Their defensive strategy can be amusing to watch and their powerful teeth can crush almost any kind of shellfish — northern puffers are a strange but familiar sight in North Carolina waters.
Commentary
Gray, red foxes and coyotes: Know your coastal canids
Coastal North Carolina is home to two kinds of foxes and also the wily coyotes, and it can be important to know the differences.
Guest commentary: Where plastic flows into the ocean
Kemp Burdette of Cape Fear River Watch and Ann Colley of the Moore Charitable Foundation write that there’s an overlooked connection in our own backyards that funnels plastics toward major bodies of water and eventually the world’s oceans.
Commentary: My firsthand experience with an algal bloom
Photographer Jared Lloyd, who recently captured images of an algal bloom in Edenton for Coastal Review, shares what exposure to the green slime’s toxic fumes is like. Spoiler alert: It’s no fun.
Climate outlook grim but NC is inching toward resilience
The report released Monday by the United Nations’ Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change paints a dire picture, but North Carolina is bucking its reputation for climate change denialism and slowly moving toward.
What’s on the line: Atlantic wahoo
Atlantic wahoo is one of the East Coast’s most prized gamefish, but a number of factors create management challenges for the popular species.
Red knots’ epic spring migration includes North Carolina
Ocracoke Island and other areas of the Outer Banks have seen encouraging numbers of red knots passing through on their marathon migration during the past few springs, a good sign for the shorebird species’ recovery.
What’s on the line: Atlantic tarpon, the ‘silver king’
Known in sportfishing lore for their spectacular leaps when hooked, Atlantic tarpon could become a catch-and-release-only species in North Carolina.
Though it’s Shark Week on TV, sharks are year-round in NC
Coastal Review is recognizing Shark Week this week with a special Nature Notes on the sharks that inhabit North Carolina waters.
Commentary: Does the Corps adequately protect the coast?
Dr. Richard Hilderman of Sunset Beach, where the Corps of Engineers has recently approved permits for a terminal groin, contends that responsibility for protecting the coastal environment has been placed in the hands of engineers, rather than natural resource agencies and coastal scientists.
Stubborn greater amberjack live up to ‘reef donkey’ name
Powerful fighters that can test any anglers’ tackle and ability to land them, greater amberjack are often called “reef donkeys.”
Hatteras Village relies on commercial fishing, a safe inlet
Alana Harrison, Hatteras Village seafood market owner and fish dealer, worries that shoaling in Hatteras Inlet will cause local commercial fishermen to relocate to neighboring fishing ports.
Piggish behavior when feeding earned hogfish their name
These predators hunt for food on the sea floor using their hog-like snouts to make meals of mollusks and crustaceans, but their sex lives are far more unusual than that of most farm animals.
Spawning season underway for NC’s migratory fish
It’s that time of year, when North Carolina’s migratory fish species — river herring, Atlantic and shortnose sturgeon and American eel — are making their annual trips upriver to spawn.
CRO Isn’t Lost, Now We’re Just CoastalReview.org
We’re making some changes around here, improvements needed for more flexibility and responsiveness in delivering the news of the North Carolina coast that you have come to expect and trust, along with a nod to our past.
Kingfish Not Always Known By Royal Titles
Sea mullet, whiting, roundhead, hard head, hake — the three species of kingfish in North Carolina waters are known by numerous names, not all befitting a king.
