mm 



DEPARTMENTS 



6 THE NATURAL MOMENT 



Night Flight 



Phofoi^mph by Fiaiis Lantiiiq^ 



8 UP FRONT 



Editor's Notebook 



10 CONTRIBUTORS 



11 LETTERS 



17 SAMPLINGS 



News from Nature 



20 UNIVERSE 



Exoplanet Earth 

 NcH dcGmsse Tyson 



24 NATURALIST AT LARGE 



The Butterfly Bird 

 Noai)i Sliaiiy 



COVER STORY 



28 BIOMECHANICS 



Shoe Fly 

 Adam Siiiiiiiiers 



PICTURE CREDITS: Page 10 



I 'isit our 1 1 eh site at 

 www.naturalhlstorymag.com 



I 



28 



48 THIS LAND 



Going with the Flow 

 Robert H. Mohlciibrock 



50 BOOKSHELF 



Laurence A. Marschall 



54 nature.net 



Wave Files 

 Robert Anderson 



58 OUT THERE 



Cosmic Cosmetics 

 Charles Liu 



59 THE SKY IN FEBRUARY 



Joe Rao 



60 AT THE MUSEUM 



64 ENDPAPER 



Stunt Double 

 Denton S. Ebel 



ON THE cover: False-color 

 scanning electron micrograph 

 of a beetle foot (Gastrophysa 

 I'iridulii). magnified 350X 



