Exquisite Gorge: Whose story is this?
July 8, 2019
For the past few weeks I’ve been carving a 4 foot by 6 foot block of birch plywood, depicting a section of the Columbia River Gorge. I live about half…
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Today's Extinct Animal
Roger's posts about vanishing fauna. 
Today’s Extinct Animal: Lystrosaurus
April 13, 2019
250 million years ago an extinction event wiped out 95% of all species on Earth, the greatest such winnowing ever to occur. It’s referred to as the Permian/Triassic extinction, or…
Hanford and the Reactionary Imagination, a Journey into Nuclearity pt 2
September 13, 2018
This is the second in a series of posts about a visit to the Hanford Nuclear Reservation in Eastern Washington state, and the fate of the uranium ores found in…
Endangered Species Mural #16: Borderlands Wildlife in El Paso
September 1, 2018
The sixteenth of the Endangered Species Murals is finished! This big wall is located near the Convention Center in downtown El Paso, Texas, and features five endangered species from the…
Ghostfish aboard the R/V Falkor
July 28, 2018
I’ve spent the last six days on the Pacific Ocean, in transit from San Diego, CA to Astoria, OR aboard the R/V Falkor, the Schmidt Ocean Institute’s big research vessel….
Hanford and the Reactionary Imagination: a Journey into Nuclearity, Part 1
July 19, 2018
This is the first in a series of posts about a visit to the Hanford Nuclear Reservation in Eastern Washington state, and the fate of the uranium ores found in…
Wilderness of Possibility
May 30, 2018
I left Portland at about eight o’clock on a Thursday night, after a cruise through the art shows downtown. The sun had set by the time I reached Celilo Park,…
Endangered Species Mural #14: A Bear-Shaped Hole
October 5, 2017
The fourteenth Endangered Species mural is finished! This one is located in the Laurel District of Oakland, CA, and is a little different in theme and execution form the other…
Jaguar Mural in Tucson: progress!
January 18, 2016
The fifth of the Endangered Species Murals is taking shape in Tucson, on the side of the Solar Culture complex in downtown. The mural is being painted by local artist…
American Cheetah: process
October 30, 2015
I’ve been at a residency in the grassy hills of northeastern Wyoming for the past few weeks. I realized the other day that I had passed quite close to…
St. Helena Giant Earwig
December 23, 2014
When considering the death of species and the grim biological impoverishment of earth, we have to take the lesser with the larger, and the less lovely as well. Recent news…
100 Years of Silent Skies
September 1, 2014
Today is September 1st, 2014, and marks the 100th anniversary of the death of the last Passenger Pigeon in a Cincinnati zoo. That last bird, named Martha, represented the culmination…
Today’s Extinct Animal: Pig-footed Bandicoot
May 26, 2013
Fire is part of the suite of factors on the short list for major contributions to human development. When we learned to control fire, we started using it to harden…
Today’s Extinct (Plant): Acalypha Dikuluwensis
April 3, 2013
Image from Copperflora.org. When I decided to reembark on this series of posts about extinct species, I did a check through my copious bookmarks to see if anything jumped out…
Today’s Extinct Animal: Falkland Islands Wolf
March 5, 2013
Islands: they’re good places to show up at if you are looking to evolutionarily diverge. If your species manages to arrive at an island with no native predators on it,…
A World of Wounds
March 28, 2010
Here’s a list of ten of my favorite quotes pertaining to the state of the world that I’ve gleaned in the past several years: A: “We don’t change our behavior,…
Today’s Extinct Animal: Christmas Island Pipistrelle
October 31, 2009
Alas, time’s up for the Christmas Island pipistrelle bat. The tiny winged mammals, endemic to Australia’s Christmas island, are overrun by human-introduced yellow crazy ants, giant centipedes and wolf snakes….
No More Jaguars
April 8, 2009
That’s all, folks! The last Jaguar in the United States has been killed. The beast in question, a sixteen year old male named “Macho B”, was euthanized by state biologists…
The Totoaba Croaks
April 3, 2009
It’s been a while since I’ve posted any depressing stories about doomed animal life on this blog. Now that I’ve actually gone through with the whole moving-to-portland, thing, maybe I’ll…
Today’s Extinct Animal- The Lake Atitlan Grebe
August 26, 2008
I’ve decided that this blog thing might be useful for regular, depressing updates on the subject that I think about most, namely, extinction. To start off with, I think I’ll…