Larry Porter Wildlife Stories

I know it’s deceiving to give human characteristics and emotions to animals, birds and inanimate objects, but there are times it just can’t be helped. The writing tool is called anthropomorphism, and there are lots of examples. Perhaps the most familiar is the Walt...

The late Jack Higgins, who steered me into photographing birds, always said that if “common” was part of a bird’s name, it wasn’t common. According to Audubon, that’s not true of common yellowthroats. The diminutive bird—only 4½ inches long—breeds throughout much of...

Whenever I see a male bobolink in the spring, an image pops into my head of a pretentious 17th or 18th century European monarch—or even one of our own Founding Fathers. The yellowish patch on the back of the bobolink’s head and nape of the neck reminds me of the wigs...

The maternity watch in York County ended in tragedy for three hoped-for offspring of black-necked stilts after their rare nesting effort in eastern Nebraska. Liz Garcia of Utica faithfully monitored the nesting activity from the time she first spotted the nesters on...

Wildlife photography during gloomy periods are not as rewarding as when the sun makes the colors of a subject pop. The spring of 2021 seemed unusually cloudy. From April 15 through May 31—a period of 46 days—only 13 days in the Lincoln, Nebraska, area were free of...

Classifying upland sandpipers as shorebirds seems as unlikely as saying bunny rabbits are ferocious. But even though upland sandpipers refuse to get near water, they are considered shorebirds. And, yes, one rabbit gained fame for attacking a U.S. president. Jimmy...