The N.C. Wildlife Resources Commission asks the public to refrain from the illegal practice of moving inland fish, specifically mountain trout, to other mountain water bodies as it can result in altering healthy habitats and negatively impact the agency’s ongoing aquatic conservation efforts.   

The Highlands Biological Foundation is excited to continue its 2025 Zahner Conservation Lecture Series with Sonya Carpenter, Co-founder and President of Co-habitate Inc., presenting “Cohabitate; Living with Nature” at 6 p.m. on Thursday, July 10, at the Highlands Nature Center in Highlands. The program is free and open to the public, with a small reception to follow. 

The Pisgah River Rangers, a partnership between The Pisgah Conservancy and the U.S. Forest Service (USFS), has kicked off its 2025 season. A team of five will work to promote freshwater stewardship in the forest and surrounding communities. 

The Franklin Bird Club leads walks along the Greenway on Wednesday mornings at 8 a.m. through September. Walks start at alternating locations: Macon County Public Library, Big Bear Park and Salali Lane. The public is welcome. 

To the Editor:

There has been a notable decrease in the number of birds coming to my feeder this year, and my neighbors report a similar decrease. This could be due, in part, to a fungal disease caused by unclean feeders.

Some hummingbirds are contracting a fungus at unclean feeders which causes their tongues to swell and results in their death.  

For the past few years, whenever I encounter the whorled loosestrife growing along a trail or roadside I have been saying its name out loud, and slowly. Like a prayer: “World, lose strife.”

Or so it sounds to my ears when said aloud. “World, lose strife.” And this world around us could use a lot less strife, that’s for sure. 

I was walking back into the house when Becky met me at the door, excited: “I think we just had an earthquake! Did you feel it?” She’d heard a low roar, she said, and then a closet door beside her rattled, as if something inside wanted out. “It went on for maybe 20 seconds.” This was on May 10, at 9:04 a.m., to be exact. And all I could say was “What?” 

Smokies Life is thrilled to announce its first audiobook, a narrated adaptation of the 2021 release for middle-grade readers, “A Search for Safe Passage,” about an intrepid group of animals trying to find their way across a dangerous highway. 

The Franklin Bird Club leads walks along the Greenway on Wednesday mornings at 8 a.m. through September. Walks start at alternating locations: Macon County Public Library, Big Bear Park and Salali Lane. 

More than two centuries after William Bartram explored the Southern Appalachian foothills, his words, like his footsteps, still echo through the ridgelines and river valleys he once traversed.