This week it’s butterflies, belly flowers, plot bunnies, foxes, and cuckoos. Also, writing advice from Mark Twain and a wonderful bit of prose from Sara Pennypacker’s book Pax. And are there word origins? Well, does a duck swim? We’ll hear the...
A highly anticipated children’s book and the epic history behind a familiar vegetable: fans of illustrator Maurice Sendak eagerly await publication of a newly discovered manuscript by the late author. And speaking of children’s literature, some wise...
In an earlier episode, we talked about the butterfly mating behavior known as hilltopping, in which male butterflies try to appeal to females by flying as high as possible. A listener in Fairbanks, Alaska, reports that the term hilltopping is used...
Hiking in the mountains, Martha kept noticing butterflies at about 4,000-to-5,000 feet above sea level. Those butterflies are hilltopping. It’s when male butterflies of many species go to high points to advertise their fortitude and genes to the...
hilltopping n.— «Several fly species have landmark-based territoriality, especially for their mating swarms, and may return to the same tree by a lake year after year. Male Cuterebra flies, also called botflies, form mating groups on hilltops...