Jurassic World Premiere at the Alamo Drafthouse

Currently, the crews of the Morrison Natural History Museum and the Best Western Denver Southwest are manning a large booth in the lobby of the Alamo Drafthouse of Littleton, Colorado, taking part of the hype that has accompanied the release of the new Jurassic World movie.  People have been clawing to get in and see the movie, and are pretty excited to see some awesome fossils and fossil casts right there in the lobby!

The Acrocanthosaurus arm clawing its way towards the Alamo Drafthouse building.

We brought over several of the awesome casts that are (usually) on display in the lobby of the Best Western Denver Southwest Dino Hotel, including a Uintatherium skull, one of the Brachiosaurus femora, a Camarasaurus skull, and the prize of the exhibition, the Acrocanthosaurus skull and arm!

Fran, the most complete skull of Acrocanthosaurus ever discovered.  A giant cousin of Allosaurus, this skull was discovered in Oklahoma, and would have lived during the Early Cretaceous Period, around 110 million years ago.  The dinosaur was first described in 1950 by paleontologists J. Willis Stovall and Wann Langston Jr.

A skull of the long-necked sauropod dinosaur Camarasaurus, statistically the most common dinosaur discovered in the Late Jurassic Morrison Formation.  This Camarasaurus specimen, nicknamed "E.T.," was discovered at the Howe Stephens Quarry in Wyoming.  Check out his page on the Black Hills Institute Website by clicking HERE.

A Tyrannosaurus rex arm picks the nose of the Acrocanthosaurus.  Now that's something you don't see every day.

Matt Mossbrucker, the entire Tally family clan, Justin Sewell from TheOneRing.net, and myself have been here since Thursday, talking with folks before and after their movie experience.  Part of what makes the Alamo Drafthouse experience particularly interesting is they do a half hour preshow, where they pull awesome old footage and fun videos that relate to the feature presentation, so you get to enjoy a half hour of awesome old dinosaur footage as well!  So definitely come on by and say hello, and enjoy the movie while you're here!

From left to right: Joe Tally, Greg Tally, and Caroline Tally doing very important science.

Matthew Mossbrucker, Director and Chief Curator of the Morrison Natural History Museum, poses next to the gigantic femur of the Brachiosaurus, with the Acrocanthosaurus skull slung over one shoulder and the Camarasaurus skull in the other.  Imagine how cool you would look carrying that Brachiosaurus femur around in a hotel parking lot. 

Merlin Barnes, Outreach Specialist at Dinosaur Ridge, our neighbors both at the Drafthouse and in real life.

I got to watch Jurassic World this afternoon, and I was very pleased with the movie, I thought it was very entertaining and a great movie overall!  For the next few days, I'm going to spend as much time as I can talking about different aspects of the movie, both accurate and inaccurate aspects of it, for all of your reading and viewing pleasure!  Some topics I plan to talk about include:

• Pterygoid teeth
• Shed teeth
• Feathers
• Faculative bipedalism
• Herding and group behavior
• Defensive tails
• Head butting
• Dinosaur hands and rabbit paws
• Venomous and poisonous dinosaurs
• Threat displays
• Paleo art
• Opposable thumbs
• Pterosaur diets
• Dinos in the snow
• Maybe even a little cuttlefish talk too

I had a lot of fun watching the movie, and I'm still having fun talking with the crowds of people entering and exiting the theater, hyped up and excited to learn more about dinosaurs and their prehistoric contemporaries!  I'm also looking forward to using the movie as an opportunity to engage people about dinosaurs, and hopefully you who are still reading this post will, too.

Matthew Mossbrucker (left) and Greg Tally, co-owner of the Best Western Denver Southwest Dino Hotel, walk the Brachiosaurus femur out of the lobby of the hotel, on its way to the Alamo Drafthouse.  We thought it could use a nice explosion in the background, so....

....this was born.

The Mace Brown Museum of Natural History

On our trip last summer to South Carolina visiting our friends the Beckleys, we got to visit the Mace Brown Museum of Natural History at the College of Charleston which, as small museums go, I was definitely impressed with.  They had quite the collection laid out in a very pleasing fashion, the lighting was great, and I definitely recommend stopping by for a visit.  They had a very nice assortment of fossils that were either local critters, or animals that had been found nearby and likely would have also been found in the area.  I started making this post way back then, and I never got a chance to finish it, so I just wanted to share a few pictures of some of the interesting animals that they had on display.

For me, last summer was the "Summer of the Giant Ground Sloths."  Up until that time, I had only seen a few ground sloth skeletons on display, including the skeleton at The Living Desert in Palm Desert, California and a mounted skeleton of a Harlan's ground sloth (Paramylodon harlani) behind the scenes at the Denver Museum of Nature and Science.  But last summer, I got to see mounted specimens at the Mace Brown Museum, the Rocky Mountain Dinosaur Resource Center, and the American Museum of Natural History.  The sloth skeleton above is the mid-sized ground sloth Glossotherium, from approximately 1.8 MYA during the Pleistocene Epoch in Florida.  The arm below is from the enormous Eremotherium, one of the earliest South American animals that migrated into North America during the Great American Interchange, approximately 2.2 MYA.  This specimen is thought to be approximately 1.6 MY old, from Florida.  That little sign placard next to the arm was probably about 2x3 inches.  These sloths were simply enormous.

I also got my first good look at a bizarre group of bizarre, dermal-armored animals known as pampatheres.  Below, we have the giant armadillo-like pampathere Holmesina septentrionalis from the Pleistocene Epoch, between around 2 - 1.5 MYA, also from Florida.  According to the signs, Holmesina is one of the largest pampatheres, and was given its current name by the famous paleontologist George Gaylord Simpson, which can be read by clicking HERE.  Originally, Holmesina was described as a species of Glyptodon by Joseph Leidy, who later thought that the animal was actually a type of giant armadillo, but Simpson was able to set the record straight in 1930.  This animal is in the same order as the armadillos and the glyptodonts, and like the other two groups, is completely covered in dermal armor.  The second picture shows a close up of that dermal armor on the front legs.

This picture displays the skulls of two rodents.  The one on the left belongs to Castor canadensis, the North American beaver.  The one on the right, however, that is freaking huge, is also from a beaver, just a gigantic extinct beaver.  Meet Castoroides ohioensis, a beaver the size of a black bear!  From what I have been able to find, it is unknown whether Castoroides built dams like its modern counterpart.  What is known is that it was one gigantic enormous beaver.

I also got to see my first fossil penguin (cast or otherwise) not still surrounded by matrix.  This is a cast of the skull of the penguin Palaeospheniscus, a genus of fossil penguin that was abundant during the Miocene of South America.  Their fossils have been discovered in Peru and Argentina, both places where penguins of the genus Spheniscus, such as the Magellanic and Humboldt penguins, are found today.

Works Cited:

Alien Vs. Predator Vs. Parasaurolophus

A few days ago, I sat down and, with several hours of homework to do, watched Ridley Scott's 1979 classic "Alien."  It was phenomenal, and I enjoyed it, and went on to watch Predator (great) and Prometheus (not so great).  Now, on this excellent but snowy Thursday afternoon, I'm about an hour into "Aliens," knowing that any second now an Alien xenomorph is going to appear out of nowhere and kill something.  But that's not why I paused the movie at the 54:44 minute mark.  What I've been thinking about is far more pressing: what's the purpose of that enormously distended xenomorph cranium?

If you have no idea what's going on in this picture yet, that means you're probably sane.

Usually with aliens, you can just pass off a big head as an indicator of big brains.  Ki-Adi Mundi from Star Wars, for example, has two brains in that big 'ol Cerean cranium of his, and an extra heart to boot.  If you rewatch "A New Hope" extra carefully, see if you can't spot Pons Limbic (note the brainy pun) in the Mos Eisley Cantina, the big-brained Siniteen whose head literally resembles a brain.  The Guardians of the Universe from the D.C. Comics franchise are often pretty wise, but in light of some recent events, they might not be quite as level headed and emotion spectrumless as we thought (but that's a story for another bright snowy day).  The Face of Boe from Doctor Who seems to be pretty smart, given that he's literally just a giant head in a tank and can communicate telepathically.  Then there's Zilius Zox, a Red Lantern from the D.C. universe, who also appears to be little more than a giant head.  Both Jumba (from Disney's "Lilo and Stitch") and E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial (from E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial) seem to have noggins that are larger than average in proportion to body size, and seem to have above average intelligence to match.  Marvin the Martian and Roger from American Dad?  Both smart, both big-headed.

A skull of the duck-billed hadrosaur Parasaurolophus at the American Museum of Natural History in New York, from my visit last summer with my good friend Zach Evens (who also deserves some credit listing big-brained aliens).

Now what about the aliens, or xenomorphs, from the "Alien" franchise?  Although undeniably intelligent to some degree, they aren't what you'd typically think of when the subject of brainy aliens comes up around the dinner table, at least not in terms of processing power.  But they definitely have big heads.  So what are they used for if not for thinking?  We, of course, can turn to the science of dinosaur paleontology to help us with this question.  Take a look at the dinosaur skull above.  This critter is a hadrosaur, or duck-billed dinosaur, called Parasaurolophus.  Scientists believe that it blew air through its special crest to produce a sound very similar to that of a trombone!  Many hadrosaurs had wild cranial ornamentation, as did other dinosaurs such as some of the ceratopsians and the pachycephalosaurs, just to name a few.  These wacky head-dos almost certainly had a whole lot to do with attracting a mate and sexual selection.  Essentially, the bigger your crest is, the more attractive you are.  Is it possible a similar sort of thing evolved for the Alien xenomorphs?  In "Aliens," we can see that the queen has a different head pattern than do all of the other xenomorphs that we've seen so far, indicating some sort of sexual dimorphism is potentially at work.  Interesting.  What should you take from this blog post?  Probably just that I have way too much time on my hands.

On a brief side note, I realized I've actually talked about the skull of the xenomorphs previously, before I'd even seen the movies.  Check out that post, all about otter skulls, by clicking HERE.

Alien vs. predator vs. Parasaurolophus vs. Tyrannosaurus vs. Lego Gilderoy Lockhart vs. Darth Vader vs. Polly Pocket vs. creepy frog candle vs. macaw vs. Apatosaurus vs. medieval archer vs. Boba Fett Pez Dispenser vs. Ambelodon vs. mallard vs. fisherman from an ironic fish cake vs. Jumba vs. Craire Cat Hello Thingy vs. six different types of shark vs. Taz monster truck vs. Aragorn son of Arathorn vs. Liam Payne vs. Marty from "Pirates of the Caribbean" vs. mouse cat toy vs. basilisk lizard vs. Spider-Man vs. penguins with jet packs and missile launchers vs. Themistocles vs. Terri Irwin.  And this is why it takes me so long to write a blog post.  I think we were all a little surprised about how quickly things escalated.  Yeah, I definitely have too much time on my hands.

Snowy Palms: An Omen of Death

Recently, parts of Southern California experienced some surprisingly cold weather, as falling snow graced the tops of the palm trees around Christmas time.  A White Christmas is nothing terribly surprising for folks like myself, born and raised in Colorado, but for California natives it was definitely more of a surprise.  People had pulled over on the side of the highway for an opportunity to play in the snow, throwing snowballs and taking selfies all over the place.

Wind turbines in the foreground, and snow capped mountains in the background in the middle of the desert just outside of Palm Desert in California.

A family stopped along Interstate-15 in Temecula, California to play in the snow, a scene that could easily have been lifted out of Colorado, if not for the trees adorned with green leaves, and especially the palm tree in the background.

A snow selfie on the side of the Interstate-15 in Temecula, California.

Although the winter freeze was very exciting for many of the residents, for the native residents of Southern California's deserts, the freeze would be much less welcome.  Over millions of years, the animals that call these seemingly barren slopes home have evolved to cope with extreme environmental stress typical of those experienced in the desert.  Aridity and extreme heat of course play major roles in any desert ecosystem, and many of the adaptations of desert animals are in response to these climatic factors.

The bobcat (Lynx rufus), one of the residents of the Southern California deserts.  This particular individual was at The Living Desert in Palm Desert.

A captive desert bighorn sheep (Ovis canadensis nelsoni) at The Living Desert.  This subspecies is native to the southern United States and Mexico.

A western diamondback rattlesnake (Crotalus atrox), also native to the southern United States and northern Mexico.

A wild greater roadrunner (Geococcyx californianus) that I chased through a Target parking lot.  

A wild California ground squirrel (Spermophilus beecheyi) that we saw foraging around at The Living Desert.

A hummingbird, possibly an Anna's hummingbird (Calypte anna).  Hummingbirds in Colorado will fly south for the winter, in order to avoid harsh weather like that seen in Southern California last week,

Of course, environmental conditions that fall well outside the norm are arguably equally important for animals native to a specific biome or region.  Even if a population of animals thrives in the harsh, arid landscape of Southern California, if all it takes is a single night of snow to wipe out the population, unusual weather (such as that seen in the area last week) can be extremely troublesome.  Extreme weather can also help control populations, and can be what keeps other animals from colonizing an area.  For example, if a population of desert rodent attempts to colonize the mountains around Palm Desert, but is unable to cope with the occasional snow storm, then that type of rodent would be much less likely to survive and thrive there.

Part of the mountains west of La Quinta and Rancho Mirage, prior to the snowstorm.

The same mountains, following the snowstorm.

Works Cited:

Hummingbirds found in California, USA. (n.d.). Retrieved January 4, 2015, from http://beautyofbirds.com/hummingbirdscalifornia.html

Rancho Mirage on Dwellable

Night Changes: Why Color Blind People Aren't So Strange (But Really Are at the Same Time)

"Why does your Tyrannosaurus skull have rings on its eyes?"  "Why are reptiles and amphibians, animals often brushed aside as "less superior" to mammals, frequently very colorful?"  "By contrast, why are so many mammals so drab?"  "Does it ever drive you crazy just how fast the night changes?"  All of these questions and more are ones that I've either received or asked over the last few months, and surprisingly, they are all (sort of) tied together.

A selection of the stars of this post.  In the top row from left to right, we have a Prestosuchus skull, Micronesian kingfisher, Opthalmosaurus skull, African elephant, and a white-necked raven.  Second row, we have a male peafowl, Microraptor specimen, myself pulling a "District 9" with a T-rex arm and Stan the T-rex next to me at the Morrison Natural History Museum (now you finally know what I look like [irresistible], you can cross that off your bucket list), a Mandarin Goby, and the hand of Zach Evens descending upon a brightly colored newt.  Finally, in the bottom row, we see a pair of tiger salamanders, a coyote that ran amok on the University of Colorado campus last winter, and several bees swarming a hummingbird feeder at the MNHM.  Did I forget anything?  Oh, right, the album cover of One Direction's new album "Four."  A further bonus for all you "Natural Worlders" out there: can you find the names of twenty-one One Direction songs scattered throughout the blog post?  Try not to stay up all night searching for them, one way or another I have no doubt you can figure it out.  Just shoot me and email, and I can get back for to you about where they are.  Just one of those little things that makes reading my blog so worthwhile.

When people first walk into the Morrison Natural History Museum near Denver, Colorado, you might see a rock hammer-toting, cowboy-hat wearing, beard-wielding paleontologist talking about lizard pseudo-placentas, the anatomy of the dinos in Jurassic park, or whether said dinosaurs would taste like chicken.*  You might notice the bathroom first, which is more or less right across the room from the front entrance.  Or, like most people, you might notice our cast of Stan, one of the most complete specimens of Tyrannosaurus rex known to mankind.  We tend to get a lot of questions about this bad boy (T-rex consistently being the favorite dinosaur of pretty much everybody), and one question that we get a lot pertains to his eyes.  You might have missed it if you were looking at the fantastic picture above, but take a look at the pictures below and you should see it: it looks like we've put little rings where the eyes should be.  The question is: Why does our Tyrannosaurus skull have rings on its eyes?

Believe it or not, this was not a once in a lifetime phenomena, and it is not a trick (excuse me, an illusion) we created to make the placement of the oculars more apparent for the casual observer.  It's real, and it's called the sclerotic ring.  Without getting too technical, the sclerotic ring is a ring of several bones that actually is inside of the eye of the animal, and is usually thought to help support the eye.  What I find really interesting about the ring is that the default condition in vertebrate animals is possession of this bony ring.  Even though you might not see it in a lot of museum specimens due to display difficulties or preservation issues, a sclerotic ring is present in most/all fish, lizards, birds, and dinosaurs.**  You won't see it in modern crocodilians, though, and it seems like at least some snakes don't have them either.  What's another group that doesn't have the ring?  You guessed it: mammals.

One with the ring, one without.  My bro Masaki Kleinkopf poses next to the mounted skeleton of the pterosaur Pteranodon at the Rocky Mountain Dinosaur Resource Center (RMDRC) in Woodland Park, Colorado.  Check out dat ring doe.

A mounted skeleton of the emperor penguin (Aptenodytes forsteri) at the American Museum of Natural History (AMNH) in New York. If you liked it, you should have put a ring on it. 

Skull of the therizinosaur dinosaur Falcarius on display at the Wyoming Dinosaur Center in Wyoming.  One ring to rule them all.

At this point you might be expecting some profound, fascinating statement that explains why some animals have the ring and some animals don't.  Believe me, very few things would please me more than to be able to explain this to you.  Unfortunately, I don't know.  Even more unfortunately, nobody really knows!  Although various explanations have been put forth over the years, I can't really find a fool('s gold fire)proof, satisfactory interpretation that broadly explains this phenomenon, and in this post I don't really wish to wade any further into this debate than we have already.  We have a few more questions to answer tonight.

The small feathered dinosaur Microraptor on display at the Wyoming Dinosaur Center in Wyoming.  You can see both the impressions of feathers off the wings and legs (making this Velociraptor-cousin comparable to the Sopwith Camel British biplane active during World War I), as well as the sclerotic ring nestled within the orbital.  My preciousssss.....

The name of this ichthyosaur, Opthalmosaurus, actually means "eye lizard," the name of which refers to the big @$$ eyes and sclerotic rings of this particular genus.  Better not put it on your finger, Dumbledore, it might be a Horcrux.

The pseudosuchian Prestosuchus, on display at the AMNH in New York.  This ring just exudes fellowship, don't you think?

Why is Nagini usually more brightly colored than Crookshanks or Scabbers?  Why are Polly's pigments predominantly prettier than Pongo's or Perdita's?  Although undeniably more handsome after true love's first kiss, there's no denying than many frogs and toads out there are much more exciting to look at than Prince Charming.  There's got to be a reason why the characters in "Finding Nemo" were so much brighter (sorry Dory, but I mean in terms of color) than Remy from "Ratatouille," or why Kevin is much more conspicuous than Dug in "Up." But what is the reason?  The answer seems to be fairly simple: with few exceptions, most mammals are colorblind. Primates are one of these exceptions, which is why we humans are able to differentiate between cherry and grape Jolly Ranchers and an elephant might fail, and why the Green lantern comic books and Bionicles absolutely tanked in the feline and canine demographics.  Mammals are good at a lot of things, but one thing that they're not very good at is seeing in color.  A picture is better than words in many cases, so check out some pics below of animals that can most definitely see in color.

Here we have a white-necked raven (Corvus albicollis) correctly putting four different colored game pieces into the correct slots at a special Teen Career Day event at the Denver Zoo that I attended with my sister. He did all eight tiles in the correct category, and it didn't take him very long, either! Some of my friends wouldn't be able to do it with such speed and accuracy....

Male peafowl (Pavo cristatus), often referred to as peacocks, are just one of many species of bird that use brightly colored feather to attract their mate.  Maybe that's why Sauron was so angry: he knew that, no matter what he did, the giant eagles would always be able to naturally two-up him.

A Micronesian kingfisher (Todiramphus cinnamominus) sittin' purty at the Denver Zoo.  Return of the King(fisher), am I right?

A clown fish (subfamily: Amphiprioninae) taking refuge amongst the stinging tentacles of a sea anemone at the Denver Zoo. 

The Mandarin goby (Synchiropus splendidus), a particularly beautiful fish, and very brightly colored as well. 

One of my two betta fish (Betta splendens), Juan Priestly.  Bright bodies with frilly fins?  Glad I'm not a betta fish, this one would steal my girl right out from under me.

Just like the default condition for vertebrates is to possess a sclerotic ring, so too does it seem that the default condition for vision is color.  So if mammals are supposedly so superior, why do so many of us lack this colorful condition?  Many paleontologists have been looking back to the Mesozoic Era, the age of the dinosaurs, to try and solve this colorful conundrum.  Just as mammals have been the dominant terrestrial vertebrates for the last 65 million years, so too did the dinosaurs rule the land during the Mesozoic, suppressing all other forms of life and filling most of the major terrestrial niches.  One of those life forms that was consistently suppressed from the Triassic through the Cretaceous was mammals.  Mostly small, shrew-like animals, Mesozoic mammals are usually thought to have been small, nocturnal creatures, pittering and pattering around the bodies of the sleeping dinos, ready to run at a moments notice.  Key word in that last sentence: nocturnal.

Can you see the little mouse-looking animal hiding underneath the box in the middle of the photograph?  That's Hufflepuff (Huffle to his friends), a small meadow vole (Microtus pennsylvanicus) that tried to hide underneath my legs when a red fox (Vulpes vulpes) happily tried to make a meal out of him last year on CU campus!  Knowing he probably had had the vole equivalent of a heart attack and taking pity on him, I said "I'll save you tonight!" and let him recover for a few days in my room before letting him go to let him live while he was young (which isn't long, I don't think most voles live longer than a year or so, but I could be wrong).  A nocturnal critter, he would have very little use for color vision, and has relatively drab coloration.

More wildlife from CU campus!  This coyote (Canis latrans) caused a bit of a stir last winter when it decided to crash on Farrand Field for a few hours, right in the middle of CU campus.  Although not exclusively nocturnal, coyotes are often active at night, but are quite adaptable, as was evidenced by this particular coyote's behavior, alive and well in the middle of campus!  Note the relatively drab coloration.

I have a friend who is partially colorblind, about as colorblind as an elephant according to some recent studies.  If you see him outside, he's going to be wearing sunglasses (unless he's done something to piss off Poseidon).***  Is he doing it just to look cool?  Well, yes, I suppose that's at least partially the case.  But for him, and for many other people who suffer from color blindness, it seems like they make up for it with above average night vision.  Essentially, an imbalance of rods (a photoreceptor that is not sensitive to color but is sensitive to light and dark conditions and aids in night vision) and cones (a photoreceptor that is sensitive to color and less sensitive to light/dark conditions) leads to many who are color blind reporting better than average ability to see what's going on in low-lighting conditions.

An African elephant drinking some water at the Cheyenne Mountain Zoo in Colorado Springs.  Drab colors?  You betcha!

When all of these seemingly disparate ideas are regarded holistically, it seems to make sense.  By default, most vertebrates enjoy a wide range of color vision (sometimes even a wider range than humans!).  However, during the Mesozoic dinosaurian domination, some groups of vertebrates such as the mammals were forced to take up residence during the night.  For millions of years, these little creatures lived a nocturnal existence, and it seems like being able to see in color no longer proved to be a competitive advantage for them.  Following the extinction of the dinosaurs and the subsequent radiation of mammals, it appears that the possession of color vision was unnecessary for them to survive and thrive.  Many mammals are still largely nocturnal today (think of your kitty at home and all of her midnight memories), which might have something to do with this disparity between their rods and cones.  All in all, it would appear that changes of the night can have some pretty profound effects on your ability to see across the color spectrum.


*You will probably come across them doing some serious work as well, but dinosaur taste-testing can be pretty important.
**I thought that Dr. Bakker, who I talked to a lot about this, mentioned that most or all frogs had the sclerotic ring, but I have been unable to confirm or deny this with a quick search through the resources I have at my disposal.
***Twice.

Works Cited:

Taima the Seattle Seahawk and the Genus Buteo

For those of you who watching the Broncos/Seahawks game right now, you might have noticed clips of a random bird of prey flying around which, if you're anything like me, that was the highlight of the entire game.  Named Taima, the bird is the mascot for the Seattle Seahawks football team, an augur hawk (Buteo rufofuscus).  Although sometimes referred to as the augur buzzard, I prefer the name augur hawk, as buzzard is sometimes a bit of a confusing name.*  According to the Seahawks website, Taima has been the "first one out of the tunnel" prior to every game.**  The augur hawk is one of the most common hawks in Africa, and inhabits an enormous portion of the eastern and central part of the continent.  Open plains, grasslands, and forests are the augur's preferred habitat, fairly similar to its close North American cousin, the red-tailed hawk (Buteo jaimaicensis).

The broad-winged hawk (Buteo platypterus) is one of the smallest members of the genus, and a hawk that's involved in a very interesting new project, the aptly named "Broad-Winged Hawk Project."  Similar in many ways to the OCEARCH shark tracking project, the BWHP is using satellite telemetry technology to track broad-winged hawks on their migration from Pennsylvania, all the way down to Central and South America.  You can join in the tracking fun by clicking on the link HERE!  Several of the nestling broad-wings were from pretty close to where my friend Zach Evens's cabin in Pennsylvania was that we visited in August!

There are a ton of other hawks in the genus Buteo besides the red-tail, augur, and broad-wing, several of which we've talked about here on the blog, such as the red-shouldered hawk (B. lineatus), rough-legged hawk (B. lagopus), and the Swainson's hawk (B. swainsoni).

A rough-legged hawk on the hand of Anne Price, the Curator of Raptors for the Raptor Education Foundation at one of the raptor shows at the Best Western Denver Southwest!

*In the Americas, a buzzard typically refers to a vulture, while in the Old World, buzzard is often attributed to members of the genus Buteo, of which the augur hawk is a member.  We Americans tend to refer to buteos simply as hawks, which is part of what can lead to this confusion.

**For those of you not in the know, the tunnel is not a metaphorical tunnel, and instead refers to a legit tunnel that leads from the locker room onto the stadium.

Works Cited: