Category Archives: Nature

Jaeger

The youth group from First Unitarian spent Friday night visiting the youth group at the Nantucket Unitarian Universalist church. It’s a two-hour ferry ride out to Nantucket Island, and I spent most of the time on the upper deck, binoculars glued to my eyes, looking for birds. I saw dozens of Common Loons spread out over Nantucket Sound, looking very beautiful in their summer plumage; the ferry passed close enough to three of them that I could hear them calling to one another with that weird ululating sound they make. I watched Common Terns catching fish: cruising along until they spotted something; hovering for a moment; then plunging suddenly into the water, thrashing around, and more often than not flying up again with something clamped in their bill.

Then out of nowhere, a fast, dark bird flew at one of the terns, swooping up on the tern from underneath. It was a Parasitic Jaeger (Stercorarius parasiticus), a bird that eats fish it can steal from terns and gulls. The jaeger attacked the tern again; I didn’t see what happened, but there was another birder on the boat who said that it looked like the tern gave up, dropped the fish so the jaeger couldn’t get it, and thus avoided being harassed any further.

I was tempted to think ill of the Parasitic Jaeger for being parasitic. From my moral frame of reference, I didn’t like the fact that one bird was stealing food from another bird. Yet when I thought a little more, I realized that I am quite happy to eat other mammals, and I don’t worry too much about the way my human needs destroy the habitat of other mammals — surely what I do to other mammals is more reprehensible, morally speaking, than the jaeger stealing an occasional meal from another bird. Nor am I entirely sure how to apply moral judgements across species boundaries — is swatting a mosquito the same, morally speaking, as killing another human being?

Even after thinking about it in this way, I still didn’t much like the Parasitic Jaeger; clearly my human morality lacks logical consistency. Whatever my moral feelings, it was quite something to watch the jaeger swoop up and harass the tern; it was, in its own way, spectacular and even beautiful.

Increasing social connectivity in this corner of the blogosphere

Discover Magazine has a great, short piece on the connectivity of the blogosphere:

The blogosphere is the most explosive social network you’ll never see. Recent studies suggest that nearly 60 million blogs exist online, and about 175,000 more crop up daily (that’s about 2 every second). Even though the vast majority of blogs are either abandoned or isolated, many bloggers like to link to other Web sites. These links allow analysts to track trends in blogs and identify the most popular topics of data exchange. Social media expert Matthew Hurst recently collected link data for six weeks and produced this plot of the most active and interconnected parts of the blogosphere.

Link with incredible graphic. (Thanks, Techyum.)

And who’s at the center of this vast social network? Daily Kos, BoingBoing, Michelle Malkin, gadget freaks, porn lovers, and sports fanatics. Good grief. People who blog about religion and culture don’t even show up. Which doesn’t surprise me — bloggers in my tiny corner of the blogosphere don’t talk to one another much, we don’t link to one another’s posts, and basically we don’t exploit the potential of social connectivity that exists in the medium of blogging. To change that a little tiny bit, here are some links to the best blog posts I’ve read recently:

ck at Arbitrary Marks posts a thoughtful video commentary on women blogging without having to deal with stalkers and crazies (I’ve already commented over there, no need to repeat here): Link.

Will Shetterly is moving “It’s All One Thing” from Blogger over to Live Journal. He promises less religion, which probably means more science fiction. That works for me. I’m liking the new cat story: Link.

Jeremy at Voltage Gate provides links to dozens of bloggers who have bioblitzed over the past week. I’ve been following his links to some very cool ecosystems from Ontario to Panama, and enjoying citizen science in action: Link.

Abby at Children and Books has a great post about teaching, where one of the kids she’s teaching gets a complicated concept. Short as it is, this post is really sticking with me, and I’m still mulling it over: Link.

Blogger BioBlitz 2007 final list

Today was my only day off this week, and I had planned to do my Blogger BioBlitz survey today, trying to find how many of each different species — plant, animal, fungi and anything in between — live within the small area I chose to survey (the garden at First Unitarian in New Bedford). We had heavy downpours most of the day, so I had to cut the survey short. In between rain squalls, I took as many photos of living things as possible; I also relied on photos and notes I had taken earlier in the week when I was surveying the area. Unfortunately, the weather meant that I didn’t have time to search out many animals (e.g., I wasn’t able to dig up some soil and look through it for invertebrates, etc.).

My identification of many plants was hampered because it’s still early in spring and many plants have just begun to emerge from dormancy or sprout from seeds; and only a few of the flowering plants were actually in flower. I’m thinking I may continue with this survey of living things over the course of the summer, to see if I can do additional identifications.

I’ve included my list of organisms below, arranged in rough taxonomic order. Over the next week, I’ll be working on further identifications as well as filling in the taxonomic order, and when done I’ll update this entry. (Final update, 28 April, link to final data sheet included.)

Video tour of the site.
Photos from field work.
First post on Blogger Bioblitz 2007.
Second post on Blogger Bioblitz 2007.

Continue reading →

Bioblitz in an urban garden

As part of the Blogger BioBlitz this week, I’m looking for biodiversity in an urban garden in downtown New Bedford, Mass. I actually found more biodiversity than you might expect.

Next post on Blogger Bioblitz 2007: Link.
Previous post on Blogger Bioblitz 2007: Link.

Note: video host blip.tv is defunct, so this video no longer exists.

Blogger BioBlitz 2007 update

My two assistants were unable to join me in the Blogger BioBlitz this afternoon as we had planned, so we’re going to put off our main effort to document the biodiversity of the church garden here in urban New Bedford until later in the week.

However, I went out this afternoon for an hour and did some preliminary research. Counting only non-cultivated species, I found at least two species of bryophytes, several species of lichens, at least one species of algae, at least five species of arthropods (4 of these in class Insecta), at least four species of non-cultivated flowering plants which are currently in bloom (and lots of other non-cultivated plants), 5 species of birds (2 native, 3 non-native and invasive species), and one mammal. Not bad for a cultivated, very human-dominated half acre plot of land.

First post on Blogger Bioblitz 2007: Link.
Next post on Blogger Bioblitz 2007: Link.

Blogger BioBlitz 2007

I just signed up to do the first annual Blogger BioBlitz. Jeremy, science blogger at The Voltage Gate, writes:

In honor of National Wildlife Week, April 21 – 29, I am inviting bloggers from all walks to participate in the First Annual Blogger Bioblitz, where bloggers from across the world will choose a wild or not-so-wild area and find how many of each different species — plant, animal, fungi and anything in between — live in a certain area within a certain time. Link

Tomorrow afternoon, I’ll be surveying the garden of First Unitarian in downtown New Bedford, which is a small green space in a highly urban environment, assisted by two teenagers from the church (thanks, Dylan and Tyler!). You may have noticed that on this blog I already maintain desultory lists of birds and molluscs I’ve seen in New Bedford Harbor. The Blogger BioBlitz is an oportunity for me to examine the even more human-dominated environment surrounding our church, ten blocks from the harbor. It’s also an opportunity to live out our liberal religion by doing some low-key citizen science. We expect to find many non-native and introduced species in this urban environment — I’ll post photos and lists later this week.

Want to participate in this blog swarm? Register here.
Thanks to Invasive Species Weblog for the link to the Blogger BioBlitz.

Next post on Blogger Bioblitz 2007: Link.

Toxic

According to a Washington Post article, Toxic Waters Provide ‘a Snapshot of Evolution,’ from Monday, January 23, New Bedford harbor is now swarming with Killifish. This is remarkable because New Bedford Harbor, designated as a Superfund site, is so polluted by PCBs that almost nothing can live there:

The waters of New Bedford Harbor, Mass., sparkle on sunny days. But beneath the bay’s gleaming surface lies one of the most toxic environments in the nation.

“You’d think nothing, absolutely nothing, would be able to live in New Bedford Harbor,” says Jim Kendall, a fisherman and president of New Bedford Seafood Consulting. “But you’d be dead wrong. Something does live there, and in huge numbers.”

Killifish, three-inch-long saltwater fish common along the Atlantic coast, thrive in these polluted waters…. “Sometimes they’re so thick in the harbor, you could just about walk across on them,” Kendall says….

No one is quite sure how the killifish have managed to adapt to the toxic environment. There are representatives of other species — the article mentions quahogs — living in the harbor, but the killifish are there in great numbers. Why so many killifish?

“That’s the big question,” said toxicologist Mark E. Hahn of the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution in Woods Hole, Mass. “It’s what can happen when animals are exposed over generations to high levels of contaminants.” The result goes one way or the other, he said. “The population dies out or it adapts through genetic changes to extreme pollution levels.”

In one way, this is a hopeful story: even with all the toxic sludge we’re pumping into the environment, some organisms seem to be able to adapt. In another way, this is a very worrisome story: the killifish are filled with PCBs, they are being eaten by other animals, and so the PCBs have a new entry point into the wider food chain. I’ve seen lots of Mergansers on the harbor this winter; Mergansers eat fish; the Mergansers are likely getting pumped full of PCBs.

Turtle

This evening, I went down to Allen’s Pond Audubon sanctuary in Dartmouth. At dusk, I was walking back along the beach when I heard someone shouting something over the sounds of the ocean. It was a fisherman I had seen fishing earlier.

“What?” I said, cupping my ear.

All I could hear in response was something-something-turtle.

I looked all around, but didn’t see anything. “Where?” I said.

He beckoned me over towards him, and when I got close enough he pointed to the ground in front of him. “It’s a leatherback,” he said.

A dead leatherback turtle lay at the edge of the water, mostly out of it. I would have said head first, but most of the head had been eaten away by something, leaving only the skull. If you weren’t looking, it could have been just another dark rock with seaweed hanging on it.

“I almost didn’t see it, but then I kicked this,” pointing at a piece of the flipper. “A boat or something must have hit him in the water,” he continued. “He must have come up here to die. Then probably one of the coyotes ate his head.” He paused, and we looked at the turtle for a bit. “I didn’t think they came this close in.”

“He hasn’t been here long,” I said. “He doesn’t stink yet.”

We looked over the body: almost black, sleek and streamlined, phenomenally beautiful even lacking the head. We thunked the shell. It was resilient, and sounded and felt much like a ripe watermelon when we tapped it with our knuckles. Ridges ran the length of the shell. The flippers were tapered and graceful. The whole body was big, a good five or six feet long, probably weighing a few hundred pounds. Even the blue-green curl of intestine spilling out from between the shells was beautiful. A senseless death.

“Well, now we can say we saw one,” said the fisherman, “even if it was dead.”

We started walking back to the road, and I asked him if the blues were running. He said they had been, but they had been feeding voraciously on some smaller fish and weren’t interested in what he threw at them. It was getting dark enough that the colors were fading, and as I got in the car I heard a few last terns screeching as they dove for prey into the ocean.

Midwestern savannah

Oak savannah, up until 150 years ago one of the dominant ecosystems around here in the Tri-Cities, has fascinated me ever since I first saw restored oak savannah over at Nelson Lake Marsh natural preserve. Contrary to the stereotypes I’d been fed, the prairie was not the only major ecosystem in Illinois.

The earliest settlers found almost half the State in forest, with the prairie running in great fingers between the creeks and other waterways, its surface lush with waist-high grasses and liberally bedecked with wild flowers. Here occurred the transition from the wooded lands of the East to the treeless plains of the West…. The pioneers admired the grasslands, but clung to the wooded waterways…. The waterways furnished timber for fuel and building, a convenient water supply, and protection for the settlers’ jerry-built cabins from prairie fires and windstorms. Fires invariably swept the grasslands in the late summer, when the Indians burned off the prairie to drive out game….” Illinois Descriptive and Historical Guide: Compiled and Written by the Federal Writers’ Project of the Work Projects Administration of the State of Illinois, 1939.

Where did the woodlands go?

Lumbering activities and the pioneer’s early preference for the woodland reduced the forests from their original extent, 42 per cent, to little more than 5 per cent. What is now commonly thought of as prairie is often the increment gained from the clearing of the woodlands. –Ibid.

The oak savannah is neither prairie nor forest, but a separate natural community, a transitional zone between forest and prairie. According to one definition, oak savannah has more than one tree per acre, but less than 50 per cent coverage (some authorities allow up to 80 per cent canopy coverage). The widely-spaced oaks rise out of the grassy undergrowth, giving a park-like appearance. This makes for a beautiful landscape, which feels open yet protected by trees.

How much of Illinois was savannah? According to a 1994 North American Conference on Savannas and Barrens, “No estimate of the presettlement extent of oak savanna has been developed for Illinois.” Since even modern definitions of oak savannah vary, it’s not surprising that no such estimate exists. Yet the reports of early settlers talk glowingly about the park-like settings of early Illinois, so we can be sure they knew and enjoyed oak savannah.

Funnily, the suburban landscape of downtown Geneva superficially resembles oak savannah, with its widely spaced trees and the grassy lawns. But the community of plants and animals is quite different in the suburbs than in true oak savannah, and it is a transitional zone between shopping mall and housing development, rather than a transitional zone between forest and prairie. Some early accounts say the Indians kept the oak savannah open by burning away undergrowth periodically; to shape today’s suburban savannah, humankind uses power lawnmowers and tree services.

You can see a contemporary image of oak savannah at photographer Miles Lowry’s Web site. Link The top two images are of a restored oak savannah about three miles due east of Geneva. Or if you want a technical discussion of oak savannah as an ecosystem, you can find it at the EPA’s interesting Web site on Great Lakes ecosystems. Link