Rhubarb Unlimited

A run around Gustavus

2009-10-12T01:20:00.018-05:00

I woke up two weeks ago in Gustavus looking for some solitude and adventure. So I decided to run the survey cuts marking the boundary between Gustavus and Glacier Bay National Park. I thought it might take 3 or 4 hours and packed a little food, some iodine pills to refill my water bottle and took off around 10:15am.
Leaving the beach at the west end of Gustavus, near Pt. Gustavus.

You can see from these cuts that the line has been brushed within the last few years. Many of the survey monuments are from 1998, so that may be the first time the line was cleared.

The brushing crew left some things behind. In addition to these loppers, I found a small amount of trash and a few piles of extra orange NPS boundary stakes.

Those blurry white spots are funky little mushrooms pushing up through the duff. Not sure what kind.

There were some wet spots, especially when the line started cutting back east toward Gustavus. (see google map).

One of the two roads I crossed all day. This one goes to the National Park. The other heads to the Falls Creek Hydroelectric project.

A moose hide drug around by wolves or coyotes? Or the sign of a moose shot in the park and drug back across the border? Kinda looks like the former, thankfully.

A sedge darner (type of Dragonfly). I finally got to use my new book "Dragonflies of Alaska" by John Hudson and Robert Armstrong to identify it.

The Salmon River.

The north end of the gravel pits. Supposedly, the pits were dug before the boundary was surveyed and no one knew they were digging in the park.

Found this algae growing on land (seemed very odd to me at the time) north of rink creek road. I photographed it on top of an old General Land Office (them's the homesteading folks) survey monument from 1920.

The most beautiful scenery of the trip. The tri-tone grass made me want to sit down and find my inner Andy Goldsworthy, but the hour was getting a bit late.

Finally made it to the beach. This is near the Bear Track Inn.

Running on home. I made it just after my parents started worrying, but before it was fully dark. In total, 31 miles in 8 hours and 46 minutes. I probably walked 18 miles of it due to wet conditions and the fact that I only brought six 120 calorie gel packs with me for food. The roasting moose that greeted me when I ran into our front yard was a welcome sight.

Wasatch 100

2009-09-18T10:24:00.006-05:00

Well that was pretty fun. Geoff rocked it (see his race report and that of his major competitor, Karl Meltzer) and I had fun being his support crew. I didn't get a picture of Katherine, Karl's support crew and a veteran observer of ultrarunning, but she was great company as we waited for the lead runners to come through. Both Geoff and Karl don't rely heavily on support--and probably would prefer races where everyone just uses drop bags and the aid stations, with no personal support crews. At each aid station I would get one of Geoff's drops bags with his nutrition (basically, cliff gels and endurolyte electrolite pills) stuff and put them in a hip belt with fresh water and electrolyte drink. I'd hand this off to Geoff and he'd give me his old belt and keep running, preferably not even stopping at all.

The picture above shows Geoff's drop bag at Brighton, the last aid station where support crew can go. It includes his night running set-up, with two headlamps, one of which is worn around the waist to better illuminate the trail.

At Brighton, I joined Geoff and tried to keep up with him for the last 25 miles of the race. I made it about 12 miles before he dropped me and kept going. He ended up doing lose last 25 miles (and their ~8,000ft of climbing) is a record setting 4:57. I enjoyed running with him while I could, and being left in the dust, tired and alone in the dark on a famously gnarly section of a famously gnarly 100 mile race, was as good an introduction to the sport as I can imagine. Thanks, Geoff!

This Rural Life

2008-07-11T15:46:00.001-05:00

From Verlyn Klinkenborg's editorial in the New York Times today,

What the insects are noticing--the bats, too--is beyond me. Our perceptions overlap without ever converging in the night. All the entangled lives on this farm seem to run on seperate tracks, except where they collide as predators and prey or companion and caretakers. Push this thought far enough, and nature seems to fray, to come apart into a disunity that is gathered up only by our human perceptions. And yet that gathering up is just our own kind of solipsism. I don't know that the horses have ever made a general proposition about nature, but then they don't know that I've made one either.

Freezing Salmon myths

2008-07-11T00:44:00.002-05:00

Listen to this, from a blog called Beyond Salmon:

The reason I was so surprised was that I've had previously frozen salmon before that was terrible, so I concluded that salmon doesn't freeze well. What I didn't take into account was that it was wild Coho and Sockeye Salmon that tasted awful. They are extremely lean compared to farm-raised Atlantic or King salmon and do turn to mush when frozen. So when you choose your salmon for freezing, go with Atlantic (always farm-raised) or King (farm-raised or wild).

Absurd. Friends don't let friends eat farmed salmon. For one, it is terrible for the environmentas currently practiced (check out Raincoast Research Society's great work on this subject). For two, all the farmed salmon I've ever consumed has tasted like soggy cardboard--even the fresh farmed king I had in Patagonian Chile.

Also, for the record, we have been freezing king, sockeye, and coho salmon forever with a very high quality result. Our guests rarely, if ever, realize it has been frozen and when we tell them so they begin to question the idea that freezing it so bad for fish. As is mentioned on the blog I bash above (which is pretty well done over all), this is a myth; what is important is how and when the fish is frozen, not whether it was frozen. My dad has always said that freezing should be done very quickly in a good quality freezer and that whole fish survive better than fillets because their is less flesh exposed to the air. From the discussion on the Beyond Salmon blog I learned why quicker is better:

I agree with Tse-Wei aho said that ice crystals can be made smaller if you freeze it very very quickly- metallurgical fact- yes I am a materials doctoral student! So it would make sense that a fish flash frozen at sea would last longer, preserve taste and texture than if you were to do the same thing at home. Also I agree with Helen that you should never defrost meat or fish or any food for that matter very quickly- i.e. do not microwave, or on your counter top.

Staying put.

2007-04-25T13:21:00.001-05:00

I will wait here in the fields
to see how well the rain
brings on the grass.
In the labor of the fields
longer than a man's life
I am at home. Don't come with me.
You stay home too.

--Wendell Berry

Adams Inlet snakes away from Glacier Bay toward Lynn Canal

2007-04-25T03:08:00.000-05:00

through beatiful mountains on all sides. I spent seven days kayaking there last week with Sean Neilson. My journal/gillnet for mystery yields these fish for the bar-b-que:

"This morning we watched a pack of 8 wolves (3 black, 2 grey, one brown and one black/grey/black like an oreo or a scaup). They were walking the beach playfully, visiting the intertidal, tug-of-waring with a piece of something we couldn't make out and rolling in one spot before taking off into the woods a short walk from us. That was pretty wonderful and it seems they weren't aware of our presence until the very end. Interestingly, when the pack passed a group of Canada geese and sea ducks foraging in the intertidal, none of the birds seemed concerned, whereas they fly from our presence at much farther distances. I checked their path for fresh wolf scat, which I've never seen. It looked like a smooth black paste with white hairs throughout (snowshoe hares?) and smelled 'horrid'."

"Today we entered Adams Inlet. From our first site of the mouth of the inlet strange noises confused us. It sounded a bit like a waterfall coming from the middle of the bay but turned out to be a group of ~150 sea lions feeding. The group approached us en masse to within 20 feet and began to scream and levate halfway out of the water. They seemed more curious than angry and we did what anybody would have done: screamed our best barbarian response and snapped photos."

"We saw lots of goats today. As always, their regal faces and agile mountain climbing captivated my attention. This time though, the captivation almost sunk my boat. A goat/subject of our future awarding winning photography we were approaching decided to head up the cliff above us. He sent down a shower of unpredictable rocks (on purpose?) that nearly put a hole in my boat and head. The sea was boiling with his rocks for several minutes--a site that was quite memorable even without the adrenaline-enhanced flee from danger."

"It sank it where I was today when an eagle feather and a steady supply of moose hair (perfect for bird nest making by the way) floated by my kayak. Signs of death as signs of life."

"Our bird list filled in over the course of the trip, following predictably the ecologist's s-shaped species area curve. First, the abundant ones--old skuas, ravens, mergansers, cormorants, guillemonts--and then ones rarer--a magpie, a red-throated loon, and two black turnstones. On our last day, and only day of inclement weather, we saw a group of hundreds of sandhills cranes flying high. The group was flying in pretty severe disorder while over the bay, but we saw them reach the steadier air currents over Gloomy Knob on the horizon and fall like beautiful dominoes into the steady lines that take them through the long haul. The best part about seeing the cranes was the process: you hear them first . . . they sink into your subconcious . . . you look up at the black in the sky . . . feel wonder . . . understanding . . . and then more wonder."

Thank you to those whose hard work protected this wilderness, and whose voices we still need hearing: John Muir is as responsible as anyone for Glacier Bay National Park and knew well the simple truth: "Fear not to try the mountain-passes. They will kill care, save you from deadly apathy, set you free, and call forth every faculty into vigorous, enthusiastic action. Even the sick should try these so-called dangerous passes, because for every unfortunate they kill, they cure a thousand."

Robinson Island Treasure

2007-02-26T20:37:00.000-06:00

This update is fueled by a Parrilla and a liter of Hieneken in western Argentina. A Parilla is a mix of different beef parts like intestines, blood, kidney, and stomach. I think I'd have to say at this point that I'd rather they ground it all up and served me a hamburger with lots of ketsup. Maybe in Buenos Aires things will get better. I just finished a month on a farm within Pumalin Park, Chile and two days rafting on the Futeleufu River, one of the best in the world for rafting. Both deserve some more description. But, my travels start with three months on Robinson Crusoe Island, about which I should at least mention.

I spent October, November and December on my knees identifying plants which were giving me alergies on a crazy island 400 miles off the coast of Chile, and part of that country. The island was discovered (for real, not just in eurocentric terms) in 1574 by Juan Fernandez. At that time, 70% of the plants of the island were evolutionarily unique, aka endemic--the highest rate in the world. Some of these species have since been pushed into extinction, but the percentage has changed mostly due to species introductions--the subject of the study that brought me to the island.

While we quietly did our work in the next valley over a treasure hunt went on, directed by Bernard Kaiser. to be continued. . .

Concepcion, Chile

2006-10-09T16:03:00.000-05:00

So far, I have conducted a quick survey of people on the bus from Santiago and amoung the youngsters that I've met through my friends in Concepcion (one has been here for 7 months). Almost to a person, when I bring up Robinson Carusoe Island I get an excited response about how unique the flora is there and how important a place it is. Of course, they are right: it has by some estimates the most unique flora in all of planet Earth, with 70% of species endemic. Hearing this articulated by 21 year old teaching students is pretty cool.

Another cool find: super nasturiums growing as weeds alongside the soccer field.

Update: It's Robinson Crusoe Island, not Robinson Carusoe Island.

What I've been up to this summer

2006-09-29T14:13:00.000-05:00

From your phone to your phone traffic data

2006-09-25T19:01:00.000-05:00

An NSF funded project that I ran across, using anonymous cell phone location data to show real-time traffic details. It is always reassuring that somebody is thinking creatively out there. Even if is solves problems that control ubran sprawl, there are climate change, not to mention mental health, benefits to reducing traffic congestion.

Photo credit: IntelliOne Technologies Corporation

Pig N Fords

2006-08-27T14:44:00.000-05:00

Here is how the official website describes this year's 81st annual Pig N Ford races at the Tillamook County Fair:

Saturday World Championships

1. Bobby Wasmer
2. Marty Walker
3. Chris Hurliman
4. John Haertel
5. Ben Salo (DQ)

"Bobby had a great start and was able to jump to the early lead and never look back. Marty stayed close throughout the race trying to find an opening. John had some starting troubles, which gave Chris the opening to get the final trophy position. Ben decided to have a little fun while he was in the back of the pack and skip an exchange for fun. The crowd loved it and was able to finish third without the final exchange, but skipping the last exchange is against the rules."

Indeed it was an exciting event, made especially entertaining, as they describe, when Ben skipped the third exchange after trouble with the hand cranking during the second exchange put him out of reach of winning.

Wait. . . What about the fact that the sport entails grabbing a screaming piglet under the arm and racing around a horsetrack in a working model T Ford? After 81 years of Pig n Fords, Tillamook County has, believe it or not, made this ritual normal, and non-ironic, within its borders. I'd guess 5,000 people came from around Oregon to see this feat.

After the race, at which PETA was completely absent (It is easy to think the race is cruel to the pigs, but it is nothing compared to the feedlots they were born in), the pigs get auctioned off. My local natural meat provider, Lance, bought six and is fattening them up right now. They will be ready for purchase in late November or December.

Mini Watsa's response to my Slime Mold inquiry

2006-08-22T19:58:00.000-05:00

Slime Mold 1
Originally uploaded by griles.

Hey,

Thanks for those pictures! I really have never seen anything quite like it... the sime mould I worked with was of a different order and species than these are. All slime moulds come under the class Mycetozoa. Listed below are the different orders and families.

Protostelia
Protosteliida
Myxogastria
Liceida
Echinosteliida
Trichiida
Stemonitida
Physarida
Dictyostelia
Dictyosteliida

I worked with Dictyostelium, and largely laboratory strains that never formed huge masses that your slime moulds (if I may call them that) do.

I believe that the kind you were looking at belong to the order Myxogastria. They are true slime moulds or plamodial slime moulds where cell membranes are missing. These 'cells' just clump together to form these huge feeding stages called plasmodia (exactly what u saw!) that are quite fascinating. Dictyostelia are cellular slime moulds and form much smaller feeding stages.

Your kind actuallym move at the rate of a mm per hour but can go as fast as 2 cm per minute. They just engulf all kinds of organic matter in their paths.

So, in answer to your question, no, these don't look like what I worked with. Mine required a microscope to be viewed. These are fascinating...you should see if you can look at a bunch under a microscope...see the individual spores perhaps.. or just starve a glob of it and watch the spores form. WOnder what they'll look like then...

Almost Got Stuck

2006-07-28T18:38:00.000-05:00

I just returned from 8 days rafting in the Idaho wilderness. Swimming ten times a day in a wild, cool river to get out of the heat, learning to navigate a raft through rapids, and enjoying great company and great views. It all kept me busy and happy.

On our last day we noticed the river was full of sediment. It turned out that rafters mere days behind us on the Middle Fork were stuck by a surprise landslide that sent dozens of trees in the river, blocking the way. It was well reported by The Idaho Statemen, a Boise newspaper. Check out their articles for pictures, movies, and details.

Middle Fork Diving

2006-07-28T18:23:00.000-05:00

Jumping of the bridge
Originally uploaded by griles.

Middle Fork of the Salmon River

2006-07-16T11:58:00.000-05:00

For the next eight days, I will be on a three-person raft floating down the Middle Fork of the Salmon River in central Idaho with 12 Idahoans. This flows north from Stanley, ID through the Frank Church-River of No Return Wilderness, the second largest wilderness area in the lower 48s, to the main branch of the Salmon. The Salmon flows into the Snake near the western edge of Idaho, and eventually into the Columbia just East of the Gorge.

My hosts with be the Marvels. Johanna is an old friend from Grinnell, Adam is her older brother and lives and acts in London, Jon is her father, a retired architect who runs the Western Watersheds Project, and Stephanie is her mother. They have rafted this river together more than 8 times.

Look forward to sharing some photos and maybe a plant or bird list when I get back.

Molly and Noah's Wedding

2006-07-14T20:04:00.000-05:00

Originally uploaded by griles.

Concopia, Wisconsin. June 25th.

Boat tour through the Apostle Islands, wiffle ball on the beach, raising the huppa, meeting Noah's high school friends, and listening to the two best wedding toasts. And, of course, a powerfully genuine and personal Jewish wedding of two of my closest friends.

Carbonate Mountain Still Life

2006-06-17T14:14:00.000-05:00

Carbonate Mountain Still Life
Originally uploaded by griles.

This photo is from Hailey, Idaho on Memorial Day. I stopped there on my drive from Kansas to Oregon, where I now live. Idaho has some big country, especially impressive when the wildflowers are getting their groove on. My host in Hailey was Jon Marvel, executive director of the Western Watersheds Project, which at any given time has several lawsuits against BLM in the works. I now work for BLM as a botanist. We had some good conversations about the mythology of the american west and the reasons for BLM's inept management style. On my drive, I also visited with old friends from Alaska: Gretel Haight and family in Longmont, Colorado and Alison Higdon and family in Hailey--great people who are thankfully bringing more great people into the world.

Lemesiur's Yeast

2006-05-19T07:23:00.000-05:00

Lemesiur Cabin
Originally uploaded by griles.

I spent some time on Lemesiur Island with friends Bob, Hank, and LInnea last week. Since then I have been mulling over a few great quotes, which are sitting in me like yeast. If I remember right Mr. Lemesiur was a chef on Vancouver's expedition to Southeast Alaska. Here, it seems, is his recipe for young men trying to find a niche and a right livelihood:

"Conservation as we know it is not an adequate response to an economy that is inherently wasteful and destructive"
- Wendell Berry, "Hell no. Of course not. but . . . " Arctic Refuge: A Circle of Testimony. Edited by Hank Lenfer and Carolyn Servid

"The more I understand hope, the more I realize that all along it deserved to be in [Pandora's] box with the plagues, sorrow, and mischief; that it serves the needs of those in power as surely as belief in a distant heaven; that hope is really nothing more than a secular way of keeping us in line."
- Derrick Jensen, "Beyond Hope" Orion May/June 2006.

Falls Creek Hydro Project Underway

2006-05-09T02:50:00.000-05:00

Bob Christenson and Greg Streveler
Originally uploaded by griles.

As Greg Streveler (pictured on left) said yesterday, "[Gustavus] wanted a bit of the outside world, and we got it."

The Falls Creek Hydroelectric Project has been approved and construction in in full swing. The picture is of the road to Falls Creek which is now under construction.

To those of you who don't know, this project is being done on Glacier Bay National Park land (and wilderness designated land at that). Bob Christenson (pictured on right) is in charge of environmental compliance for the project.

To get a sense of why this project is happening, read this short article in the Alaska Journal of Commerce. Notice the complete lack of reference to the environmental impacts of this project, and the haughty impatience for a project with very dubious environmental and economic benefits.

Dan's Best of Iowa Part 3: Prairie Reconstruction

2006-05-06T12:48:00.000-05:00

Spring Burn at CERA
Originally uploaded by griles.

Tallgrass prairie once spread throughout central North America, as did bear, elk, bison, and prairie wolf. In Iowa, 99.9% of this ecosystem has been lost to the plow--one of the most drastic and widespread landscape changes in human history. Over 95% of Iowa is now privately owned (the second highest percentage in the nation), the vast majority of which is corn and soybeans destined for consumption by hogs, chickens, and cows in massive confinment feeding operations.

Out of this monumental change has grown an equally unique response. Iowans have come to know, like almost no one else, that it is too late to save many of our "last great places", the call of the Nature Conservancy. Indeed, it is the truly greatest, most unbelievably rich places that disappear first. Such as Iowa.

We can protect Iowa's remaining postage stamp remnant prairies and savannas, but reconstruction is the primary tool for recreating vast swaths of flatland prairie, the kind that you can get lost in, along with a herd of bison. These are the places that will have the power and saliency to truly bring Iowa back to its rightful place as one of America's natural treasures and to finally sink the nail into the coffin of the pessimistic and simplistic idea of ecological sacrifice.

The best example of this kind of restoration is the Neil Smith National Wildlife Refuge just east of Des Moines. At 8,000 acres and only 15 years, it is one of the most ambitious restoration projects ever, though by no means is it finished.

For now, however, many of the smaller reconstructions that dot the rest of Iowa are more beautiful and diverse. They have given many, many contemplative Iowans a chance to commune with their degraded landscape, and to try to revive it with their attention and intention. For me, prairie restoration has been one of the most hopeful and spiritually salubrious activities I have ever participated in. It has given me a chance to see how Iowans tick and to share in their long vision for the future of this most contentious landscape.

For more information, watch the trailer of the great documentary America's Lost Landscape: The Tallgrass Prairie.

Dan's Best of Iowa Part 2: Aesthetics of Loss

2006-04-26T02:35:00.000-05:00

David Ottenstein has taken some beautiful photos of Iowa barns and buildings. He visited Grinnell last Fall and I got a chance to talk to him about what he called "the aesthetics of loss". His term strikes at one of the fascinating paradoxes of living in Iowa: our decaying history surrounds us, and at times it is stunningly beautiful. Iowans seem to bear this loss stoically, almost as if it were an extension of their self-effacing, no frills nature. In Ottenstien's photographs the connection between Iowan art, environment, and psychology begs to be discussed.

So, I brought these photos up with Arion Thiboumery, a graduate student at Iowa State University focusing on revitalizing Iowa's small meat lockers. His first thoughts: "when I see these photos there is not an "aesthetic of loss" in terms of sadness, but rather of bearing. . . . There is real salvage in knowing what is here, what is left. The withered and cracked, the ruins in the "low spots and hilltops" on the verge of the oblivion, become all the more beautiful, because they have not been lost for good, yet. The rediscovery fills me with dreams and hope. Even if I do not know their exact use or meaning, or any of it at all, the motivation they bring to make new meaning stretches the limits of measure. Dreams have value, and what inspires us to dream in new ways likewise has value."

"To give you an example: the meat lockers project. Meat lockers are living relics of the past, most that have ever been are gone, but they are a viable means for future sustainability through decentralized production. Some of them are downright dirty and need work. Standards of sanitation have greatly improved in recent years. "Lockers," in many places, are conceived of as "that blood-stained shack where my grandma went to get her cow slaughtered." They need a make over. They need to let the past die so they can be reborn."

Dan's Best of Iowa Part 1: Golden Ridge Blue Cheese

2006-04-23T20:41:00.000-05:00

Iowan blue cheese is synonymous with Maytag. This famous blue, made by the famous kitchen appliance family, has a subtle blue flavor and clean, almost metallic, cow milk finish. But the real story in Iowa is a new comer in the northeast--Golden Ridge Cheese Cooperative's natural rind blue, which, in a mere two years of production, has racked up two major awards: "Best Blue in the US" (2004 American Cheese Society Competition) and second best blue-veined cheese world-wide (2005 Wisconsin Cheese Makers Competition).

The co-op is owned by a group of 40 Amish dairy farmers, who felt their high-quality, hand-milked, organic milk deserved a better market than regional dairies. The USDA and the county helped them purchase a modern factory in 1998 and hire a crew of "English" who run the machines and carry out their traditional French/Spanish-inspired recipe. The key to their success seems to be in the little things: happy cows, a small degree of natural fermentation on the way to the factory, an absense of fat-chain-breaking mechanical pumps in the production line, and a natural, flavorful rind.

The product is a much more layered and intimate cheese than Maytag's self-effacing midwestern product. Subtle enough for non blue cheese fans, but complex enough for its national audience, the Natural Rind Blue (Golden Ridge's award-winner) features a mushroomy taste with layers of rich cream and a light grass-fed tang.

You'll find this cheese in any major American cheese shop, but visit their website and buy via mail at half the price and you'll save money, eat world-class cheese, and support the livelihoods of our country's best environmental stewards -- the Amish.

Even better, make the drive up to the factory. If you make it past the Amish farms in the area (the horse-drawn plows, playing kids and bake sales easily distract), you'll get to visit with the General Manager, Richard, who has also won awards for his organic pecans. Ask him how long the two wheels of cheese you've just bought (at $5 a pound who wouldn't?), and you'll likely get the same answer I did: "In front of me, ten minutes."

My Photos

2006-03-24T08:21:00.000-06:00

Photos from my travels in Latin America and the Caribbean, and food and natural history adventures in the US. Check them out at their (now permanent) address: www.flickr.com/photos/danlesh.

Leaving Belize

2005-06-30T10:09:00.000-05:00

We did what we came for- complete data on plant diversity and abundance from 10 Mopan Maya, 10 K´ekchi Maya, and 10 Garifuna home gardens. Most of these gardens were the size of a ¨normal¨ suburban front and back yard. We insinuated ourselves temporarily, and respectfully, into these cultures by bringing along Maya plant experts Polo Romero and Señor Cocom, by first approaching the local government, and, of course, by compensating each gardener for the (non-consumptive) use of their garden ($12.5-25 US). The local government was an interesting matter- an ostensibly democratic (the election process is unclear) combination of the old-school alcalde system and a newer village council system. The alcalde is in charge of legal matters and unrest. The ones we met had less than law abiding pasts, shall we say, but they seemed good people committed to doing well for their community, which they probably would define as letting illegal activity (marijuana growing primarily) go on as long as the village stays civil and harmonious in other matters. Many of the happiest, most prosperous, and most proud of the Maya we met seemed to be involved at one time or another in the drug trade. The village council consists of a chairman, a secretary, and 6 other elected positions. These folks are all volunteers, and via their hard work the organization and limited administration of the town is achieved. On of the most important of the chairman’s roles is as the organizer of quarterly fahinas- communal workdays to ¨clean up¨ the village.

We really liked these little villages. San Pedro de Columbia, a K´ekchi Maya community, in particular was a clean community of nice, open, and proud people who readily shared their gardens, plant knowledge, and language with us. One family was so nice we stayed all day and played with the children, Jerry, Jabril, Gloria, and Valentino Ack. These kids were exceptional in the premium they put on education, books, inane facts, and many of the things I grew up valuing. Jerry, who just graduated from primary school, clutched a book of fairy tales the entire time we were there. When I asked he enthusiastically said he needed new, more advanced book. This was a defining moment for me. It was both something I highly value (intellectual growth and reading) and something I only then fully realized was rarely as valued in these communities. For Jerry, education could mean upward mobility and success. But will cultural knowledge (linguistic, botanical, etc.) be associated and maintained with this growth? A touchy subject that I’m ill equipped to understand fully. The constant becoming of our values requires much attention and labor.

Incidentally, I took the opportunity to test with these children the results of a dissertation conducted in a neighboring village. With mixed skepticism, confusion, and amazement (it was very poorly written), I read this dissertation and its remarkable conclusion that by age 9 children in San Miguel know, on average, 80% of the names of plants in their garden and 50% of the names of plants in the surrounding area. I can say that the Ack kids (ages 6-12) seemed to know more plant names than other children I casually talked to, but still knew less than half of the plant species in their yard. This may be a problem of how we each define a garden, but it doesn’t seem to be. It seems to me that Zarger half-assed her research and came up with erroneous results. It is no wonder I haven’t been able to find any publications by her in the literature- her methods are flawed.

The second Maya village we visited, San Antonio, is the largest Mopan Maya community in the Toledo district (about 2,000) and very homogenous, which we later found out is culturally enforced. This community was generous and nice but conspicuously troubled. All the young men I saw seemed unhappy, tattooed, and wary of us. When we first showed up, the community was celebrating the day of its patron saint and we joined in, drinking a wonderful cacao-based drink, eating food, and listening to live marimba music. I was feeling welcomed and innocently approached some young men with the intention of chatting. I soon told them we were here studying the plants people grow in their yards, which they reflexively took to mean I was a threat to their (obvious) involvement in the drug trade. They concocted a bogus story about being traveling marimba musicians and then stopped talking to me and refused eye contact. Later, they joined a group of other half drunken young men and in a very obvious and drunken way eavesdropped on our conversations with more reasonable adults. This threat may have been neglible but it was rendered so anyway by our association with the alcalde. I realized now how smart it was to get the alcalde´s approval first and how the functioning of the community was best achieved by an alcalde that is connected to the drug trade and, in this case, is deferred to by these young men.

In all of Belize, there seems to be a high tolerance for filth. This was especially so in San Antonio. I would go so far as to characterize it as laziness and irresponsibility. Litter in a developing country and in a culture fairly new to non-biodegradable packaging is fairly understandable. But stagnant rivulets of pig and human wastes and piles of rusty metal are another matter. Not all yards displayed such love of amoebas, dysentery, and tetanus, suggesting that it wasn’t inevitable in these situations. I guess I can understand, but not accept these conditions. I did, however, have to accept all but the worst conditions in the process of the research. I predict I am gestating amoebas as we speak.

If the dark underbelly in San Antonio could be characterized as new and festering (if livable) in San Antonio, the social problems in Hopkins (the Garifuna community we sampled) were chronic and ingrained in the culture. This village is in a very different part of Belize - an ecologically more simple and saline coastal area. The Garifuna are a mix of African slaves and Carib Indians, which have not survived independently as far as I know. Their culture is very syncretic and interesting. It, at least superficially, shares similar magico-religious traditions with voodoo-probably a result of similar African origins and is very closely linked to the sea. For me, the most powerful and obvious expression of their culture was through drumming and fishing. One morning I awoke at 6 to read and ended up watching some young men in a dugout canoe pull in a net for a half an hour. They jumped in and out of the small canoe, even from neck deep water, with remarkable aplomb and love of getting wet. That they didn’t catch anything is, I understand, unusual. Later that day, Sarah and I charted a boat to go snorkeling and ran into a fleet of these canoes 40 miles off shore (they were based out of a large fishing boat). Their owners would pop up every now and again near the scattered canoes as they dove for lobster, which they used a hook to bring up to the surface.

Here, I must say, is a tragedy of over fishing in the making. Creole and Garifuna fisherman alike are harvesting undersized lobster habitually, depriving the species of any chance of reproducing enough to sustain fishable populations long, much less maximize the potential of the reefs in the long term. Lobster season started June 15th and I have enjoyed many of these fine creatures (less rich and succulent than the New England species I’m used but satisfying and wholesome none-the-less). But many of the ones I was served in fairly respectable establishments were undersized. In addition, I understand there is a good, and undiscerning, market for lobster in Guatemala which fishers illegally tap into on a regular basis.

That night, Sarah and I walked around the town in the meager light of the moon. There were a whole lot of people out on the streets, some drunk but most jovial and kind. This was in part normal but also in part caused by an all night wake in the neighborhood. Instead of joined the wake as we had been advised to (we would have been the only non-black non-Garifuna there and we didn’t know the deceased’s family), we sat at a nearby local bar. After a soda and a nice chat, a man pulled out a large sea turtle shell and began to drum on it. More drums surfaced and we witnessed a wonderfully unique jam session. The rhythm was loud, almost frenetic but controlled, and passionate. Singing in Garifuna accompanied it and young and old sang along. Later, I bought some Garifuna drumming music and it has the power to recall the contented and simple appreciation I had for that music that night.

The gardens in Hopkins were fairly simple and uninteresting. The most interesting feature was the use of bitter cassava (aka manioc in South America). Only sweet cassava, if at all, was used throughout the Maya villages we sampled. It was, to us, an unexpected (granted we knew little about this culture before we went) legacy of the Carib part of the Garifuna culture. The Carib´s former use of bitter cassava was the northern extent of the plant, which was domesticated in South America. I am unsure but doubt that the ancient Maya much used the bitter variety. I know the record is largely absent to answer this interesting question but some more research is in order. In addition, the Garifuna had some interesting African ornamental plants not much seen in the rest of Belize, including the pencil tree among others.

So we leave Belize content with our progress. I leave with a toehold from which to begin to try and understand Latin America and contemporary traditional cultures. I am convinced of the value of plants and their uses in assaying these cultures and their futures. However, more work needs to be done to standardize and deepened the rigor of the field of ethnobotany. It needs to be more than purely descriptive, possibly by making ecological tools and better writing more common. We aim for our publications to contribute in these areas. However, first the mountain of data must become intelligible- the task before us as we return home.

I don’t think we will find anything of much value in our data regarding forest creation – the original main interest of our work. These gardens are too globalized and modern to possibly reflect the composition of home gardens in the pre-collapse Maya area. However, these inventories are a good and necessary step in this discussion. More and more, it is becoming obvious that culture, especially the way the landscape and plants are used, is a social construction responding to changing environmental, economic, and political factors. That is, it is silly to say that the Classic Maya did this or that categorically. Their was a mosaic of environments in Classic era Maya Lowlands and a context for their subsistence that changed dramatically over time. What makes sense now doesn’t make sense then and vice-versa. I think I see this transition towards understanding the dynamism and materialism of culture occurring and having occurred over the last decade and presently but I’m not convinced Campbell has dealt with its critiques fully. Gratuitous neologism is one of the most glaring, and superficial, indications of this transition-subsistence strategy matrix, for instance.

So I’m not sure where I would go next with the forest composition question but it would likely not focus as much on contemporary home gardens. Still I look forward to seeing what the data have to say, which will require increasing my statistics capabilities and may not get finished this summer, unfortunately.

Belize update

2005-06-25T19:44:00.000-05:00

I think you ought to know that I did an amazing thing three days ago: I swam with a 30 foot long fish. It was a Whale Shark, the largest species of fish in the world. It was congregating as part of a biological orgy cued by the moon that occurs every full moon in March-June in certain spots along the barrier reef aff Belize. This orgy is a matter of mutton and ? snapper sex: millions of them congregate to release their eggs and sperm in places that offer good dispersal (major gaps in the barrier reef). The only successful strategy for these species is to release so many eggs in one place as to overwhelm any possible congregation of predators, such as filter feeding Whale Sharks, dolphins, and small feeder fishes (whales are not common around here for some reason).

Finding these orgies is a crapshoot made only slightly less chancy by knowing the tides and currents (great Creole captains took care of this), going on the full moon (check), and following terns and gulls. We found two of these orgies all day- and we were considered very lucky. At one I got about 2 or 3 minutes of swimming above thousands of snapper and one large whale shark roughly 25 feet away. The sharks here are being chased a bit too much and this one immediately started to descend to distant depths in the species' characteristic slow nonchalant way. It seems they have no natural predators.

At the other orgy I swam with a bottle nose dolphin which was enjoying the buffet. It was a male and he actually approached me to within 20 feet.

That day I also swam with two other species of harmless sharks at a nearby reef- a nurse shark and a reef shark. I must go to dinner but I will finish this later. I'm off to Hopkins tomorrow for three or four days or relaxation and snorkeling.

Belize Photos

2005-06-10T19:20:00.000-05:00

New photos here.

Santo Dogmingo

2005-05-29T22:00:00.000-05:00

Check out pictures of joey and katie's pup. I have been spending time with them in Carrboro, NC--eating, walking, and talking mostly.

Hope for Alaska

2005-05-13T12:58:00.000-05:00

Looks like Alaskans are realizing that Fran would have been a better choice for governor. Frank's approval rate is the 2nd lowest in the union with 27%. 66% of Alaskans say they disapprove of how he is running the state. 2006 will be interesting.

Belize photos

2005-05-04T17:08:00.000-05:00

Check out most of my Belize photos at http://www.flickr.com/photos/73275024@N00/. Or click on the photostream on the right side of this website.

Also, check out the visiting professor that came with us's photos. He has some great shots of flowers and insects especially.

Bats

2005-05-01T22:53:00.000-05:00

Vampire bats running at Jeff's blog. I'd add to his comments that bats wings are another great example of convergent evolution. Bat's wings are mostly highly developed and specialized webbed hands which evolved independently of bird wings. Hence, the name of the bat order Chiroptera (Hand wing).

Vampire bats are in the suborder Microchiroptera which means, among other things, that they use echolocation (megabats do not). There are only three species of sanguivorous (vampire) bats, each in different genuses in the leaf-nosed bat family (Phyllostomidae). All three species of vampire bats are limited to the new world south of Mexico. In Belize, there is the
Greater False Vampire Bat (Vampyrum spectrum) which I hope to see sometime. It is unclear if Riskin, the author of the study that has us buzzing, has tested this species for the ability to run.

Lastly, let us remember that the bible specifically says that bats are unclean animals which we should not eat since they cheweth not the cud nor divideth the hoof (Leviticus 11:19).

The Ivory Billed Woodpecker is NOT extinct

2005-04-28T16:55:00.000-05:00

What a rare treat, these tears of joy for old-school conservation. What other species (and government I dare say) but ours would silently pump $10 million+ into buying up the land around where another endangered (and thought to be extinct) species was seen and make sure it was well protected before announcing (a year later) that the spieces wasn't extinct. I remember reading into this last year and finding less than conclusive accounts, which now seem like they must have been strategic, and touching.

See for details:

http://today.reuters.co.uk/News/NewsArticle.aspx?type=scienceNews&storyID=2005-04-28T203324Z_01_N28115095_RTRIDST_0_SCIENCE-ENVIRONMENT-WOODPECKER-DC.XML

It is important to point out that there are major reasons to get away from thinking on the species-level and move toward ecosystem-level thinking (as is hinted at in the end of the above article). But for now let us bask in some good old biophilia.

Classes Fall 2005

2005-04-28T16:38:00.000-05:00

I will be studying the following exciting subjects (and making you listen to me talk about them):

Anthropology 395: Advanced Special Topic: Past Human Landscapes

Biology 305: Evolution of Iowa Flora (Labs will be held at the fancy new facility on our college-owned prairie CERA)

Biology 345: Advanced Genetics

Philosophy 242: Ethical Theory

And this summer I will be taking:

Biology 399: Summer Research: Maya Ethnoecology

Grinnell College Environmental Mission Statement

2005-04-28T16:33:00.000-05:00

Folks,

I'm on a committee that is developing overarching environmental guidelines for Grinnell and we wrote up a draft. If you have any comments please leave them for me. We meet with the President next week to finalize the statement. See below:

---------------------

Grinnell College “aims to graduate women and men. . . who are prepared in life and work to use their knowledge and their abilities to serve the common good” (Grinnell College Mission Statement). It follows that the College values the common good of environmental sustainability: the long-term maintenance of the environmental resources and services that support human and all other life on earth. Thereby, Grinnell College is committed to promoting environmental sustainability in all its actions.

The College, in pursuing this over-aching goal, will pursue strategies to:
Reduce resource consumption.
Increase resource re-use and recycling.
Reduce waste output.
Maintain a healthy campus environment for the Grinnell College community.
Acknowledge Grinnell College’s interdependence with the Iowa landscape.
Foster native Iowa biodiversity.

Successful implementation of environmental initiatives will complement other college priorities, such as reducing financial costs and creating campus landscape and architecture that promote personal health, safety, and productivity. The above environmental goals and their associated benefits will be achieved most effectively if they are seamlessly integrated with campus operations.

To achieve its environmental goals, the College will:
Challenge all members of the campus community to improve their environmental practices.
Incorporate analysis of environmental costs and benefits into budget planning, purchasing,
campus planning, construction projects, and daily operations.
Provide the educational and human resources necessary to assess, research, implement, and improve environmental strategies.
Provide opportunities and resources for research and free inquiry of environmental issues.

Guano

2005-04-19T13:34:00.000-05:00

I hope to resolve the meaning of the word guano. It seems that the word came into use in the mid 19th century when it became an export commodity (mostly from islands off Peru and Chile) for use on European and, later, American farms. So the term mostly means easily collectible nutrient rich droppings. Most dictionaries simply call guano the feces of sea birds. Wikipedia, the most useful site in my search, calls it " the name given to the collected droppings of seabirds and bats." The word has its origin in the Kitchua (aka Quechua, an important Peruvian upland native group with a relatively global visibility. My spelling is the more politically savvy according to Lara Janson, a friend who is going to the area on a Fulbright next year) word "wanu" which, I gather, refers to its ability to enrich argiculture. The most important animal for the Peruvian industry of guano exportation has been the Guanay cormorant and the Peruvian Pelican.

Incidentally, lest we think that this industry was of little importance, let us remember that when the English began to import significant amounts of guano in 1847, their nightsoil industry collapsed. The nightsoil industry collected human wastes from cesspools outside houses in London and other major cities to distrubute to agricultural areas. While the transition to connecting house waste streams to city sewers was well underway, many houses still used cesspools near their homes and paid nightsoil men to take it away periodically. In 1856, the problem of human wastes accumulating in the Thames and London's groundwater became so serious and undenyable that a massive undertaking was begun to build the world's first major system of sanitary sewers seperate from storm water sewers. The seperation of London's water supply from its waste disposal was undertaken by Sir Joseph Balzalgette and saved many lives by reducing cholera epidemics and other fecally transmitted diseases.

The game of the Season

2005-04-12T23:33:00.000-05:00

I urge you to try Bottle. It is a simple game that requires only a Powerade or Gatorade or similar bottle. You get three or four plus people together and stand in a circle on the grass. The object of the game is to catch the bottle with one hand (and no trapping against any part of your body) after in bounces off the ground and before it hits the ground a second time. So the game starts with a player throwing the bottle against the ground and everyone trying to snatch the bottle out of the air at the same time. It ends up being pretty fun because you never know what is going to happen and everyone dives around for the bottle as it goes bouncing through the air off people's attempts to snatch it. A good starting throw is important. Try holding it by the cap end and trying to make it hit the ground on its bottom and then bounce up pretty high. Keep score or not; we typically don't here. It's so much fun no one usually gives a shit. Good for most ages and athletic abilities.

Note from Belize

2005-04-12T23:18:00.000-05:00

Today I walked through Maya ruins- Cahal pech and Xunantunich. Archeologists have reconstructed them but they have recreated only what they know was there. It is pretty impressive. Actually, I hardly have the capacity for a proper taking in: today, I've decided to read a novel to relax from all the learning I have been doing the last week. I was on Glover's Atoll, one of four atolls (sunken islands with reefs all around the edge) in the caribbean. Specifically, I was Middle Caye, on one of the three cayes (small islands made of accreted corals) on the atoll. Middle caye is about 7 acres and is taken up by a research facility for anyone who wants to do research. The staff are all locals- creole, garrifina (essentially a unique caribbean african culture), and belizians. They speak english and creole mostly, the latter when they are in a rush or shooting the shit. I shat with them a few nights on the dock where they sit with a shotgun and gaurd their boats from theft by locals or Guatemalans who can boat there in a few hours. BUT, the mostly amazing thing has been what lies under water, through the plastic of a dive mask. Do you know what it is like??? I can't describe it. I wish only that a similarly easy (amazingly easy) portal into the below ground were possible. The water in the whole attol is from 1-100 feet deep and we spent most of our time in depths of about 1-20 feet. You drift on the water and look down at the most-creative-and-full-of-secrets-and-surprises aquarium you can imagine. Parrot fishes eating the corals make an audible crunch and there are so many of them it sounds like rain. Small nurse sharks sometimes can be seen around the reefs hanging out. Angelfishes, grunts, snappers, rockfish, gobies (cleaner fish who wait for large fish to come and bite off parasites even from inside the mouth), wrasses, basslets, squirrel fish, etc. I learned to recognize at least 3 species in each of these groups plus more groups I can't remember. Then there are the corals- hard ones with calcium carbonate between the polyps (clonal indivuals), soft ones with protien structures seperating the polyps, and sea fans. Sponges, amazingly different kinds of algae, land crabs, hermit crabs the size of your fist that can climb trees, parrots, ospreys, grackles, other birds. I haven't coutned but I bet I've learned a hundred or more species in a week.

Now I'm the mainland, enjoying the forests. I think so far I have only seen what we would call second growth and what I thought was great in Alaska until I saw a real old growth forest and realized what was really great. I hope to see a similarly huge and great forest but I'm not sure I will. The trees and amazingly diverse (there are most species of trees in 10 square hectares in the tropics than in all of north america) and they are covered in epiphytes (plants that live on the trees). Iguanas, lizards, kinkajus . . . .

A Working Description of my Thesis

2005-01-30T23:32:00.000-06:00

Riparian Decomposition

Carbon dynamics in forest soil alongside major uncontrolled river systems in southwestern New Mexico.

J. Stan Rowe's Ecocentric Worldview Principles

2004-12-31T16:53:00.000-06:00

J. Stan Rowe died this year and he left many significant contributions to ecology and environmental ethics. His Earth Manifesto includes the following principles which provide a good a simple guide to the big picture as I've come across:

CORE PRINCIPLES
Principle 01 The Ecosphere is the Center of Value for Humanity
Principle 02 The Creativity and Productivity of Earth’s Ecosystems Depend on their Integrity Principle 03 The Earth-centered Worldview is supported by Natural History
Principle 04 Ecocentric Ethics are Grounded in Awareness of our Place in Nature
Principle 05 An Ecocentric Worldview Values Diversity of Ecosystems and Cultures
Principle 06 Ecocentric Ethics Support Social Justice
ACTION PRINCIPLES
Principle 07 Defend and Preserve Earth’s Creative Potential
Principle 08 Reduce Human Population Size
Principle 09 Reduce Human Consumption of Earth Parts
Principle 10 Promote Ecocentric Governance
Principle 11 Spread the Message

Seawead Newsletter Article

2004-12-16T11:08:00.000-06:00

Volunteer Spotlight: Dan Lesh

The summer of 2002 I was a student intern with SEAWEAD in Icy Straits. As I soon learned, SEAWEAD is about biting off and chewing a lot. Some excerpts from my journal give examples of the effect this research had on me.

While doing reconnaissance for potential bear study sites:
"The outer coast landscape is much like the inside passage but the whole place has a very ancient and spiritual look to it as well with a feeling of great power hanging in the air. The balance of sea and land, potential and kinetic energy has never seemed so well fit anywhere else I've been. Kayaking in this land was a turning point in my life. A sudden trust in myself gripped me where it had somehow been held back before. "
While doing a Landmark Tree Stand in Black Bay Gorge River area:
"This precious old growth habitat was truly a different world for me even though I' thought I'd spent a good deal of time in the pristine forests of southeast. A two hour hike up to this ridge and down put us in one of the wildest and most amazing rivers i can imgaine. There was great old growth growing right up to the river and the river itself went from being a hundred feet wide and very shallow to twenty feet across with beautiful twenty foot deep pools. There was so much smooth gravel every where in the river it looked like a painting. Bob and I ended up spending all day trying to find the best stand in an unconcious and impossible effort to do this place justice."
Reflecting on the Brown Bear study in Mud Bay:
"The scat survey was the highlight though and taught me a lot about how to determine the contens of bear scat and what a bear bed looks like. The mind and activities of the bears began to be less mysterious to me."

One doesn't easily forget such experiences and though I left again after that summer for college in Iowa, I found myself back in the area for the next spring and summer. The bear study had grown into Cheryl's master's project and I was fortunate enough to be her paid research assistant and spend another summer observing brown bears, living remotely, and trying to figure out the meaning of our work, lives, and SEAWEAD. My own personal development has been so intertwined with my experiences with SEAWEAD that I'm not sure what to think. It seems that SEAWEAD is striving to provide a sane voice of experience and natural knowledge- a voice from the wilderness spoken through grant applications, web publications, and symposiums. Bob Christenson has done much to place SEAWEAD and its mission solidly in Southeast Alaska and hold it responsible to the land and to time, the ultimate judges of a society. The research undertaken provides us with an education to begin a markedly absent public discussion about the future of these places and these animals. The internship program is equally a experience apart from all others. It is a chance to work among the greatness of Southeast Alaska and begin to realize that what leads us to understand our surroundings leads us to understand ourselves.

Christmas

2004-12-16T10:58:00.000-06:00

I am going to Belize in March 2004 to study ecology! I am going to buy a pair of nice binoculars for the trip. If you want to help with this project, put a UMB envelope on the tree for me!

CD's I have recently been enjoying

2004-12-16T10:54:00.000-06:00

Classic Maritime Music: Simsonian Folkways Recodings

Back Roads to Cold Mountain: Simsonian Folkways Recordings

Jimmy Martin

Jimmie Rodgers

Letter to the Editor August 2004

2004-12-16T10:26:00.000-06:00

The natural economy
Letter to the editor

Some, such as the author of a recent My Turn ("Alaska needs to revitalize dormant timber industry," by George Woodbury), argue that timber sales will bring much needed investment to Southeast Alaska's economy and benefit our communities. Others have a different notion of the industries essential to our future.

What is missing in the never-ending and high-impact debate, though, is that the future of the human race depends on nature's economy, not ours. We can discuss technologies, jobs, subsidies and pollution abatement advances till we are blue in the face. But does Mother Nature care?

Our species has a 10,000-year history of making a living by mining the cheapest and easiest energy-rich carbon sources we can find. We started with the soil (agriculture) and we are losing that at high rates. In 1859, we hit the jackpot when the first oil well was drilled by Col. Drake, and we have already consumed close to half of the world's oil.

From our spending sprees of ecological capital, we have learned that we don't need to worry about environmental sustainability, that gross national product is the best measure of a society, and that technology will fix all of our problems.

But will the lessons our society learned while drunk on soil, coal, oil carry us into the future?

In order to learn how nature works and create systems of food and shelter production that don't deplete our sources of life, we need intact ecosystems. In Southeast Alaska, we need the 300-year-old forests, clean rivers, and abundant salmon runs. These represent our only enduring models of how to live in this place.

As we continue to discuss logging and the future of the Tongass and our region, I hope we realize that potential importance of maintaining the Tongass' ecological integrity transcends benefits to today's communities and our tourism and fishing industries. Someday the cheap carbon sources will become prohibitively expensive and our societies politics and economics will be forced against the same limits as other species.

Future generations need a whole and prosperous Tongass more than we need short-sighted jobs and "economic growth" today.

Dan Lesh

Gustavus

Some good quotes

2004-12-16T10:24:00.000-06:00

But Eliot has shown us what the world is very apt to forget, that the statement of a terrible truth has a kind of healing power. In his stern vision of the hell that lies about us..., there is a quality of grave consolation. In his statement of the worst, Eliot has always implied the whole extent of the reality of which that worst is only one part. -Kathleen Raine

Great problems call for many small solutions. -Wendell Berry

If science cannot lead us to wisdom as well as power, it is surely no science at all. -Aldo Leopold

Once you learn to read the land, I have no fear of what you will do to it, or with it. And I know many pleasant things it will do to you. -Aldo Leopold

Laugh. Laughter is immeasurable. Be joyous though you have considered all the facts. - Wendell Berry

"The human mind, so frail, so perishable, so full of inexhaustible dreams and hungers, burns by the power of a leaf." - Loren Eiseley

Whom is domesticating whom? -Michael Pollan

In wildness lies the preservation of the earth - Henry David Thoureau

In Human culture lies the preservation of wildness. -Wendell Berry

Imagination is more important than knowledge. - Albert Einstein

Stay alive, all your life. -Wendell Berry

S&B Wind energy letter to the editor

2004-12-16T10:22:00.000-06:00

Renewable energy, renewable destruction?

We ought to put up a wind turbine on or near campus to supply more of our power through renewable energy sources: this was the general consensus after a conference on the subject was convened in Grinnell a few weeks ago. I agree but with reservation. My idealistic side says that the environmental crisis is a crisis of the human soul and wind energy is, at best, prozac. My practical side doesn't think much, let alone about wind energy. It goes about living mostly by habit and always within the bounds of my chosen lifestyle. Which brings me to my point: real environmental change requires lifestyle changes, changes which can be joyous and healthful. This is different from the numerical environmentalism of efficiency and sustainability. Humans don't have an organ for truth, said a wise dead german, much less one for quantifying what makes life worth living. Environmentalism can do much to threaten those that want simple economic notions of "good" by externalizing immeasurable impacts on our souls; indeed, it is the most powerful social critique available. Social change is needed in which we collectively awaken from the extractive cult of comfort and mobility and engage in the miraculous reality of human life on Earth. Our future may rely on wind but that fact barely scratches the surface of the matter.