Southern Appalachian Creature Feature

The dry, late-winter brush covering the field was several feet high as we walked across, side-by-side, looking for birds. Then, with startling suddenness, a bird shot out of the brush, flying for several yards before settling back down to earth.

The Chattooga River is perhaps best known across the nation as the place where the movie Deliverance was filmed, beginning what seems like endless banjo and paddling jokes. Locally, the Chattooga enjoys a reputation as home to some of the wildest angling and paddling experiences in the Southern Appalachians.

Tax time. A burden, with a bit of a consolation for those receiving a refund. But for people in North Carolina, it’s also an opportunity.

When you work with endangered species, you sometimes reflect on those that may disappear in your life, or the pristine places that have become spoiled. However, our generation is poised to bear witness to the near opposite – the revival and return of what was once one of our most important species here in the Eastern United States.

Great Smoky Mountains National Park has long held the title of the nation’s most visited national park, but a recent study shows it holds the top spot in terms of visitor spending.

Most people don’t get the opportunity to spend a day with biologists snorkeling a river looking for mussels, hiking through the high country keeping tabs on northern flying squirrels, or going underground to check on bat populations. I’m blessed in that I get to do all of those things on occasion.

Whooping cranes are one of the rarest animals in the world, with only between 525 and 550 remaining. Of those, two recently touched down in Western North Carolina. Biologists recently confirmed the presence of a pair of whooping cranes in Clay County, North Carolina, marking the first time the birds have been documented wintering in Western North Carolina.

I previously spoke about the arrest and conviction of Johnny Carl Grooms of Cosby, Tennessee for conspiring to distribute oxycodone and cocaine, interstate travel to further drug trafficking, possession of oxycodone with the intent to distribute, distribution of cocaine, possession of firearms by a convicted felon, and illegally trafficking in ginseng. Grooms was recently sentenced, and his crimes earned him more than 24 years in prison.

In the depths of winter, it may be a little hard to think ahead to early spring, but soon spring peepers, tiny frogs found across the Eastern United States and among the first frogs to emerge and begin mating, will begin their calling.

The holidays -the gifts, the time with family and friends, the question of what to do when not eating or watching football.