Katlyn Taylor’s life has bumped into practically every phylum of the Animal Kingdom. Ask her how she got into science, and she’ll spin a narrative that spans sea lemons, orphaned chickens, 4-H rabbits, endangered Asian elephants, gray whale migration, sea lion pups, the genetics of microbacterial phages and the coloration of sea stars.
What runs through the life of author Norman McLean is a river. In the life of Elliott Finn, it’s a plant.
Siberia seldom tempts Western travelers to explore its vast taiga forests and endless permafrost — unless that traveler happens to be Allison Stringer. For the OSU biology student, nothing could be more enticing than spending a summer month “out in the middle of nowhere”— living on a barge at the Northeast Science Station near a tiny town called Chersky, discovering the long-buried bones of mammoths and ancient bison in the eroded banks of a nearby river, measuring tree rings with a high-powered microscope and recording carbon levels in soils to gauge the impact of climate change on Arctic ecosystems.
When manatees and alligators are members of your backyard ecosystem, it’s like living with a ready-made science project. Justin Conner took full advantage of the biodiversity bursting in and around the Florida canal that linked his childhood home to the ocean. There were peacock bass and cichlids to hook. There were frogs and toads to collect. There were black racers and corn snakes to stalk beneath the dense, tropical foliage.
For the rich and the royal, arras hangings were status symbols. They depicted ancient stories of valor and virtue. Often designed to inspire viewers to be braver and better, they also were instruments of political propaganda and puffery.
It boils down to a centuries-old debate among philosophers, scientists, veterinarians, farmers, ranchers, aquarists, and pet owners: What is our obligation to captive animals?