PRX - Pieces for Topic: Science
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At my age I should being thinking more of getting rid of clutter rather than adding to it. I like to tell our daughters Katy and Sarah that some da...
- Added: Jul 19, 2022
- Length: 04:23
This episode is a reminiscence…something I seem to be doing a lot of lately…and also a plea for getting our children and grandchildren out of doors...
- Added: Jul 19, 2022
- Length: 04:02
I hope we all get all of our monsoon fixes this season. One of those for me and maybe you too will be toads calling from puddles.
- Added: Jul 19, 2022
- Length: 04:01
I wrote this song about Lycium fremontii when I was managing the native plant nursery of Desert Survivors on West Starr Pass in Tucson. The nursery...
- Added: Jun 23, 2022
- Length: 05:01
I’ve told the story of the yucca moths and the soaptree yuccas many times. I love to tell it when I give talks and I’m not making this up, many yea...
- Added: Jun 23, 2022
- Length: 04:06
Every time I pull a reference book or field guide off the shelf to read about a recently seen insect I seem to run across a quote by the famous ent...
- Added: Jun 23, 2022
- Length: 05:09
When I was a boy vultures were called buzzards. It’s an interesting common name that came across the ocean with early British colonists who had no ...
- Added: Mar 15, 2022
- Length: 04:03
Anyone who lives in groundhog country will have a woodchuck tale or two to tell. Growing up in Kentucky I sure did. At the University of Arizona in...
- Added: Mar 15, 2022
- Length: 03:47
I’ve known barn owls since I was a kid in Kentucky and I always saw them in barns roosting or nesting up high in the rafters. I remember finding a ...
- Added: Mar 15, 2022
- Length: 04:43
One of the most magical moments of my childhood was when I first dug up potatoes in a garden and we later had some for dinner. I was awe struck! Th...
- Added: Mar 15, 2022
- Length: 04:59
One of the positive sides of isolating and staying very close to home during the pandemic is that we discovered new places and rediscovered old hau...
- Added: Mar 15, 2022
- Length: 05:07
The scientific name of the band-tailed pigeon is no longer Columba fasciata, but is Patagioenas fasciata. That’s too bad because I was hoping to st...
- Added: Sep 28, 2021
- Length: 04:59
The scientific name of the ringtail is Bassariscus astutus. It’s in the Procyonidae, the same family as our local borderlands’ critters the raccoon...
- Added: Jun 01, 2021
- Length: 04:56
The genus Artemisia is found in the sunflower family Asteraceae and there are over 200 species found around the world in the northern hemisphere. W...
- Added: Jun 01, 2021
- Length: 05:04
I’m telling you, late summer and fall are great times to get out into the hills, especially if you want to find interesting plants. While you’re ou...
- Added: Sep 24, 2019
- Length: 05:02
Cliffrose is the star of this show. It also goes by the common name quinine bush or the scientific name of Purshia mexicana. If you look at a map o...
- Added: Sep 24, 2019
- Length: 10:12
You know you haven’t been hiking or botanizing out in the desert or grassland enough when you look to the roadsides for interesting plants, but I’l...
- Added: Sep 24, 2019
- Length: 05:13
Apache plume (Fallugia paradoxa) is very common around out little homestead. There are thickets of it all along the banks of the Ol’ Guajolote. It ...
- Added: May 30, 2018
- Length: 11:28
Berberis fremontii is in the Barberry family or Berberidaceae…that’s fun to pronounce. Fremont barberry has quite a range north of the Salt River i...
- Added: May 30, 2018
- Length: 05:16
I suppose the thinking is that any wildflowers blooming along the side of the road will beautify that road and who cares what’s in the hydro-seed m...
- Added: May 30, 2018
- Length: 05:09
At one point when I was reading about the age of water I came across some research indicating that some of the water molecules we drink could be 4....
- Added: May 02, 2018
- Length: 05:09
I like the name sumac and I’ve known it since I was a kid in Kentucky. The most talked about sumac of my youth was poison sumac or poison ivy, but ...
- Added: May 02, 2018
- Length: 05:42
Hmm, I’m not doing a very good job of keeping up with botanical names. Either that or I’m making them up as I go. The current and correct name for ...
- Added: May 02, 2018
- Length: 05:13
Chuparosa is one my of favorite plants from back when we used to live outside of Tucson. I bet we had 5 or 6 of them planted at our little homestea...
- Added: May 02, 2018
- Length: 05:23
A morning or two after I recorded this show I heard a scaled quail calling, so now I have both species calling starting at dawn and then off and on...
- Added: May 02, 2018
- Length: 05:20