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.

Solving the Mystery of the Vanishing Bees

Scientific American has an article out on Solving the Mystery of the Vanishing Bees:

The mysterious ailment called colony collapse disorder has wiped out large numbers of the bees that pollinate a third of our crops. The causes turn out toe be surprisingly complex, but solutions are emerging.

Enjoy,

Sia

Hat tip to Neil Gaiman (for the bee song by Vermillion Lies) and Rowan Fairgrove for the link to the article.

Recommended Reading:

Robbing the Bees: A Biography of Honey, the Sweet Liquid Gold That Seduced the World by Holley Bishop

The Shamanic Way of the Bee by Simon Buxton
I haven't read this one but it looks intriguing. Or, it could be bunkum (lovely word). If you have read it, let me know what you thought.

(fiction) The Secret Life of Bees by Sue Monk Kidd
I adore this book. She also wrote another favorite of mine, The Dance of the Dissident Daughter.

Related Articles:

Guide to Bee Friendly Gardens

The Last Child In the Woods

The question of the day comes from a woman speaking at the inauguration of the new Wildlife Center (1) at the Tualatin River Refuge (Oregon, USA)

"Who is going to be our next conservation heroes?" asks Kim Strassburg, the refuge's visitor services manager. "Our kids. And if our kids are losing touch with nature?

Who indeed?

Richard Louv author of Last Child In the Woods: Saving Our Children From Nature Deficit Disorder attended the opening and signed copies of his book. You can view one of his lectures here.

Earthwise parents concerned that we are losing touch with nature may wish to check out Spiral Scouts.

Enjoy,

Sia

For those of you using a reader, the video I've posted at my blog is from the Netherlands, and it is titled Discovery of the last child in the woods.

Endnotes:

Tualatin River Refuge

was established as an urban refuge to provide wetland, riparian, and upland habitats for a variety of migratory birds, threatened and endangered species, fish, other resident wildlife, and for the enjoyment of people. The refuge is now home to nearly 200 species of birds, over 50 species of mammals, 25 species of reptiles and amphibians, and a wide variety of insects, fish, and plants.

Habitats include remnant and restored communities along rivers and streams, emergent, shrub, and forested wetlands, riparian forests, oak and pine meadows and grasslands, and mixed deciduous/coniferous forests common to western Oregon prior to settlement.

These habitats are known primarily for their importance to salmon and steelhead, wintering Canada goose, pintail and mallard ducks, and for providing breeding habitat for songbirds.

Links:

Gaia's Guardians