Category Archives: Science

Redondo Beach Foxes

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“It only takes one clever fox
to best a thousand men.”
Nina Varela

 

While driving home the other day, I saw this Dynamic Message Sign (DMS), “FOXES IN AREA”. I pulled over to take a photo. That’s my blue car in the bottom right. It’s hard to read my license plate but it reads: IBLUFOX. Yes, I’m a big fan of the fox, so much so I nicknamed my car, “Blue Fox”.

Over ten years ago, I saw a red fox on my daily evening walks. When I got home and told my husband, his response was: “We live at the beach. The only foxes I’ve ever seen are the bikini-clad ones.”

I wish my husband was alive today to witness the City of Redondo Beach announcing foxes in the area.

In California there are two populations of Red Fox – the native Sierra Nevada Red Fox, a threatened species found only in the Sierra Nevada and Cascade mountain ranges, and the more common, non-native Red Fox. Non-native Red Foxes were introduced decades ago for fox hunting and fur farming.

In my neighboring area of Palos Verdes, back in the 1920s they had fox hunting. Obviously, the foxes they released “outfoxed” the riders and headed to Redondo Beach to be closer to the ocean. Their populations have grown and gradually spread.

The fox, the smallest member of the dog family, is a highly adaptable species that inhabits mostly forest, chaparral, and desert regions, but can be found in nearly all habitats. There are three types of fox common to Southern California, including the Gray Fox, Red Fox, and Island Fox. The Southern California Kit Fox, a subspecies of Kit Fox, died out in Southern California in 1903.

Two Red Foxes living at the beach under a lifeguard stand

Foxes are more solitary in their habits than are others in the dog family. They are territorial and can be aggressive, especially during the breeding season. Their once-a-year breeding season corresponds with the availability of food.

Despite the fact that urban foxes use human buildings for shelter and human refuse for food, their contact with humans is quite limited. Most people who live in an urban area have never seen a fox in the city. Foxes keep a nocturnal schedule, and in the nighttime are often mistaken for dogs when they are seen.

Red Foxes, the most commonly recognized fox, are known for their cleverness and have the largest range in North America. Although they are close relatives of the Gray Fox, they are considerably larger, normally ranging in size from ten to fifteen pounds. Their coats may be reddish or gray or even black, but their legs and feet are always black. The tail is tipped with white.

Socially, the fox communicates with body language and a variety of vocalizations. Its vocal range is quite large and its noises vary from a distinctive three-yip “lost call” to a shriek reminiscent of a human scream. It also communicates with scent, marking food and territorial boundary lines with urine and feces.

With all our fires and oil spills the last few years, our wild life has had to relocate and adapt. The bright side is some of our wild life thought to be outsourced by fires, and over building in rural areas have actually been thriving.

It’s exciting to witness one of my favorite animals in my own backyard, the Redondo Beach foxes.

Shine On

Musicophile

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“Music is the soundtrack of your life.”
Dick Clark

The definition of a musicophile is an avid lover and enthusiast of music. Point of fact, a musicophile’s passion is deeply rooted in the artistry, history, and emotional experience of the music itself. If this definition is true, I believe most people would call themselves a musicophile.

My love of all styles and types of music began as a child. There was music always playing in our home. My parents had a large collection of albums, 45s and even large reel tapes. I learned how to use the record player long before I could read.

Recently I read Oliver Sacks 2007 book, Musicophilia: Tales of Music and the Brain. In this book, Dr. Sacks explores a range of psychological and physiological ailments and their connections to music. He wrote the book in an attempt to widen the general populace’s understanding of music and its effects on the brain. Sacks states at the outset of the book’s preface, music is omnipresent, influencing human’s everyday lives in how we think and act. 

For those of you not familiar with Dr. Sacks work, he wrote the book, Awakenings, which the 1990 feature film by the same name is based. In the book and movie he describes his medical experiences using a drug levodopa on Parkinson’s and post-encephalitic patients at the Beth Abraham Hospital, later Beth Abraham Center for Rehabilitation and Nursing, in New York.

Since the 1970s, there have been multiple studies on the benefits of music therapy for people with medical conditions, trauma, learning disabilities, and handicaps. Most of the documented studies for children have shown a positive effect in promoting self-actualization and developing receptive, cognitive, and expressive capabilities. 

For me, music can evoke a time in my life. Can evoke emotions and even the memory of pleasant scents from decades past. All this from listening to a single song.

During 2023 I published my first poetry book, Heartstrings, An Anthology From A to Z. All the poems in my book I always imagined as lyrics to songs. Then in 2026, I wrote, produced and put together a 13 track album, Dragonfly. I’ve uploaded the album to SoundCloud and will soon add the album to Spotify and Apple Music.

My life long love of music has come full circle, for this full-blown musicophile.

Shine On

Father of the Cell Phone

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“An inventor is one who can see the applicability
of means to supply demand five years before it is
obvious to those skilled in the art.”
Reginald Fessenden

Our cell phones have the capability of a supercomputer. They can perform as a cell phone and instantly they are a computer, television, music playing device, camera, video camera, library, GPS, and a gaming system.

What I find interesting is that I use it less and less as a phone. My monthly cell phone bill shows zero actual phone minutes used and thousands of kilobytes used for data.

For example, at the DMV the other day, the line was hours long. So I pulled out my cell phone, and began reading a book from my OverDrive account.

When I looked around the long line of people, I noticed they too were engaged in cell phone activity. I began to wonder, how did cell phones first get started? So, I pulled up Google on my trusted cell phone.

The cell phone dates back to its early inception of the shore-to-ship radio telephony during the Second World War. The inventor, Reginald Fessenden probably never anticipated the huge impact he would have on society. An inveterate tinkerer, Fessenden eventually became the holder of more than 500 patents. His rendition of ‘O Holy Night‘ from a 1906 broadcast was the first coherent audio transmission to be received.

The telephony developed into mobile phones that were first used for automobiles in the 1940’s. The early mobile phones of the 1970’s to the 1990’s were bulky, consumed high power and the telephone network supported only a few simultaneous conversations. The first cell phone I used in 1993 could only be used in the car and was the size of a man’s size 12 shoe.

I wonder how Reginald Fessenden would react to the huge success of his invention? No doubt he would be proud. But, I bet he would of had no idea how far his inventions would take us and that he would become the father of the cell phone.

Shine On

Persistent Illusion

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“People like us, who believe in physics, know that the distinction
between past, present and future is only
a stubbornly persistent illusion.”
Albert Einstein

Shine On

Light the Way for Humankind

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“There are stars whose radiance is visible on Earth,
 though they have long been extinct.
There are people whose brilliance
continues to light the world,
though they are no longer among the living.
These lights are particularly bright
when the night is dark.
They light the way for humankind.”
Hannah Senesh

Connected by the Light

As I stare up at the last full moon of 2020, I reflect on this past year and previous happier New Years. The brilliant light of the moon brought back memories of a friend of mine. A friend I worked with, socialized with, and who I respected and admired for well over thirty years.

Though my friend and I didn’t see or talk daily, we always seemed to connect during the holidays. It was 2009 New Year’s Eve in California around 10:00 pm, a few years before this friend passed away. I was on my balcony looking up at the full radiant moon and I wondered if he too was looking up at the moon.

When I left my balcony and returned to my living room, I heard an incoming email notification on my laptop. I was astonished to see the email was from my friend. He was vacationing in Belize, as he always did during the holiday season. The email simply read:

JR, It’s midnight in Belize. I’m looking up at a magnificent moon over the bay here and am thinking of you. It’s still a wonder to me that we all can see the same moon from different places–albeit at different times and longitudes, but with no major physics correction involved. John Muir said, ‘When we try to pick out anything by itself, we find it hitched to everything else in the universe.’  Happy New Year 

During the holidays, I find myself reminiscing about this dear friend. I miss him and our long talks about life, history, and whether or not we are alone in the Universe. I miss the special connection we had. A connection, I believe all of us have the ability of obtaining.

All of us have the energy and light within us to light the way for humankind.

Shine On