2000 FACTS

Few birds are as unmistakable as the Northern Cardinal. With its dramatic crest, thick orange-red bill, and—in the male—brilliant scarlet plumage, it has become one of the most recognizable birds in North America. You don’t have to be a serious birdwatcher to know a cardinal when you see one. They visit backyard feeders, sing from suburban trees, appear on holiday cards, and brighten snowy winter landscapes from the Midwest to the East Coast. But familiarity can be deceiving. Behind that familiar red silhouette is a bird with a surprisingly complicated life. Cardinals communicate with sophisticated songs, recognize threats to their territory, change their behavior with the seasons, and can even appear in some extraordinarily unusual colors. Here are 20 fascinating facts about the Northern Cardinal you probably didn’t know.   1. Female Cardinals Sing Too When people imagine a singing bird, they often picture a brightly colored male advertising his territory. ...

Few things make a backyard feel more alive than birdsong. A clear whistle drifting through the trees, a burst of chatter from a hedge, or the bright flash of a bird landing at a feeder can turn an ordinary morning into a small wildlife encounter. The United States is home to an extraordinary variety of songbirds, from familiar backyard visitors to colorful migrants that travel thousands of miles each year. Some are loved for their voices, others for their colors, personalities, intelligence, or willingness to live close to people. Here are 20 of America’s most popular songbirds—and some of the fascinating stories hidden behind those feathers. 1. Northern Cardinal Few American birds are as instantly recognizable as the Northern Cardinal. The male’s brilliant red plumage, black face mask, and pointed crest make him look almost impossibly colorful against a snowy winter landscape. Cardinals are especially popular because they remain in much of their range throughout the year instead of mi...

In 1634, in a beautiful natural Caribbean harbor on the island of Curaçao, the Dutch established a trading post. It soon developed into a thriving city that today presents an urban center with different historic districts, whose architecture reflects both the styles of the Netherlands and the Spanish and Portuguese colonial cities with which Willemstad carried out its commercial transactions. The historic area of Willemstad is characterized by an urban landscape consisting of four historic neighborhoods: Punda, Pietermaai, Otrobanda, and Scharloo, which are separated by a natural harbor. Although each has its own urban morphology, they all share a "tropicalized" historic Dutch architecture.  The World Heritage site consists of a central part built by the bay of Sint Anna and a part of the Caribbean Sea, the Punda neighborhood, and a large area of Otrobanda, plus two transmission areas that penetrate the neighborhoods of Pietermaai and Scharloo. The mouth of Sint Anna Bay is p...

Berlin's Museum Island is a complex of buildings consisting of five individual museums of remarkable artistic importance, located in the heart of the city, illustrating the evolution of modern museum design from 1824 to 1930. The Pergamon Museum ( Pergamonmuseum ), one of the 5 museums in Berlin's Museum Island The Spree Island, today known as Museum Island, began its development with the creation of a pleasure garden (Lutzgarten) in the 16th century. But its current importance began with the construction of the Altes Museum, according to the design of Karl Friedrich Schinkel in 1824-1828. In 1841 Friedrich August Stüler, court architect to Friedrich-Wilhelm IV, drew up a plan to convert the part behind the museum into "a sanctuary for the arts and sciences". The first element of this plan was the construction of the Neues Museum. This was followed in 1866 by the construction of the Nationalgalerie by Johann Heinrich Strack. Then, between 1897 and 1904, the Kaiser-Fri...

With a collection of well-preserved buildings dating from different periods, the historic center of Graz, which was born in the Middle Ages between the Mur River and the Schlossberg mountain, represents the unique testimony of a central European city that was not affected by wars or strong economic expansions, and which became a princely court and a stronghold of the Austro-Hungarian Empire against the Ottomans. The city of Graz (Austria) Although there are traces of continued human occupation since Neolithic times, the Romans did not build any settlements here. The first mention of the name Graz was in 1228. It was a town of merchants and craftsmen that included a Jewish community that remained until the 15th century. From 1379 it became the capital of Inner Austria. But it was Frederick III who made it his favorite residence, granted it numerous privileges, and had numerous buildings built and rebuilt, including the church of St. Giles, today's cathedral. To face the Hungarian an...