Matt Pelikan
Wild Side: Insect IDs
Twenty years ago, it would have been nearly impossible for an amateur naturalist like me to study insects with any success. A few groups,...
Wild Side: Cooper’s hawks
Cooper’s hawks are good-sized birds, distinctly smaller than a red-tailed hawk but about the size of a crow. Compared to either of those familiar...
Wild Side: The great fly hunt
“Think like your prey,” say the hunters and fisherpeople. It’s good advice for naturalists, too. I can’t say it has helped me with fishing. The...
Wild Side: Fungus gnats
Nearly everybody has at least a vague notion of what a fly is. To a biologist, “fly” means a member of the insect order...
Wild Side: Lapland longspur
On Sunday, Nov. 8, I took advantage of ridiculously fine weather for a quick birding and bugging trip to Katama. In addition to the...
Wild Side: Listen for chirping
As we move into November, there is almost always a dramatic shift in the weather on the Vineyard, and with that, a shift in...
Wild Side: Pine siskins coming to feed
One of the more exciting types of avian events is a finch irruption — a large-scale movement of one or more finch species south...
Wild Side: Changing seasons
As autumn progresses and the natural world begins shutting down for winter, I like to play a game of “the last X of 2020.”...
Wild Side: Predatory beetles
While I have my favorite places to look for insects, I’m always alert for habitats that look like they might hold something interesting. This...
Wild Side: Long-winged katydids
The straight-lanced meadow katydid, Conocephalus strictus, is a very common insect on Martha’s Vineyard, inhabiting dry habitats with a mix of grasses, other herbaceous...
Wild Side: Katydids
A green insect with very long antennae and long hind legs gets posted on social media with a request for identification. “Katydid” is inevitably...
Bee happy, they’re flower lovers
The wasp genus Philanthus is blessed with an appealing name: it means “flower lover” and refers to the fondness members of the genus have...
Wild Side: Counting butterflies
Perhaps the type of wildlife inquiry I receive most often is about abundance: “Butterflies (or birds, or dragonflies) seem especially scarce (or especially common)...
Wild Side: Metamorphosis
Most everyone knows the basics of insect metamorphosis: It’s the way a caterpillar turns into a butterfly. We don’t often think, though, of how...
Wild Side: Robber flies
Among my favorite groups of insects are the robber flies, the predatory members of the family Asilidae. Ranging in length from a half-inch or...
Wild Side: Fledgling season
However screwed up the world may be, certain things keep chugging reliably onward. Pandemic? Protests? Birds don’t care. Their focus is elsewhere, and their...
Wild Side: Oystercatchers
American oystercatchers have an interesting history on the East Coast. Originally, they probably occurred across much of the region, from the Gulf of Mexico...
Wild Side: Summer tanagers
Spring migration is a hit-or-miss proposition for a Vineyard birder. It never brings the sheer volume of birds that fall migration brings, and to...
Wild Side: Bee happy
As the weather starts to warm in April, one of the first and most obvious groups of insects to become active are the bees....
Wild Side: Hawks and doves
As usual for this time of year, the production of more mourning doves is in full swing in our small Oak Bluffs yard. But...