Good News for the Florida Panther

A rare photo of a Florida Panther and her cubs
taken by Biologist Darrel Land

I thought you might enjoy some good news today:

A rare photograph taken last month of a Florida panther and her two kittens is making the e-mail rounds among wildlife biologists and conservation partners who have toiled for decades to restore the big cat’s habitat.

...Picayune Strand, a 55,000-acre chunk of the Everglades, was drained and partially developed decades ago to build a subdivision. The development failed, and over the years the state and federal governments spent $150 million to purchase the land lot by lot. State and federal biologists consider the Picayune Strand an essential piece of remaining panther habitat, connecting other public lands that include the Florida Panther National Wildlife Refuge, Everglades National Park and Fakahatchee Strand Preserve State Park. Since the early 1990s, when the Florida panther was on the brink of extinction, the population in the wild is still less than 100.

Full Story here.

Work is now being done to restore water to the area.

Congratulations and best wishes for everyone who made this possible. You must be so proud.

Sia

Note: The young of large cats are called "cubs". The term "kittens" is used for smaller cats.

Links

Florida Panther information

Information on the Restoration Project and the Everglades Plan

Welcome to the Owl Box

Welcome to the Owl Box (live updates every 15 minutes)

Happy Spring,

Sia

Related Articles

Thousands Watch as Molly's Babies Hatch On Screen

T'was Ever Thus OR Hey, Baby!

Today I would like to share this enlightening note from Sex and the Dark-eyed Junco care of the National Wildlife Federation. (1)

A team of scientists ...have discovered that males with higher levels of testosterone—no matter what their age—are irresistible mates for older, more experienced females. They also produce more offspring.

But there’s a catch: The scientists also discovered that these these testosterone-pumped studs are not particularly good fathers, and their offspring are born smaller and die at higher rates. The hormonally charged birds are so eager to show off and chase after new partners that they don’t visit or bring food to their nests as often as their less popular rivals.

In an earlier study, Ketterson found that the über-juncos tend to die at a younger age. Not only does elevated testosterone make them less wary of predators, it also increases their stress levels...

There is only so much time and energy available in a given day, notes Ketterson, and evolution requires making some tough choices. “If you’re a male junco,” she asks, “do you maximize the time you spend chasing partners or do you maximize the time you spend parenting?”

To quote a gentleman of my acquaintance, "I could not possibly comment".

Tell Me You're Kidding

Humans seem cruel enough for anything but finch fighting? Really? Most of the men involved were from Brazil where finch fighting has been banned for decades. I believe in the rule of law but don't you just wish we could throw these folks in the Thunderdome and see how they like it?

Congratulations to the town firefighters who discovered this obscene set up.

Lest we take this too lightly, Annie Harnett at Change.org reminds us of the well known link between animal abuse and child abuse.

Ancient Egg Shells Yield DNA

In other bird news, scientists think they have found a way to extract DNA from ancient egg shells. This means that elephant bird Aepyornis, the heaviest bird in existence (no surprise that design didn't last), may be coming to a zoo near you in, say, 2040. Sadly, by then the kids will be asking, "Mommy, what's a tiger?"

Sia

Art: Found at a useful article for birders titled Do You Know Your Dark Eyed Juncos? from the Birding in Sonoma County blog.

Endnotes

(1) Adapted from "The High Price of Being a Hunk" by David Lukas, National Wildlife, February/March 2009.

Related Articles:

Finch Fighting

A Question of Action

Here in Oregon we are doing the Happy Dance at news of a new 43,000 acre national forest near Bend that will help protect against urban sprawl and give wildlife room to roam. With that in mind, I would like to share this essay by author Barbara Kingsolver titled Understanding the Value of Wild Places. Excerpt:

It's a privilege to live any part of one's life in proximity of nature. It is a privilege, apparently, even to know nature is out there at all. In the summer of 1996, human life on Earth made a subtle, uncelebrated passage from mostly rural to mostly urban. More that half of all humans now live in cities....I find this exodus from the land makes me unspeakably sad. I think of the children who will never know intuitively, that a flower is a plant's way of making love, or what silence sounds like or that trees breathe out what we breathe in..I wonder what it will mean for us to forget that food, like rain, is not a product but a process. I wonder how we will imagine the infinite when we have never seen how the stars fill a dark night sky.

According to the Wild Hunt, Orion Foxwood made this statement at PantheaCon 2010 and the quote is making it's way around the earthwise net:

The Earth isn’t running a democracy. She is calling us all into action whether we like it or not.

Yes, yes and again yes. As always, I come back to loving the questions we ask ourselves. As a Green Witch I ask this question on a daily basis: "What is right action in this place and time?" The answers may differ for each person but the fundamental need for action does not, even as the question itself becomes ever more urgent for us all.

Sia

Celtic Tree of Life by the talented Kevin Dyer at Compost.com. You can buy copies of his creations at that gallery link.

Suryia the Orangutan and Roscoe the Dog

Today I would like to share a video about a friendship between Suryia the Orangutan and Roscoe the Dog.

Enjoy,

Sia

P.S. Congratulations to the folks at the North American Discworld Convention who raised over $24,000 for the Orangutan Foundation International during their Discworld Charity Auctions at NADWCon.

Wildlife Migration Begins

Goodbye little Ruby-throat. Good luck,

The National Wildlife Federation reminds us many different species of birds will now begin their fall migration.

Songbirds, waterfowl, raptors and hummingbirds travel north and south each year, some as far as the tropics. Caribou and pronghorn shift their range based on the season to ensure access to food. Even insects such as monarch butterflies and green darner dragonflies travel great distances to survive the oncoming winter.

One of the greatest things about fall migration is that it offers some pretty awesome wildlife watching opportunities. Get outside this fall and see what migratory species you can spot. You can report your sightings on National Wildlife Federation’s Wildlife Watch website, on Twitter or even using your iPhone.

Hummingbird lovers should check out the video at that same page.

Sia

Photo: from National Geographic website

Related Articles:

Spirit Bird

Lemurs Butchered

Bastards.

Sadly,

Sia

Links

Conservation International
Help them help the lemurs

The Lemurs of Madagascar

A Lemurs Tale
Wonderful PBS program

BushMeat Crisis Task Force
Actions others have taken to stop the taking of endangered wildlife as bushmeat.

Youtube Video

In the Wild - Lemurs with John Cleese

Related Articles:

Lessons from the Crisis in Madagascar
from www.WildMadagascar.org

I'm Not Having It
With notes on why a Mountain Gorilla may have died to make your cell phone and what you can do about it.

Is Environmentalism Our New Religion?
Our environmental harvest and how it effects ethics, ecology and climate change.

Photo: Golden Crowned Lemur, Madagascar - from the BBC website

Butterfly Woman

Someone You Should Know:

Meet pioneering 17th-century lepidopterist Eleanor Glanville

Born just after the Civil War, she can be called the first lady of British natural history. This was a time when women were scorned for dabbling in science, when butterflies were regarded as sinister creatures that represented the spirits of the dead, and anyone with an interest in them was viewed with suspicion, liable to be accused of sorcery.

Amazingly, Glanville’s will was overturned by her children, in what became a cause célèbre, on the ground that only an insane person would go “in pursuit of butterflies”.

Oh, if only I had been able to learn about such women when I was young and still in school. Nevertheless, I enjoy making up for lost time.

Another, modern butterfly woman is Camile Parmesan. As I noted back in 2007

Her groundbreaking studies on butterflies and global climate change offer “the strongest statistical evidence that global warming—influenced by trapped greenhouse gasses such as carbon dioxide from cars and factories—is having an impact on a wide scope of species and regions.”

Dear parents, please tell your sons and daughters about such inspiring people as often as you can. You'll be glad you did.

Butterfly gardening:

Want more butterflies in your garden? Then check out the gardening pages at the Butterfly website.

Images of Butterfly Women

Here are some famous art images of women as butterflies. These ladies are not fragile.

Enjoy,

Sia

Related Articles

The Secret World of Butterflies

Butterfly and Moth Symbolism

Spiral Scouts

Art: Butterfly Woman found here.
Does anyone know who this artist is? I would like to give him/her credit.

Wildlife Centers Need Your Help

Love nature? Then please support a wildlife center in your area. They can use donations (no matter how small), supplies (like paper towels) and volunteers.

It's spring, and centers all over the country are filling up with orphaned and injured baby animals in need. Do what you can.

Sia

Links:

How to locate a wildlife rehabilitator

Video: California Wildlife Center

Never get between a humpback whale and her dinner.

Wow. Just....wow.


Sia






Art: Whale (Haida style) by Paul Windsor, British Columbia. Much of his work is now offered in cards, t-shirts and prints by Native Northwest

Video: BBC program: Nature's Great Events

Feeding Wildlife In Winter

By now, most of our song birds have flown south. The Canada geese cross the sky, coming and going in great flocks, calling to one another as they fly under red and pink clouds at sunset, and leaving those of us rooted here on the ground gazing up in wonder. Last night Long Moon rose clear and bright, promising frost and firece winds to come. Here on our mountain the snow is late in arriving but a winter storm is dancing offshore, and she's bringing the party to us. Now, we wait. (1)

Feeding Wildlife In Winter:

As the cold and dark increase, I change my seed and put up different kinds of feeders, especially suet, keeping in mind that there is a right way and a wrong way to feed wildlife in winter:

In its handbook Wild Neighbors: The Humane Approach to Living with Wildlife, the Humane Society of the United States (HSUS) notes that the question of feeding wildlife has curious wrinkles. A multimillion-dollar industry surrounds the feeding of wild birds, for instance, even as many cities prohibit the feeding of pigeons, ducks, and geese, animals that thrive in the presence of humans and their castoff food. The HSUS offers a broad criterion for deciding what animals to feed: “Wild animals,” it warns, “should not be fed when the consequence of feeding could cause them harm.”

That harm can be of many sorts. When confined to a single food source such as a feeding station, congregating animals are susceptible to disease just as humans are in close quarters; moldy and wet food can also cause illness. HSUS guidelines recommend that feeders for ground-feeding birds be rinsed every two days in a 5–10 percent solution of chlorine bleach and warm water for two or three minutes and then scrubbed clean.

Climate Change and Migration.

Climate change is changing the migration of birds all over the world, including Oregon where we live.

Just outside of Portland is a wonderful haven for geese and other waterfowl and we take great delight in visiting these. Some of these birds have not been seen here in years past:

As the weather has cooled and the days shortened, many birds that nest in Oregon and Washington have moved on.

Warblers, tanagers, flycatchers, and other insect-eating birds are now in Central and South America. The concept of birds flying south for the winter is a familiar one but for many birds that nest in the high arctic, the Pacific Northwest IS south. With the arrival of cooler, wetter days come approximately 250,000 geese that spend the winter months in the Willamette Valley.

While the area has always hosted wintering populations of geese, in recent decades many birds that used to winter in central California have shifted their range northward into the Willamette Valley. Large flocks of geese can be found in fields, wetlands, and urban duck ponds from October through April, providing fun viewing for wildlife watchers and hardcore birders alike.

The vast majority of birds in the winter flocks are Cackling Geese, followed in abundance by Canada Geese, Snow Geese, Greater White-fronted Geese, and the occasional Ross’s Goose, Brant, and Emperor Goose.

Oak and Acorns:

Meanwhile, naturalists are asking, "Why are the squirrels starving from lack of acorns?"

For parents and teachers:

Information on the Canada goose, with worksheets and coloring pages from KidZone.

Enjoy,

Sia

Endnotes:

(1) As urban folks, we've had a steep learning curve when it comes to living here in real weather, but our neighbors give us good advice. We've added extra blankets in the igloos for the feral cats we have not yet trapped and re-homed as barn cats. We put on the snow tires on the four-wheel drive, and hauled out the Columbia coats; after two winters here I now a big fan of those coats. The winter boots are waiting in the mud room and we have candles and food and enough supplies to last a week without power at need. Our home is as ready and warm as we can make it.

Photo: Black capped Chicadee found at New England Wildlife Treasures website.

Want A Job? How About Saving the Planet?

The Iberian Lynx Could Use A Hand...and A Lot More Rabbits: (1)

The BBC reports that "More than 8,000 conservationists and policy makers are in Barcelona, Spain, for the IUCN World Conservation Congress."

The focus at this congress is both broad and deep. It involves not just saving wildlife but changing the way conservation works.

Richard Black writes:

Saving the planet now needs lawyers, economists, engineers, chemists, politicians, as well as those steeped in the traditional disciplines..

The great fields of the green world now contain lawyers, to draft environmental treaties and laws and make sure people obey them. Economists calculate the financial costs of nature loss and the benefits of sustainable businesses.

Engineers work out how to re-invigorate dying watercourses. Communications chiefs look for new ways of getting the word out. Hunters run sustainable trophy-hunting schemes that raise money for conservation.

Gender specialists engage women in conservation in societies where they may not have a lot of power. Entrepreneurs leverage funds - a term you would never hear from an ecologist - for green technologies.

It's a rich ecosystem.

And it's virtually an open door. Just make sure you have a skill to bring, plus the commitment to work long hours for far less money than you could earn elsewhere, [Sia's note: don't a lot of us do that already?] and the environmental family will find a home for you somewhere.

Ecotopia

The Daily Green tells us that people who have been downsized are finding jobs in the green sector.

In many ways, Jobson's career mirrors that of the nation. Given Jimmy Carter's historic efforts to promote energy conservation (not to mention that pesky oil crisis), things were looking pretty green, and the U.S. was the world leader in solar power, wind energy and other green tech areas, with hundreds of start-ups and thousands of high-paying jobs. But then Reagan and the go-go, booming, me-generation 80s hit like a bad hangover.

Now, with even more complex energy problems and the growing threat of global warming, clean tech is starting to get another look, on a broad scale. "We're going back to the same principles we should have learned before, and there are business opportunities again," says Jobson.

Wind Jobs, Ecotourism and the Economy:

In Green Inc., Kate Galbraith writes about energy, the economy and the bottom line when it comes to wind power in A Gust of Green Jobs. Meanwhile, the Ecotourism Awards for 2008 were presented. Click on the link to read about the winners.

Sia

Endnotes:

(1) Lack of Curiosity May Kill Most Endangered Cat

The lynx has managed to survive for so long in Spain in part because it has always shared the Iberian Peninsula with another emblematic Spanish species — the rabbit.

The Phoenicians, the great trading empire of the Mediterranean from 1000BC, named the Iberian Peninsula "Hispania" (Land of the Rabbits) because they found so many rabbits when they arrived.

Why this matters to the Iberian lynx is that rabbits account for 90 per cent of its diet. Without rabbits, the lynx would, en masse, starve to death.

Difficult as it is to imagine...the rabbit is considered endangered in Spain...If declining rabbit numbers have placed the lynx under threat, however, it is humans who will most likely cause its final extinction. Of all lynx deaths since 2000, almost 80 per cent were caused directly by humans.

Related Articles:

The Amazing Iberian Lynx

Photo: Iberian Lynx (AP) used at The Age.

I'm Not Having It

There are things I really, really miss about living in the Bay Area of Northern California, but people like this are not among them.

It took a while for me to get used to how very polite everyone is here in Oregon. It actually seemed kind of creepy, at first, as if they might want something from me...but they didn't. People in Oregon seem to live a bit differently. The ones I've met aren't stressed to their limits and sleep deprived. They aren't multitasking so much that their brains are fried and they forget the smallest things. In fact, most of the folks I've met since moving here are kind and thoughtful. Maybe it's because they aren't caught up in a constant battle with traffic, overcrowding, and hellishly long commute times. They aren't breathing bad air, either, and the ones I know aren't working 70 hour weeks or tied to their cell phones and pagers 24/7, like so many of our friends back in the Silicon Valley and Los Angeles. In other words, they arn't so overloaded they're about to implode. (Maybe some kind working mother should have walked up to that man and calmly told him that he needed to go to his room and take a time out? Oh, and will someone please teach him to use his inside voice?)

The people I encounter here have both the time and the desire to be friendly, even to strangers. Maybe it's because everywhere they look they are surrounded by some of the most breathtaking, easily accessible, well protected and healing natural beauty on the planet. Unlike many of the people I knew in California (who are blessed with much of the same) they go out and play in it. (1) As a result of all this they're just...nice. Go figure.

LuralMay's story about the rude man with the cell phone made me laugh but what amazes me, is that no one stood up to this fool. In such a situation I would (and have) said: "Excuse me, this seems to be an important conversation to you but it is interrupting my morning's peace. Could you please take this outside?"

I am about to turn 50, and I find that I'll put up with less and less crap as I get older. This tends to be true for most of us, but it's especially true for women my age who by this point have had it up to here.

Personally, I feel invaded and violated by loud and/or ultra personal phone calls in public places. I do not wish to be involved in some stranger's drama and I will ask them to lower their voices or move along politely, but firmly. I call this Glass Mountain Manners. I learned them from my mother, who like the fabulous Miss Manners, is a real lady in the good, old fashioned sense of that term. If you have GMM you say what you need to say in courteous, fair minded terms. You have been respectful, but firm. As a result, you have offered them no emotional footholds. They cannot use self righteous anger or outrage to climb the smooth mountain of civility and common sense that you present. (Oh, they'll try, but it doesn't work and they just slip and slide back down again, landing right on their asinine behavior.) (2) They cannot get around this mountain, because I will repeat myself, and I am happy to elaborate if they did not - for what reason I cannot possibly imagine - understand me the first time. So, they back down. They do that because I am standing there, looking into their eyes, and I am not afraid to (politely) call the manager and have them escorted outdoors. (3) Sometimes they curse or grumble. Let them. As a friend of mine likes to say, I am happy to be their learning experience.

It beats walking out the door feeling angry and thinking all day about what I would have said.

Don't get me wrong, I love my cell phone. They are changing the way the world communicates and empowering thousands of people. Just ask James (I want to have his creative genius baby) Burke: (From an interview on the 25th anniversary of his groundbreaking show Connections)

Cell phones/wireless media are the end of traditional news reporting, for the betterment of all via 20 million firsthand reporters, unfiltered by a centrally-vetted cultural bias. Local, culturally-oriented, witness-produced and better-produced news becomes coin.

I will concede that bypassing Big Brother's News Cycle is worth a little hassle now and then. So speak your peace but mind your manners. Oh, and help save a mountain gorilla by recycling that old cell phone. My mountain is fine, thank you, but her's isn't doing so well. Mess with gorilla Mamma and she'll rip your arm of.

Good girl.


Sia

(1) They are so passionate about getting outdoors you'd think it was some sort of religion or something.... hey....wait a minute...

(2) The same goes for people who talk during movies. I did not come there to hear your opinions, thank you, and we are not in your living room at home. If you do not understand the plot, do not ask your friend to explain it to you in loud whispers, just go home and read the book.

(3) Am I always calm and courteous? Hell no. But, in general, my life works much better when I can be so.

Related Articles:

Miss Manners: Don't Be Wireless and Tactless

Mind Your Cell Phone Manners

Vehement Anti-cell phone guy finally caves (humor from The Onion)

Cell phones in rural India

Links:

Freerecycling

Photo: Mountain Gorilla mother and baby
from a story on the latest threats to gorilla habitat

Five Mountain Days

The fall fog is here at last. It comes on little cat feet, straight up from the river, purring and rubbing up against our trees, till it stops a mile or two below us, where it curls up and takes a nap. Most mornings, I can look out over our back deck, to see a lake of soft white fog covering the river valley below us. The sun is shines on our mountain and on the mountains beyond the valley and between us is the fog. Looking Northeast, I can see all the way to Washington state and there sits Mt. Adams with it's cap of snow, stately and peaceful.

These are what we call five mountain days, those crystal clear days we get in spring and fall when facing directly east, you can see the mountains Jefferson, Hood, Adams, Rainier and St Helen's in the distance, forming a silver and green chain along the cascade range. I see them on my drive to work most days. I drive through farmlands and past past berry and apple orchards and the odd alpaca ranch, with these shimmering mountains leading the way. I still can't believe I get to live here.

The air is clear and a bit moist, a perfect time for a safe burn, so many of our neighbors make bonfires using the brush and wood they have cleared from their land in the past year. The scent of clean wood fires on a clear, breezy day is heady stuff.

My inner clock is shifting as dark comes earlier each day. One morning I woke up at dawn, and watched a sunrise turn the clouds pink from our deck while an owl hooted it way home. Last night, I woke up at 3 am and went out to watch the winter stars. It's clear enough up here to see the Milky Way. Orion's belt was low in the sky and the Seven Sisters sparkled brightly just above our roof.

The geese are traveling, traveling, traveling, singing as they go.

Proposition 49 passed, which means that this beautiful place will last a while longer.

Friends are coming soon and will stay for a visit.

We have a new kitten, a little rescue, who is learning to trust us.

Today is my day off. I will drive down the mountain to take in our recycling, and then I will work in the garden.

Sia

Image: Fogcat

Links:
Overview of Portland, Oregon - one of my favorite cities

Words and Pictures

Photo by wetribe.

I've got two new obsessions.

LibraryThing
Which lets me catalog my books and meet other people with like-minded libraries. Sometimes I'll post an obscure subject in the search function (medieval soap carving, say) and see what other people have in their collections. I've found many a treasure that way. Or, I'll post a favorite author and see what people who like that author also read. This site makes my Inner Librarian so very happy. Those of you who live in L-space will understand.

Ooook!

The next obsession is Flickr.

Because images excite me.

Photo by wetribe

I love human faces. I love to draw faces, and I love to see the photographs of people that others make. I like the stories behind the images.

What is she laughing at, I wonder?

Sometimes I'll got to Flickr, hit the "Explore" button and just travel the world in other people's photographs.

My favorite photos are of places that are sacred to others. Someone loves these small haunts - you can feel that in the photos.

If you are a writer, I recommend Flickr for writer's block. Spend some time there, and you'll be making up stories about these photos before you know it.

Photo by Eldad75

Sometimes the stories about the photographers are just as good as the pictures. The man who took this tiger photo also has a photo set on dogs he has rescued from shelters. He works with a rescue group out in L.A. called Ace of Hearts. He has rescued over 400 dogs from shelters, and fostered 100 of them at his own home. What a guy.

I love nature photographs. I've been drawn to these since I was a kid (and thank you Mom and Dad for making sure we had National Geographic and Time Life books around the house when we were young). Some of the animal encounters posted at Flickr take my breath away.

If I had it to do over again, I would become a wildlife photographer; the kind who spends months in the wild, and then makes up for it by sleeping in four star hotels once they get back to the city. An experienced, well traveled woman can live both with and without hair dryer.

But coffee is always a must.

Sia

Photo Credit:
Woman with Shell Necklace and Woman Laughing by Kyle Hally at wetribe.
Tiger Swimming by Eldad75
Used with permission

Gaia's Guardians

Gaia's Guardians

Gaia's Guardians is a loose confederation of professionals and volunteers who work on projects that benefit Mother Earth and her creatures. This is an inter-faith effort & people from all belief systems (or none) are welcome.

They just opened up a new Yahoo networking board for their colleagues here.

Please note: This is a networking group for those who are already actively engaged in this sort of work. If you are new to community service, and wish to get involved, either visit Volunteer Match or write to Full Circle at info@fullcircleevents.org and we'll try our best to hook you up with local efforts you can support. Once you are involved you are very welcome to revisit the group and apply for membership.

A note about the Gaia's Guardian Award and the kind of work that Gaia's Guardians do is listed at the bottom of this post.

For The Smallest Among Us:

Have you ever rescued a baby bird or a baby squirrel. If so, you know how amazing that experience can be. Check out this video of Loki, a baby White Crowned Sparrow rescued at the Wild Heart Ranch.

Here is a brief overview of the rehabilitation process at a wildlife rescue shelter, complete with some very cute pictures.

And this is a useful article on coexisting with our wild neighbors.

When Helping Hurts

Remember, if you find a wild animal or bird on the ground, it may not need to be rescued! Most bird species spend about 10 days on the ground, learning to hop and fly, while Mom and Dad come to feed them. Many wild mammals like rabbits and deer leave their little ones alone for days at a time while they look for food. Even that lost looking baby seal may have a mom hovering nearby but out of sight. Or maybe the animal really does need help. If you have questions, ask the experts; call your local shelter or wildlife group for advice.

Wildlife Rehabilitation Information Directory

Here is a web directory of those groups in the U.S. who do wildlife rescue. It also has very helpful tips and some wonderful stories and pictures.

"One Cat Just Leads To Another" - Earnest Hemmingway (who had quite a few)

It's kitten season folks. Your local shelter and the various rescue groups are no doubt inundated with beasties, and will need volunteers, foster parents and supplies. Why not get together with your group and make them a goody basket? All these places have Wish Lists. Call them or go on-line and find out what they need. Trust me, you can never have too many paper towels, and after the recent pet food scare recall, a lot of these places are in need of food.

And don't forget,there are lots of older cats and cats with special needs that need good homes, too.

Before There Were Malls...

I've just finished reading Hacate's evocative essay titled Sense of Place. and it got me to thinking. I wonder how many of us began on this path because a place we knew and loved as children was ruined by greedy, mindless over-development? I grew up in the San Fernando Valley. Back then, it was best known for it's fertile farmland and horse ranches. Cougar and bobcats roamed the rolling hills and we road our bikes through dirt paths dotted with poppies and wild sage. By the time I was 10, the fields we had played in and trees we had climbed were destroyed to make way for shopping malls and concrete heavy suburbs. By the time I was a teenager the wild cats, hawks and deer were gone from the hills, and houses sat cheek by jowl in their place. The small family farms where we bought our fruits, vegetables and sweet corn were gone. The open spaces and small creeks we knew and loved had disappeared. All that was natural was paved over to make way for housing enclaves called names like Deer Hallow and Mountain View.

The Valley is now known for it's shopping malls. It is also the center of the porn industry. The 100 acre park, where we had all learn to climb rocks as kids and where I met my first oak trees, became littered with graffiti, broken glass and the occasional dead body. Ah, progress.

Like many of us, I thought and lived like an eco-feminist long before I heard the term. I can date my heart's path from the day I went with my friends to climb the trees in an open field near our house, only to find a bulldozer had cut them down the day before.

These days I belong to groups that protect wild spaces and open lands *as well as* those who advocate for lower income housing, sensible mass transit, green building, and limited growth.
The beauty of nature is for everyone. We cannot put our open space behind gates and reserve them for the privileged few. But neither can we allow our National Parks to be so trammeled and over crowed that our desire to enjoy it damages the place itself. What we need is common sense, vision and balance, like that shown by the people of Sonoma County, CA who willingly add 2 cents on to their sales tax specifically to purchase and protect small farms, and open space. Let us also praise the 10,000 Friends of Oregon who are working to preserve our heritage for future generation in Oregon and elsewhere.

The mending of the world is nigh. Wouldn't you like to be a part of that? Visit Volunteer Match and find out what you can do to help. Make a difference. It doesn't take a lot of time. It just needs a bit of heart.

Sia

The Gaia's Guardian Award

This award is given to a person or group for "Outstanding work benefiting Mama Gaia and her creatures". These people inspire the rest of us by their courage, caring and compassionate action. You do not have to be Pagan to win this award - what counts are good deeds and a noble heart.

Previous Award Winners

The California Bat Conservation Fund

The Wildlife Center of Silcon Valley

Deborah Noel: Service Dog Trainer & Spokesperson for People with Disabilities

Officer Christine Franco, Investigator (Animal Cruelty & Neglect) Silicon Valley Humane Society

In previous years, the Gaia's Guardian Award was given out at the Witche's Ball, a costume ball, charity event and fundraiser hosted annually by Full Circle. At that time, it was given to heros and heroines in California. The award is now given out nationally. The 2005 recipient was United Animal Nations for their work benefiting animals left abandoned, starving, and hurt after Hurricane Katrina. In 2006 The Gaia's Guardian Award was given posthumously to Carol Chapman, tireless advocate and Cat Rescue Mamma extraordinaire.

Some of the Work Done by Gaia's Guardians

* Companion animal rescue: fostering, adoptions, shelter work, etc.

* Wildlife rescue, rehabilitation & release.

* Habitate restoration & native plant education.

* Creating art, websites, blogs and/or writings on natural themes in order to awaken others to the beauty and power of nature.

* Working to teach children about nature and the web of life.

* Working to support the preservation of open space, forests and wild lands.

* Offering educational workshops, hikes, birding walks, and other events related to these issues.

* Involvement with water issues such as river clean up, coastal protection, water wise gardening, etc.

* Grass Roots organizing, fundraising & networking for various Earthwise & ecological causes.

* Involvement in organic & sustainable farming. Teaching kids about same.

* Working to establishment and support green spaces, parks and hiking trails.

* Actively encouraging our local governments to use native plants and trees in neighborhoods & public spaces.

* Raising awareness about recycling and wise use issues.

* Working with service animals and/or rescue animals.

* Working to aid abused animals and animals caught in disasters.

* Working for community which is both economically and environmentally sustainable and socially just.

The Secret World of Butterflies

Off the Shelf:

Butterflies in the Garden by Carol Lerner

Stokes Butterfly Book : The Complete Guide to Butterfly Gardening, Identification, and Behavior by Donald Stokes

Children’s Books:

Sam's Secret World by Cara Dennis.

A little girl discovers the secret world of butterflies. For ages 7 – 9

From Egg to Butterfly (Start to Finish) by Shannon Semlick. This is an excellent book for home schooling and/or the family nature library.

One Butterfly (Board Book) by Golden Books. Ages 4 – 8

Good Night, Sweet Butterflies: A Color Dreamland by Dawn Bently. Ages 4 - 8

Sia's Post:

Taiwan recently announced that they would close one lane of a major highway to protect more than a million purple milkweed butterflies, which cross the road on their seasonal migration. Protective nets and ultra-violet lights will also be used.

Wouldn’t it be wonderful if we built our cities around migration patterns, rather than in front of them? What if we placed our local parks and open space preserves in those places where animals have traveled for thousands of years, and put the our disturbing lights and buildings somewhere else? Of course, people don’t think that way. At least not now. Maybe someday they will. In any case, my hat’s off to Taiwan, for doing what they can to save nature’s most beautiful pollinators, and keep their own country healthy as a result.

More Than Just A Pretty Face:

Many of the foods we eat could not be produced without pollinators like butterflies, bees, birds, and bats. What threatens them, threatens us.

Butterflies may look fragile but they are incredibly strong for their size and they have their very own bundle of super powers. For example, every year Monarchs and other butterflies travel thousands of miles without getting lost. Researchers now believe that they use ultraviolet navigation to find their way. They also possess a complex biological clock, which signals when it’s time to leave.

Wild About Color

Did you know that plants have evolved their flowers to make it easy for butterflies, and other pollinators to feed on their nectar? Check out this website exhibit on the Causes of Color.

While butterflies like color, they also give off some pretty special effects of their own. Check out Why Butterflies Shimmer from The Science Show.

Fun with UV

Parents and teachers might enjoy this page from Educational Innovations. They offered products such as beads, t-shirts and nail polish, all of which interact with UV light.

I want that spy pen.

Gardening for Butterflies

Many butterflies, such as the Finder’s Blue and the Monarch are endangered through loss of habitate. You can help the butterflies in your area by gardening with native and butterfly plants. Kate Staron offers a helpful article on creating endangered butterfly gardens. Also check out the book list below for gardening tips and ideas. Parents might wish to share the Butterfly Project page with their school age children.

Got Seeds?

Create a butterfly habitate for Monarch’s and other butterflies with Milkweed Seeds from Butterfly Encounters. The Milkweed Database and the Butterfly Atlas will help you find which species in your area likes which kind of seed. The Butterfly Website also offers a photo gallery with beautiful pictures of each kind.

Gardening Books:

Attracting Butterflies & Hummingbirds to Your Backyard: Watch Your Garden Come Alive With Beauty on the Wing (A Rodale Organic Gardening Book) (A Rodale Organic Gardening Book) by Sally Roth

Creating a Butterfly Garden by Marcus Schnek

National Wildlife Federation Attracting Birds, Butterflies & Backyard Wildlife (National Wildlife Federation)by David Mizejewski

Better Homes and Gardens Nature's Gardens: Create a Haven for Birds, Butterflies-And Yourself! by Better Homes and Gardens - How to create a haven for birds, butterflies and yourself.

Conservation

There is hope on the butterfly horizon. Conservation efforts are underway in the UK and other countries. Many of these efforts involved restoration of habitate and captive rearing and reintroduction of endangered butterflies. I was lucky enough to see one such endeavor. My husband and I stayed at an eco-resort in the Mayan Mountains of Belize called Chaa Creek. While there we visited the Chaa Creek Butterfly Farm, which works to reintroduce the Blue Morpho Butterfly (AKA The “Belizean Blue”) back into the wild. I will never forget the thrill I felt as these delicate iridescent blue creatures settled lightly on my head and hands. I have tremendous respect for the work done at Chaa Cheek. The native butterfly wranglers (many of whom have Mayan ancestry) told us that they felt a deep sense of satisfaction at reintroducing these wondrous little beings into their homeland.

Gaia’s Guardians: How a Little Butterfly and a Texas Biologist Prove Climate Change

I would like to close with a respectful nod to one of Gaia’s Guardian’s (tm) biologist Camille Parmesan. Her groundbreaking studies on butterflies and global climate change offer “the strongest statistical evidence that global warming—influenced by trapped greenhouse gasses such as carbon dioxide from cars and factories—is having an impact on a wide scope of species and regions.” An article on Dr. Parmesan by Ted Green for the University of Austin notes that:

While the studies have been influential, it’s not the kind of work Parmesan became a biologist to do.

“We had to slog through paper after paper,” she said about the study she and Yohe conducted, “sometimes with obscurely written data sets. Very rarely were the data nice and clean.”

Parmesan would rather be in the field chasing butterflies.

“My work is very dirty. I’m out in the mountains, camping out in a tent for months at a time,” she says. “And it’s wonderful. I don’t think I could ever go back to working in a sterile lab environment after working in the field because you get to know the pulse of the species you’re working with, you get an intuition for them. You get to know what makes them happy, what they like, what they don’t like.”

As she works on the international stage, Parmesan also is working to increase awareness about climate change in Texas. She says she faces uninformed, if not skeptical, audiences and she comes prepared with charts and graphs showing 70 million years of the planet’s climate history.

Parmesan has already won over two stalwart climate change skeptics: her mother and sister. “I’ve had so many arguments with them about climate change,” she said. “By now they’re finally converted.”

She plans to return to the field, which means the Alps and tundra of Scandinavia to track butterflies.

The Gaia’s Guardian Project: This is a Full Circle project. It has five key elements.

* It brings Pagan and other volunteers together with Earthwise non-profit groups in order to help rescue animals and birds and protect wild lands.

* It supports local, grassroots organizations that protect both animals, and nature.

* It supports those who teach about the natural world via education, interaction and art.

* It helps raise awareness of ecological issues.

* It brings Earthwise Ethics and values into the wider world.

The Gaia's Guardian Award:

This award is presented by Full Circle to a person or group for "Outstanding work benefiting Mama Gaia and her creatures". These people inspire the rest of us by their courage, caring and compassionate action. You do not have to be Pagan to win this award - what counts are good deeds and a noble heart.

ART: This lovely piece is by artist Linda Ravenscroft. Visit her site to see greeting cards, books and gifts, as well new works and original paintings. Ms. Ravenscroft was kind enough to allow us to use her some of her art work for our Beltane Ball website. The Beltane Ball is a charity costume ball offered by Full Circle which helped raise money for our local Humane Society.