I like this topic as a contrast to yesterday's inquiry into the philosophy and psychology of overseas travel, that is, moving about the face of the Earth on a grand scale. The alternative isn't to remain stoically immobile, pent up at home, but to move within a smaller scale in your locality. You have not yet seen what is there. You have not seen it every day of the year, every time of the day. Enlarge your powers to go small. There is infinite smallness.
You could read "Walden" — "I have travelled a good deal in Concord..." — but maybe you'd like some snappy how-to tips from the NYT:
Every environment has a variety of living creatures, said Sgt. Rob Mastrianni, a park ranger in Manhattan, who recommended taking a walk with the express goal of spotting wildlife. He suggested turning over logs to see bugs and salamanders...
Oh, no! We're going beyond looking for wild animals. We're harassing them.
From the comments at the NYT:
Karl Washington, DC
"He suggested turning over logs to see bugs and salamanders"
The bugs and salamanders would rather you didn't. That's their home.
Kitty
I was amused by the NYC focus. I'd never thought of park rangers in Manhattan. And there's also "Pattie Gonia, a drag queen and environmentalist who leads hikes as part of her mission to get marginalized people outdoors."@Karl Agreed. It's like taking the roof off of their house. Leave them be. There's still so much to notice without changing things with our presence.
[She] pointed out that squirrels were surefire entertainment. “They’re always in a war with each other,” she said. “It’s endless melodrama, like a tree version of the Kardashians.”
A drag queen to clue you into the presence of squirrels. To be told if you go out for a walk in the park in Manhattan, you can see squirrels is like being told you can bird-watch — just look at the pigeons. What TV shows do the pigeons remind you of?
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Oh, no! We're going beyond looking for wild animals. We're harassing them.
Take an aerosol can and a lighter.
Hours of fun!
This is easily accomplished by taking a 3-4 year old on a walk. You will see more within a couple blocks of your home than you have ever noticed before. Ants, birds, dandelions, pine cones, and more!
The streets and subways of NYC just teem with wildlife. Start there.
I love flipping for salamanders! There's so many cool ones out there. And if you know what you're doing you don't really disturb them. Most (not all - I'm looking at you, duskies) are pretty chill about being picked up. If you follow the rules they'll be just fine. Make sure your hands are wet and clean, but don't use soap or any other chemicals - most salamanders breathe through their skin so any chemicals on your hand (e.g. bug spray, sunscreen, soap) can get absorbed, and that's not good. Also, don't grab them by the tail - they can drop their tails as a defense mechanism. They grow back, but they're kinda wonky-looking.
If you find one (and if you know what you're doing, you'll find some pretty quickly - it's said that the redback salamander, P. cinereus, is the most populous vertebrate in North America, though most people have never seen one because they don't think to look) handle it gently, take your pictures or whatever. And then, before you put it back, put its rock or log or whatever back where it was and then set the salamander next to it. It'll have no trouble finding its way back in. Don't risk squishing it by putting the rock/log on it.
If you still don't want to disturb their habitat, you can be patient and they'll come to you. In many parts of the US there are salamander species that migrate to/from vernal pools in the spring. A vernal pool is basically a small pond that is not permanent (usually dries up in the summer) so that there aren't fish to prey on the larvae and eggs. On the first warm wet night of the spring (think 45 or 50 degrees, depending on where you are) they'll come out of hiding and come down to the vernal pool to court and breed. With any luck, you can stand in the right spot and see dozens or even hundreds stroll by. And these aren't the little common redbacks, these are the really cool-looking ones - spotted salamanders, tiger salamanders, jeffersons, even the bizarre unisexuals. It's a sight to behold. Not to mention you might go deaf from all the frog calls.
Herping (looking for amphibians and reptiles) is a hobby my son and I (and my game wife) picked up at the beginning of the Covid lockdown, and I can't recommend it enough. We travel a decent amount for it too, but if you're anti-travel, you should know you're not exactly traveling to the crowded tourist spots. I think the nearest hotel to Snake Road in Illinois is like 45 minutes away.
Enlarge your powers to go small. There is infinite smallness.
Good rule for unborn children, I think.
" ...a park ranger in Manhatten recommended taking a walk with the express goal of spotting wildlife. He suggested turning over logs to see bugs and salamanders..."
Today finding bugs and insects is a wildlife adventure. By the time Biden leaves office it will be called "grocery shopping."
Rather, it's a good insight into unborn children.
As a worldly, human rule, conception sucks.
We don't know when it happens -- we know how it happens, but not when.
To enforce conception, you'd have to be over-protective and outlaw many forms of birth control as well.
It's wrong to say that the termination of a microscopic organism is of the same moral gravity as the stabbing of a baby, for instance.
That's a spiritual or religious idea, as opposed to a worldly rule.
I beg pro-lifers to keep it real.
I can’t read anything from nyt cuz paywall, but I do consider myself somewhat expert in the micro adventure of walking within your immediate area. It’s hot here in Texas, so my job this week is to wear out my 18 month old grandson in the mornings, before we hit 105. So we walk. To the playground, around the block, or in the backyard. I enter his world. Yesterday he didn’t want to even go down the slide. At the playground, all we did was pick up little piles of wood chips and pick out the prettiest ones. Then we watched a beetle as it made its way across the walk. Then we watched the giant red industrial lawnmower mow the park. Back and forth, back and forth. We stopped for squirrels. Threw pebbles over the footbridge into the canal. His world is a revelation.
"And if you know what you're doing you don't really disturb them. Most (not all - I'm looking at you, duskies) are pretty chill about being picked up..."
Remember, it was Wittgenstein who famously said that "if a salamander could speak, we could not understand him."
Caroline, Yes! When my granddaughter was that age I had to empty her hands and pockets of pretty gravel when we got back home. We also picked up a lot of sticks.
I don’t see anything wrong with going on walks through the local woods to enjoy he wildlife and flying to Egypt to see the pyramids or to London to tour the British Museum or to Florence to view the art in the Uffizi.
With pigeons it's probably pretty much social media all the time. The cooing sounds pretty. What about the rats in NYC? Lots for the grandkids to learn? Raccoons? Are there any coyotes on the island yet?
Surely there's a tendency for environmentalists/conservationists to shift from wanting to avoid "imperialism" to practising a new, supposedly more enlightened kind. The ecosystem we want rather than the one we find.
"look up and let your nose guide you"
A micro-aggression against Althouse's anosmia. Or against Cyrano.
I remember a "Turtle Crossing" sign in Middleton that was later changed to "Salamander Crossing." Seems like a long, rough walk for a salamander across two lanes of asphalt.
A great tool for identifying birds on a walk is Cornell University - Ornithology Lab’s Merlin Bird ID app for smartphones, which is a free app. It can identify a bird by taking a photo of it with your phone or by using your phone’s microphone to identify birds by their sounds in real time. I highly recommend it.
There is infinite smallness.
Max Planck to the ultraviolet courtesy phone...
"Ain’t talkin’, just walkin’
Through a world mysterious and vague"
Have you extracted the maximum opportunity from your surroundings? If so, increase the scope of your geography. If not, find your best place and use the opportunity it offers. I am lucky enough to live in a beautiful and (usually) temperate place. I live in a lovely, leafy, walkable neighborhood. By now, I know all the street cats, walked dogs, gardening buffs, walkers, runners, and park sitters in my scope. The same goes for most of the places I can go to eat a meal better than what I would cook at home, but there's always some new place to try. I can walk to one of America's great bookmines. I can go out and see friends make all kinds of different music every single night locally. I can sleep in my own comfortable bed, which fits my old bones. I can sit on my porch and watch the sunset over the river.
What is the opportunity cost of taking this life and disrupting it with another place? Travel is hard work. I've done a lot of it. Enough, for now. This could change, but I'm sanguine inside my scope. It may not work for you, but it works for me.
What!? Just walking around looking at bugs, birds, flowers, parks, houses, etc.? Just enjoying yourself? Why, that's tourism (shudder). Instead, strive to be a traveler: wander to your neighbor a block away, knock on the door and invite yourself in to have lunch with them. Put on your backpack and follow all the kiddies to school. Join the PRIDE demonstration over at the park. Give blood to the vagrant shooting up in the alley. Now THAT'S authentic (local) travel!
Ever since the Commie Crud narrowed our lives down to be "allowed" to maybe go outside, but not to travel, I've taken to sitting on our front porch with a book and some nuts to feed the wildlife. It's one of the unexpected true gifts of the lockdowns.
I watch the setting sun's light take the enormous ash tree in the yard. I've made some good friends with the squirrels; not so much with the chipmunks. The chipmunks worry but they do lurk. There's one sparrow who has figured out that it's safe to come near and that peanuts will be tossed her way.
And yes, the squirrels are always fighting---the comparison to the Kardashians is hilarious.
Dunno about NYC, but here in Alabamastan flipping over logs could reveal a snake. They don't especially scare me if I'm alert (inadvertently stepping on a copperhead can be bad). But my wife would plotz.
Menno Schilthuizen's book "Darwin Comes to Town: How the Urban Jungle Drives Evolution" is fascinating.
In the early days of my marriage, my wife often said it wasn't really a vacation until and unless we were driving alone on a gravel road, in the rain, close to sunset, with no idea where we were spending the night. Those were adventures!
Microadventures these days include just about everything we manage to do.
look up and let your nose guide you
I see smoke. I smell smoke.
Ever since I downloaded that Merlin app, I never get any peace on my walks. Instead of generic birdsong, I hear red eyed vireo, Baltimore oriole, raven, crow, yellow warbler, warbling vireo, etc, etc, etc… And now that I know them all, I can’t turn it off. I did hear a yellow billed cuckoo the other day, and that was cool. But I was just as happy not knowing a herring gull from a ring billed gull by sound, I have to admit.
My dog and I go for a walk in the evenings. I look at trees, and she looks for squirrels and poop.
But I was just as happy not knowing a herring gull from a ring billed gull by sound, I have to admit.
This is why I don't take the mobile out on my walks any longer.
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