New Beginning

Utrecht, The Netherlands

I'm well aware my last post was from over two years ago. In the interim, I had been living in Utrecht, a small medieval city in the Netherlands. Decartes lived in Utrecht way back when, and, fittingly, I studied philosophy there. A research masters in the History and Philosophy of Science, to be precise. Now I'm back in the United States, putting the finishing touches on my thesis and freelancing as a science writer and editor. I spent some time in my home state of Florida and now I'm living in a small cottage in the middle of nowhere in North Carolina. In the following weeks I will post photos of my time in the Netherlands, Florida and North Carolina. Occasionally, I'll also write posts that contextualize current happenings in science in time and space (society). Wish me luck.

The Many Mindless Murders Of The Great Auk

Do you remember the story of the Great Auk, or as Icelanders like to call it, the geirfugl? The history of this extinct bird is staple curriculum in Icelandic schools, probably because three Icelanders killed the very last mating pair about 170 years ago. However, "the history of the Great Auk has faded away" in Iceland, says Kristinn Haukur Skarphéðinsson, wildlife ecologist at the Icelandic Institute of Natural History. Though at first, he says, "nobody knew they were killing the last auk," as soon as the truth of the matter revealed itself, Icelanders had to carry the burden of a "collective guilt that we did the Great Auk in."

But we have been massacring this poor, clumsy bird before humans were technically humans. Yes, believe it, Neanderthals hunted Great Auks over 100.000 years ago. And a whole lot of death occurred between then and that notable day of July 3, 1844 when the book of Great Auk was slammed shut. So who should really be held responsible for the extinction of the Great Auk? How much of the blame should Icelanders carry on their shoulders? Could the bird itself take some of it? Maybe just a little?

POINTING FINGERS, IF ONLY LITTLE ONES

The Great Auk, in some ways, had it coming. Living in the wilds of the North Atlantic and having a picky disposition when selecting breeding grounds is akin to accepting only foie gras for dinner during the Irish potato famine. Great Auks would only breed on rocky, remote islands near easily accessible food sources. They'd settle with no less than islands with sloping shorelines, which gave the birds easy access to the ocean, where they spent the majority of their time.

The birds were excellent swimmers, but their ability to traverse land resembled a drunken Icelander on a weekend night in Reykjavík. Just as easily as you could net a hipster leaving Bakkus at 5am on a Saturday, you could casually stroll up to a geirfugl, put 'em in a bag and eat 'em for dinner with some potatoes (the bird, not the hipster). For some strange reason, these animals didn’t have an innate fear of humans, which many cultures took advantage of for thousands of years, including the Maritime Archaic people of Newfoundland and Saqqaq Inuits of Greenland.

BUT IT'S NOT OKAY

Though the Great Auk made it super easy for us to wipe them out, it doesn't exactly warrant our overexploitation. Yeah, you could probably make a living out of mugging old ladies on the street, but the ease of it doesn't make it morally acceptable (unless they're giving you sass about your haircut, or something). Frankly, when pillows become more valued than the survival of a species, it's hard not to wonder whether humanity had its priorities straight.

Starting in the eighth century, Great Auks were hunted in droves for their feathers. By the mid-sixteenth century, the breeding colonies along the European boundary of the Atlantic were almost completely wiped out by humans smitten with selling the luxury of down pillows. Finally by 1775, the Brits banned the killing of auks for their feathers and eggs, though the birds could still legally be killed for bait and food. This was one of the first environmental laws, which, in many people's eyes, made the Great Auk the "emblem for extinct birds," says Kristinn.

Though the severity of public flogging, the punishment for killing an auk for feathers, was discouraging, anyone with minimal intelligence could deduce an easy way out of publicized embarrassment and torture: say you're hunting the auk for bait (“Yes, officer, it was only a cigarette, I swear.”), and save the feathers as a keepsake of your trials and tribulations at sea.

But anything that's worse than reckless overindulgence in life, is reckless overindulgence in death. In a grave near Port of Choix, Newfoundland that dates back to around 2.000 B.C., archaeologists found a person buried in a suit made of more than 200 Great Auk skins, the heads left on for extra bling.

THE BEGINNING OF THE END

Nothing really tops the way the last Great Auk of the British Isles was killed. Sorry Icelanders, you didn't win the barbarian award this time around. In July of 1840 on the Saint Kilda archipelago in Scotland, three local men caught and killed the very last Great Auk of the region. They tied the bird up and kept it alive for three days, until a hefty storm loomed over their islet. Instead of assuming that the intermingling of warm and cold air caused the storm (maybe too logical for the times), the men took the shitty weather personally, accused the auk of stirring the skies with witchcraft, and beat it to death with a stick. The impact of the slaughter on the storm's cessation was inconclusive.

By 1835, after centuries of mass annihilation, one colony of about fifty auks remained on Eldey, an island off the coast of Iceland. But when museums and private collectors found out the Great Auk had become so scarce, they commissioned any willing body to hunt down and kill auks for their skins and eggs to put on display in their collections. The irony of this situation couldn't possibly have evaded the people of the time. I'd even bet the sign underneath the specimens on display in museums read something like, "Great Auk skin, RARE bird species of the North Atlantic."

On July 3, 1844, three Icelandic sailors by the names of Sigurður Ísleifsson, Ketill Ketilsson and Jón Brandsson, travelled to Eldey to collect specimens as requested by Danish natural history collector Carl Siemsen. Jón and Sigurður each found and killed the male and female of the last mating auk pair (thought they didn't know it at the time), but Ketill was left empty-handed. Poor Ketill, feeling left out, decided to smash the last auk pair's egg with his boot. And that was that.

OVER BEFORE WE STARTED?

In the world of extinction, great emphasis is always put upon the last of a species. The events that take place in the beginning and middle have less weight because, by default, the animal's numbers are probably doing alright then. But ask any conservationist and they will tell you that when there's only one lonely couple left of a species, the game is already over. So Icelanders, yes, you technically killed the last hope for the Great Auk, but widen the scope of the extinction lens and you certainly weren't alone.

Originally published in The Reykjavík Grapevine

Ingólfshöfði

And a little bit of travel writing...

Into The Ocean
A tour of Cape Ingólfshöfði's history and wildlife

My gloveless hands clutched the cold metal railing of the tractor-drawn hay cart as we drove into the sea towards Ingólfshöfði, an isolated cape located south of the Vatnajökull glacier. From a distance, a vast ocean seemed to separate us from our destination. In reality, it was a thin layer of water that the tractor's burly tires easily traversed.

In late April, the six kilometre drive through a wet, black sand desert to Ingólfshöfði, though scenic, was a cold and bumpy one. The bumps, however, produced mostly giggles over grumbles from me and my travel mates. We could see Ingólfshöfði's silhouette in the distance, and its elusiveness kept us inquisitive and happy.

The only way to get to Ingólfshöfði is via amphibious vehicles or tractors (so don't try to drive there in your rental, even if it's a 4x4). For the past decade, Sigurður Bjarnason, a retired farmer of the area, and his family have been driving gaggles of tourists out to the cape daily during the summer using their nifty tractors. Due to Sigurður's increasing age, his son Einar has taken over most of the tours with his wife Matta.

Though I usually prefer traveling on my own to guided tours, I was pleasantly surprised by Einar's tour of Ingólfshöfði: he did not herd the group like cattle, nor did he make cheesy jokes that aimed to please the dull-brained masses. He provided information about the history and ecology of the cape in a relaxed, straightforward manner and came equipped with a monocular through which we could all gaze at seabirds. We spent about an hour and half on the cape and walked about 2-3 kilometres following the cliff ledge.

Before Einar mentioned it, I had no idea Ingólfshöfði was named after the first permanent settler in Iceland, Ingólfur Arnarson, who spent a few winters on the cape in the late 800s before moving to Reykjavík. When Ingólfur and brother-in-law Hjörleifur Hróðmarsson first saw land on their voyage from Norway, Ingólfur threw his high-seat pillars (a pair of wooden poles that symbolized the status of head of the household in Scandinavian houses) overboard and vowed to settle where the gods brought them to shore. It took three years for Ingólfur's slaves to find the pillars in the bay of what is now Reykjavík.

During the summer, thousands of nesting seabirds call Ingólfshöfði home, especially puffins and Great Skuas, which is one reason why many tourists travel to the cape on Einar's tours. Before heading out, Einar warned us that we might not see puffins this early in the season. In late April, only the males have come to shore to clean out their old nests, a burrow usually situated at the edge of a sharp precipice. After cleaning, the males line the newly excavated nests with a fresh layer of plants, feathers and seaweed. The females, who are courted and charmed (and impregnated) on the rough waters of the north Atlantic Ocean, come to land around mid-May, when they have to find their mate amongst a bustling colony of other puffin couples.

Puffins start breeding at around four to five years of age and remain with the same mate for life. These birds are the ideal of monogamy in the flesh; divorce rarely occurs, and when it does, it's usually because the pair failed to produce young after trying for several years. . Some of its neighbours on Ingólfshöfði, like the Great Skua, sabotage the puffin's romantic lifestyle by murdering its children. With a wingspan of up to 140 cm, Great Skuas are much larger than puffins and find their young quite tasty.

Known to fly at the head of humans or other intruders approaching its nest, the Great Skua is a feisty parent. While on Ingólfshöfði I felt as though they were watching me closely as I paraded around their home. (The puffin, however, remained oblivious to our presence until someone got too close.)

After climbing up a steep-ish sand dune, Einar guided the group along the cliffs of Ingólfshöfði that faced the open ocean. In the corner of my eye, I caught a glimpse of a silly little bird flapping its wings vigourously in an attempt to make it to the edge of the rock ledge. With its natural tuxedo and colourful beak, puffins are not that difficult to spot. Before plummeting down to the ocean below, the puffin remained still just long enough for all of us to get a closer look at him through the monocular, which my bird-crazy eyes enjoyed immensely.

On our way back to the tractor, I spotted the skeleton of a bird stripped bare to the bones lying in the grass, its bright orange and black beak giving away its identity. Despite their comical name and appearance, I was reminded while on Ingólfshöfði that puffins are real, live animals, susceptible to the grips of skuas, starvation and disease. Seeing them in their natural habitat, they became much more than the caricature tourism companies portray them to be. For this, I have a newfound respect for puffins; for tour guides, too, and their fancy monoculars.

Little Marimo

The land of volcanic eruptions, glacial fields, and herds of grazing sheep, Iceland does not welcome plant life with open arms. The ones that do slip through the cracks (quite literally sometimes) are often marvels of evolutionary accomplishment. The marimo, a big fuzzy ball of algae that dwells in the shallow waters of Mývatn, is one such plant. It's one of those weirdo, outcast plants, the kind that other plants gawk at in the photosynthesis line: they do not know the latest fashions of fruit or flowers, the sport of root growing, nor the lingo of leaves. But perhaps the marimo's huggable form or their lush, calming green hue, often adorned by pearls of air bubbles, might win you over. Simply said, they have a lot to offer, as most outcasts do.

Marimos are the creative limits of evolution in the flesh. And for this, us nerdy naturalists are utterly enamoured with them. However, according to Árni Einarsson, director of The Mývatn Research Station, an ecological research institute that monitors Lake Mývatn, the "marimo has no place in Icelandic culture." Only until relatively recently, he says, were they known to people outside of the Mývatn area. But to be fair, scientists only discovered the colony that inhabits the lake in 1977.

When gazing upon a marimo, one might wonder how the elements of nature convinced an algae, an organism that prefers a more planar existence, to take the form of a perfect sphere. Normally plants want to increase their surface area-to-volume ratio (e.g. with big leaves or lots of pine needles) to capture as much light as possible for their size. Spheres are really bad at maximizing this ratio; actually, they're the worst. The marimo, however, has gotten around this staple rule of evolution. They took the hypotenuse line to survival: require less light (thus, energy) to live by staying small. The marimos in Mývatn reach only about 10 to 12 cm in diameter.

Though scientists aren't completely sure how they form, they think it involves the gentle caresses of wind-induced waves over Mývatn, the silky sediments of Icelandic volcanoes, and the light conditions of life at the bottom of a clear lake. When these three factors combine, marimos leave the psychedelic dreams of a young botanist's slumbers and materialize here in Iceland and only a few other locations on earth, including Japan's Lake Akan. Like Mývatn, Akan was formed by volcanic activity, which might explain why large colonies of marimos call both lakes home.

English speakers actually adapted the Japanese word for these algal balls, 'marimo,' as their own. The direct Japanese translation is quite literal: 'mari' meaning 'ball' and 'mo' meaning 'water plant.' The direct translation of the Icelandic word, 'kúluskítur,' is a bit less endearing. 'Kúlu' translates to 'ball' and 'skítur' means 'shit' in Icelandic. "Fishermen often used vulgar names for strange things that come to the surface when fishing," says Árni, and in the marimo's case, they were probably deemed shit because they would get "entangled in the fishing nets but [aren't] fish," he says. So for Icelandic fishermen, not fish = shit. Makes sense.

Maybe what stunts any growth of respect for marimos in Iceland is their elusive behaviour. Yes, let's blame it on them. They just won't let us in, damn it. In order to see one of these guys in the wild, you'd have to be lucky enough to hook one on a fishing line or be part of a registered diving operation. The Natural History Museum in Kópavogur does have some in a tank on display, but that's not really the same as seeing scores of them piled on top of each other in Mývatn.

Though their exterior allows for quick judgement, the marimo's interior deserves the respect of many far and wide. It is evolutionary fitness at it greatest: break one of these guys open and out will come a torrent of chloroplasts that in a matter or hours will awaken from a dark hibernation. After these chloroplasts see the light, they become photosynthetically active and start producing energy that the marimo uses to make one broken ball into two shiny new balls.

The way to kill a marimo may require the slow, insidious approach. And humans are accomplishing this quite successfully, scientists think. Marimo populations are declining worldwide. Though they aren't exactly sure how, biologists have a hunch that the decline involves eutrophication, which is the build up of nutrients caused by either natural sources, like bacteria, or human sources, like fertilizer runoff. Eutrophication can make lakes foggy, which hinders the amount of light that reaches the things living at the bottom of the lake.

The situation in Iceland is bit more complicated, where during the winter months everyone's got to learn to live with little sunlight. If the marimos can survive months without sunlight, then a little extra fogginess can't be the cause of their decline, Icelandic scientists reason. Basically, what we've got here is a case of the elusive outcast, shunned by society, which only leads to more secrecy. The marimo has stumped the scientific community, not only concerning the cause of its decline but also the basics of its life cycle. But there are a few of us that take a fancy to your elusiveness, little Icelandic marimo, and we will continue chip at the wall you have built around yourself until we reach the emerald core of your biology.

Painting with Neuroscience

I recently wrote an article for The Scientist about an artist and a neuroscientist who are collaborating to better understand how people perceive art. Here is a video of they didn't end up publishing with it.



I also found this great music video about optical illusions by The Whitest Boy Alive. Entertaining and educational.

DCist

I just started writing for a news blog in DC called DCist. It's pretty popular here. I like writing for blogs because of the freedom. Informal writing that isn't over-edited. It's great.

Here are some stories I've done so far:

Urban Beekeeping: Nectar Over Politics

Some Day, There Will Be Spring: Rooting DC

Interview with Ralph Lombrelia

A few months ago I interviewed Ralph Lombreglia for the Scholar. It was one of the first assignments I was given. He's an under the radar kind of writer that follows the current fashionable style of storytelling: instead of developing a plot or characters, you set up a scene, roll with it for a little while and then end abruptly. At first, I was always severely dissatisfied with these sorts of stories. I wanted something profound. I wanted an epiphany or realization at the end. Lombrelia's story "Unrippable" changed my perspective in a way. I didn't even think it was written with an exceedingly large amount of grace or poise, but rather that it was simple, unimposing, and more closely resembled the majority of life than the old-fashioned, climatic alternative to storytelling. It made me think: what about the stories behind the everyday, the subtle, the somewhat mundane? The story behind a crisis, a love, or a epiphany are so obvious. Aren't the times between love or after crisis important too? Aren't they worth telling? I'm still not completely sure. Read my interview, and read "Unrippable" and let me know.

On the Road

I'm done with my job in Northern California with the spotted owl, and now I'm on the road with a good friend for the next month. I don't know how much time I will have to post pictures on the way, but they will all make it up here sooner or later.

Cherice and I started in San Francisco and drove east to Yosemite where the sky was hazed with wildfire, and the people's voices were all heavy with European accents. We glided through the redwoods with our hands out the windows, and up the Oregon coast where the land dramatically met the moody Pacific ocean. The final destination is Washington, DC, where I'm doing an internship with The American Scholar.

We're currently in Portland hanging out with two good friends, drinking spirited but bad beer (Hamm's and Dale's), and eating good food. The currently itinerary is Portland, Olympic NP, Seattle, Glacier NP, Yelllowstone NP, Fort Collins/Rockies, Omaha, Chicago, NYC, DC. We have three weeks ahead of us filled with lots of good laughs and new experiences.

The Olm

There are an infinite number of species alive on Earth at this very moment. Evolution is an interwoven quilt of life, no part more or less significant to the large scheme of things, to the beauty and essence of life as a whole. We all possess unique ways of adapting to this unpredictable planet, ways of keeping the quilt of life still functional and flourishing. Some dominate; some linger in the shadows, avoiding attention as much as they can. Taking into consideration the changes that are now occurring on the planet, it is vital to remember that the subtle red threading in the quilt of life is just as important as the brightly colored patches of material that make up the quilt’s pattern. We all strive find to others of our own species to connect with, but there are organisms that live outside our everyday reality, organisms that go for years or even their whole life without seeing a human.

If humans are the bright patches of material that are used to make the quilt of life, then olms are the subtle red thread. Lurking in the caves of southern Europe, the olm is (Proteus anguinus) a blind amphibian that shares its genus with no one. It is listed as vulnerable on the IUCN Red List (International Union for the Conservation of Nature and Natural Resources), but it is considered endangered under the Slovenian Red List. It dwells in the underground streams of the limestone caves of the Dinaric karst that extends through Italy, Slovenia, Croatia, and Herzegovina. The natives gave the olm the nickname the “human fish”, because it’s skin color resembles that of Caucasian people.

The olm lives a life of darkness, thus it has undeveloped eyes. For the majority of humans, eyes shape our actions, reactions and beliefs. But living a life in complete darkness, it’s a waste of valuable energy to have eyes you never use, so the olm has evolved a heightened sense of smell and hearing instead. The larvae have fully developed eyes, but soon after the larval stage, development seizes and the eyes begin to degenerate. Another adaptation to life in dark caves possessed by the olm is skin that is completely deficient of pigmentation. The thin translucent skin that covers their underside gives a glimpse of their internal organs.

The olm sleeps, eats, and mates underwater. An adult olm preserves qualities from its life as a larva, such as external gills, which facilitates its entirely aquatic lifestyle. The gills stick out of the back of the olm’s head like little red branches. Oxygen-rich blood surging underneath its skin causes this red coloration. When an organism retains attributes from younger stages of its life it’s called neoteny. Olms also have very elementary lungs, but the gills are the main players in respiration.

The olm’s walk is reminiscent of a belly dancer. They sway their hips as if giving homage to their ancestors, the fish-like organisms of generations past. Their short, horizontally-flatten tail follows their hips in that ancient S-motion. Their limbs are petite for their body and they have a reduced number of digits on each leg: three instead of four on the front legs, and two instead of five on the back legs.

Compared to other amphibians, the olm’s sense of smell is exquisite. The lining of the nasal cavity is thicker than that of most amphibians. They have an apt ability to discern incredibly low levels of organic compounds in the water, which helps in sensing both the condition and number of prey in the waters nearby. Not much is confirmed about the hearing of the olm, but it is thought that they are well adapted to hearing under water because the tissue of the inner ear is distinct compared to the semi-aquatic amphibians. Recent research suggests that the olm can also sense electrical fields, potentially the Earth’s magnetic field. Many organisms use the Earth’s magnetic field to orient themselves. It’s different world underground in caves, no light leads to a wide array of inventive adaptations that enable an organism to “see” its surroundings.

Along with it’s human-like skin, the olm’s life history is also reminiscent of humans: they reach sexual maturity at around fourteen years old and individuals raised in captivity have lived for up to seventy years. In the wild, individuals as old as fifty-eight years have been found.

Although, through unofficial observations, olms were once thought to give birth to live young at lower temperatures and lay eggs at higher temperatures, it is now believed that olms are strictly egg-laying amphibians, which researchers refer to as oviparous. The female will lay up to seventy eggs which can take up to four and a half months to develop into larvae.

The olm is a predator of small crabs and snails of the underground streams in which it dwells. Like many birds and reptiles, it swallows its food whole. It can consume large quantities of food in one sitting and store the energy as fats in its body. If the olm eats enough, and if it decreases it activity level and metabolism, it can live up to a decade without eating at all.

The olm is very sensitive to changes in the environment because of its adaptation to the historically stable conditions in these caves. Small quantities of contaminants can easily seep through the olm’s permeable skin, which may lead to its death. Most contaminants enter the cave’s water system through the leaching of rainwater. Chemicals such as pesticides and fertilizers that are used in farming are among some of the most detrimental to the olm.

Nearly a quarter of all known amphibians are classified as threatened in Europe. It was in 1962 that Rachel Carson published Silent Spring, which discussed the damaging effects of pesticides on the environment and wildlife. Pesticides are still inflicting wildlife to this day, and amphibians, with their highly permeable skin, are especially at risk. If we are to preserve the quilt of life, the beauty that lies in its variety of colors, in its subtle details that make it all the more extraordinary, we must preserve the olm. When loose threads are left unacknowledged the quilt just isn’t as beautiful as it used to be.

*photo from www.euroherp.com/species/proteus_anguinus
*information from http://books.google.com/books?id=E3jeDU7KuhEC&pg=PA1788&lpg=PA1788&dq=book+amphibians+of+europe+olm&source=bl&ots=AdhKa62dgP&sig=h8I7DHgYqXdDjWE9gb59CwUEFDA&hl=en&ei=_CNISu-TAcS0twfJpI26Ag&sa=X&oi=book_result&ct=result&resnum=1
*information also from http://www.pbs.org/wnet/nature/episodes/the-dragon-chronicles/the-olm-and-other-troglobites/4533/

A Change in Values.

The scientific details concerning the current ecological crisis are nothing new to the people of the 21st century. For us, there is no more room for denial; we know we have “fouled [our] nest” and we are beginning to feel the retributions of it. However, these details were fresh in the minds of the people of the nineteen-sixties and seventies. Lynn White, Jr.’s article “The historical roots of our ecological crisis” must have come as a shock in 1967. His article gathered a great deal of attention due to its fiery subject matter and its publication in Science, which is considered one of the most prominent scientific journals currently in press, and it was no less notorious in 1967.

The topic of religion’s role in the environment is always one of extreme controversy. It is often so contended a subject that many scientists and politicians chose to circumvent the topic to avoid the scorn of society, hiding their opinions, arguments, and possible solutions to our growing ecological issues. Lynn White, Jr., a professor of medieval history at the University of California, Los Angeles at the time of the article’s publication, was not intimidated in the least respect by the eggshells that lie under one’s feet while religion is in discussion.

White’s area of expertise within history was the role of technological advancements in the Middle Ages. According to White, the origin of our current ecological crisis is rooted in Western technological and scientific advancements of the Middle Ages. Religion, specifically Christianity, motivated many scientists of the era in their exploration of the natural world. Most scientists of the time also considered themselves theologians. In fact, Sir Isaac Newton considered himself more a theologian that a scientist, according to White. Unlike today, scientific inquiry in the Middle Ages was not simply an investigation to gain a better understanding of the natural world, but an examination of the essence of God, through knowledge of the natural world. Thus, in many respects, scientific inquiry of the Middle Ages was a means to an end.

Genesis can be interpreted in two different ways. Either human beings are stewards of Earth, or they are exploiters of Earth. Either we are a part of nature or nature is a monarchy with human beings at the top. There are various excerpts from the Bible that lean in one direction or the other, but it is not difficult to decipher the more environmental friendly perspective. White argues that the bottom line is since the Middle Ages the exploiter perspective has been held and the combination of this perspective and the growing advances of technology and science have lead us to the environmental predicament we face today.

“All forms of life modify their contexts,” White states so eloquently. Every organism’s presence affects the overall functionality of an ecosystem. The existence of mass congregations of coral polyps, forming coral reefs, provides a home for thousands of other organisms, thus “modify[ing] their contexts”. Humans clear cutting forests, polluting water supplies, and burning fossil fuels also change the composition of specific ecosystems, as well as the essence of the entire Earth as a whole. White compares the manner in which a coral polyp changes the environment to the way humans have changed the environment. Humans must learn from the coral polyp: although one’s existence must effect the environment, many other animals and plants live without harming the environment they live in.

White offers a solution to our current ecological crisis: we must change our view of nature as a monarchy. He goes so far as to suggest that we need a new religion or we need to reevaluate our old one. White argues that more science and more technology are not going to cure the planet of its mounting ailments. If we follow White’s advice, and view nature as a democracy rather than a monarchy, then conservation and sustainability can enter the equation. Conservation advocates biodiversity and the right of all species to exist on earth. Sustainability strives to use the Earth's resources at a degree at which they can be renewed. But even in conservation we are biased towards species that are attractive to humans, such as charismatic species or species that we find useful. Amphibians and reptiles are so underrepresented because of this bias that nearly one-fifth of all known reptiles and one-quarter of all known amphibians in Europe are threatened, according to IUCN Red List (International Union for the Conservation of Nature and Natural Resources). Bird and mammal conservation efforts are far from sparse in comparison.

White argues that when Christianity overtook paganism, the belief that every tree, river, hill, and so forth, has its own spirit, we became less aware of the large scheme of things. While previously we were required to ask permission of the spirit of a tree whether we could use its wood to make our home, and give thanks after we did, the more prevalent, less environmental interpretation of Christianity encouraged the idea that all of the nature is at our disposal.

Humans, like all other organisms, are in a constant struggle of adapting to the changing environment; we are concerned with propagating the earth with our own kind, with passing on our genes. Before Christianity overtook paganism, there were far fewer people inhabiting the earth. When our population grew, it is possible that from a need for more food, there developed a need for more efficient farming methods and use of the land, which, thus, might have influenced us to see ourselves as dominators of nature. Did we change what we believe because we unconsciously felt we needed to believe it to stay alive?

Religion, it has been argued, is a form of adaptation. Humans, like all other organisms, are captives of natural selection. When numbers of an organism increase, competition increases and the tactics of survival become fiercer. Thus, dominating the land as we did and viewing nature as a monarchy might have been a result of increased competition. However, a system that uses resources at the alarming rate we are using them today can only be a short term solution to our growing population. We are now beginning to realize that our destructive methods have proven not so adaptive in the long term. If we are to survive, we must, again, alter our beliefs.

At the end of the article, White recommends St. Francis of Assisi as the patron saint for ecologists due to of his unified view of nature, and his belief that all organisms form a family. If we followed St. Francis’ philosophy, we would be returning to a set of values that has respect for the earth, rather than the desire to transcend and dominate it. In 2009, it is apparent that St. Francis has truly lost the battle. In some ways, science has formed our new set of values. Sustainable methods of life have become our savior, big bang theory is our creation, natural selection feeds our morals, and Darwin, Einstein, Mendel, Freud, Wilson, Leopold, Watson, Crick and Franklin are our saints.

What is strange about our destruction of the earth is humans generally prefer to be in nature over urban environments, “Studies conducted in the relatively new field of environmental psychology during the past thirty years point consistently to the following conclusion: people prefer to be in natural environments” . Why then, do we destroy the environment? Greed? Ignorance? Both? The depths of human psychology are undoubtedly the most mysterious and obscure area of knowledge. Maybe if we attempt to better understand the inner workings of our own minds, we will understand the needs of our planet, of our home.

Life in the Forest.

In Trinity County there is not a single traffic light. There are about four people per square mile and according to the 2000 US census, Trinity County was home to a mere 13,022 people. On the other hand, Trinity County is home to a plethora of trees: the Douglas firs with their rugged bark and vertical low-lying branches, the madrones with their smooth orange trunk that peaks out from under their flaky bark, the sugar pines with their intimidating widths and mosaic lavender-colored bark, and the tanoaks with their ubiquitous pollen.

Trinity County lies just east of Humboldt County, which houses the major towns of the area, Arcata and Eureka, and Humboldt State University, which has one of the best wildlife management and conservation programs in the country. The eastern most town of Humboldt County is Willow Creek, a small logging community where cans of “cream of spotted owl soup” can be found lurking in the windows of the town’s few, but friendly businesses.

The trees of the region are of the utmost importance. Since the 1980’s, spotted owl advocates, researchers, and the logging industry have been butting heads. The old-growth forests mean habitat for a charismatic, threatened species for the former and money for the latter.

Spotted owls nest in the cavities of broken-top old-growth trees, often Douglas firs. In April, a female, who often remains with her mate for many breeding seasons, will lay one to three eggs. Rarely does a pair fledge more than two young, and even more seldom do the juveniles survive into adulthood to produce young of their own. Thus is life in the wild, a constant struggle of staying alive and passing on one’s genes, but nestled in the Klamath Mountains of northwestern California, a watchful distance from its feathered friends, is Klamath Biological Research Station.

KBRS, as it’s often called to avoid a mouthful, resides just five miles east of Willow Creek, about a mile past the Humboldt/Trinity County border, in Salyer. When driving down the curvy mountain roads of highway 299 between Eureka and Redding, a little green sign marks one’s entrance into each town, and informs of the town’s population and elevation. Salyer is such a small town that if it were not for the sign and the general store/post office that faces the town’s only intersection, one would continue on highway 299 without even realizing they had passed through a town. A few years ago Salyer also had one restaurant, a shack-like building that served Mexican breakfast and lunch from 6:30 to 2:30 everyday. It was called Whole Enchilada, but they didn’t stay open for very long. The building still houses the Redbud Theatre, where plays are put on twice a year.

KBRS, owned and operated by Dr. Alan B. Franklin, is the home of the longest running spotted owl population and demography study in the country. It all began in 1985, with Alan Franklin and Pat Ward tromping through the brush and poison oak and over the rugged mountains of the Lower Trinity Ranger District in the Six Rivers National Forest. Now, twenty-five years later, the group includes two year-round biologists, six research assistants during the breeding season, a graduate student and his assistant who are studying the affects of barred owls on the spotted owl population, and yes, Alan still visits at least three times a year.

During one of the lax Monday afternoon meetings, Alan, on his first visit of the season, goes around the room asking the research assistants how old they are. The majority of them weren’t even born when the project started, and those remaining were still in the single digits.
The station can house up to twelve people and includes a main house, a bunkhouse, three trailers, and a laboratory. There are two bathrooms, one the size of a small closet. The atmosphere is pleasant; everyone gets along and shares the items that become scarce when one lives in a minute town, like new music and fine foods.

Every few weeks the group gets together to exchange perspectives on a current dilemma in conservation. Opinions float freely in the air like the pollen from tanoak trees, and playing the devil’s advocate is praised. But conversation is not limited to science. The evening, hour long drives up the unpaved mountain roads to the spotted owl territories facilitate philosophical conversation ranging from religion to politics, music to literature. NPR is almost always on the radio.

The laboratory at KBRS plays a small but significant role in the research at the station. It’s used for processing owl blood samples, drying owl pellets, and identifying mosquitoes. Attached to the lab is the ‘mouse-house’ where up to fifty mice are kept for use during spotted owl surveys.
One may still wonder: what does the spotted owl crew do in the forest, except tromping around on steep hills and brushing by fields of poison oak? It’s all about leg bands and mice. At around six p.m., three teams of a crew leader and a research assistant will head into the mountains to established spotted owl territories. The hike can range from 100 feet to 2200 feet change in elevation, from unsteady rocks to soft leaf litter, from nearly flat to nearly vertical.

In the beginning of the season the priorities are to find which owl pairs are nesting that year and to identify each owl by a leg, band, and tab color combination. The crew puts a mouse down on the forest floor and waits for the owl to swoop down and take it. What the owls do with the mice helps determine whether or not the pair is nesting that year, but watching the owl’s behavior overall is essential. If the owl, frequently the male, brings the mouse to a broken top tree, it’s likely the pair is nesting. If the owl stashes the mouse in a nearby tree, they’re probably not nesting that year. It’s often not as cut and dry as it seems, primarily because the owls do not know the crew’s protocol for confirming a nesting pair. The owls are living creatures, incapable of the uniform behavior researchers would hope for.

Keeping a spotted owl in sight at all times is incredibly difficult. Owls have evolved feathers that allow for nearly silent flight, and they are normally active at night, making them nocturnal. The setting sun hinders the crew’s vision, and the highly evolved owl feathers make hearing the owls fly away nearly impossible. But with well-trained eyes, spotlights, and persistence the team has collected the needed data every year for twenty-five years.

Toward the middle and end of the season, the team is mostly concerned with monitoring the nests, recording which nests have succeeded and failed, and ultimately catching the juveniles to band them like their parents. The spotted owl adults exude a noble character. They perch on branches high above human reach with pride radiating from their black eyes. The juveniles, on the other hand, who first emerge from the nest as a ball of white fluffy feathers, have an innocent disposition and a limited understanding of the rules of flight. They make a humbling addition to the experience of being a researcher at the station.

The season begins in the rainy month of April with sporadic sightings of adults, some as old as twenty-two. It ends in the midst of the hot and dry California summer, with young spotted owls eager to take on the world, or maybe just the Lower Trinity Ranger District of the Six Rivers National Forest, but life out here is far from simple.