Sustainable Communities Program at NAU

April in northern Arizona is heralded by the loud metallic wing trills of broad-tailed hummingbirds returning from winter in the Highlands of Mexico and Central America.

Researchers in the Southwest are using hidden recorders to capture the fluted whistles of the pinyon jay. It’s part of a new effort to track ecological changes through sound.

Every spring, thousands of sheep were herded on a three-week trek across northern Arizona, up onto the Colorado Plateau for summer grazing.

A wildlife bridge on Interstate 17 south of Flagstaff could help guide elk, deer and other wildlife navigate the highway and cut down on collisions with cars and trucks.

From the Roosevelts and George W. Bush to NAU students, the Hat Ranch near Williams has a layered history of conservation and public life.

Fremont cottonwoods form a ribbon of green along Arizona’s rivers and streams. They have heart-shaped leaves which turn golden in fall and fluffy, cotton-like seeds.

Route 66 is known for roadside history, but the landscape also holds older signs of passage and human movement.

Insects don’t fly straight to lights — new research shows they orbit them instead, offering insight into night behavior and how light affects insect populations.

If you look toward the eastern horizon just before dawn on a clear, moonless night, you should see a ghostly white glow shining up through the dark sky.

Coyotes and badgers are known as rivals, but sometimes the unlikely pair works together to hunt burrowing rodents.