Marcia Bonta

  • Furry Raiders

    I knew there was going to be trouble last autumn when the acorn, black walnut, beechnut and hickory crops failed. Our mountain then supported the largest population of eastern gray squirrels in the 26 years we have lived here. Every acre of forest contained leafy squirrel nests tucked high in the tallest deciduous trees. And…

  • Winter Survival Champions

    “It’s amazing. I can’t believe there’s anything here,” exclaimed Dr. Joseph Merritt. Resident Director of Powdermill Nature Reserve, the biological field station of Pittsburgh’s Carnegie Museum of Natural History and author of Guide to the Mammals of Pennsylvania, Merritt is a specialist in small mammals. To learn more about the lives of such creatures as…

  • Irrupting Birds

    Every winter birdwatchers hope for an irruption of boreal birds from the northern forests. This “irruption” or irregular migratory movement southward of birds that ordinarily live and breed in Canada and Alaska include glamour species such as pine and evening grosbeaks, purple finches, red and white-winged crossbills, pine siskins, common and hoary redpolls, red-breasted nuthatches,…