The Final Post (for now)

Hello everyone!

It seems as though spring has finally caught up! As the school year begins to wind down, the trees are full bloom, and the forests are once more echoing with birdsong. In many ways, this season is a blessing, but it can also be a curse, since its beauty is so short-lived. By the end of the month, all the tulips and trilliums will be dying, temperatures will be getting hot, and most of those lovely warblers will have headed somewhere further north. So for now, I've been enjoying spring while it lasts- the birds, flowers, weather, and everything.

Since this is the last post I'll be writing for the school year, I thought I would write about some sort of "big picture" where I draw from everything that I learned this past year and throw it together into one big statement.

However, I think that's kind of trite. Instead, I'll tell a more specific story.

Today, after an exciting bird-adventure at the Grove (Glenview), I decided to relax at home and study outdoors for my AP Bio Test. No sooner had I sat down in my favorite lawn chair, than a Black-and-White Warbler appeared.

Although this bird is hardly uncommon in May, it's got some unique qualities. Unlike other warblers, which flit from branch to branch, this bird creeps sideways along tree trunks, forages upside down, and likes to poke around in every nook and cranny it can find. Now consider its plumage- an assortment of black and white stripes- and it looks like a zany, tree-climbing zebra.

So I put down my homework and decided to watch this little wonder creeping around the trees in my backyard. He seemed a little wary of me, but couldn't have cared too much since he landed in my backyard pond to take a drink. At this point, however, another bird appeared- entirely golden-yellow with red streaks on the chest. It was a Yellow Warbler, and it too, had come down to drink from the pond.

After admiring the birds for a short while, I decided to get back to work. But just as I opened my textbook, two more warblers appeared. These were Black-Throated Green Warblers- birds that I lovingly refer to as "Blackbeards". I try studying again. Another Black-and-White Warbler shows up. Then two plump little yellow sprites: Nashville Warblers. A beautiful Magnolia Warbler appears. Then a Cape May Warbler. Three Yellow-Rumped Warblers. The trees and bushes are now dripping with them- shades of yellow, black, blue-gray, and orange. And then there's a tiny bluish bird with a fiery, liquid-sunshine pattern blazing across its chest. It's a Northern Parula- one of the rarer ones. As it pauses in a Japanese Maple, the sunlight dances upon its colors. And then, just as quickly as it appeared, it is gone. In any case, these birds were simply passing through. For them, my backyard is little more than a stopping point on their yearly journey from Canada to Central America. The stopover, however, is essential, for it is difficult for a 0.4-ounce to fly over 2,000 miles in a single month. For each and every day of migration, these birds must stock up on food, and for each and every night, they must fly.

As I grow, learn, and graduate high school in the coming month, I feel as though I am completing another step of my own personal journey. Like the blossoming trees that provide migrating birds with sustanence, the Academy has done a great job in providing me with all the skills that I'll need as an adult. And even if Senior Academy English is just a small part of the migratory route, I feel that it has done me very well. In this year of English, I've flown through times good and bad, developed deeper levels of understanding, and learned some new things about myself along the way. And like the Parula, I am ready for the next leg of migration.

What's the Deal with Wolves???

Just over a week ago- April 8, to be precise- a rider was introduced into Federal Budget Bill that would remove gray wolves the Endangered Species List in 5 western states. Although Congress has previously intervened with a number of wildlife matters, this occasion marks the first time in history in which Congress has single-handedly "delisted" a species.

So what's the deal here??? Is this a "legit" delisiting for species that has recovered? Or is this the work of some angry ranchers flipping shits about wolves and sheep? Unfortunately, there seems to be almost no clear answer. Wolf conservation remains one of the most controversial wildlife topics in our country's history, with heavy bias on both sides of the argument. While conservationists and wolf-lovers across the nation have vied for the protection of these magnificent animals, the people who actually deal with wolves on a day-to-day basis have repeatedly argued that wolves pose threats to their livestock.

But before we begin to address that, let's ask ourselves: What exactly is the status of the Gray Wolf? Despite centuries of persecution by man, wolves remain widespread on a global scale- ranging across Canada, Central Asia, Siberia, and some of the less densely populated areas of Europe. Still, just by looking at the map, it's shocking to see how much territory they've lost in North America. Whereas wolves may have once roamed as far as Mexico, it seems that their only remaining strongholds are the Upper Great Lakes and two isolated pockets out west.

The fact that there are ANY wolves remaining in the Lower 48 is largely due to intense conservation efforts and reintroduction programs. Just 15 years ago, a few Canadian wolves were brought to Yellowstone National Park, and since then, they have made a dramatic recovery (from 66 individuals to 1,651). The same goes for the Wisconsin and Minnesota, where legal protection has allowed wolf populations to skyrocket.

According to state senators and wildlife officials, the wolf populations have risen well beyond expectations and have reached the point where they are spreading into human-occupied areas, feeding on livestock, and causing trouble for local farmers and pet owners. Aside from taking a few sheep or cattle every now and then, people- particularly hunters- are worried about the wolves' impact on elk and deer populations.

The latter view, however, is controversial for a number of reasons.
First of all, it's hard to determine just HOW many elk the wolves are taking. Studies on this matter are few and far between, and without proper research, its nearly impossible to determine whether wolves should be held responsible for declines in deer and elk populations. According to studies by the International Wolf Center, a single wolf may consume between 14 and 19 deer-sized game animals per year. Multiply that by few thousand and it would seem like that's alot of kills, but in truth, this is NOTHING compared to the number of the deer and elk that starve, collide with vehicles, or are taken by hunters every year. By keeping deer and elk populations in check, wolves actually do alot of good by preventing them from overgrazing and outstripping their food supply.

Unfortunately, it seems like the recent delisting of wolves was more of a political move than something that was actually backed by scientific evidence. Although 1,651 may sound like a huge number of wolves, it's really nothing if you consider the fact that this is the entire American West we're talking about. That number could plummet just as fast as it went up, so perhaps Congress needs to think things through before they allow something like this to pass.

Interpreting Nature

For the past two weeks in my English class, there's been alot of reading and classwork on nature- specifically, the portrayal of nature in literature. What is typical of the images we associate with nature? Streams? Mountains? Thunderstorms? Untouched wilderness? Or perhaps parks and gardens? Any way you look at it, it seems as though nature is open to an enormous range of human interpretation. At one end of the spectrum, there's nature as a source of harmony, beauty, perfection, and tranquility. The sound of a forest waking with birdsong, the complexity of a flower, and the intricate balance of life are just a few of the many phenomena that provide humanity with this perspective. On the complete contrary, we may view nature as a cruel, powerful, unforgiving force that has waged battle against mankind through the ages. Every day, nature assaults us with storms, earthquakes, famine, and disease. Thus, we're constantly developing new ways of fighting back, conquering nature, and taming it so that we may harness its great and terrible energy.

So with this in mind, what is nature? Friend? Foe? Neither? Both? As humans, do we consider nature to be wild, savage, and untamed, or do we call it our sanctuary? Following a discussion from class, it seems that people's interpretations of nature vary depending on their geographic region, local culture, age, class, religion, and even gender.

Let's take a young child for example. A child who regularly interacts with nature may see the natural world as a place of mystery, adventure, and freedom- far removed from the boring world of adults. According to E.O Wilson is his book titled Biophilia, a large number of children go through a "nature phase", where they venture out into the natural world, explore, investigate, and make their own discoveries based on observation.

Interestingly enough, the way children approach nature is very similar to biologists of various fields. Like children, biologists are curious, fascinated by natural processes, and enamored with the idea of discovering something new.

Let us also not forget that people's views of nature may vary depending on their generation or time period in which they lived. Before cars, communications, or modern industry, nature was much more of a force to be reckoned with, and less of something that needed "saving". Aside for a few budding conservationists such as John Muir, Theodore Roosevelt, and Henry David Thoreau, who insisted on preserving nature and biodiversity, there was little incentive to protect anything until the 1960's, when the environmental movement kicked off.

So in any case, what are your views of nature?

Update

Hello everyone! In case you haven't noticed you've noticed, it's been a while since I last wrote a post. To be honest, I've been pretty busy with homework and college decisions, but hopefully, things will work themselves out and I'll get back to doing my regular posts. So before I begin with another topic, I'll fill you in on what's been going on in my life lately.

• Aside from online consumer homework, a visit to Lawrence University, and a bit of birding here and there, I did relatively little over the course of spring break.


• I GOT ACCEPTED INTO CORNELL UNIVERSITY!!! (A place I'll be visiting on my own this week)


• While I was visiting Lawrence up in Appleton, I did some local birding and stumbled across YET ANOTHER BOHEMIAN WAXWING!!! Unlike last time however, the bird actually stayed put and provided my entire family with excellent looks.


• I just tested out my first homemade bird blind: a large cardboard box with 2 holes just big enough for a camera lens. Although the birds and animals don't seem to mind being followed and photographed by a man in a giant box, I'm pretty sure that I weirded out the neighbors.


• Last but not least- it looks like spring's finally coming here to stay! With Sunday's warm spell, all the plants are coming up, the grass is green once more, tree are budding, and the daffodils are in bloom!

A Weekend Escape- Part 2 (The Mound Builders!)

So in any case, that's not the end of my adventures from this weekend. In between viewing the giant snow goose flock at Emiquon, trying to photograph ducks from a moving car, and chasing Eurasian Tree Sparrows, mom and I decided to stop by the Dickson Mounds Museum.

I must admit, I didn't really know much about Dickson Mounds prior to visiting. All I really knew beforehand was that it consisted of some old Native American burial grounds, which were built hundreds of years ago, forgotten, and later discovered by a man named Dickson.

In 1927, after purchasing a tract of land along the Illinois River, Dr. Don F. Dickson just so happened to stumble upon a series of burial mounds from an ancient Native American society. He soon began excavating, but instead of removing the bones and other artifacts from their graves, he left them intact, transforming the place into a private museum of sorts. Tourists, scholars, and archeologists came from all over the world to interpret Dickson's findings, and eventually, by 1945, Dickson sold his museum to the state of Illinois, which has maintained it ever since.

So, yeah... I kind of learned this from browsing the Dickson Mounds website, but one thing that I almost certainly had no prior knowledge of was the society that actually built the mounds.

When we picture Native Americans, we tend to think of them as nomadic hunter-gathers who lived in tribal communities, worshipped nature, occaisionally went to war with other tribes, and were eventually destroyed by the Europeans. And while we do acknowledge that the Native Americans were here "first", we rarely seem to take their 10,000-year history into account- from the crossing of the Bering Land Bridge up to the present day. While our textbooks may have entire chapters devoted to ancient Egyptian society, the sections describing Native American history seem consistently vague about the societies, languages, and religious beliefs that evolved during that enormous span of time. It's almost as if there's a giant, 10,000-year gap in history...but why?

I know for one thing that the North American Indians never really "built" much in comparison to other native societies, such as the Aztecs and Incas. There are no great big temples of stone in New Jersey, and certainly not in Nebraska, but there are these burial mounds in some parts of the midwest. Dickson Mounds is one of these places, and contrary to what I've always believed about Illinois history (that it hardly dates back further than the 1800's), native "mound-building peoples" had actually built thriving, sedentary societies as early as the 11th century- complete with temples, walled cities, population centers and trade-based economies!

According archaeologists at the museum, these Mississippian societies flourished during the first half of the millenia, but eventually fell into decline as they went to war with each other and contracted diseases. When Europeans colonized Illinois, most of the mound-builders had already evicted, and for the few that still remained, European conquest dealt the final blow.

I find it disappointing that we hardly spend any time learning about the ancient cultures of our region- and even worse how we rarely imagine them as little more than primitive, nature-worshipping teepee-dwellers. I glanced over my World History textbook from freshman year and noticed that the mound-builders are only mentioned in a single paragraph. I mean- really, what's the deal? Why don't we learn more about them?

In a sense, it all boils down to New Historicism- the idea that all writing is a product of its time. The Europeans who encountered native societies in all their intact glory found them inferior. When they initially encountered the remnants of mound-building societies, they actually refused to believe that the mounds were built by Native Americans. They didn't believe that such primitive, inferior people were "capable" of building these things. And since the Europeans were the ones who eventually wiped out the native populations, their writings- which offer us a glimpse into intact native societies- were probably biased to the point of being innaccurate.

A Weekend Escape- Part 1

This weekend, my mom and I took a short vacation to Fulton County, Illinois- mostly in search of our favorite birds: Ducks. With the ice melting, rivers swelling, and fields beginning to flood, the waterfowl -which have spent most of the winter in ice-free zones- are now heading north. Nowhere is their migration more evident than along Illinois' major rivers, where these ducks stop to rest and refuel before continuing their journey.

At Emiquon National Wildlife Refuge, a shallow, 2,000 acre lake formed at the junction of the Illinois and Spoon Rivers, snow geese often gather in the tens of thousands, accompanied by pelicans, bald eagles, and thousands of other ducks and waterbirds. Interestingly enough, this wildlife magnet hardly existed before the Nature Conservancy purchased it in the year 2000 (none of my old bird books on Illinois mention it). Although the area had historically been a giant wetland, years of intensive farming operations had all but drained the surrounding marshes and confined the the Illinois River to manmade channels. Only in recent years, when the Nature Conservancy removed the drain tiles, planted native flora, and restored the river to its original course, did the wildlife start to come back.

In one nearby Fish and Wildlife Area known as Banner Marsh (a place I would have liked to stop at, but didn't have time), the 4,363 acre property was initially a strip mining operation. This just goes to show you how quickly nature can heal.

Oh, and one more thing. LOOK AT THIS VIDEO. This was Emiquon 2 weeks before I went. HOLY SHIT.

The Last of the Bluefin Tuna

It’s been several hours since my last meal, and for some reason, I’m craving a big, juicy, tender filet of fish— preferably halibut or whitefish. Maybe trout? Mahi-mahi? No wait, I got it- A tuna burger! Mmmmmm so delicious.

It disturbs me that I think about these kinds of thing when I should be writing about the depletion of fish stocks, destruction of aquatic ecosystems, and ruthless, unregulated nature of our fishing industry. It certainly proves how strong our hunger instincts are. Sometimes I wonder: If I was stranded on an island with the last breeding pair of dodos, there was no help in sight, and there was nothing else to eat, would I have the will to refrain from eating them?

Anyways, that’s not my point. What I mean to say is that fish are in trouble. Now this is not true for every species, but for large predatory fish like tuna, grouper, and sharks, the situation is dire. Big fish are disappearing at a rate faster than anyone could have imagined. Bluefin Tuna- which are prized on the Japanese sushi market- have declined more than 90% since the 70’s, and are now listed as “critically endangered” by IUCN Red List. It’s really a shame too, because these are such majestic fish. A full-grown adult -bulging with muscle and power- can measure up to 10 feet, weigh more than 300 pounds, and reach speeds up to 50 mph. To think that such magnificent creatures would be slaughtered en masse and reduced to cat food seems pretty revolting to me.

Yet despite warnings of overfishing, Japan and a number of other countries continue to deplete fish populations- from the majestic tuna to rather gross-looking Patagonian Toothfish. With improved, industrial-scale fishing operations, virtually nothing is safe from exploitation. Even the deepest, blackest recesses of the ocean are fished to the extreme. Trawling nets are indiscriminately dragged across the seabed, killing all sorts of untargeted creatures as well as destroying seafloor ecosystems.

Some deep-sea fish like the Orange Roughy (a long-lived member of the Slimehead family) are already starting to suffer from this type of trawling, since they tend to be VERRRRYYYY slow to reproduce. Young roughies take 20-40 years to mature, and if you’ve ever had orange roughy, chances are good that you’re eating a 50-year old fish.

Although many countries now enact quotas on the allowable catch within their waters, a vast majority of fisheries are poorly regulated. With oceans spanning the globe, poaching is easy, and many countries (Japan in particular) tend to ignore limits imposed on fishing.

Although people nowadays may have higher eco-awareness, international cooperation may be better, and people may be finally waking up to the effects of overfishing, a tragedy of the commons seems to be playing itself out. According to a 2009 prediction, Bluefin Tuna may go extinct within 3 years. Unless people act now, we’ll simply deplete the large fish, move onto smaller ones, and repeat the cycle until there’s nothing left but plankton.
<----- :(

Not sure which kind of seafood is sustainable? Check out the Monterrey Bay Aquarium’s Seafood Watch Program. You’d be surprised by what’s on the red list.