This week in birds

This week in birds - #613

A roundup of the week's news of birds and the environment:

I first met the Greater Roadrunner at the Princess Movie Theater of my youth where the cartoon between the Saturday double feature regularly starred the roadrunner outwitting the dastardly but dimwitted coyote. Many years later I finally met the bird itself in a field in Texas. It did not disappoint. The American Bird Conservancy's Bird of the Week is currently extending its range from Mexico and the southwestern states into the states farther east.

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Is our planet finally doomed to be drowned in a sea of plastic? The world's countries seem unable to come to an agreement on curbing plastic pollution. The greatest stumbling block to reaching such an agreement is Saudi Arabia.

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Meanwhile, the extreme marine heat wave that hit California's coasts ten years ago may, in fact, have been a glimpse of the future.

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And in a world that is heating up, the permafrost may not be permanent.

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In Canada, the woodland caribou population is threatened by human activities, but an Indigenous group in Quebec is working to protect them and to ensure that they survive into the future.

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How did the bond between dogs and humans come about? Scientists are finding answers to that question in ancient DNA.

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The Hawaiian crow, the Alala, went extinct in the wild decades ago, but now five of the birds have been released on Maui as part of the ongoing attempt to reestablish the bird in its native habitat. It is a second chance for these brainy birds.

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A rare attack by a polar bear in Canada ended with the bear dead and the man who tried to prevent the attack on his wife in the hospital. A neighbor came to the rescue of the man and his wife and shot the bear. It is believed that the aberrant behavior of the bear may have been provoked by changes to the climate.

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The Arctic National Wildlife Refuge has been protected from drilling for the last four years but with the coming change of administrations in Washington that protection may not continue.

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In Scotland, the bumblebee population has made a dramatic recovery thanks to a rewilding project.

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An ancient forest in Tasmania teems with an astonishing variety of wildlife.

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The latest fashion trend among orcas in the Puget Sound is dead salmon hats.

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Pufferfish are cute and toxic and, just perhaps, Nature's greatest artist.

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Did hunting by early Americans help lead to the extinction of megafauna?

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The keepers at a bird park in England kept waiting for their "female" King Penguin to lay an egg, but it turns out Maggie the penguin is actually Magnus.

Poetry Sunday: Don't Hesitate by Mary Oliver

How about we share another Mary Oliver poem? After all, you can never have too many of those. In this one, the poet seems to acknowledge that it is often hard to simply live in and enjoy the moment, perhaps because we are afraid it can't last. She urges us to give in to that moment and fully experience the joy. Although "much can never be redeemed, still, life has some possibility left." Don't Hesitate by Mary Oliver If you suddenly and unexpectedly feel joy, don’t hesitate. Give in to it. There are plenty of lives and whole towns destroyed or about to be. We are not wise, and not very often kind. And much can never be redeemed. Still, life has some possibility left. Perhaps this is its way of fighting back, that sometimes something happens better than all the riches or power in the world. It could be anything, but very likely you notice it in the instant when love begins. Anyway, that’s often the case. Anyway, whatever it is, don’t be afraid of its plenty. Joy is no...

Poetry Sunday: Blackberry-Picking by Seamus Heaney

My mother was a farm wife and a prodigious canner. She canned fruit and vegetables from the garden, even occasionally meat. But the best thing that she canned, in my opinion, was blackberry jam. Even as I type those words my mouth waters! Of course, before she could make that jam, somebody had to pick the blackberries. And that somebody was quite often named Dorothy. I think Seamus Heaney might have spent some time among the briars plucking those delicious black fruits as well, so he would have known that "Once off the bush the fruit fermented, the sweet flesh would turn sour." They don't keep; you have to get that jam made in a hurry! Blackberry-Picking by Seamus Heaney Late August, given heavy rain and sun For a full week, the blackberries would ripen. At first, just one, a glossy purple clot Among others, red, green, hard as a knot. You ate that first one and its flesh was sweet Like thickened wine: summer's blood was in it Leaving stains upon the tongue and lust ...

Poetry Sunday: Hymn for the Hurting by Amanda Gorman

You probably remember poet Amanda Gorman from her appearance at the inauguration of President Biden. She read her poem "The Hill We Climb" on that occasion. After the senseless slaughter in Uvalde this week, she was inspired to write another poem which was published in The New York Times. It seemed perfect for the occasion and so I stole it in order to feature it here, just in case you didn't get a chance to read it in the Times . Hymn for the Hurting by Amanda Gorman Everything hurts, Our hearts shadowed and strange, Minds made muddied and mute. We carry tragedy, terrifying and true. And yet none of it is new; We knew it as home, As horror, As heritage. Even our children Cannot be children, Cannot be. Everything hurts. It’s a hard time to be alive, And even harder to stay that way. We’re burdened to live out these days, While at the same time, blessed to outlive them. This alarm is how we know We must be altered — That we must differ or die, That we must triumph or try. ...

The Nature of Things

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