51 days until the paperback release of When the Earth Was Green

226 days until the release of Tyrant Lizard Queen

The desert sharpens. I kept coming back to the thought as I wandered around the Arizona-Sonora Desert Museum yesterday morning, not because of the innumerable spines and needles and prickers among the pathways, but for all the stark, colorful, and resilient life. The orange and black of hooded orioles, the ‘70s horror red of cactus flowers, ocelot spots that look like pools of night among the gold and cream of the cat’s coat, life that has been shaped by extremes of the heat and the dry into patterns and shades that always take my breath away.

The museum is one of the finest I’ve ever been to. Nestled within a national park, it blurs the boundaries between wild and captive. Standing at an overlook, facing the flats running out towards Mexico, I could spot the kennels where the museum’s coyotes are cared for while a group of spiny iguanas - imported from California by museum staff in the 1970s to control the mosquitoes - watched me from a nearby basking rock. Mid-morning, the museum brought out a great horned owl to fly among the cactus, a bird that struggled to survive on its one, but then there was another, wild great horned in a tree by the black bear exhibit, dozing in the midday warmth near a new nest. Signs all around the campus remind visitors to bring water, be mindful of scorpions and wasps and tarantulas, to not feed the coyotes, a place that often feels less like a piece of nature carved away for close viewing but an introduction.

I’m out here for the Tucson Festival of Books, running this weekend. The three hour time change getting out here, and a little sunburn, hit me hard, but I’ve still got some good stuff for you.

Scribblings

• Premium subscribers got a new piece about the surprise discovery of a toothy bird that flapped around ancient Spain 125 million years ago.

• Last week’s article, on baby sauropods as Jurassic snack food, is up on my blog. If you want stories like this first, and to help me keep writing original paleo pieces like it, hit the premium tier for a new article every Wednesday.

• If you happen to be around Tucson this weekend, I’ve got two panels and a workshop at the city’s Festival of Books! It’s a great event in one of my favorite places.

Ear Perks

• Paleontologists have named a new early tetrapod with a twisted jaw and a hardened, cheese grater-like set of tooth-like denticles. I want to do a full piece on this new fossil friend, but you can check out the paper here.

• Historian Sadiah Qureshi has a great essay on the problems with de-extinction, emphasizing the importance of recognizing different ways of being - and not just genes - as efforts to create new designer species continue.

• I love wandering among the saguaro, which of course reminds me of this tune.

  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mg5VwtODOJQ