This week in birds - #393

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

A Snowy Egret photographed at Anahuac National Wildlife Refuge shows off his "golden slippers".

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The losses of ice sheets in Greenland and Antarctica are tracking the worst-case scenario as stated by climate scientists. They are melting six times faster than they were in the 1990s.

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Mangrove forests, marshes, and seagrass beds protect inland areas from storm surges and strong winds. Over long periods, coastal wetlands like these build up sediment that mitigates sea level rise and local land subsidence. A recent study found that there were staggering economic benefits derived from having healthy wetlands, a good reason to protect them.

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In the absence of leadership from the federal government, many states are exploring cooperation in the fight against climate change.

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A study indicates that birds are beneficial to farms that grow corn because they help to control pest insects. However, they do not provide the same benefit to soybean farms because they tend to eat some of the "natural enemies" of soybean pest insects.

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Climate change is altering the character of the Kenai National Wildlife Refuge in Alaska. The forest is disappearing and the land is becoming grassland. Refuge managers are considering introducing grassland species, including bison, to proactively adapt to the changes.

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The Atlantic Forest area between Brazil and Argentina has seen the number of jaguars more than double to 105. This is after the area had almost lost all of its big cats in the early 2000s.

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A tiny skull trapped in 99-million-year-old amber suggests that some of the earliest birds evolved to become miniature. The skull may be from the world's tiniest dinosaur.

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The administration in Washington is considering pushing for federal assistance for oil and gas producers hit by plummeting gas prices during the coronavirus pandemic. Because, of course, they are.

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Meanwhile, the city of Honolulu has filed a lawsuit against eight petroleum companies for damages to the city from climate change.

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The Greater Sage-Grouse has lost much of its habitat to oil and gas drilling and the Bureau of Land Management's solution to this is to cut down piñon and juniper forests to create more grouse habitat. Is this really an acceptable answer?

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Coconut crabs in the Philippines are considered a rare delicacy and they are being overharvested to serve to tourists. Different options, including a possible sanctuary, are being considered to protect the creatures. 

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Cameras set up in gaps in the border wall between the United States and Mexico have documented the wildlife that passes back and forth through the border.

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Intensive agricultural practices are contributing to the decline of the Mourning Dove population in the eastern part of the country.

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The tiny land bridge between Central and South America that is the Darién region creates a kind of bottleneck for neotropical birds migrating between the two continents.

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Studies that delve into how animals adapt in urban environments are still relatively rare. But anoles are becoming a model system for urban evolutionary research. Recent research shows how urban lizards in Puerto Rico are adapting to the increased heat of the urban landscape. 

"No, I'm not a Puerto Rican anole but it gets pretty darned hot in Texas, too!"

Interior Chinatown by Charles Yu: A review

Charles Yu presents his book as if it were a teleplay set in a Chinatown restaurant called the Golden Palace. The restaurant is the setting for a cop show called "Black and White." Yu's protagonist, Willis Wu, is a bit player on that show and through him, the author considers the stereotypes about Asians and Asian-Americans that are stock in trade for Hollywood. His portrayal of these cliches is utterly devastating. Also quite funny.

And so we learn about "Background Asian Male," "Dead Asian Man," "Generic Asian Man Number One, Two, and Three," and, of course, "Delivery Guy." These are all roles played from time to time by Willis Wu. The role that he really, really wants to play is "Kung Fu Guy," but he never gets the chance. 

We gradually come to see that not only does Wu play these roles on the television show, but he also to some extent inhabits them in his real life. Through these roles, we learn his character.

We also meet Wu's father, Sifu, who himself was once a "young dragon" and martial arts expert but has now passed into the role of "Old Asian Man." Sifu loves the songs of John Denver and he loves singing karaoke featuring "Country Roads." Yu describes white people making fun of Asian-Americans doing karaoke, but he writes of Sifu:

"When he steps up and starts slaying 'Country Roads,' try not to laugh...because by the time he gets to 'West Virginia, mountain mama' you're going to be singing along, and by the time he's done you might understand why a 77-year-old guy from a tiny island in the Taiwan strait who's been in a foreign country two-thirds of his life can nail a song, note perfect, about wanting to go home."  

It is a brief sketch through which we understand Sifu's character and Yu has such character sketches throughout. These sketches not only reveal the characters, they also develop the plot

Yu has written for television shows such as "Westworld" and the quirky "Lodge 49," which my husband and I recently watched, and Interior Chinatown continues his string of unique works. It is essentially a darkly funny book about racism and the way that Hollywood's reliance on stereotypes to tell its stories helps to perpetuate such racism and continues to maintain the status quo. Yu makes his points subtly, without hitting us over the head. It is very effectively done.

My rating: 4 of 5 stars 

The Silent Patient by Alex Michaelides: A review

I have resisted reading this book as it has solidified its spot on the best sellers list over several weeks. Something about the description of the plot just put me off. But the book kept nagging at me and finally I surrendered. Take me, Alex Michaelides, I am yours.

And actually, it wasn't bad. 

The plot briefly is this: Alicia Berenson, a well-known artist, has been convicted of killing her husband, Gabriel, a fashion photographer. Gabriel was bound to a chair and then shot in the face five times. Afterward, Alicia slashed her wrists and thus they were discovered - the dead body of Gabriel and Alicia bleeding profusely. 

There was never any question that Alicia had committed the murder, although a motive was apparently never identified. The investigation and the trial were complicated by the fact that the accused murderer either refused or was unable to speak. Now it is several years later. Alicia has spent those years in an institution for the mentally ill and during that time despite the best efforts of her doctors, she has not spoken a word.

Enter psychotherapist Theo Faber. He has been employed at another facility but he is aware of Alicia's case and is fascinated by it. When the opportunity comes to accept a position at The Grove, the place where Alicia is housed, he jumps at the chance.  He is assigned to work with her and he begins the process, seeing no change in her behavior at first. But gradually he makes a connection with her and sees that he is making progress, although she still doesn't speak.

The narrative switches to the background of Theo's marriage, which he had thought was a happy one. But then he discovers that his wife, an actress, is having an affair. He becomes a stalker of her lover and finds where he lives, learning that he, too, is married.

The narrative is quite ambiguous regarding the timeframes of these two storylines and you have to read until almost the end of the book to see the connection in what is billed as a "shocking twist". Well, I admit it was unexpected although I recognized at least one big hole in the plot early on. Namely, Gabriel had been tied in a chair before being shot. Exactly how did Alicia manage to overpower him and do that? Why did the police apparently not question that? It just didn't make sense to me. There were other less obvious things that didn't add up as well. Let's just say the plot is porous.

One feels empathy for Alicia lost in her silent world and viewed as a challenge to be conquered by her psychotherapist. Theo, on the other hand, did not engage my sympathies. I questioned his motives from the first and found him to be quite self-serving in his actions. He is our main source for the story and he gives new meaning to the term "unreliable narrator". The other characters in the book are underdeveloped and not particularly memorable.

This was Alex Michaelides' first novel. He had previously written for films. It is a promising start, a good idea for a psychological thriller that was just a bit sloppy in the execution. But, on the whole, not a bad book. I wavered between a three-star and four-star rating for it and, of course, in the end, I decided to be generous.  

My rating: 4 of 5 stars

Poetry Sunday: Dear March - Come in by Emily Dickinson

So now we welcome March and wonder how we got here so fast. And, of course, there is a poem for that by no less than the "Belle of Amherst" herself. It's somewhat enigmatic. What do you think it means?

Dear March – Come in (1320)

by Emily Dickinson 

Dear March – Come in –

How glad I am –

I hoped for you before –

Put down your Hat –

You must have walked –

How out of Breath you are –

Dear March, how are you, and the Rest –

Did you leave Nature well –

Oh March, Come right upstairs with me –

I have so much to tell –

I got your Letter, and the Birds –

The Maples never knew that you were coming –

I declare – how Red their Faces grew –

But March, forgive me –

And all those Hills you left for me to Hue –

There was no Purple suitable –

You took it all with you –

Who knocks? That April –

Lock the Door –

I will not be pursued –

He stayed away a Year to call

When I am occupied –

But trifles look so trivial

As soon as you have come

That blame is just as dear as Praise

And Praise as mere as Blame –

This week in birds - #392

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

The redbud tree is blooming. Unfortunately, there are no Pine Siskins here this winter to perch in it. This picture is from a previous year.

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Scientists have warned us for years that climate change will bring more extreme weather of all kinds. As far as I know, no scientist has expressed an opinion regarding a connection between the violent tornadoes that devastated middle Tennessee this week, but I admit that was my first thought when I heard that this was the strongest-rated tornado to hit anywhere in the nation in three years. 

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Scientists are confirming a connection between climate change and the wildfires that swept through a large swath of Australia in recent months.

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Yes, this is a part of New York City. (Image from The New York Times.)

When you think of Staten Island - if you think of Staten Island - you probably don't imagine it as overrun with wildlife, but, in fact, the least populous borough of New York City has an extensive population of deer, wild turkeys, and also feral cats and this is causing some serious problems for the ecosystem.

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The world's second-largest contiguous rainforest, the Congo Basin of central Africa, is losing its capacity for absorbing carbon dioxide, which would be extremely detrimental to its ability to store greenhouse gases related to climate change. 

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The real "Pirates of the Caribbean" are Magnificent Frigatebirds which have a well-earned reputation for the efficiency and effectiveness with which they plunder food from other birds. 

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As cougars continue to grow in population and expand their range, they are increasingly coming in contact with humans, which can sometimes be problematic.

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The current federal government, through the EPA, is putting further far-reaching restrictions on the science that can be used in formulating environmental and public health regulations.

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California has just had its driest February on record. This comes after a January that was also drier than average and a record dry autumn for much of the northern part of the state.

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Six previously unknown species of geckos have been described by scientists in Australia. Some of the species are widely found in the country and had evidently been hiding in plain sight. 

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Feeding and watching backyard birds has become a popular activity for many Americans, but it is important to do the feeding in the right way. Here are some tips.

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The meteorological winter of 2019-2020 has shattered records for warmth in many parts of the northern hemisphere. In Moscow, this was the warmest winter in nearly 200 years of record-keeping, with an average temperature at or above the freezing mark. 

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Conservationists on Kauai are using sound to attract endangered seabirds to protected areas for breeding. They play recordings of the sounds made by the species in order to welcome them to the sites.

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Here's news of an interesting innovation in Philadelphia. A new apartment building there will function as its own power-producing plant.

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This is a Woodcock, a secretive bird of the woods that you might not expect to find in Manhattan, but the "Incidental Naturalist" tells us we would be wrong in that assumption.

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This may not really have anything to do with the environment as such but it is a bit of science that has always completely fascinated me. I speak of Voyager 2 that has been traveling through space for 43 years and is now 13 million miles from Earth. And still phoning home. But starting next week when Voyager calls, Earth will not be able to answer for the next eleven months. So even though the probe will still be sending data back to us, if something goes wrong with it, scientists won't be able to send a fix because the space age equipment used to beam messages around the solar system will be offline for eleven months. Let us hope that nothing goes wrong in that time. Fly safely, Voyager, and take our message to whatever worlds are out there more than 13 million miles away.   

Righteous by Joe Ide: A review

I read Joe Ide's first book in his series, IQ, a couple of years ago and liked it well enough that I thought I would read further, but, as often happens, I was distracted by other books and actually sort of forgot about it. Then I happened upon this one recently. This is the second in the series and I decided to give it a read.

The events in this book take place ten years after the hit-and-run death of Isaiah Quintabe's older brother, Marcus, the experience that has set Isaiah on his life's path. His righteous anger over the incident has not abated; in fact, it has only gotten stronger over the years, fueled by the fact that the killer was never found and brought to justice. He is still searching for that killer.

But then Isaiah is contacted by Sarita, who was Marcus' girlfriend at the time of his death and someone for whom Isaiah has nourished a secret crush. She seeks his help for her sister, Janine, a DJ and gambler addict living in Las Vegas with her loser boyfriend, Benny. Janine and Benny are in trouble with Chinese gangsters and loan sharks. They are in way over their heads and in danger and Sarita wants to get her sister out of Las Vegas and away from those who threaten her. Isaiah takes the case and convinces his friend Dodson to help him out. Dodson somewhat reluctantly heads to Las Vegas with Isaiah (IQ), leaving behind his very pregnant girlfriend, Cherise. 

The main plot deals with IQ's efforts to help Janine and Benny and impress Sarita but there are a dizzying number of side plots, including IQ's discovery that his brother's death was no accident; it was actually murder. At a junkyard, he discovered the car that ran him down - 10 years after the event! (To say that that discovery stretched the limits of my imagination and my willingness to suspend belief is an understatement.)

But that hardly even scratches the surface. There was the drama of Cherise's pregnancy; there were multiple gang disputes that degenerated into brawls and all sorts of additional drama; there was a subplot involving human trafficking. There were too many characters to keep track of and each of the secondary characters was given an extensive back story to explain who he or she was and their role in the story. I felt the book would have benefited from a tighter focus on the main story and character and that other characters could have been adequately introduced through dialogue without the author having to give us a mini-biography of each of them. As it is, IQ comes across as a kind of one-dimensional character, motivated by anger and loneliness but without humor and with little leavening of any kind. 

Still, there are the makings of a fascinating character here and one feels sympathy for this lonely outsider. We want to see him succeed. I think the next book in the series will be definitive in deciding whether that character becomes a full-fledged human being and whether Joe Ide really has a successful series in the works.

My rating: 3 of 5 stars 

Poetry Sunday: Forgetfulness by Billy Collins

The former poet laureate Billy Collins is one of the most popular American poets writing today. It's easy to see why. He writes poetry that is very accessible and that has a wry and gentle humor. It's poetry that often references everyday events in people's lives, thus it is poetry that ordinary people can relate to and appreciate. It's poems like this one that talks about something which many of us experience as we get older. See if you recognize yourself here.

Forgetfulness

by Billy Collins

The name of the author is the first to go

followed obediently by the title, the plot,

the heartbreaking conclusion, the entire novel

which suddenly becomes one you have never read, never even heard of,

as if, one by one, the memories you used to harbor

decided to retire to the southern hemisphere of the brain,

to a little fishing village where there are no phones.

Long ago you kissed the names of the nine muses goodbye

and watched the quadratic equation pack its bag,

and even now as you memorize the order of the planets,

something else is slipping away, a state flower perhaps,

the address of an uncle, the capital of Paraguay.

Whatever it is you are struggling to remember,

it is not poised on the tip of your tongue

or even lurking in some obscure corner of your spleen.

It has floated away down a dark mythological river

whose name begins with an L as far as you can recall

well on your own way to oblivion where you will join those

who have even forgotten how to swim and how to ride a bicycle.

No wonder you rise in the middle of the night

to look up the date of a famous battle in a book on war.

No wonder the moon in the window seems to have drifted   

out of a love poem that you used to know by heart.