The FWP weekly digest of wondrous wildlife happenings
and other interesting items from the natural world
Creatures to meet | Things to learn
Things to do
Lisa S. French
1.5-minute read
If you were a wild feline trying to creep through the canopy of a rainforest undetected or stalk the tall grasses of a savanna in stealth mode, which pattern and color would you choose for your pelt? Striped, spotted, or solid? Brown, beige, grey, or maybe green? Green might seem like a natural choice, but as you’ve probably noticed, mammal fur doesn’t come in green (and here’s why).
Of course, lions, tigers, and leopards don’t pick their own pelt patterns. Through the process of evolution, nature provides each of the 40 wild cat species with coloring that ensures they don’t stand out in a crowd. According to a University of Bristol study, the differences in patterning relate to how, when, and where the animals hunt. Cats, big and small, are creepers and leapers. Their primary meal acquisition strategy is to stalk their prey until they are close enough to pounce. Blending in with background colors, shapes, and textures makes keeping a low profile a whole lot easier.
Researchers believe that the more complex the animal’s surroundings, the more intricate the pelt pattern. Cats like the fancy-furred clouded leopard that live in dense tropical forests have evolved with dark-spotted, patchy pelts that blend in with shifting patterns of shadow and light compared to solid-colored cats like lions that spend their days prowling wide open, relatively tree-less grassland environments.
It seems that when it comes to surviving in the wild, there’s no such thing as too matchy-matchy for felines—maybe that’s why leopards never change their spots.
ICYMI Nature News
Cancer Detecting Lab Ants
French scientists have trained ants to detect cancer cells through tiny supersensitive receptors in their antennae. This is how they do it.
Bringing Back the Kelp Keepers
The Center for Biological Diversity is on a mission to protect and restore Pacific Coast kelp forests by reintroducing ecosystem engineering otters to Oregon and Northern California. What an otterly good idea!
Bald Eagles in Brooklyn?
For the first time in over 100 years, a pair of bald eagles are trying to build a nest in the Jamaica Bay wetlands. Egg-citing! You can learn more about the new arrivals and NYC’s total raptor mania from the good people helping to restore urban bird habitat right here.
FWP Carbon Capture Report
New Year. More trees. We’re rolling on with Tree-Nation in 2023, planting more community-supporting, habitat-restoring, planet-cooling trees in places where they provide the most benefit. The trees we planted from April 2022 through January 2023 capture carbon equivalent to 6,166,444 miles driven by an average gasoline-powered passenger vehicle, 2,748,608 pounds of coal burned, or 302,191,960 smartphones charged. We couldn’t do it without you. Thank you for your support!
Lisa S. French
February 10, 2023
1.5-minute read
How much do you imagine birds know about what their feathered friends might be thinking? Are they capable of putting themselves in another bird’s shoes—if birds wore shoes—or do they simply rely on instinct to navigate intra-avian interactions?
The ability to comprehend that another’s thoughts and desires may differ from our own was long believed to be a uniquely human cognitive trait. Recent research has revealed that predicting and interpreting the beliefs and intentions of others is a skill that we share with some members of the crow family. Despite having a distinctly different brain structure, these brainy birds are capable of perspective-taking, the complex thinking and behavioral flexibility that enables them to ignore their own preferences and predict and respond to the preferences of their mates.
A University of Cambridge study revealed that the courting male Eurasian jay could perceive that the way to his best bird’s heart was through her stomach. Given a choice between two types of favorite worms to feed his mate, and regardless of which wriggly delicacy he wanted, the insightful jay chose to feed her the type of worm she had not already eaten. Because both humans and animals would prefer not to eat the same food for every meal, researchers concluded that the male jays paid attention to what their mates ate and predicted that offering her food she had not grown tired of would be more likely to please her. It seems, for Eurasian jays, to love a bird is to cater to her worm wishes—food for thought.
ICYMI Nature News
Dolphins Return to Da Bronx
Delighted New Yorkers welcomed the return of dolphins to the Bronx River this week thanks to a decades-long cleanup effort to restore the aquatic habitat. Happy to have you back, finned fellows!
A Vaccine for Endangered Bees
Help is on the way for honeybees plagued by a deadly bacterial disease. The first bee vaccine developed to save hives has been approved in the United States. Roll up those teeny-tiny sleeves!
Turtle Moms Talk to Their Eggs
Researchers have discovered that giant South American river turtles chat to their eggs before they hatch. Not only that, but the pre-hatched turtles also chirp together to coordinate the big breakout. Ready, set, go!
These Frogs Hide their Blood to Go Stealth
Scientists in the Amazon have learned that tropical glass frogs can divert their blood to their livers to make themselves invisible. Ooh, amphibian party trick!
Keeping It Cool with Snot Bubbles
According to a study at Curtin University, echidnas, prickly egg-laying mammals native to Australia, cope with high temperatures by blowing snot bubbles to keep their noses wet. Wait, doesn’t everyone?
Time to Plan Your Pollinator Patch
To reach their goal of 25,000 new pollinator gardens across the U.S. in 2023, Save our Monarchs is inviting every school, scout troop, and 4-H club across the U.S. to pitch in and plant to help save the endangered butterflies. Find out how to get your free seeds here.
Lisa S. French
January 27, 2023
1.5-minute read
Before we get down to tree business, wherever you are in the world, we hope that your new year is off to a promising start. Beaming you a gargantuan dose of good fortune in the months ahead.
If you’re a regular reader, you know we often write about how forests help support life on Earth: combating climate change, purifying air and water, enhancing well-being, providing habitat for wildlife, and food, energy, and economic security for rural communities.
Every month we share updates on the carbon capture potential of the trees that we plant in reforestation projects around the world. Because what we plant is as important as where we plant, we’d like to introduce you to some of the leafy green, multi-purpose marvels that help keep the planet in good working order:
Nile Tulip
Markhamia lutea
- Fast-growing
- Provides shade for crops
- Prevents soil erosion
- Bark and leaves used for traditional medicine
Red Silk Cotton Tree
Bombax ceiba
- Ornamental
- Restores native woodland
- Provides habitat for birds and bees
- Edible seeds, flowers, and leaves
Horse Tamarind
Leucaena leucocephala
- Drought tolerant
- Restores native woodland
- Provides human and animal nutrition
- Edible seeds, flowers, and leaves
Teak
Tectona grandis
- Fast-growing hardwood
- Used for carpentry and construction
- Provides human and animal nutrition
- Used for traditional and modern medicine
Pombeiro
Tapirira guianensis
- Big-canopied shade tree
- Provides habitat for birds and bees
- Provides human and animal nutrition
- Used for traditional medicine
Croton
Croton megalocarpus
- Fast-growing, 94% survival rate
- Provides animal nutrition
- Serves as fencing and windbreak
- Used for traditional medicine
As you can see, in addition to cooling the planet, trees are good for all manner of important, life-sustaining things. Wherever the trees we plant put down roots, they don’t just stand around looking pretty; they get to work providing local and global benefits. With your kind support, we’re glad to continue to offer them job opportunities through the Tree-Nation platform in 2023.
2022 FWP Carbon Capture Report:
The 16 species of trees we planted across 12 projects from April through December of 2022 bring our total CO2 capture to 2,365 tons. That’s equivalent to 102,360 trash bags of waste recycled instead of landfilled, 2,616,392 pounds of coal burned, or 266,092 gallons of gasoline consumed.
Lisa S. French
January 15, 2023
“And now we welcome
the new year,
full of things
that have never been.
Rainer Maria Rilke
Coming in autumn 2023,
a new love nature story
from
Favorite World Press.
Lisa S. French
January 7, 2023
As the sun sets on another year, we have two important announcements:
1. We love our readers!
Because when you support Favorite World Press, you’re not just readers, you’re tree planters.
For every book we sell, we plant a tree—a native tree that will help cool Earth, provide food and shelter for wildlife, purify air and water and support local communities.
In 2022, we put down roots in 11 countries; that’s a pretty good year!
By reading with us, you’ve made an investment in the future health of our planet. Thank you for being a force for positive change.
2. We are so grateful!
From our favorite world to yours, wishing you a hopeful heart and a happy New Year.
xo LSF • WW • FWP
Lisa S. French
December 31, 2022
“There is no better place I know
To think of trees in wind and snow
Than here, where embers fall and glow . . .
Trees bewildered now in snow:”
Leigh Buckner Hanes
Wherever you find your joy this season,
wishing you happy holidays.
xo Favorite World Press
FWP Happy, Merry Playlist.
Lisa S. French
December 17, 2022
1.5-minute read
Coexistence is about care, not control. It is about reciprocity, not retribution.
Peter S. Algona from The Accidental Ecosystem.
Over the course of the past year, we’ve written about creature life, the beauty, benefits, and science of nature, and some of the people and organizations working tirelessly to protect and preserve the living world that we love. In the spirit of the giving season, we dedicate this year-end blog to one of our favorite conservation non-profits in the hope that they will become one of yours.
Big Life Foundation: Conservation Supports People. People Support Conservation.
Protecting 1.6 million acres of wilderness in the Amboseli ecosystem in East Africa, Big Life has partnered with local communities for over a decade to safeguard nature, benefiting both people and wildlife.
Across alpine meadows, mountain forests, savannas, and wetlands, the holistic conservation organization secures habitat and migratory corridors for elephants, giraffes, zebras, wildebeest, gazelles, hartebeests, and other native species by creating economic opportunities for native people to participate in protecting the ecosystem they depend on to survive.
And that collaborative approach to preserving nature has been incredibly effective. Thanks to Big Life’s community-based conservation and anti-poaching campaign, wildlife numbers in the Amboseli are on the rebound—giraffes have quadrupled, and there are ten times more lions and more elephants roaming the ecosystem in the past year than any time in the last half-century—much-needed hopeful news as global wildlife numbers continue to plummet.
Devastating Drought: A Call to Action
Following years of success implementing strategic interventions to sustain East Africa’s wildlife and wildlands, Big Life and their conservation partners are now facing a heart-wrenching climate-based crisis. The fourth year of the worst drought in decades across the Horn of Africa has devastated the region.
Prioritizing vulnerable communities and children, Big Life is providing school lunches across the Amboseli ecosystem and environmental work for women to help feed their families. Until the rains return, they are also pumping water into remote areas for migrating wildlife and providing hay and food pellets to prevent starvation. The effects of this environmental crisis will likely last for months. Right now, the conservation organization is in critical need of assistance. If you would like to pitch in to help save Africa’s iconic animal species and provide relief for drought-impacted communities, please visit BigLife.org to learn more about their life-sustaining work—for the love of the living world.
ICYMI Nature News
A Big Plan for the Entire Planet
This week’s really big news is that international negotiations are underway in Montreal to develop a roadmap to protect biodiversity and keep our home planet’s ecosystems chugging along, providing life essentials and soul-soothing extras. What’s at stake? Oceans, rivers, lakes, wetlands, forests, prairies, woodlands, the climate, all creatures great and small—life on Earth. Here’s an explainer. And here are the biodiversity numbers. And here is a visual tour of nature in crisis.
Glow-in-the-Dark Crustaceans
Described as “the most spectacular natural wonder most people will never see”, tiny Caribbean male crustaceans light up their underwater world. Actually, you lucky people can see it here.
Honeybee Half-Life
According to scientists at the University of Maryland, the life span of honeybees is 50% shorter than it was 50 years ago. Fifty percent! We need to bee better.
City Cougar Quadruplets
The world’s largest wildlife crossing is about to get more big cat traffic. A cougar in the Santa Monica mountains near Los Angeles has delivered four healthy cubs, and the mother and adorable babies are doing fine. You can have a peek at the new arrivals here.
Lisa S. French
December 12, 2022
