After a delay of a week, Justin Kestler and I got to talk about his new book The Hair Scale Identification Guide to Terrestrial Mammalian Carnivores of Canada. This concise book is a quick guide to interpreting the origin of hairs based on the morphology of scales along the cuticle (outer side) of the hair. It’s not like a fingerprint per se, which attempts to identify an individual human, but instead may help to identify a species. This is because the scale structure is different across species but not so much individuals of that species. Make sense?

We talked about the process of documenting the hair scales, acquiring the hairs, and a bit about ecological traits which might be indicated through the characteristics of the hairs. It was really fun to nerd out about the finer details of hairs. The book, and the interview have really pushed me to keep a hair journal and begin looking for a microscope. Maybe in the future…

To learn more :

The Hair Scale Identification Guide to Terrestrial Mammalian Carnivores of Canada