There is an astonishing diversity of native bees across the USA. About 4,000 species have been identified and catalogued, ranging in length from less than one eighth of an inch to more than one inch. They vary in color from dark brown or black to metallic green or blue, and may have stripes of red, white, orange, or yellow. Many common names reflect the way they build nests: plasterer bees, leafcutter bees, mason bees, digger bees, and carpenter bees. Since most don’t fit the stereotyped image of a bee (black-and-yellow-striped, living in a hive, and apt to sting) they are easily overlooked. Out of sight, out of mind they gently get on with foraging, and in doing so provide the vital ecosystem service of pollination. h/t: http://www.xerces.org/pollinator-conservation/native-bees/

The meaning is often lost to time, but the human impulse for artistic expression was obviously alive within the ancient peoples who created these works.

The Big Hole Valley in Montana is a wild place. The National Park Service preserves the Big Hole National Battlefield in the valley which marks a deadly skirmish between the Nez Perce and U.S. military in 1877. This cultural preservation also preserves the wildness of the land. All of these images were taken within the park, via a special permit.

Of the approximately 70 vole species known worldwide, the red tree vole (Arborimus longicaudus) has the unique distinction of living high in the canopy of old-growth forests. It feeds on toxic conifer needles, and fastidiously peels away the needle's resin ducts, and consumes the heart. The discarded resin ducts are then used for nesting.

"God has an inordinate fondness for beetles." - J. B. S. Haldane, British geneticist and evolutionary biologist. Stephen Jay Gould elaborates on this quote "Haldane was making a theological point: God is most likely to take trouble over reproducing his own image, and his 400,000 attempts at the perfect beetle contrast with his slipshod creation of man. When we meet the Almighty face to face he will resemble a beetle"

On August 28, 2014, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service listed the Oregon spotted frog as a threatened species under the Endangered Species Act. This once common, colorful little frog has been decimated by invasive bullfrogs, habitat loss, and disease. The population at Conboy Lake in Washington is one of the few places where it survives in numbers. Researcher Kyle Tidwell has set out to understand why.

Once thought to be one of North America's rarest animals. First described in 1891, the species had only been seen a handful of times until 1990. Spotted bats (Euderma maculatum) are actually well distributed in the west - they are however, incredibly elusive. They prefer open country, and fly higher than most bats - making them incredibly difficult to observe.