Ep. 182 : Deer Mouse and Song Sparrow

I have been tracking Deer Mice a lot lately, and trying to learn a little bit more about them through their tracks and all the questions that come up. What are they eating right now? How can I tell them apart from Voles and Shrews? How many live together in the Winter? Who ate this one’s brains? You know, the usual. I have also been looking at bird tracks a bunch, especially in this past week, when I noticed a Song Sparrow feeding on the withered stalk of an uncertain forb on the side of a new gravel road near where I work. It was fun to go and see the work the Song Sparrow had done, and wonder at all the debris that remained. Who knew there’d be so much to look at and wonder about?

Ep. 147 : Fox and Rabbit predator-prey interactions with wildlife behavioral ecologists Jeremy Pustilnik and Paul Curtis

For this interview I get to talk with Jeremy Pustilnik and Paul Curtis about a recently published paper from the journal “Urban Ecosystems” on the interactions of Eastern Cottontail Rabbits (Syvilagus floridanus) and Red Foxes (Vulpes vulpes) around the use of Groundhog (Marmota monax) burrows and if the scent of Red Fox urine would dissuade the Cottontails from using the burrows.
It was a lot of fun to get to dig in with these two biologists on their research, their experience and their passion for the work.