Is this you? As a journalist, you can create a free Muck Rack account to customize your profile, list your contact preferences, and upload a portfolio of your best work.
Claim your profile
Articles by Gordon Orians
Common Eiders Favor Close Relatives
BirdNote® Common Eiders Favor Close Relatives Written by Gordon Orians This is BirdNote. [Common Eider Nosey Gossip Sounds…] Can birds tell who their relatives are? Recently, researchers at the University of Gothenburg in Sweden tried to find out. But first - a bit of background. Female birds of some species try to save energy by tricking others of the same species into incubating their eggs. They're known as brood parasites.
Birds Are Evolving Rapidly - Today
House Finches are evolving rapidly and visibly. In 1941, some captive House Finches from California escaped near NYC. They spread rapidly and are now found across most of the US. We know the finches have evolved, because those that survive differ from their parents. Size is one example. Male House Finches in recently established populations are larger than the males that escaped. Females have become smaller and survive better than larger females as nestlings.
Snail Kite - Bird of the Everglades
When Florida became a state in 1845, the legislature declared the Everglades, America's largest wetland, totally worthless. In 1905, Napoleon Bonaparte Broward was elected governor on a campaign to drain them. So over the years, the slowly flowing "River of Grass" has been replaced by a series of reservoirs with little water movement. The endangered Snail Kite feeds only on the Apple Snail. And neither kites nor snails flourish in places that are permanently under water.
What Makes an Efficient Flying Bird?
Every bird species uses its wings a little differently, and some are specialized for highly efficient flight. But that means going without other abilities. Swallows and hummingbirds (like this Talamanca Hummingbird) capture their food on the wing, but they can’t walk. Swifts, which are acrobatic in the air, can’t even perch. Yet they dazzle with the maneuverability made possible by their aerodynamic bodies. BirdNote® What Makes an Efficient Flying Bird? Written by Gordon Orians This is BirdNote.
Winter - Nature's Cold Storage
For birds and other animals with good natural insulation, winter provides a striking benefit as they scavenge. Bacteria function very slowly or not at all in the cold, preventing dead bodies from rotting. In northern latitudes, ravens and other scavenging birds take advantage of winter's cold storage. When a caribou, moose, or deer dies in Canada, Alaska, or other cold place in the winter, it's available to be eaten for months.
Common Eiders Favor Close Relatives
Transcript: BirdNote® Common Eiders Favor Close Relatives Written by Gordon Orians This is BirdNote. [Common Eider Nosey Gossip Sounds…] Can birds tell who their relatives are? Recently, researchers at the University of Gothenburg in Sweden tried to find out. But first - a bit of background. Female birds of some species try to save energy by tricking others of the same species into incubating their eggs. They're known as brood parasites.
Ecosystem Engineers on America's Serengeti
Transcript: BirdNote® Ecosystem Engineers Written by Gordon Orians This is BirdNote! [Sound of prairie wind and bison snort] Some birds require habitats created by other animals. [Prairie dog whistles] Two such landscape shapers were the American bison and the prairie dog. For thousands of years, these animals generated a mosaic of vegetation on the Great Plains, ranging from nearly bare earth in bison wallows and prairie dog towns, to lightly grazed tall grasslands.
Birds and Climate Change - Places for Birds to Go
Transcript: BirdNote® Birds and Climate Change - Preparing Places to Go Written by Gordon Orians This is Bird Note. [Sounds of internal combustion engines in a city] The climate of the earth is changing rapidly, as we burn fossil fuels at a rate faster than nature can remove the emissions from the atmosphere. Birds are responding accordingly. Of the 305 species found in North America in winter, nearly 60% have shifted their ranges northward by an average of 35 miles.
Winter - Nature's Cold Storage
Transcript: BirdNote® Winter - Nature’s Cold Storage Written by Gordon Orians This is BirdNote. [Call of ravens + the sound of winter wind throughout] For birds and other animals with good natural insulation, winter provides a striking benefit as they scavenge. Bacteria function very slowly or not at all in the cold, preventing dead bodies from rotting in sub-freezing temperatures.
Snail Kite - Bird of the Everglades
This is BirdNote. [Call of the Snail Kite and Everglades ambient] When Florida became a state in 1845, the legislature declared the Everglades, America’s largest wetland, totally worthless.* But today, we know how important wetlands are. They soak up storm water. They remove toxic chemicals that contaminate drinking water. And they’re home to a bird called the Snail Kite, which in the United States is found only in south Florida.
Alaska’s old-growth forests are our climate-change insurance policy
There is no better place to experience old-growth forests than the Tongass and Chugach national forests. Here, all five species of Pacific salmon line up to spawn like rush-hour traffic, spruce and hemlock trees tower like skyscrapers, and bears and wolves still run free. The Tongass National Forest in Alaska, the crown jewel of our national forest system, is facing an unprecedented threat. At the end of last year, U.S. Sen.
Care about our birds? Protect Earth’s largest intact ecosystem to our north
The boreal forest is one of the world’s largest storehouses of carbon and home to an abundance of animals and birds. LONG before Lewis and Clark made their way to the Pacific Coast, members of the diverse indigenous cultures who lived on the rivers and deltas of the region were awakened on spring mornings by the song of the first returning Swainson’s thrushes.
Show More
loading
Actions
Is this you?
As a journalist, you can create a free Muck Rack account to customize your profile, list your contact preferences, and upload a portfolio of your best work.Get in touch with Gordon
Contact Gordon, search articles and posts on X, monitor coverage, and track replies from one place.
Learn more about Muck Rack