It has begun
Posted on Feb 8, 2010 by jason
Less than four miles/six kilometers north of downtown Dallas. Nestled within the hospital district with towering university and medical buildings quite literally a stone’s throw away. Surrounded by major thoroughfares and the constant din of automobiles and airplanes. A motte only 3.5 acres/1.4 hectares in size. Yet at the height of summer, it will host more than 70 bird species.
Some species will travel hundreds of miles from their usual nesting territories just to play a part in what can only be described as the most powerful and profound example of opportunism in the whole of North Texas. Thousands of nests will be built, thousands of eggs will be incubated, thousands of chicks will be hatched, and from late winter through early autumn it will be a place of unimaginable beauty and awe such that all those who see it will be left struggling to comprehend how it could be real. And all this will take place in a grove of trees much smaller than your local supermarket.
I’m of course speaking about the colonial wading bird rookery that continues to thrive on the grounds of the University of Texas Southwestern Medical Center campus. Older than the oldest records, all we know about the rookery is that it hosts a congregation of species so diverse and so vast that it engenders an otherworldly sense of reality, as though one has been transported to the most remote place imaginable where mystic creatures thrive.
Yet this is anything but remote. The rookery lives in an urban jungle. Six lanes of concrete surround it on two sides and multistory buildings and parking garages surround it on the other two. Nevertheless they will come, the birds, and some will travel far outside their usual nesting territories just so they can join thousands of other pairs who will mate, nest, brood and rear young in a place that seems accidental at best.
Already the largest nesters, the great egrets (Ardea alba), vie for prime real estate, these giant birds wandering the still barren woods plucking up twigs and sticks with which to build a home for their newest generation. Soon the black-crowned night-herons (Nycticorax nycticorax), little blue herons (Egretta caerulea) and snowy egrets (Egretta thula) will join them. Following quickly behind them will come the anhingas (a.k.a. water turkey or snakebird; Anhinga anhinga), the cattle egrets (Bubulcus ibis) and the tricolored herons (a.k.a. Louisiana heron; Egretta tricolor). And when it all seems too much, white ibises (Eudocimus albus) will arrive.
Meanwhile, flycatchers, cardinals, grackles, woodpeckers, kingbirds, mockingbirds, jays, swallows, wrens, hawks, thrashers, sparrows, robins and a legion vast of species will settle in where space is available. Simultaneously the opossums and woodrats and raccoons and snakes and tree frogs and other animals will begin making appearances. The air will fill with insects, the ground will move with crawling things, and the transformation will be complete: the rookery will once again be alive, will be thriving, will be full of so much life that it boggles the mind.
I will make every effort to visit regularly and document reliably this most fascinating natural wonder. As I did last year, I hope to follow the progress of the rookery and observe its inhabitants as much as possible. I hope you’ll come along for this journey through the wonderland of an urban rookery where life abounds, where magic abides, and where city dwellers can lose themselves in nature’s demonstration of alien life. One cannot say they know birds in North Texas without visiting this place, for this place holds more bird species and more individual birds per square yard/meter than anywhere else in this region.
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Photos:
[1] Great egret (Ardea alba)
[2] Black-crowned night-heron (Nycticorax nycticorax)
[3] Snowy egret (Egretta thula)
[4] Cattle egret (Bubulcus ibis)
[5] Tricolored heron (a.k.a. Louisiana heron; Egretta tricolor)
[6] White ibis (Eudocimus albus)
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Four score and four months ago
Posted on Feb 5, 2010 by jason
Seven years ago today I began a wee experiment: this blog. My capricious tendencies have seen it through many incarnations. It has traveled across domains and has lived and died on multiple platforms and multiple servers. Historically I gave it a face lift almost as often as I posted. Yet through all of that, 84 months have passed since it came to life in 2003—and it’s still here.
Through this online journal I have met many fantastic people. It has gifted me with new friends and it has helped me find a community of like-minded individuals.
Blogging also has given me a chance to exercise my writing and my photography.
But why did I start? More importantly, why do I still do it today? Instead of trying to answer those questions anew, let me republish something I wrote last November, something that perhaps was meant more for this anniversary than it was the random writ it seemed to be at the time. Hereafter is The journal is the thing, only this time I will augment it with images of my favorite kind of creature: raptors.
* * * * * * * * * *
Should I waste that which spills from my soul? Should I dispose of haphazardly the many tellings which spring forth from cluttered and uncluttered thought alike? Such writs take shape with ease, gleaning from life’s treasures the simple and complex notions that wind their ways through labyrinths of ideas until finally taking shape in the guise of pedestrian words. Dare I forsake such a thing?
I am but a tool in the hands of creativity. A lithe bit of sandpaper destined to remove sharp edges from nature’s display. A rigid scythe meant to clear a path through grasslands too overgrown to be enjoyed by the masses. A sturdy bridge meant to convey observers across imagination’s mire. And a supple cloth to dry the sweat from a hard day’s work. These things am I… And more.
Green pastures stretch out before me like maidens lying in wait for gentleman callers. Hills rise like breasts from an earthen mother, and shores stretch like her lips around warm waters. Trees sway in the breeze like dapple braids of hair touched by loving hands. If indeed life is anything more than existing, it is a consummation, a marriage betwixt what is and what can be. I fear ever denying the embrace of this seductress.
In the tiniest of things I find inspiration; in the notation of them I find being.
I reap from fields sown of the universe’s seed. What comes from me, then, is the simplest interpretation of the greatest mysteries. To find magic in a single leaf hanging above my head while I travel paths ancient and new… To bend a twig and find upon it the hopes of a timeless soul wrapped in winter’s slumber… To stand by the riverside and hear sweet whispers from the commotion that hides beneath its still surface… Ah, to live in the now, in such a wondrous place, and to never wish to lift a pen so that I might complete the journey that I began… Blasphemy, it is. I would rather die.
Why toil with clumsy language? It remains clumsy only in the hands of those unlearned in its use, uneducated to its robust expression, and unfamiliar with its mystic secrets. Nay, the journal is the thing in which I conceal and through which I perform. Find within its borders the vellum of life, a papyrus upon which I paint in fine and broad strokes of words every bit of me, and every bit of the world where I reside.
Catharsis barely scratches the surface of why I blog; expression even less.
I find everywhere the riddles begging to be solved, the confidences left openly where none shall see them only to be discovered by those truly looking. By the rhythm of the sentence and the cadence of the photograph do I reveal such things as much to myself as to others.
For decades have I reveled in the joy of the journal. For almost a decade has that joy found new life in blogging. The universe opens her dress for me, welcomes me to her bosom, holds me close as I ponder the magnificence of her being.
Never could I give it up.
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Photos:
[1] Turkey vulture (Cathartes aura)
[2] American kestrel (Falco sparverius); male
[3] Juvenile sharp-shinned hawk (Accipiter striatus)
[4] Red-tailed hawk (Buteo jamaicensis)
[5] Red-shouldered hawk (Buteo lineatus); female
[6] Cooper’s hawk (Accipiter cooperii); female
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Shade
Posted on Feb 4, 2010 by jason
Inexorable heat. Stifling humidity. Omnipresent sunshine. My life drained away in gallons of sweat.
In the middle of the glade my suffering felt endless, my thirst unquenchable. I would die. I knew that without question. The clearing no larger than a football field, the unrelenting misery enlarged it until it became impassable, a forever journey that would take my life.
Then he pointed and said, “Shade.”
Trees stood atop the hill like sentinels, guards ever watching the comings and goings of life in the forest. Atmosphere thick with temperature inversions made them dance and shimmer and hover above the surface on wisps of smoke. An ocean of imaginary water lifted them to the sky.
“Come,” he added. And we walked.
Eternity passed before the first limb stretched out above my head. After a few more steps another limb, then another, then a few more, and finally the trees embraced each other with arching arms that created a canopy of verdant cover.
Barren earth greeted my knees as I dropped to the ground. My canteen could not be opened fast enough.
Even as I gulped desperately at the warm water inside the plastic container, we saw him. He must have seen us coming, must have noticed us as we entered the glade on the far side of the clearing. Yet he never moved.
His antlers seemed to hold up the sky. With his head turned, he watched. Still he didn’t move.
His harem and offspring nestled beneath the trees a bit further down the hill. Some nibbled on grass where it could be reached without moving. Others dozed as much as was possible given the cloak of infernal warmth that blanketed them. They also didn’t move.
“Too hot,” he said. I nodded and mumbled agreement, unable to turn away from him, the stag, the buck just a stone’s throw from where we rested against a tree. Then my mind completed the thought: Too hot for him to move.
Yes, I understood that feeling all too well.
And so we sat in the shade, offered respect to each other by sharing a commodity that none of us could be without. Though he never stopped watching us, likewise he never denied us the moment to survive together, to wash in the only cool breath to be found in the mouth of hell.
Shade. So simple a thing. Amazing how it bridged the expanse between us.
[photo of a male chital (a.k.a. cheetal, chital deer, spotted deer or axis deer; Axis axis)]
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A few of my favorite things #3
Posted on Feb 3, 2010 by jason
Flowers and the many faces of those who visit them…
a mason wasp (Monobia quadridens) and a white-faced tachinid fly (Archytas apicifer) sharing the bloom of a wild carrot (a.k.a. bishop’s lace or Queen Anne’s lace; Daucus carota)
brownbelted bumble bees (Bombus griseocollis) foraging on aromatic buttonbush (Cephalanthus occidentalis)
a black and gold bumble bee (Bombus auricomus) weighing down a plains sunflower (a.k.a. petioled sunflower or prairie sunflower; Helianthus petiolaris)…
…and right next door, a metallic sweat bee (Augochloropsis metallica) visiting a different bloom on the same plains sunflower (a.k.a. petioled sunflower or prairie sunflower; Helianthus petiolaris)
a female southern carpenter bee (Xylocopa micans) piercing the base of an amazingly hardy pink Texas skullcap (Scutellaria suffrutescens)[1][2]
a scoliid wasp (Campsomeris plumipes) enjoying the furry bloom of woolly croton (a.k.a. hogwort or doveweed; Croton capitatus)
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Notes:
[1] Beautiful bit of adaptation in this case. The carpenter bee is too large to fit into the flower, and it lacks a tongue long enough to reach from the opening to the base of the bloom. So these ingenious insects pierce the base of the flower with their mandibles so they can reach through the hole and access the nectar. Clever!
[2] This herb draws in hummingbirds and insects in large numbers. It can be entertaining to watch the varied horde compete for the blooms.
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Housekeeping
Posted on Feb 2, 2010 by jason
The diligent observer might have noticed a handful of arbitrary posts yesterday that appeared and quickly disappeared. Oops! In perusing my drafts, I inadvertently shuttled more than a few into the “posted” category. But more troubling than that was the discovery that I have drafts going back seven years, most of which I’d long forgotten.
That discovery drew me into an overall evaluation of the junk that has accumulated here over the seven years I’ve been blogging. Technical specs for the site? What theme I’m using? An archive of header images that shows I really need to update the collection? Dare I go on?
So I’ve embarked on a cleanup of the site. A lot of static and draft material will fall by the wayside. A few posts will vanish as well. (These posts have been password protected for ages because they contain material I intend to publish, such as the “Darkness Comes to Kingswell” short story, so removing them affects no one since no one can access them anyway. No publicly available posts will be removed, though.) A new collection of rotating header images will begin to take shape but the archive of them will be dumped. And other various housekeeping changes will be made.
I mention this because, like yesterday, there might be times when I accidentally publish stuff that makes little sense (some of the drafts are nothing but collections of random notes and others are incomplete thoughts that dangle like half-fallen fruit). Removing currently available detritus might cause 404s (page not found) on those rare occasions when someone is actually looking for the garbage I throw out. Certainly the long overdue replacement of header images should be noticeable (though that will happen over time and not all at once).
So while I vanquish debris to the refuse pile, here are some worthwhile carnivals you can visit to occupy the time you’d otherwise spend wading through my overly loquacious gibbering.
Friday Ark #280: The weekly carnival of critters. Whether you’re into dogs, cats, birds, or even invertebrates, this celebration of life always overflows with the week’s best offerings from the blogosphere.
Berry Go Round #24: The carnival dedicated to plants. Until a few months ago I’d never heard of this, but it’s since become a regular in my must-read list. Go enjoy a fantastic collection of science, discovery and beauty from all around the globe.
Festival of the Trees #44: The carnival dedicated to trees. My first memory of a tree? Falling off one and skinning my knee. How I’ve loved them ever since. This robust and beautiful edition will leave you breathless.
Circus of the Spineless #47: The carnival dedicated to invertebrates. Ted being an entomologist and a beetle blogger, it certainly took him long enough to get around to hosting this. Slacker. But no matter how long he waited to host, it was worth the time: he does a fantastic job presenting a varied edition that covers everything from sea slugs and snails to spiders and skippers. You don’t want to miss this.
[photos of northern cardinals (Cardinalis cardinalis): male at top and female at bottom; they're an "item" if you get my meaning; it was cool and drizzling that day, so he hunkered down at the top of the tree and collected a nice moist sheen of white; meanwhile, she was smart and perched lower and more inside the tree where she was protected from wind and precipitation]
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