Author Archives: David George Haskell

Walking fern, Asplenium rhizophyllum

These ferns were rooted in the moss on the north side of a large boulder in Shakerag Hollow.

The fronds arch through the air and, when they are fully grown, their skinny ends touch down into the moss…

…and root, producing a new fern, a clone of the parent. This baby will ultimately grow into an independent individual, arch its own fronds outward, and continue the “walk” across the boulder.

Walking ferns need a moist carpet to take root and they are seldom found away from thick mossy mats. Unfortunately their diminutive charm makes them attractive to plant-thieving gardeners. Transplants seldom survive, so it is best to leave them unmolested in the woods.

Red Jungle Fowl sighted in Sewanee

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I’ve been looking after the chickens at the student Green House for the last few days. The birds live behind the Green House “eco-dorm” and provide eggs, education, amusement, and, in the end, flesh. Their caretakers have dispersed, so a motley group of those “left behind” are coming in to feed, water, and check on the birds.

Dawn breaks on chickens pecking in the frost...in a PVC enclosure (wandering dogs love to eat chicken).

This gal is good-looking...

...and she's feisty. About one microsecond after this blurry photo was taken, she launched a lightning jab at the lens -- ping! She looked disappointed that the lens filter didn't crack, then she moved on to a vigorous attack of my boots.

The nest boxes in their shed have half a dozen eggs each morning -- including, today, a blue one.

I can’t help but think of Asian jungles whenever I’m around these birds — and what a long strange trip it’s been.

Moss

Why are we taking up all the room in the Manger?

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Thousands of Jesuses have colonized the front lawns of America, surrounded by clusters of people and animals. What substance Jesus is made from varies by social stratum: carved wood is very upper crust (but is usually not displayed outside for the general public to see), plastic is a solid middle class option, and painted plywood indicates a rugged back-to-the-workshop blue collar household.

Regardless of the medium, Jesus lies in his manger alone. Other species cluster around as supporting characters, but they are not the ones that are going to get saved. There is a discontinuity here, a break that runs through our idea of the world: us (Homo sapiens, but probably not other Homo species, were any to show up at the communion rail) and them (a few million other species).

The Catholic Church is quite clear about this (my italics): “The magisterium of the Church takes a direct interest in the question of evolution, because it touches on the conception of man, whom Revelation tells us is created in the image and likeness of God … man is the only creature on earth that God wanted for its own sake … In other words, the human has a value of his own. He is a person … It is by virtue of his eternal soul that the whole person, including his body, possesses such great dignity … the origin of the human body comes through living matter which existed previously, the spiritual soul is created directly by God. With man, we find ourselves facing a different ontological order” Pope John Paul II, Message to Pontifical Academy of Sciences, Oct 1996.

So, although there may be physical continuity between us and other species, we’re the only lucky winners of the soul, of dignity, and, they say, of consciousness. Other denominations follow suit, although usually without a well articulated public statement of epistemology (gotta hand it to JPII: his comments are meaty and well-reasoned). And, the vast majority of society buys in also, including modern science (experiments on chimps, anyone?).

So, fellow Humanoid Earthlings: a lonely Christmas? Or might we truly be kin with our fellow creatures?

“Tree” of life, showing relationships among species for which we have complete genome data. Center of circle is the common ancestor. Kinship is shown by branching order as you move out from the center. Image from Wikimedia Commons.

Solstice Quiz

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The theological overlay has changed over the years, but the underlying principle is the same: Sun = Life. So, on this most life-affirming day of the year, Happy Solstice to you (11:30pm CST is the hour, for those who like some precision).

In celebration, let’s have a quiz. These photos are all from along the Elk River, taken earlier this week.

Who made these tracks in the sand (each print would nestle easily in the palm of your hand)?

The same animal, showing back and front feet:

How about this one (a bigger track, about human hand-print sized, or a little smaller)? Normally, this creature has a fourth toe, pointing backward, but this time the mystery track-maker must have been walking daintily.

Now, look up. Whose nest is this?

Answers: here, here, and here.

I’ll close this ramble with a shot of the dawn mist on the Elk. Around my feet was strewn the plastic detritus of Homo sapiens (fishing tackle, TVs, bags of household junk, oil cans — all the usual suspects, minus needles this time), but the place was still beautiful.

Christmas Bird Count

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The Audubon Society runs an annual “Christmas” Bird Count across the Americas. This count was started in 1900 by Frank Chapman at the American Museum and has continued ever since. Each individual “count circle” is fifteen miles in diameter and volunteers fan out within this circle to record all the birds they can find. The data is then compiled across the whole continent to give a large-scale picture of the health of bird populations.

This morning, I took one pie segment of the Franklin/Coffee County circle. (LouAnn Partington organized the whole event, I was just one of many “counters.”) The weather made this outing a treat: mid-50s and sunny. In New York, I remember doing one of these counts on cross-country skis in biting cold.

In all, I found over fifty species. Some highlights included finding a Loggerhead Shrike, a species that is in serious decline. Shrikes are birds of mixed grassland and shrubs, and they have been hit hard by the intensification of modern agriculture which removes their habitat and potentially exposes them to agrochemicals. They are fierce little birds, preying on small mammals and large insects. They impale some of their dead prey on thorns and barbed wire as a signal of their hunting prowess: mini trophies.

Loggerhead Shrike, one of the few remaining in the county.

Population trend for Loggerhead Shrike. Data taken from US Christmas Bird Count database. The Breeding Bird Survey (a summertime census) reports a minus three percent per year decline for the last thirty years.

Some other personal highlights were hearing Sandhill cranes make their bugling sounds, getting blasted by a blue jay with an imitation of a red-tailed hawk keeer as I walked under the jay’s perch, watching a belted kingfisher fly through the mist along the Elk River, and seeing Henbit the goat’s namesake plant, Henbit the little pasture weed.

Lamium amplexicaule, Henbit

A goodbye

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Henbit the goat died today. She was born here eight years ago, led the herd in the charm department, but lately cancer brought her low. “It was time,” as we presume to say.

Farewell, sweet companion.

Waay?

Sing on, grave crickets

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This morning, before the rainy front moved in, I heard a remarkable thing — crickets singing softly from the long grass under a powerline (field crickets, genus Gryllus, I think). We’ve had several hard freezes, two modest snowstorms, and the days are about as short as they get. Yet, they sing on.

Our culture has a long tradition of moralizing about these singing orthopterans, starting but not ending with Aesop.

Wastrel Fools! Squandering summer while the provident ants buckle under and work.

Or, Happy Fools! Sing while you can, for tomorrow we die.

As the title of this post suggests, the crickets seem to me to offer an alterantive to Dylan Thomas’ rage — why not sing, sing as you go gentle into that good night? A song is more defiant than rage.

So far, so good. These little tales are hardly masterful works of nuanced allegory, but they make their point. What the literary encrustations don’t do is honor the actual insects. We see ourselves reflected in their lives, but the mirror itself is invisible.

Here’s a brief take from a biologist’s perspective: evolution has molded each species to the particularities of the ecological situation. There are many ways of being a successful insect. Diversity wins the day.

Crickets overwinter as eggs, a thrifty strategy that requires no food stores. In the spring and summer, the eggs will hatch and several generations of crickets will follow before the winter comes again. Ants overwinter as colonies of sterile workers tending their fecund queen (she truly is “the 1%”). Because the colony has so many workers, it needs food stores to make it through the winter. Both strategies have worked for tens of millions of years.

Ironically, ants also eat cricket eggs to make it through the winter. In fact, hungry ants are a major source of mortality for cricket eggs. So, it seems that we need each other after all.

Hello? Aesop, are you there?

Five ridges

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From Morgan’s Steep, Sewanee, early this morning. The ridges are the rocky wake left by the slow eastward erosion of the Cumberland Plateau. The air was thick with water vapor rising from the wet woods, blurring the focus on everything in the distance.