Wild Backyard: Enjoying wildlife close to home in the age of Covid-19

Now that we're all spending more time at home and many parks are closed,  you may think 'there goes my chance to see wildlife'.  Wrong!  There is an abundance of wildlife to be found, even in the most urban of environments. I am a wildlife photographer living within the city limits of Chapel Hill, North…

Ban deer hunting in Chapel Hill

--->>>  Sign the petition When you go for a walk around Chapel Hill, do you wear blaze orange for safety? You may wish to consider it. Hunting—both legal and illegal—is occurring in unexpected places in town and reflects a need for the town to revise the Deer Management Program. One neighborhood’s experience I live in…

Chapel Hill Groundhogs—yes really!

Groundhog Day--that oddest of holidays in which we look to a rodent to predict the duration of winter.  On February 2, if a groundhog sees its shadow, gets spooked and runs back in the burrow, it will be six more weeks of winter.  Cloudy day and no shadow?  Hey, it's an early spring. Punxsutawney Phil may…

Wild Chapel Hill

There's a side to the quiet Town of Chapel Hill most folks don't know about....and it's a wild one. Do you have to go 'into the wild' to see wildlife?  No! Even urban areas can have a surprising diversity of wildlife.  Case in point:  Chapel Hill, North Carolina is a university town of around 60,000…

Carolina Trashed

The modern marker of disenfranchisement has become...littering by nature lovers? I take wildlife photos, so I do quite a bit of hiking around local rivers and lakes.  I've always packed a trash bag in my photo bag to wrap gear in case of rain.  At some point, I found myself starting to use the bag…