Marcia Bonta

  • Long-term Ecological Reflections Project

    A year ago I was asked to join the host of artists, writers, scientists, and students who have contributed to Penn State’s Shaver’s Creek Environmental Center’s Long-term Ecological Reflections Project (LTERP). Begun ten years ago under the auspices of Dr. Ian Marshall of Penn State Altoona’s Environmental Studies Program, the hope is to continue such…

  • Wintering Short-eared Owls

    For years I have wanted to see the wintering short-eared owls of Adams County, especially after reading an article in National Wildlife about the dozens of these owls at a farm in the winter of 2005. But as the years passed, it seemed as if the large numbers had dwindled. Then, in early March, I…

  • Chipmunk Lives

    It was eight degrees at dawn on February 6, and once again I was out on snowshoes looking for animal tracks. That’s when I spotted eastern chipmunk tracks emerging from a burrow hole beneath one log and moving over the snow to a hole underneath another log. Possibly it was a male checking out the…

  • Tracking Snow

    Most Januarys it is cold and light snows fall which make ideal tracking weather. Only then do we discover, for instance, that we have fishers on our mountain property. Last winter, in mid-January, it was a relatively balmy 16 degrees Fahrenheit, after days below zero or in the single digits, although three days before, it…