Good morning, Whitewater.
Thursday will offer a wintry mix of flurries and freezing drizzle in the morning, with a high of thirty-four. Sunrise is 7:11 AM and sunset 5:05 PM, for 9h 52m 56s of daytime. The moon is a waxing gibbous with 73.6% of its visible disk illuminated. It’s still January, a month associated with cold and dark nights, yet the days are actually growing longer, and sunset is even now past five o’clock. Each day is, in fact, getting a bit longer; although it’s cold now, it’s these successive days are getting brighter.
For the first time in over a century, there’s a confirmed sighting in Yosemite National Park of a Sierra Nevada red fox:
Don Neubacher, the park’s superintendent, said he’s “thrilled” by the news. He called the species “one of the most rare and elusive animals in the Sierra Nevada.” It’s the first time the fox has been spotted in the park in nearly 100 years.
Indeed, little is known about the fox in part because they’re so hard to track down. According to a fact sheet from the U.S. Forest Service, the Sierra Nevada red fox lives in remote and rugged habitats. They’re solitary and have a habitat range from California to southern Oregon and western Nevada. It’s thought 50 of them may remain, but the fact sheet notes that there could be as few as 15.
Striking.
Google-a-Day asks about literature:
Early in Conrad’s 1903 novella, Marlow makes a comment “one of the dark places on earth”. About what place does he say this?