What is BrainFodder - Ruminations of a Naturalist?
BrainFodder
One day while living at Morro Rock, I realized how useless some of the skills I honed over the years really were. Morro Rock is a 580 foot volcanic plug located at the mouth of Morro Bay California. I lived at The Rock in the parking lot for 100 days back in the spring of 1985. It was my job as a raptor biologist to be there monitoring the peregrine falcons that at the time were endangered and susceptible to breaking their eggs due to the amount of DDT in the female falcon’s body.
It was a late afternoon when I and an amazing naturalist named John Schmidt were standing there watching the parade of gulls, pelicans, and cormorants flying north by the rock when we both noticed a bird unlike all the others. It was a brief look at the bird, maybe 10 seconds before it disappeared behind the rock. We looked at each other and discussed what we saw, the flight profile, the long sharp bill, the deep wingbeats. We eliminated options, looked at the field guides, and confirmed that we had just seen a Brown Booby, a rare sighting in this area. We were proud and congratulated ourselves to have deciphered the sighting but then John said, “Do you realize how economically useless these skills are to most people out there?” So very true.
One of the definitions from the Oxford dictionary of nugget is “a valuable idea or fact”. As a lifelong naturalist I am awash with little nuggets about the natural world. I don’t know how “valuable’ they are, but it’s information I have gleaned over the years of noticing things in nature and asking, “I wonder why?” then researching it. I am proud to call myself a naturalist and have been practicing the craft for almost 40 years.
So, what is a Naturalist? Naturalist, as defined by Webster’s: 1. A scholar or student of natural history. Which leads to the question, what is natural history? It’s the scientific research of plants, animals, and natural phenomena, usually leaning towards the observational rather than experimental. Naturalists observe nature and then attach meaning to what we have seen, which in essence is Interpretation.
Interpreter is the traditional title used by NPS and other organizations for what many of us do. It’s a very telling term because Interpreters translate or express the sense of another language. But let’s continue down this rabbit hole I’ve created, what is “Language”? One definition of language is an organized form of communication used by a community or system. Language can consist of words, gestures, sounds, songs, expressions, and figures of speech. It can be spoken, written on paper, typed in code, etched in stone, pressed into clay, chalked in on slate, or even expressed with paint on canvas or blood on hides, just like the language found in nature.
When we see tracks pressed into the clay by a river, we’re reading the signs of the area. Discarded feathers, bits of fur, birdsongs, patterns of scat, and scrapes on a branch or tree can communicate much to an experienced naturalist.
The wind rippling the water or patterns on the surface of a river can communicate information to experienced sailors, or fishermen. When outside our senses are being bombarded with stimuli from nature and as naturalists, we are constantly translating this language of nature into human understanding. That is the nature of naturalists.
Naturalists enjoy having this knowledge and understanding of the natural world, but many of us want to share our sense of wonder with others. For me, and probably for others as well, we want people to enjoy and understand the language of nature to the point where we don’t have to interpret it for them, and they become fluent in the language of nature.
Bernard de Clairvaux once wrote: “You will find something more in woods than in books. Trees and stones will teach you that which you can never learn from masters.”
Ecological ignorance breeds indifference, I don’t want indifference when it comes to the natural world. I want people to make a difference. I want folks to enjoy nature, or at least respect it. If I can get people to empathize with, and in turn, hopefully, conserve the natural world as much as I try to do then I’ve accomplished my purpose. After all, humans ARE part of nature, and our culture, society, and way of life deeply touch many aspects of our natural world.
So, in these many ruminations to come I plan to look at the weird and wonderful life forms we share this planet with; but also to occasionally delve into our culture, policies, politics, and societal evolution from the perspective of a naturalist. So much Brain Fodder out there, between work, play, dog walks, gardening, and games, I hope I can keep up. At the bare minimum, there will be one or two ruminations a month.
Want to come along for the ride?