Guest Author - Sandy Mullins

I enjoy watching shows on wildlife and domestic animals and I stumbled upon a new show on Animal Planet today. Wildlife Journal strikes a good balance on this educational show. Wildlife Journal has several different offerings in it hour-long program. Wildlife Journal explains how the conservation officers do their job and how they work with other agencies in times of need like hurricanes, floods, tornadoes, etc. It’s not to one sided on conservation and explains things in a way that we can all understand.

The first episode I watched took use to Yellowstone National Park and told us all about conservation of the bison. It explained the differences in buffalo and bison, even explaining about their status on the Endangered Species List.

Next off north for salmon fishing, with the big sea fishermen and the rangers that make sure the fishermen don’t over fish and maintain safe driving while steering those large fishing boats.

The next couple of stories were on deer in New Mexico and Boas in Central and South America.

The next story took as back to salmon, but it was more on the younger salmon and the spawning habits of the salmon. It explains that the salmon about the salmon spawning back to their place of birth to mate and lay their eggs. It also explained how fewer salmon are making it back up the Snake River in Idaho to the point of extinction. There are several dams on the Snake River and the salmon are finding it almost impossible to pass the dams upstream.

The last segment of this episode was about the conservation officers helping out during natural disasters a Hurricane Bonnie in North Carolina. It takes us with these officers through the retreat and the time after the storm.

Wildlife Journal is a great show you should turn into with the family. It helps us all understand our relationship with wildlife and the officers who nurture and protect them.

Check here for episode and times: (offsite link) http://animal.discovery.com/schedule/series.jsp?series=109469&gid=13117

Animal Planet TV: (offsite link)
http://animal.discovery.com/