Hirondelle

Odette's barnWhen I am in Estampes, I can time my days to Odette’s movement: 8 in the morning she lets out the chickens, and the sheep, gives water to the rabbits. 7 At night and she’s back again, watering, feeding, bringing in her creatures for the night. On this evening as I follow her through the routine, I’m paying particular attention. I’m in charge of all of this the next morning as Odette has an early doctor’s appointment. Odette has rarely left her animals to anyone so I want to get it right. Water for the rabbits; don’t forget to shut the barn door behind the sheep. It’s all very simple, but I feel like I’m being entrusted with the most important job.

As we step into the barn to put down hay for the sheep, a barn swallow swoops through the open door. Swallows, with their white bellies and long forked tails are obvious all day long as they wing about chattering in elegant loops and dives. Inside the dark barn a dozen mud-formed nests cling to the wooden rafters. Strings of straw dangle from cobwebs nearby in this nearly abandoned barn. The space between nest and the ceiling is narrow—just enough for a swallow head.

young barn swallows“The swallows, they always return on March 20,” Odette tells me. A person of daily rhythms keeps track of the larger rhythms of the world around her. “The 20^th, maybe to the 23^rd, but always in March. Usually the 20^th. I’ve noticed that.” I nod. “Oui, the vingt Mars,” Odette repeats. “But the swallows aren’t doing well.” She points to the ground. “Look.” At the tip of her toe rest two dead swallows, their small bodies crumpled on the cement floor of the barn.

She can’t explain it, but the swallows are dying. She’s not the only one to notice this. Genevieve, the local baker, tells me she doesn’t see swallows anymore. There are ten swallows in the village, Claude tells me. They all guess at what is wrong: the fertilizers on the fields, perhaps. They all shrug: who knows. There are a lot of mysteries in the farming life. This is one more.

Odette and I look about the barn. Under two nests are bird droppings, a sign that someone has taken up residence. “Maybe there will be young,” she says, hopeful.

The next morning as I quietly go about playing farmer, then I check on the nests. There’s a swallow on one, her body covering the opening of the mud structure. When I look closely, I see a little beak poking out the side. I slide the barn door shut, leaving her to her swallow business.

Eight days later I look out the window of my bedroom and see two swallows on the phone line and another stuck to the side of the house, clinging awkwardly to the stucco surface. I pull out my binoculars to look more closely because though the swallows fly over the house during the day, they have never stopped in for a visit like this. And I see that they do not have the long tail streamers of the adult male and female barn swallow. They have shorter tails. But really, it’s not this detail that lets me know they are juvenile birds. They all look a bit lost, a bit goofy, a bit young.  When a car drives by they turn their wide eyed heads in unison to see what it is. When a larger bird flies overhead they look up to see what is going on in this huge world beyond the dark of the nest and the barn. The young birds are not afraid of me as I take their photos. They look on, a bit bemused, as they learn how to be swallows.

Through the day, they use our courtyard as a place to hang out, to practice flying and to beg for food. From time to time an adult swoops in and satisfies that need, but most of the time they are on their own.

Later that night, I return to the barn and tell Odette about the baby swallows. The news cheers her. I peer in at the nests and see that the young have all returned to the safety of the barn for the night.

young swallows on a wireThe next day, the swallows are back. As I sit at the dining room table writing I can hear their chatter as they swoop through the courtyard. And then I hear a flutter above my head—swallows doing laps in the dining room! I look over just on time to see two swallows fly out the door. They left quickly, but really they are welcome anytime.  

Haskell-Baker Wetlands

The Haskell-Baker wetlands in Lawrence Kansas are paradise. Most marshlands are paradise because they contain enchanting and secretive birds, like rails and bitterns. But there's something particularly magic about this almost 600 acres of land, located just off of 31st street in the southern part of this college town in prairie country.

I was in Lawrence for the ASLE conference (Association for LIterature and the Environment). I'm not a conference person--but if ever there was a conference for me, this is it. Friday afternoon is devoted to fieldtrips, one of which is to kayak down the Kansas River. And, a ten-minute drive from my extraordinarily bleak dorm room, sits the Haskell-Baker wetlands (also known as the Wakarus Wetlands).

DickcisselAt 6 every morning, I shared the marshlands with the clack of rails and the witchita witchit witchita calls of common yellowthroats. I'm enchanted by the blues: of the Indigo Bunting so vivid against the skyline, but also of little blue herons, poking through the grasses. It's exciting to see such vibrancy in Tanagers and Orchard Orioles, and then one lone Yellow-crowned Night Heron. As I walk down the flat, green path, bordered by wet areas choked with reeds and cattails, there’s a call that is new to me. I listen to the chirr of the bird with a black throat that’s just bigger than a sparrow. Soon I identify it: Dickcissel (not one of the best bird names out there). It’s a common, vocal bird in the prairies, and to me, it’s a treat. I discover a blind, which allows me quiet views onto the marsh. Every morning of the conference, I walk with the sure happiness of someone who knows she will see something special.

Noooooo!One morning there is something new on the trail. Not coyote scat or a snake or a cottontail vanishing into the grass. There's a sign. The sign tells me that 31st street is going to cut into this marsh, railroad through this lush place so alive with breeding birds. I stop and stare at the sign and I feel something itch behind my eyes. How can a road cut into wetlands--I naively believe they are protected. The thought makes me dizzy. If this land rested near me I'd spend umpteen hours fighting the proposed road. Turns out locals have been fighting this construction for twenty years--with intelligence and persistence. But it looks like the fight has ended; the road is going to be built.

I have just gotten to know this place, and yet I’m still a bit heartbroken. Every chunk taken out of wild and precious places hurts.

Indigo BuntingBut the truth is this place is not really wild.  It's a piece of land, I learn, with a long history. This marsh rests in the Wakarusa Valley and was originally 18,000 acres. These remaining 600 acres are adjacent to the Haskell Indian Nations University. In 1884, when the school was founded, it belonged to them.  Giving the Indians a chunk of swampland was not a generous gesture--it was useless land. But they drained the swamp and made it into agricultural land. In the 30s, it fell into disuse and was given back to the city. (For a fuller history, read this clear blog post from Haskell graduate, Jessica Lackey). That the city now wants to build a highway, supported by $192 million from the governor, through what remains of the wetlands seems absurd. There are lots of places to build roads. Why here? Perhaps because we still see wetlands as throwaway land. Kansas DOT will fill, then pave over all of this rich bird habitat.

ASLE has, to my delight, given money to the efforts to preserve these wetlands.  Jessica Lackey, a member of the Cherokee Nation, spoke with tremendous clarity about the work she has done as she organizes others to think about environmental issues with a Native perspective. She's done an analysis of planting prairie grasses on the campus (rather than the fertilized lawn that needs constant mowing). Geographer Mike Caron offered a clear history of the site and the lives of the Native children brought to the school to be educated: the marshlands were the place they turned to in order to continue their rituals, and as solace. Others offered a sense of the ongoing fight--and they seem a bit worn down, as if this latest victory for the Kansas Department of Transportation might be final. They have all engaged in a long fight, which for someone young like Jessica is almost her entire life.

View from a blind onto the marshThis all reminds me of the long fight of the Hudson River Valley: Storm King. For 28 years environmentalists, fishermen, and those who love the Valley fought against GE building a pump storage station on the summit of Storm King Mountain. One of the great fighters in that case and for other Hudson River issues was Pete Seeger. What would he say? Keep on.  

On my last day in Lawrence I make a final pilgrimage to this place I find so magical and that I’ll probably never see again. There's a father and his three and a half year old daughter walking the causeway. Olivia's got a pink barrette in her hair. She's gregarious, asking me what I have seen and we discuss footprints in the mud. She starts to head out with me, to see more things and her father stops her, "we're going home now." We hesitate for a moment, and he asks where I'm from; New York. This is a great place to raise a kid, I note, and he nods. "Are we in Kansas?" Olivia asks. I almost laugh. We are. And it's beautiful.

Little Blue Heron I walk further out into the swamp and three young men, jogging, pass me. "It's snake city down there," one says cheerfully. I see a water snake stretched in the path and look for brothers and sisters. I turn to leave, saying goodbye to this place that might be paved over as early as this summer. I wish—knowing that wishing is not enough--that the marshlands continue on with the memories of those Native children; as a place for Olivia to grow up; as a perfect place for those boys to run; as the ideal environment for birders eager to see special birds. Keep on my Kansas friends. Keep on.

Snow Goose

As I approached the South Tivoli Bay, I heard a dramatic squawk. Two enormous birds looped and circled around each other. It took a moment for me to realize what I was looking at: an Immature Bald Eagle chasing a Great Blue Heron. It seemed like a case of teenaged miscalculation. The Heron dropped into the reeds and vanished. The eagle flew off.

Thrilled by the show, I continued snowshoeing south, following the path that meanders near the edge of the South Tivoli Bay. The Bay is wide and shallow, often freezing up before the rest of the river. Snow covered the ground and the temperatures hovered near freezing. I could see that the Bay had a thin coat of ice, gleaming in the high noon sun. There are three underpasses that lead to the Hudson River and near those underpasses stood open water. There had to be ducks nearby.

Goose bedraggled; photo by Bard student Christina BaalI arrived at a jut of land affectionately referred to as Buttocks Island. I walked out through the crevice of the island and peered south. A flock of Ring-Billed Gulls stood on the thin sheet of ice. Soon, the heron joined them, standing tall next to its shorter compatriots. I spotted the eagle in a far tree on the end of Cruger Island, perched near a mature eagle, it’s white head visible without my binoculars. The immature eagle flew over, swooping low over the gulls. They all took to the air, while the heron stood, refusing to engage in another chase.

I loitered for a while, scoping the Common Mergansers floating in the open water near the underpass. Beyond the underpass I could see the far shore of the river, the hamlet of Glasco and the Catskills, lumpy blue, in the background. It was a perfect blue-sky day, the sort of day that demands time outside.

I poked around the south side of Buttock’s Island, hoping without much hope, to see a Snow Goose there. Just after Hurricane Sandy swept through, the Goose arrived. It looked pretty bedraggled, white feathers all askew. When thousands of Snow Geese migrated through the valley this fall it did not pick up and join its cousins. I assumed it was too injured to fly. Despite this, the bird had made it through December, with frequent visits from Bard College students, eager to see a special bird. Through the fall I had grown fond of the bird, thought of it as my goose, and had resisted an urge to feed it.

The bird wasn’t there, of course. I refused to get sentimental. This was just nature taking her course. A fox or a coyote could have made it a good meal.

I continued on my way, taking the narrow path that rolls over hillocks and hugs the South Tivoli Bay. The views through the trees were long, out to patches of open water where Black Ducks floated. As I approached the mouth of the Sawkill, I heard the cackle of the Kingfisher that had been there all summer and fall. And then, to my amazement, there was my goose, idling in the open water! It shoved further out as I approached, full of admiration for its will to live.

 

RV in Alaska

I have always been fascinated with life on the road. My fantasy runs more to Travels with Charley than it does with those monstrous RVs that hog the road (what DO they have in there?) getting 2 miles to the gallon. To roam freely like a turtle with its shell had become a real fantasy. And my fantasy vehicle is the RoadTrek. It's sleek and runs on diesel and costs a fortune (just about what I paid for my house that doesn't roll around, and that will appreciate, not depreciate). It's a RoadTrek I had in mind when I decided we would rent an RV in Alaska. Instead, I found website after website of big fat RVs to rent. So that's what we would do.
The company I found online boasted they were homegrown Alaskan. Rave reviews followed. I booked early and got a discount. I was ridiculously excited about this leg of the trip, and imagined sending photos of me at the wheel of our rig, grinning as I backed into a camp site.
From the start it was clear that choosing homegrown wasn't such a good idea. When we were ready to go, at 9 on the morning, I called for a pick up. The message said, leave a message, but call back as well; I don't return phone calls. So I called a while later and they said the rig would be ready at noon. At noon they said 1:30. At 2:30 they said they'd pick us up in twenty minutes. At 3:45 they picked us up. At 4:30 we rolled out of the parking lot in a vehicle with nearly bald tires, that rattled (loose heat shield?), that barked (hole in muffler?) that had a cracked windshield and, we learned after being honked at a few times, the left blinker didn't work. I won't even begin to list the problems inside, like the passenger seat that flopped backward and would not lock, or the refrigerator that froze all of our food, or the shower that leaked. Sitting in the RV felt like being suspended in a hammock as we swayed from side to side rolling down the road. It was not a good feeling.
First stop: Walmart. In my strongest moments I find Walmart a challenge. I staggered out with our food for the next nine days. Second stop: the airport where we hoped PenAir would have delivered our luggage that did not make it onto our return flight from St. Paul. It was supposed to be in at 4:30. It was not, but they promised it would arrive at 7:30. It didn't arrive then either.
So luggage-less and in our swaying vehicle we made our way out of Anchorage. A gloom settled into the RV as we both took in our situation. Our plan to drive the Denali Highway vanished as we realized this RV wasn't reliable enough to drive the dirt road. What if we got a flat? the RV rental refused to give us a jack. "You'd never figure out how to use it."
I read the description for a camping spot outside of Palmer, a suburb to Anchorage. "Beautiful views of the Matanuska Valley," it said. A series of RV stacked in a row occupied a vast, characterless field. "Beautiful," I echoed as Peter pulled in.
I hardly slept through the night under our polyester sheets as I went through the ridiculousness of this venture. Driving a big, clunky vehicle is not an adventure; it was just midnight anxiety. We woke to walk down a mosquito-infested dirt road in search of Hammond's Flycatcher. No bird but the walk did, for a moment, distract us from our situation.
The drive out the Glenn Highway is one of the most beautiful in the world. In the distance, the snowy mountains of the Wrangell Mountains. The black spruce that line most of the road give a sense of true wilderness. A Northern Hawk Owl swooped across the road, a Robin in hot pursuit. There was little room to pull over but Peter got the RV off the road and we ran back to find the Owl perched on top of a tree. A mate joined it and the two sat there, staring at the world.
Excited by our owls, we rolled forward. We had expected to already be in Paxson by this night, but the RV wasn't much good over 50 miles per hour, so we were short of our goal.
The Tolsona Wilderness Campsite at one point had nesting Great Gray Owls--what could be more thrilling? So we turned in there for the night. We had a site right next to a stream, an open and beautiful place to sleep. Turning off the engine of the RV was the sweetest moment. Peter leapt from the driver's seat, relieved to be done with the narrow, often shoulder-less road in a fat vehicle. We needed a walk, so headed toward the gravel entrance road, intending to go in search of those owls (a search we knew would be fruitless, but we had to try). A squirrel caught his eye, and when Peter focused on the squirrel he saw two little brown blobs at the base of a large spruce tree. "Owls!" he said, practically walking up to them.
Two baby Boreal Owls huddled together, staring at us. Their wide eyes were framed with white, but the rest of them was a downy brown, the fluff of babyhood. There is nothing as magic as an owl. But a baby owl--I was shaking with the excitement of this. Others staying at the campground caught wind of our excitement and came over to look. A little boy peered into the woods. I handed him my binoculars. "Look closely," I said. "You will never see this again in your life." I was speaking to myself.
Through the night I woke a few times, wondering if those little owls were safe. A family of Ravens had set up camp on the other side of the river. The baby Ravens--nearly full size--made a racket asking for food. I didn't trust those Ravens not to take the owls.
At three in the morning Peter woke to the noise of the baby owls begging for food. He went out and recorded their cries. Later in the morning we visited them both, eyes closed in contentment, perched on tree limbs off the ground.
And here is how my logic works: if we had a light and fast car, or even a smooth riding RV, we never would have stopped at this campground, we never would have seen those baby Boreal Owls. I didn't start loving the RV--that would be going too far--but I saw that it was a part of this magical evening and night sharing a campsite with baby Boreal Owls.

Me, smiling at the wheel of the RV (a fake smile); two blobs of Boreal Owl; close up of Boreal Owls--photo by Peter Schoenberger