Chicago Wildlife Watch Talk

head up / head down, collections?

  • ForestPreserve by ForestPreserve moderator

    "Head down" is pretty easy for the most part. "Head up" is a little trickier, especially for the low-slung animals. I've been picking "neither" in a lot of cases where the animal seems set to move straight ahead. Since you should now have a lot of critters identified, would it be possible for the scientists to make collections showing examples of the different poses? I'm thinking "head up", "head down", and "head neither up or down" would do it. (Probably not necessary to have "head up, squirrel", but it would probably be adorable.)

    In a similar line, the examples could use some updating in spots. Maybe some newly identified critters could fill in?

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  • DZM by DZM admin

    I'd actually love to know what information the science team learns from volunteers' identifying whether an animal's head is up or down... !

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  • mason_UWI by mason_UWI scientist

    That's actually our next blog post, we hope to have it up later this week!

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  • mason_UWI by mason_UWI scientist

    We got slightly delayed by field work, but here is the next blog post about head up / head down!

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  • DZM by DZM admin

    Thank you! That's really helpful! 😃 And that picture of the two coyotes is adorable. 😃

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  • ForestPreserve by ForestPreserve moderator

    Thanks for the blog post. (Been a while since I checked back here!) Still not sure how to classify the cases where the animal seems to be moving from point A to point B, with the head more or less in line with the shoulders.

    I'll probably keep using "neither" in many cases like these, as suggested in the blog post.

    Then there are those rabbits, just sitting there with their heads up. Then manage to look very mysterious.

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  • llehrerlpzoo.org by llehrerlpzoo.org scientist

    Yes, if the animal's head is in line with the shoulders than we just say "neither". We are looking for very clear examples of the behaviors. Thanks!

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