. Carle, science director for the nonprofit research gr
Audubon Magazine14 min read
Where The Not-so-wild Things Roam
ACCORDING TO THE TRACKING APP ON MY PHONE, THE CAT WAS in the alley, right in front of me. He should’ve been easy to spot: He’s bright white and, for the past week, he’d been sporting a blue GPS collar, which I’d selected to match his eyes. I peeked
Audubon Magazine13 min read
Appetite for Construction
TIME IN THE ALASKAN Arctic moves slowly. Layers of permafrost inter the chilled remains of mammoths and early humans; dwarf birches and lichens grow at almost imperceptible clips; glaciers creep down mountains at annual rates measured in millimeters.
Audubon Magazine9 min read
Reflections Of A Bird Collision Monitor
ONE OF NEW YORK CITY’S LITTLE-known and mostly unseen wonders is that, in the dark of night during spring and fall, millions of birds fly directly over Manhattan on a migration path that their ancestors have been traveling for millennia. For some, th
Audubon Magazine1 min read
Yes In Your Backyard
MEREDITH BARGES AND VIVECA MORRIS, “BUILDING SAFER CITIES FOR BIRDS—HOW CITIES ARE LEADING THE WAY ON BIRD-FRIENDLY BUILDING POLICY,” YALE BIRD-FRIENDLY BUILDING INITIATIVE, AUGUST 2023. ■
Audubon Magazine1 min read
A Wave Of Legislation
This first major bird-safe materials policy from a U.S. city was a call to action, but its narrow definition of “bird hazards” and exemptions for many low-rise residential buildings significantly limit its impact. Though limited to certain windows an
Audubon Magazine1 min read
Clear Winners
One of the most effective collision deterrents—when installed on the exterior of windows—does double duty by also keeping unwanted bugs out of your home. Either secured above and below or left to dangle in the breeze, closely spaced vertical cords on
Audubon Magazine1 min read
How To Stop “The Thud”
Move feeders. Place bird feeders and baths less than three feet from the nearest window to prevent birds from gaining deadly speed as they take off. Even better, install features more than 30 feet away to give birds room to maneuver. Fix windows. Fac
Audubon Magazine3 min read
A Bloom Bonanza
WHILE SEASONAL WILDFLOWER blooms offer spectacular displays for nature lovers, they didn’t evolve for our pleasure. Their job is to attract pollinating insects that help native plants produce seeds and, eventually, seedlings (a process that feeds bir
Audubon Magazine1 min read
Create a Tradition
EVERY MOTHER’S DAY WEEKEND, my mom and I join a small knot of bird and flower enthusiasts at the West Virginia Wildflower Pilgrimage. Their pace felt agonizingly slow when I first attended. As a hiker, I wanted to cover miles—not vainly search trees—
Audubon Magazine2 min read
Bug Out With The Birds
With hundreds of species, mosquito-size midges occur throughout North America and are especially plentiful around water. Some bite; many do not; all taste delicious to birds. Midge hatches happen year-round, but the best time to bird one is when it c
Audubon Magazine2 min read
Why Are Flycatchers So Hard to Identify?
I OFTEN TELL PEOPLE THAT UNDERSTANDING why a species is difficult to identify can be key to making an ID. No birds illustrate this better than tyrant flycatchers (family Tyrannidae), one of the world’s largest bird families, with well over 400 specie
Audubon Magazine1 min read
To the Rescue!
Even seasoned birders are known to throw their hands in the air when faced with an enigmatic flycatcher, but Cin-Ty Lee and Andrew Birch believe you can make the call. (No, really!) The co-authors of FIELD GUIDE TO NORTH AMERICAN FLYCATCHERS walk rea
Audubon Magazine3 min read
No Place Like Home
WHEN NORA AUSTON MOVED TO a new house in Portland, Oregon, a few years ago, she’d long been thinking about building a catio. Her family had revoked roaming privileges for Bertie, “our grouchy old lady cat,” after three strikes: Bertie had harassed a
Audubon Magazine1 min read
The Purr-fect Fit
Catnets’ metal frames covered by stainless-steel reinforced UV-treated netting can stand up to claws and the elements. They’re a snap to assemble and disassemble, and ideal for renters, owners who aren’t ready to commit to a permanent structure, or t
Audubon Magazine1 min read
The Aviary
AS A TEEN, MEG T. JUSTICE OFTEN SKETCHED DUCKS ALONG THE TENNESSEE RIVER, CAPTURING their glorious quirks. Today her primary medium is printmaking, but she still delights in water-birds. She chose the Hooded Merganser for this print because of the ma

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