I love this time of year. After the exuberance of summer and the vibrant colors of fall, I’m thankful for the days growing shorter. The nights longer. Temperatures falling. Silhouettes of bare branches against a leaden sky promising snow. All of nature winding down. Encouraging quiet. Reflection. Introspection. [more]
Origins of the Holiday Turkey
With the holidays fast approaching, many folks are beginning to plan their requisite feasts with family and friends. The centerpiece for many a merry meal will undoubtedly be a turkey; indeed, Americans will consume nearly 50 million turkeys on Thanksgiving and about half as many on Christmas. Given that the average American consumes over 15 pounds of turkey each year, I thought it would be interesting to briefly explore the natural history of this ubiquitous bird. The domestic turkey that you buy in the grocery store is the same species as...
read moreRTPI Presents Traveler and Photographer Jeanne Wiebenga November 28 at 7pm
Jeanne Wiebenga will share photographs and stories from her Antarctic journeys during a presentation at the Roger Tory Peterson Institute (RTPI) on November 28 at 7:00pm. The Antarctic Peninsula and the subantarctic island of South Georgia are near the top of Jeanne Wiebenga’s list of favorite places. Twice, eighteen years apart, she made the trip by boat from Argentina, most recently in 2016 with a group of photographers under leadership of Dutch National Geographic photographer Frans Lanting. In her mind, nothing on this planet compares to...
read moreRTPI to host Holiday Open House on December 1st
RTPI invites you to our anuual Holiday Open House on Saturday, December 1, 2018, from 10:00AM – 6:30PM. Visitors will enjoy free admission into our galleries, light refreshments, and a chance to win a gift bag filled with unique items from our museum store. Guests will also have the opportunity to create bird-friendly ornaments (for a $5 donation), take a stroll on a whimsically-lighted nature trail, and roast marshmallows on our patio (from 3-6pm). This event is part of Swedish Market Day in Jamestown – Julmarknad, organized by the...
read moreWinter 2019 Hemlock Woolly Adelgid Surveys
Winter 2019 Hemlock Woolly Adelgid Surveys Hemlock Woolly Adelgid is an aphid-like insect, originating from Asia, which feeds off of the food storage cells below the needles of an Eastern Hemlock tree and hides itself under white woolly masses for protection. Within only a matter of 4-10 years an individual tree can succumb to an HWA infestation if left unnoticed. This deadly bug has been progressively moving closer to the area as it has spread throughout much of the eastern United States, leaving massive stands of hemlocks dead in their...
read moreRTPI to host screening of “From Billions to None”
RTPI invites you to join us for a screening of “From Billions To None: The Passenger Pigeon’s Flight To Extinction” on November 8. The screening, sponsored by JCC’s Earth Awareness Club and sustainability committee in collaboration with RTPI, begins at 7:30 p.m. and is free and open to the public. At 6 p.m., artist Alberto Rey will give a tour of his “Extinct Birds Project” exhibition which is now on view in our galleries. The exhibition features 18 original works. Rey is a painter, filmmaker, writer, fly fishing guide, distinguished...
read moreRTPI Joins the High Allegheny Hemlock Conservation Partnership to Offer Hemlock Woolly Adelgid Early Detection Training
Although autumn is just beginning in Western New York and Pennsylvania, the winter season will soon be upon us. The colder months, November through March to be exact, are the best time of year to search the area’s forests for an invasive forest pest known as Hemlock Woolly Adelgid (HWA). HWA is an aphid-like insect, originating from Asia, which feeds off of the food storage cells below the needles of an Eastern Hemlock tree and hides itself under white woolly masses for protection. Within only a matter of 4-10 years an individual tree can...
read moreThe Nature of Halloween
This article by Dr. Scott Shalaway originally appeared in the Post-Journal on October 29th,2016. I thought it was a perfect piece to share given we are hosting a program on snakes, spiders and bats this week! Learn more about “Snakes, Spiders and Bats! Oh, My!” this Friday, October 26th. THE NATURE OF HALLOWEEN Halloween, as I recall, was a day for friends to scare each other with nature’s creepy crawlies – spiders, snakes and bats. And often those fears lasted a lifetime. We all know people who recoil at the sight of these...
read moreRTPI will host Lawn of the Dead! Landscape Design Workshop October 26th
(RTPI) invites you to Lawn of the Dead! on Friday, October 26th, from 10:00am – 2:00pm. It has been said that if you compared the average American lawn to a desert, the desert would win easily with much greater life and species diversity. Keeping up a lawn is both a chore for you and harmful to all flora and fauna in the area. This special landscape design workshop will help you learn how to make your yard a haven for native and migrating wildlife. You will discover how your landscape choices as a homeowner can improve the health of our...
read moreRTPI to host: Snakes, Spiders, and Bats! Oh, My!
The Roger Tory Peterson Institute of Natural History invites you to join us for “Snakes, Spiders, and Bats! Oh, my!” on Friday, October 26th from 5:30-8:00 pm. The Buffalo Zoo’s education department will be on site from 5:30-6:30pm with their “Zoo Mobile” to introduce guests to an array snakes, bats and spiders, and from 6:30 to 8:00 three knowledgeable and passionate local biologists (Twan Leenders, Becky Nystrom, and Jonathan Townsend) will explore the causes and consequences of the common misconceptions surrounding these creatures that so...
read moreRTPI to Host Bird-Skinning Demonstration/Workshop 10/20/18
The bird specimens so artfully depicted in Alberto Rey’s ‘The Extinct Bird Project’ exhibition, now on view at RTPI, are stunning studies of lifeless creatures that will never again be seen in the wild. Some of the birds represented in Rey’s paintings have been dead for over a century, but their preserved bodies are still available for researchers – and artists – to study in the country’s natural history museums, including the Roger Tory Peterson Institute of Natural History (RTPI). These so-called ‘study skins’ are not taxidermy...
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