Nature Now

Whales of Alaska have been studied by NOAA scientists for many years. For a third of a century, Dave Rugh flew in small aircraft, stood on sea cliffs, rode various ships, and spent a lot of time on sea ice documenting the abundance of whales around Alaska. This included the enigmatic bowhead whale, belugas (which are white whales) in Cook Inlet near Anchorage, and gray whales which migrate from the Arctic to Mexico's warm lagoons. (KPTZ airdate: April 16, 2025)

Learn more:
NOAA in Alaska

Nature Now is created by a dedicated team of volunteers. If you enjoy this episode and can support the work that goes into making Nature Now, we invite you to go to kptz.org/donate to make a contribution. Thank you for your support!

Nan Evans and Christie Lassen are at it again in part two of "Birds and Their Feathers" as they explore such topics as: What is the impact of diet on feathers? How do feathers keep birds warm? And cool? How do feathers help birds fly? (part 2 of a two-part program). (Airdate: April 9, 2025)

Learn more:
Wild Birds Unlimited in Gardiner, WA
Feathers: The Evolution of a Natural Miracle by Thor Hanson
What It’s Like to Be a Bird by David Allen Sibley
Bird sound recording: Gerrit Vyn, ML128932, courtesy of Cornell Lab of Ornithology | Macaulay Library

Nature Now is created by a dedicated team of volunteers. If you enjoy this episode and can support the work that goes into making Nature Now, we invite you to go to kptz.org/donate to make a contribution. Thank you for your support!

Please join host Debaran Kelso as we welcome our special guest Peter Harrison. Peter is a world-renowned seabird expert, artist, and conservationist, and this week we will be speaking about writing and illustrating his beautiful new book Seabirds: The New Identification Guide. We end with exploring the world of the albatrosses, in anticipation of his upcoming public lecture sponsored by the Port Townsend Marine Science Center on March 30, 2025 (part 1 of a two-part program). (Airdate: March 26, 2025)

Learn more:
Peter Harrison's lecture: Ocean Nomads: The Albatrosses
SEABIRDS: The New Identification Guide autographed by Peter Harrison
Peter Harrison
Oldest known wild bird, Wisdom, has a new chick!
Bird sound recording by American Bird Conservancy

Nature Now is created by a dedicated team of volunteers. If you enjoy this episode and can support the work that goes into making Nature Now, we invite you to go to kptz.org/donate to make a contribution. Thank you for your support!

Hosts Jackie Canterbury, Nan Evans, and Debaran Kelso get together to share their best reads and top "wish list" books to read in the coming year. As naturalists, the choices include some great natural history picks. But their eclectic tastes range across poetry, philosophy, history, personal reflections of authors, and art. Tune in to hear their conversation and to share in the fun they all had doing this program. (Airdate: March 5, 2025)

Books discussed (in alphabetical order):
The Outermost House by Henry Beston
The Good Rain by Timothy Egan
A Naturalist's Year in the Pacific Northwest by Geoffrey Hammerson
Hurricane Lizards and Plastic Squid by Thor Hanson
Apprentice to the Wild by Kurt Hoelting
Wild Forest Home by Betsy L. Howell
The Laws Guide to Nature Drawing and Journaling by John Muir Laws
The Parrot and the Igloo by David Lipsky
What It's Like to Be a Bird by David Allen Sibley
Birdwatching with American Women, edited by Deborah Strom
The Backyard Bird Chronicles by Amy Tan

Find more to read in the Jefferson Land Trust Natural History Society Book Club reading list.

Bird sound recording: Matthew D. Medler, ML43973911, courtesy of Cornell Lab of Ornithology | Macaulay Library

Nature Now is created by a dedicated team of volunteers. If you enjoy this episode and can support the work that goes into making Nature Now, we invite you to go to kptz.org/donate to make a contribution. Thank you for your support!

Envision a bird – any bird. What do you first notice? The feathers, of course. But, what do you really know about those beautiful and amazingly variable structures? Join Nan Evans and Christie Lassen to explore feather forms and structures, colors and patterns, and the incredible usefulness and functions of feathers (part 1 of a two-part program). (Airdate: March 19, 2025)

Learn more:
Wild Birds Unlimited in Gardiner, WA
Feathers: The Evolution of a Natural Miracle by Thor Hanson
What It’s Like to Be a Bird by David Allen Sibley
Bird sound recording: Andrew Spencer, ML32411761, courtesy of Cornell Lab of Ornithology | Macaulay Library

Nature Now is created by a dedicated team of volunteers. If you enjoy this episode and want to support the work that goes into making Nature Now, we invite you to go to kptz.org/donate to make a contribution. Thank you for your support!

Jackie Canterbury talks with Brittaney Drake about science visualization which is 'art in service of science' and how bird illustration is used to teach art and nature in her democratic classroom. Brittaney uses a variety of bird illustration tools including black ink, gouache watercolor, colored pencil, and digital illustration to teach bird illustration (part 2 of a two-part program). (Airdate: February 26, 2025)

Learn more:
The Pearl Remote Democratic High School
Brittaney Drake's artwork on instagram
David Sibley: My painting process – gouache
Gouache as a witness to history
Art Pearl, Democracy and Education: Remembering a Legend
Bird sound recording: Thomas G. Graves, XC663793, accessible at www.xeno-canto.org/663793. License CC BY-NC-SA 4.0

Nature Now is created by a dedicated team of volunteers. If you enjoy this episode and want to support the work that goes into making Nature Now, we invite you to go to kptz.org/donate to make a contribution. Thank you for your support!

Are we diminishing our lives of the senses? Nan Evans talks with special guest Richard Louv, author of many books examining the crucial connections between the natural world and human physical, mental, social and even cultural health. Richard Louv first developed the concept of a nature-deficit disorder in his 2005 book, Last Child in the Woods. You will be inspired to get yourself and those you love outside to explore, play, watch and listen. (Airdate: February 19, 2025)

Learn more:
Richard Louv
Register for Jefferson Land Trust's 2025 Conservation Breakfast (free and virtual)
Child and Nature Network
Music from the library of Laura Martin

Nature Now is created by a dedicated team of volunteers. If you enjoy this episode and want to support the work that goes into making Nature Now, we invite you to go to kptz.org/donate to make a contribution. Thank you for your support!

Buzzz... Think of a bee. Do you see a honey bee gathering pollen and making honey in its hive? Is it native to the Western Hemisphere? No! Think of another bee. Do you see a bumble bee? Peraps a picture or a drawing? Think of another bee. Having problems? Do you know that there are over 600 native bee species in Washington? Nan Evans talks with Dr. Karen Wright from the Washington Department of Agriculture to learn more about our native bees and the Washington Bee Atlas. (Airdate: January 29, 2025)

Learn more:
Washington Bee Atlas
Washington Native Bee Society
Buzz: The Nature and Necessity of Bees by Thor Hanson
Jefferson County Master Gardener Foundation's Yard and Garden Lecture Series
Bird sound recording courtesy of Cornell Lab of Ornithology | Macaulay Library
Music from the library of Laura Martin

Nature Now is created by a dedicated team of volunteers. If you enjoy this episode and want to support the work that goes into making Nature Now, we invite you to go to kptz.org/donate to make a contribution. Thank you for your support!

Jackie Canterbury talks with Brittaney Drake about her work at The Pearl Remote Democratic High School in Seattle, Washington where she teaches about nature using a visual arts curriculum. Her teaching style follows the fundamentals of Dr. Art Pearl who developed the Democratic classroom in Eugene, Oregon. He inspired the words Democracy and Education. "His message was about the primacy of democracy, the fragility of it, the assaults against it, how far we are from a nation that truly cherishes it and practices it — and the essential role of public education in any chance for a healthy democracy in the future." The founder and director of the Seattle Democratic school is Dr. Robin Harwick who has served as a mentor to Brittaney. In this program we talk about the importance of using the democratic process as a backdrop to teaching about art and nature. Globally and as a nation, we are now realizing the fragility of democracy. In this program Brittaney discusses how she uses a visual arts curriculum, particularly bird illustration, as a way to teach about nature and science (part 1 of a two-part program). (Airdate: February 5, 2025)

Learn more:
The Pearl Remote Democratic High School
Brittaney Drake's artwork on instagram
The Democratic Classroom: Theory to Inform Practice (Understanding Education and Policy)
Art Pearl, Democracy and Education: Remembering a Legend
Bird sound recordings: Donald R. Gunn, ML57586, and John Patterson, ML93401111, courtesy of Cornell Lab of Ornithology | Macaulay Library

Nature Now is created by a dedicated team of volunteers. If you enjoy this episode and want to support the work that goes into making Nature Now, we invite you to go to kptz.org/donate to make a contribution. Thank you for your support!

Join Debaran Kelso and guest wildlife biologist Betsy Howell of the US Forest Service, as they review recent wildlife research projects being conducted in the Olympic National Forest. (Airdate: January 15, 2025)

Learn more:
Betsy Howell
Wild Forest Home: Stories of Conservation in the Pacific Northwest by Betsy L. Howell
Three Cool Ways USGS is Studying Bats in National Parks
2022 Marmot Monitoring Results
Marmot Monitoring
Bird sound recordings: Geoffrey A. Keller courtesy of Cornell Lab of Ornithology | Macaulay Library

Nature Now is created by a dedicated team of volunteers. If you enjoy this episode and want to support the work that goes into making Nature Now, we invite you to go to kptz.org/donate to make a contribution. Thank you for your support!