Red Knots Deserve Better

Migrating birds are a true marvel, especially Red Knots which I remember seeing as a child visiting Delaware Bay. I also remember seeing lots of horseshoe crabs, and now the horseshoe crabs – like Red Knots – are much rarer and under attack from a lot of human-created problems. The two species are closely linked, like so much of the ecosystem.

Red Knot. Image used under license from Shutterstock.com.

A recent New York Times article (“Migration Numbers Plunge for the Red Knot, a Threatened Shore Bird” by John Hurdle, 6/11/2020) backed up what Audubon has been saying for a while: “If they can’t find the food, then either they may cut off their migration and they won’t be able to make it up to the breeding grounds, or they make it up there in very poor condition and have a bad breeding season,” said Ken Rosenberg, an applied conservation scientist at the Cornell Lab of Ornithology in Ithaca, N.Y. “These are steeply declining birds like all the shore birds are, and if they have a year like that or a couple of years, it could be disastrous for the species.” (NYT, 6/11/2020)

The Red Knot is migratory (9000 miles, south to north in the spring), and it takes an enormous amount of energy and stamina for a bird to migrate. When the Red Knots land at places like Delaware Bay, they rely on energy-rich horseshoe crab eggs as sustenance to keep them alive and to give them energy to continue migrating (after a rest period).

Horseshoe crab. Image used under license from Shutterstock.com.

But horseshoe crabs are under attack too, and they’ve had big population declines over the past decades. Horseshoe crabs (living fossils!) have been on this planet for 450 million years old (and they can live over 20 years): they used to carpet the Delaware Bay beaches and those eggs fed shorebirds who were migrating and desperately needed the eggs for weight gain and strength. The crabs have been in steady and alarming decline and the various industries who publish statistics are probably killing more than their published percentages, according to conservationists.

Three main things hurt the horseshoe crab:

1). They’re being over-fished (they’re used as bait for eel or whelk/conch and they’re by-catch from other fisheries).

2). They’re being over-used in the biomedical industry (bleeding them to get the Limulus amebocyte lysate, LAL, which detects harmful bacterial endotoxins). Bleeding them interferes with their ability to lay eggs (affecting future generations) and stresses them, affecting their health. A bled crab won’t breed. If it’s not breeding, it won’t lay eggs and the Red Knots will have nothing to eat. Horseshoe crab egg density has decreased significantly and remains low. There’s a movement to use synthetic LAL instead of bleeding horseshoe crabs.

3). Shoreline over/development and habitat loss (humans not giving them enough space).

Shorebirds (including Red Knots, sandpipers, Dunlins, Ruddy Turnstones, and others) just don’t have enough horseshoe crab eggs to eat, and those eggs help them gain weight to migrate. The impact has been catastrophic. Shore birds that come to Delaware Bay are in rapid decline.

What we can do:
– Don’t use horseshoe crabs as bait: use other species which are more plentiful.
– We can use synthetic LAL instead of bleeding horseshoe crabs.
– Return a favor: if the horseshoe crab is overturned, turn it right side up (don’t grab it by the tail: gently grasp it by the sides of its carapace). Give the crabs space.
– Keep your pets leashed on the beach. Give the birds space.
– Report tagged horseshoe crabs. (fws.gov.crabtag)

Migration is physically and mentally demanding for birds, and even under good/best conditions (enough food, limited human interference, etc.), many migrating birds die before reaching their destination. The ones who are struggling (like the Red Knot) deserve our attention, respect, and protection. Get involved via Audubon and protest the rollbacks of the Endangered Species Act and the Migratory Bird Treaty Act.

 

Why Birds Matter (Again)

There’s not a lot of birding to be done during a pandemic on World Migratory Bird Day (today), with many parks closed and travel frowned upon, so I decided to reread Jonathan Franzen’s great essay in National Geographic, “Why Birds Matter” Here’s the extremely short version of what he wrote:

1). “If you take care of birds, you take care of most of the big problems of the world.” Those problems, Franzen explains, include pollution, habitat loss, pesticides, overconsumption, etc.

2). Birds are more similar to us than other mammals are. They build homes and raise families. They travel/migrate/vacation to warm places. Some are shrewd thinkers (crows, parrots). Yet our (human) unique abilities have unique human responsibilities: to protect the world, nature, and the creatures who live in it.

3). “Bird populations indicate the health of our ethical values … wild birds are our last, best connection to a natural world that is otherwise receding. They’re the most vivid and widespread representatives of the Earth as it was before people arrived on it.” – Jonathan Franzen.

 

Trying to help while stuck at home

One of my projects for the Covid-19 self-isolation has been reading about bird migration and bird conservation, mostly on sites like Audubon and the Cornell Lab of Ornithology. World Migratory Day is May 9, 2020, and although I’d like to travel to a bird migration viewing site, there’s still a lot of restrictions in place.

The dark side of bird migration is the number of impediments they face from humans: habitat loss, pollution, buildings (a surprising number die by flying into tall buildings and skyscrapers). Habitat loss is the one that bothers me the most as it is a national and international problem.

Cornell has a great list of 7 things you do to help birds. Make your windows safer. Keep your cats indoors. Plant native plants, trees, and flowers. Avoid pesticides. Drink bird-friendly coffee. Avoid single-use plastics. Try to make your immediate environment better for birds. It’s the stuff we know but don’t always follow.

A friend of mine gardens and noticed that the birds were flying into one side of an enclosure and suffering, so we put up ribbons.

Protect birds from fences they don’t see.

I hope this helps. She faithfully monitors stuff like this, and I consider any birds saved to be a victory.

 

 

Comfort Reading (and watching)

I’m trying to “get stuff done” during the Covid-19 quarantine, but nothing beats bird-watching. Unfortunately, I have to settle for it online, but I’m not complaining. My favorite hawks at the Cornell Lab of Ornithology are sitting on their eggs now:

Cornell Lab of Ornithology’s bird cams

But back to books. The two that have impressed me so much lately are both very different.

Lionel Shriver’s dystopian novel The Mandibles: A Family, 2029-2047, is amazing and it’s also great on audiobook. America is in financial collapse, and a clan (well, a group of relatives) band together for their physical and economic survival. It’s bleak, funny, and inventive. I saw bits of myself and my relatives in many of the characters, and in spite of their suffering, they make it. By the way, I am convinced Lionel Shrivel has prophetic vision. Just read it and see.

The Body: A Guide for Occupants by Bill Bryson is also amazing, mostly for his ability to make complex anatomical concepts digestible and fascinating, but also for his appreciation and insight into the body, especially when so many of us now (in quarantine) are hearing terrifying things associated with the body over and over. Listening to Bill Bryson read it on audio is oddly comforting.

And if that inspires you to start doing a review of your old anatomy textbook (you got time to kill, right?), I love this Crash Course: Anatomy series on YouTube, narrated by Hank Green: Crash Course: Anatomy and Physiology playlist

Hank, talk slowly!

Hank Green talks very, very fast, but the information is incredibly well presented and funny and thoughtful.

Stay well and read on.

You Must Read This

Imagine being a Harvard golden boy – smart, well read, funny – and suddenly having a freak accident in which you’re blinded in your right eye. Goodbye, golden boy status (sort of). That’s what happened to Howard Axelrod, a bright young Harvard student in his mid twenties. In his memoir, The Point of Vanishing: A Memoir of Two Years in Solitude, basically nothing happens, plot-wise, beyond his living in a very remote house in the Vermont woods.

This interrupted Axelrod’s successful white collar trajectory. His family was dubious about the whole idea, not surprisingly, but he needed time to re-adjust to his new disability, after all. After putting up handwritten signs in obscure places, Axelrod secures this hidden living arrangement; his time spent there is one of reflection and solitude. He rarely sees people, takes long walks, writes, and thinks. I’ve never read anyone write so beautifully or poetically about silence and its role in identity and selfhood. If I had to use one word to describe this book, it’d be “silence.” Silence both heals and provokes change, but it’s change that others cannot see, ironically.

This was my favorite book of 2015. It struck me repeatedly while reading this that Axelrod has a unique writing voice and doesn’t give himself enough credit for the guts and humility that he clearly has. I can’t wait to read more by him.

 

 

 

I’m normally not this dumb

The art museum’s alarm went off, and I happened to be behind the man who (I think) set it off. He was getting alarmingly close to a medieval painting in an art museum in Bologna, Italy. “You moron,” I thought. He lurked off, and a guard entered the room. I must have had my best “It wasn’t me” look on my face, but the female guard smiled at me and started chatting at me in fluent Italian. I was dressed up, in European art-going style.

I had zero idea what she was saying. She figured it out soon enough, and just smiled at me and said “Okay.” Problem over. That was the fourth time something like that had happened to me in less than a week. Most Americans do not go to Italy over Thanksgiving, so that was part of it. You can fool a lot of people with dress and overall appearance when you travel, too. Just keep your mouth shut, or you’ll ruin the illusion.

Feeling powerless comes with the territory of not speaking a language and being surrounded with people who do. Luckily, many Italians in major cities (or ones who work in the service industries), do speak fluent English. And they always took pity on me and my family. Every single time. People helped us when they didn’t have to: on buses, on trains, and in the labyrinthine streets. I was so grateful, and I realized how much it means to the person being aided, even if it’s a little thing.

On my home (work) turf, I routinely help people who speak no English, some English, or pretty good English (albeit heavily accented), and it’s given me new perspective on how they must feel virtually every single day.

My New Year’s resolution is to be super nice – as nice as I can be even if it’s the fifth time I’ve had to help them with the printer – to anyone and everyone who struggles with English. Te lo prometto (I promise).

Real Popularity is Kindness and Acceptance

I just stole a sentence from a book which I thought I would despise:  Maya Van Wagenen’s Popular, a Memoir: Vintage Wisdom for a Modern Geek. I loved this book, and I am a huge skeptic when it comes to books on teen popularity. My husband and I are parents of a pre-teen, and I regularly tell my son that I wouldn’t go back to middle school for all the money in the world. But I digress. I dislike “gimmicky” books, and when I first heard the general premise of this book, I wrongly assumed that it would be just that: gimmicky.

Wish I had had this as a teen.

Maya, a young teen living near the Mexican border in Brownsville, Texas, decided that she would apply the principles found in a 1950’s etiquette book (Betty Cornell’s Teenage Popularity Guide) to her modern day life in middle school. She would adopt the advice – both physical and psychological – in an effort to make more friends and come out of her shell.

In many ways, it’s just a really good slice-of-life book about being a young teen and facing all the things (body issues, friend estrangements) that young teens face, including heavy topics like a dying mentor. Her discussion of where she lived was equally interesting: being on the Tex-Mex border, they could see smoke from Mexico as it burns in the drug war (63). Her school was regularly on lockdown, and not for drills. She’s essentially a middle-class kid (her dad is a Ph.D. who works in academia) living in a predominantly blue collar world; her observations were insightful and poignant on this. Maya would regularly poke fun at herself: her looks, her clothes (she claims to do all her shopping at Walmart), and her dorkiness. She could not be more likeable, and her writing style was genuine and funny.

Like most things in life, her experiment worked and it didn’t. She thoroughly embarassed her best friend Kenzie by wearing 1950’s clothing (girdle, long skirt, the works) to school. She worked on her posture and wore minimal makeup. She did the tummy reducing exercises which Betty Cornell recommended. But mostly, she worked on initiating conversations with people who seemed intimidating or lonely or not in her “group.” As an adult, I tend to forget how hard it was for me to do that as a teen, but Maya worked on it and got better at it. Her final thesis – not original but completely true – is that real popularity is directly tied in to how kind you are to people, and how accepting you are of them. She admits it has everything to do with your ability to get along with all kinds of people. I wish I had known that as a teen; I know adults who are still working this out. Way to go, Maya. Your book is awesome.

Goodbye, sweet bird

The Mississippi Kite would not eat.

He was injured but reasonably calm, a probable car hit. He had been brought in to the Raptor Conservancy of Virginia in order to be rehabilitated. Not native to northern Virginia, Mississippi Kites are beautiful hawks with gray feathers and deep reddish brownish eyes. The vet – another volunteer who works for free – gave a “meh” prognosis. The MiKi (his species abbreviation) just wasn’t thriving in spite of excellent care.

He looked remarkably like this.

The MiKi was elegant and elegaic in his wail. He would cock his head to the side (a possible sign of neurological damage: once again, thanks to our car culture) in what seemed to be thoughtful contemplation. He needed to be force fed every day. He was gentle and easily caught. But not eating is a huge problem in the bird world.

Birds which can be rehabilitated and can prove that they are physically and mentally capable of surviving re-entry into the wild get approval to be released back into the wild. Birds which can be rehabbed but are unable to survive in the wild can be placed into an educational setting: a wildlife rehabilitator; a wildlife center; a zoo; a nature center; etc. But birds which have to be force fed every day are virtually impossible to place. Not eating is a deal breaker.

For almost a full year, this beautiful bird was lovingly hand fed (force fed) by two rehabilitators. They tried to place him, but to no avail. Not eating is a symptom of failure to thrive. Best case scenario for a bird in this situation? Euthanasia.

Most wildlife rehabilitators, including the one I work for, do their utmost to prevent this. They spend precious time and money trying to save every bird. But some cannot be saved, despite their best efforts and intentions.

I feel privileged to have known this bird. He was gentle and beautiful. He’s a species I rarely – if ever – get to see. But I’m honored to have known him, as much as a human can “know” a bird. I feel sad that I participate in a consumer culture which essentially seeks the end of nature.

Goodbye, sweet bird.

The Old Woman Who Awaits Me

Working with the general public teaches one patience whether one wants it or not. It’s taken me years to realize this, but a lot of people just want someone to talk to. It’s hard to see this behind their obnoxiousness, or their craziness, or their neediness, but it’s there if you look hard enough. They’re lonely. You’re the person with whom they talked today. Maybe the only one.

This is her one outing for the day.

For years I’ve had an elderly lady who seeks me out on a shift during which my library is very busy and very understaffed. She has radar for where I am, and she’ll wait for me (often showing irritation with other librarians who try to help her). Her reference questions – often involving people or places or things from her past – are often time-intensive, hard to complete at a public library, and frustrating in their obscurity. She knows this, too, and it doesn’t bother her. She doesn’t mind holding up the line. Those people can wait.

I used to grit my teeth when I saw her coming, but I learned a trick which has stood me in good stead with her: just be kind to her, make a good-faith attempt, and give her something, whether it’s a fact, or a book, or a piece of paper with a website address. If her give her your enthusiasm and a “take-away,” she’s reasonably content. Not surprisingly, it’s gotten easier to deal with her over the years, even though she is still a time vacuum. She hugs me (sometimes) and tells me about the surgeries she has had. I feel a fondness for her. She’s a good person with lots of interests, opinions, and wit. She lives alone in this area.

I am not necessarily getting better at research in this internet age, but dealing with the general public on a regular basis has taught me patience. I know very well that someday I could be that old woman, and I hope that others show me kindness.

 

Birds: Blood, Sweat, and Tears (Part 3)

Like most people who end up caring for wildlife (including birds), Michelle Rafffin never set out to become a wild bird/exotic bird/wildlife rehabilitator. She just grew to love birds.

Michele Raffin’s new book

I had the pleasure of listening to her on Diane Rehm’s podcast today about Raffin’s new book, called The Birds of Pandemonium: Life among the Exotic and Endangered. If you’re interested in wildlife conservation or bird conservation in any way, you should check this out.

The few rehabilitators I have read or listened to never intended to get into the “business” (which is not really a business but rather a labor of love) of wildlife rehabilitation, and Raffin is no exception. When she started caring for birds, she learned the hard way: through failure. She explains – on the podcast and in her book – how bird care (especially wild bird care) is complex and hard because there’s really not that much written about it. For example, she learned the hard way that the mating habits of certain exotic wild birds are controlled by humidity levels. That hadn’t occurred to her.

Right now Raffin is focusing on six exotic species which are at a high risk of extinction in their home countries. These birds now function as a reservoir of potential birds that could be returned to the wild in their home countries when the numbers start to run drastically low. It’s sad that the world has come to this; it would be even sadder if there weren’t some people, like Michele Raffin, trying to reverse it.