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'Candid Creatures:' How Camera Traps Are Revolutionizing Observational Science

In 1913, National Geographic published the first photographs taken with an automatic camera trap.

Wildlife photographer George Shiras rigged a string to his camera shutter and used bait to coax animals into pulling it, arguably resulting in the first animal selfies ever.

Today, the technology has come a long way, and more scientists are using it to study the behavior and diversity of species all over the world, and it has opened a new frontier in citizen science.

Biologist Roland Kays has documented this evolution of camera traps in a new book, "Candid Creatures," which includes more than 600 photos of animals that we know well and others that have rarely been studied in modern science. 

Host Frank Stasio talks with Roland Kays, director of the Biodiversity Lab at the North Carolina Museum of Natural Sciences, about "Candid Creatures."

Will Michaels is WUNC's Weekend Host and Reporter.
Longtime NPR correspondent Frank Stasio was named permanent host of The State of Things in June 2006. A native of Buffalo, Frank has been in radio since the age of 19. He began his public radio career at WOI in Ames, Iowa, where he was a magazine show anchor and the station's News Director.
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