Category: Arb Talk

If you’ve been out and about in the evening recently, you may have noticed some new voices piping up near ponds. Breeding season has started for Minnesota’s frogs and toads—and…

In these early April days you have probably noticed every excursion in The Arb accompanied by lots of wind. April is the windiest month in Minnesota, with a daily average…

Before Carleton’s beloved Farm House existed, there was the Carleton farm. In the first decade of the 1900s, then-president Donald Cowling started noticing aesthetic issues with the state of Carleton’s…

Spring migration is a-coming, and it’s a fantastic time of year to go birding. The Arboretum is a home to many bird species, and many migrators visit as they follow…

In recent years, we’ve experienced societal disruptions ranging from political and climate tumult to racial and pandemic reckoning. While experienced differently across communities, lessons learned in Carleton’s Arb make me…

We finally got enough snow for most of the grass to be covered and the skiers have been out and about. Most skiers are using the waxless skis from the…

Ahhh, scavenging from garbage dumps, sunbathing in trees, no opposable thumbs, and partially hibernating in the winter. If this were a human I was describing, you might be concerned. But…

Those who were on campus last year might remember beavers swimming in the Lyman Lakes and building dams on Spring Creek – but where have they been this year? Last…

The Arboretum is a lovely place to enjoy a vast array of trees and greenery, though one particular species towers above the rest: the eastern cottonwood (Populus deltoides). This prominent…

Although a brisk wintry stroll through the Arb might convince you that the Arb is devoid of wildlife, a whole ecosystem is just below your feet! In fact, many THREE POUND critters are dwelling below the soil, namely the plains pocket gophers (Geomys bursarius). If you’ve seen one, consider yourself lucky.