Spring is birthing time for many animals in order for the young to have adequate time to grow and develop before the onset of winter. For many animals, that means mating in mid- to late winter. Raccoons begin mating in February and March and give birth in April.
Winter can bring a range of snow conditions from minimal snow to deep snow with an icy crust. Whether the snow condition is favorable or not depends on how the animal moves through it or on it.
When the snow becomes deep enough, we bring out our skis, snowshoes and snowmobiles to travel around. Even with snowshoes, slogging through knee-deep powdery snow can be exhausting if you are breaking trail. Worse is a thin icy crust that doesn’t support your weight and you punch through with each …
BONNERS FERRY HERALD | UPDATED 9 YEARS, 1 MONTH AGO
Lizards are one of the more well-known animals to regrow their tail after shedding it to evade predators. Last week, I wrote about autotomy (the process of voluntarily shedding a body part) and how it is advantageous at first but can cause hardship afterwards. Certain animals alleviate these hardships by …
BONNERS FERRY HERALD | UPDATED 9 YEARS, 1 MONTH AGO
Northern alligator lizards and western blue-tailed skinks possess two unique abilities in the animal world--they can self-amputate their tail and grow it back.
BONNERS FERRY HERALD | UPDATED 9 YEARS, 1 MONTH AGO
Even though most owls are nocturnal hunters and we can’t see what they hunt, we know a surprising amount of information about their diet. An owl’s feces look like any other bird dropping, so we can’t tell what they eat. The clues to an owl’s diet lay in owl pellets--regurgitated …
BONNERS FERRY HERALD | UPDATED 9 YEARS, 2 MONTHS AGO
Boundary County Fair Royalty this year include (left to right) Victoria Thomas, Collin Luther, Kimberley Kramer, Jolene Neumayer, Erica Wood and Collin Stone (not pictured).
BONNERS FERRY HERALD | UPDATED 10 YEARS, 5 MONTHS AGO
Staring into a campfire, watching the flames flicker and flare until the wood is reduced to glowing red coals can be mesmerizing. The warmth of a campfire is welcome on cool summer nights while camping or on cold, winter hikes during a lunch break.
BONNERS FERRY HERALD | UPDATED 11 YEARS, 1 MONTH AGO
When thinking of invasive species, one often thinks of weeds. But some birds also qualify as invasive, most notably European starlings, house finches, English sparrows and rock pigeons.
BONNERS FERRY HERALD | UPDATED 11 YEARS, 1 MONTH AGO
Boundary County is at the forefront of wildlife detection systems on roadways. A pilot project has been installed near Moose Valley Farms, south of Naples, to test new technology.
BONNERS FERRY HERALD | UPDATED 11 YEARS, 1 MONTH AGO
As autumn begins, a golden color will highlight timberline as alpine larch turn from a light green to a golden yellow. Turning color and losing its needles a month earlier than lower elevation western larch, the alpine larch ushers in autumn in the high country.
BONNERS FERRY HERALD | UPDATED 11 YEARS, 4 MONTHS AGO
Shooting stars are always exciting to see. Sometimes I only see them out of the corner of my eye, other times I'm lucky enough to be looking at the right part of the sky at the right time.
COEUR D'ALENE PRESS | UPDATED 12 YEARS, 2 MONTHS AGO
Walking on a trail near Moab, Utah, I stepped over some large depressions in the bedrock but quickly stopped and realized that these were more than depressions, these were dinosaur tracks. Not the well-defined tracks I had envisioned but what 18-ton creature leaves detailed footprints in the mud. I could …
COEUR D'ALENE PRESS | UPDATED 12 YEARS, 11 MONTHS AGO
While driving up Smith Creek, there was movement on a snowbank along the road. The small creature was holding a huge piece of meat. I was amazed at how big the piece of meat was compared to the animal.
Did you know that badgers are the fastest digging animals on earth? Their life depends on it. They dig for food, dig their dens and dig to escape predators.
BONNERS FERRY HERALD | UPDATED 14 YEARS, 1 MONTH AGO
BONNERS FERRY — A curbside recycling program is proposed for the residents of Bonners Ferry to help reduce the amount of waste going into the landfill.
BONNERS FERRY HERALD | UPDATED 14 YEARS, 8 MONTHS AGO
Spring is filled with firsts: the first bluebird, first crocus, and first barbeque. Spring signals a time of growth, life, color and warmth after winter. Signs of spring are occurring a lot earlier than last year, when we were still buried in snow. The following are my top ten signs …
BONNERS FERRY HERALD | UPDATED 14 YEARS, 10 MONTHS AGO
