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Connecting People with Nature
Dirt, water and gravity. Backslope, outslope, brushing, grade reversals, and tread. McLeods, picks and Pulaskis. When you are hiking a trail, how much attention do you pay to the actual trail? If a trail is well built, the engineering of the trail likely never crosses your mind. As it should be. The purpose of a trail […]
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Urban Birding at Stormwater Ponds in Austin
As part of the Central Flyway, Texas will be the wintering home for over 90% of the ducks that use the this flyway1. While a majority of the waterfowl, including the endangered Whooping Crane, will head for the Gulf Coast Wetlands, several species will make Austin their winter home. Hornsby Bend is the most popular […]
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White Christmas in Austin, Texas
Christmas in Austin came wrapped in fog this year. Except for a trace of snow in 1939, weather records going back to the 1890s show Austin has never had a White Christmas. So the combination of humid air, warm daytime temperatures and cool nights that shrouded the city in a gauzy whiteness is the closest […]
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Audubon Society Christmas Bird Count
A popular Christmas Day tradition in the late 1800’s was the competitive “Side Hunt.” The “side” of sport hunters that amassed the largest pile of dead birds at the end of the day won. The conservation movement was young then but early conservationists and scientists were becoming concerned by the decline in bird populations as […]
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The Brackenridge Field Laboratory
George Washington Brackenridge had big plans for the 500-acres of Colorado Riverfront property he purchased. It was downriver from the future site of the Austin Dam; the Austin Dam which would be built with stone quarried from his property and that was expected to generate the power needed to jumpstart industrial development in Austin. Brackenridge […]
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PARD Comes to CAMN
Many of the rangers in the Parks and Recreation Department (PARD) are familiar faces to CAMN members who have assisted in restoration and research projects on Austin’s public lands. The rangers have led projects and shared their extensive knowledge with us but what else do they do, you may wonder. Casey Carter, PARD Park Ranger, […]
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CAMN Represents at the 2019 TMN Annual Meeting!
This year’s Texas Master Naturalist Annual Meeting was held in Rockwall from October 17th-20th and it was my third year to attend. For those that have never attended a meeting, it is a blast! This year’s meeting had over twenty field trips and training workshops, fantastic seminars, educational displays, a book store and a silent auction! “This year’s Texas Master […]
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Learning to Tag Austin’s Urban Wildlife
More than a dozen CAMN members met along with members of the Goodwater and Bastrop Master Naturalist Chapters on October 12, 2019 to learn how to identify urban wildlife captured on the cameras stationed throughout Austin by the Urban Wildlife Information Network. The cameras are set up in parks, nature preserves and along creeks that wildlife use as travel corridors. The purpose […]
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Chapter Meeting Recap: Austin Wildlife Rescue
Cedar waxwings get drunk off berries. Opossums have 50 teeth. Nighthawks aren’t hawks and ringtails aren’t lemurs. These were just a few of the delightful tidbits shared in the recent CAMN Chapter Meeting. Kathryn Mattison gave a wonderful presentation on the work she does with Austin Wildlife Rescue. She talked to us about the animals AWR […]
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Getting Teens Involved with Nature through Technology!
As a part of the 2019 CAMN training class experience, students participated in a variety of class projects from restoration work at the Vireo Preserve to developing educational materials. One project in particular kicks off this weekend (Sept 29th, 2019) at the Austin Central Library and it aims to connect the teens in out community […]
