Can You Fashion a Goose?

Aldo Leopold is one of the great names of nature writing and environmental thought. His classic, A Sand County Almanac, is still in print 66 years after its first publication in 1949. In the book, which encapsulates a lifetime of personal reflection, Leopold expounds a philosophy that he calls a land ethic.

[A pair of Canada geese]

He uses "land" to mean "soils, waters, plants, and animals" as well as the circuit of energy flowing between them. He summarises his land ethic thus.

A thing is right when it tends to preserve the integrity, stability, and beauty of the biotic community. It is wrong when it tends otherwise. 

Essentially Leopold wants us to recognise that we have ethical obligations not only to other human beings, but also to entire ecosystems, including animals and plants, soils, water and air.

What gives Leopold such on-going authority is that he beds his philosophical thought in long and direct observation of nature.  

I have seen a thousand geese this fall. Every one of these in the course of their epic journey from the arctic to the gulf has on one occasion or another probably served man in some equivalent of paid entertainment. One flock perhaps has thrilled a score of schoolboys, and sent them home with tales of high adventure. Another passing overhead of a dark night, has serenaded a whole city with goose music, and awakened who knows what questionings and memories and hopes.

[Migrating geese, Sitka, Alaska] 

This is partly an argument for the economic contribution of species via their inspiration/entertainment “value”. But Leopold goes well beyond this. For him economic value – what you will pay in exchange for something – is not the be-all-and-end-all. For him life forms have an intrinsic value. If we were, for instance, to make it extinct, who would be able to “fashion a goose” from scratch?

His quasi-biblical turn of phrase is reminiscent of God’s quizzing of Job in the Old Testament.

Does the hawk take flight by your wisdom and spread its wings toward the south? Does the eagle soar at your command and build its nest on high? (Job 39:26-27)

Both call for a similar humility in the face of living things. Sadly while humanity and humility might share many letters, that appears to be the extent of it. And so – despite the power of his words – I ask myself whether flocks of geese still thrill today’s schoolboys? And whether whole cities even notice their song? My instinctive answer is in the negative.

[Massed short-tailed shearwaters, Tasman Peninsula ... click image to enlarge]

But I try first to think of some Tasmanian equivalents. Is there anything that might send our school children scurrying home with eye-popping nature tales? Are they, for instance, thrilled by the arrival of millions of short-tailed shearwaters each spring; by their stupendous migration from the Arctic circle; or their effortless gliding flight just millimetres above the waves? Sadly if these incredible birds are known at all, they’re more likely to be observed on YouTube than over the ocean.

But turning to natural sounds, are there any that awaken something in today’s city dwellers? Are we, perhaps, captivated by the carolling serenade of the magpie; by “its silver stridency of sound”, as poet James McAuley put it? Just as I’m wondering this, my friend Paul posts a picture of singing magpies on facebook! There in suburban Melbourne, the magpies still have an appreciative audience.

[An Australian Magpie] 

And then my school teacher wife tells me a story of pelicans interrupting a recent music lesson. She’s been telling the 7 year olds about how birds have long inspired composers. In the middle of a lesson, one child calls out “Pelicans!”  Five pelicans are wheeling across the sky, making for the nearby bay. Lynne grabs the moment and rushes the class outside to take in the sight.

For long minutes they stare skyward, mouths wide open. For some there is immediate awe as the enormous birds fly over two or three times. Tellingly Lynne also observes how some of the more blasé students catch her enthusiasm and those of their peers. These are literally awe-inspiring moments, and worth a week’s worth of words about inspiration.

[An Australian pelican, East Coast Tasmania] 

So yes, I am convinced that Leopold’s land ethic, or something like it, is still called for: perhaps now more than ever. Could any of us fashion a goose, or a magpie, or a pelican if it dies out? And if I feel overwhelmed by the size of this ethical task, perhaps I need to consider that it might best be achieved one child, one bird, one street at a time.

Freycinet Experiences 4: Egotourists

A favourite cartoon of mine has a man in a pith helmet arriving for a bush holiday. Its heading says “Egotourism”, and the helmeted man is commanding those around him: “Tell the wildlife I have arrived!”

This comes to mind on the final morning of our Freycinet Experience Walk, and not for the first time on the trip. We’re gathered on the beach in front of the lodge for some pre-breakfast stretching exercises. As we finish, no-one is in a hurry to leave. Breakfast can wait as we sit and stare out at the low sun over the ocean. Birds fly over; the waves whisper; the sun scintillates off waters that match the blue sky and raise it a notch or two.

[A pair of pied oystercatchers at the Friendly Beaches] 

I shade my eyes, straining to see what’s happening beyond the waves. As if on cue a pod of dolphins surfaces. I’ve left my camera behind, so I simply take in those moments. We all watch, mesmerised, for several minutes. Yesterday we’d looked through the translucent waves and had seen schools of small fish through the water window. Perhaps these schools were drawing the dolphins.

If I were inclined to be an egotourist – and I see tick-lists of species as one form of that – I would have stoked my ego on this trip. I could have counted off dozens of bird species; multiple mammals of both land and sea; raptors and albatrosses that vie for the largest wing span; and fish swimming and jumping – some of them onto our plates!

But today as we pack up and leave, it’s my own species that I will miss the most. Meeting as a group of strangers, we have become friends. We’ve shared jokes and conversations; walks and wordless wonders; wildlife and weather, and those seemingly endless beaches. And, despite plenty of exercise, we’ve also shared a girth increase thanks to some amazing food!

[A group shot on the final morning at the lodge] 

For once breakfast is perfunctory; ‘though we’re promised a sizeable brunch before we have to leave to meet the bus. But first we have to pack our bags and head off to explore the bush property that belongs to the lodge. It’s all but surrounded by national park, nestled beneath hills that are somehow named mountains.

We climb up the ridge that leads towards Mt Peter, but today isn’t a day for mountains, however small. Instead we pause to hear about the property’s history, then share a little more of our own with our walking companions, before we’re on our way downhill towards Saltwater Lagoon.

[Another walk along the Friendly Beaches] 

And yes, yet more birds are there waiting for us, including some shy pelicans. If birds had egos, Australian pelicans could boast they were the equal of albatrosses when it came to wingspan. And they’d surely use their enormous bill as a trump card. But thankfully the birds aren’t concerned with such nonsense, and they quietly go about their business.

From the lagoon we walk back up the beach, sans shoes, chatting; splashing; taking in the incomparable peace that is the Friendlies in fair weather. From time to time we cast our eyes seaward on the off-chance of seeing more dolphins. Indeed why not hope for whales this time!

[Hannah and Daniel talk us through the brunch] 

And then we’re back at the lodge, and it’s time for brunch, whether we need sustenance or not. Hannah and Daniel haven’t let us down with any single course yet, and their hand-made pizzas are as amazing as anything they’ve prepared for us.

We dally over the food, not wanting our time to end. But too soon it’s group photograph time. And then we’re stacking our bags for Gil’s minibus and farewelling Eric, Hannah and Daniel, who will stay back at the lodge. The rest of us have one more long, lingering stroll up the Friendly Beaches to Isaacs Point.

[Gil and Jodi share a joke - probably at Eric's expense!] 

There Gil meets us and we’re soon driving out of the Friendlies and back to our various “other” lives. After an experience like this, I hesitate to say it’s “back to reality”. The profound reality of this place will carry on perfectly well without us. We could see that as a threat to our egos. Or we could accept the grace and generosity of the wild, and carry some of its reality with us.

[I walked the Freycinet Peninsula as a guest of Freycinet Experience Walk]

Sharing the Shore

Summer surf on Tasmania's East Coast 

They come in boats, they come in cars, they come on foot. They bring their ragged temporary dwellings, their exotic foods, their noisy animals, their strange cultural practices. If it feels like an invasion, to the creatures that live on our shorelines it really IS an invasion.

Every summer, Tasmanians come down to the shore, to spend those few precious days or weeks with sand between their toes and salt on their skin. Whether the weather cooperates is almost beside the point. It’s about getting back in touch with saltwater and ourselves. It’s a primaeval ritual so deep and strong that it’s easy to believe those who say we came from the sea in the first place.

Scenes from East Coast Tasmania 

But as creatures of comfort and instant gratification, these days we’re inclined to overlook who we share the shoreline with. Shorebirds are one obvious example.

I am visiting the Bay of Fires in Tasmania’s north-east. Today it is living up to its name, in temperature at least. By the time we reach the shore at Policemans Point the temperature is in the high 30s. Unless you’re immersed in the water, the conditions are ideal for neither bird nor beast. We still manage to see a dozen different species of shorebirds, including a pair of endangered little tern (Sterna albifrons sinensis).

As we wander the estuary shore, we start to see why some of these birds are endangered. There are a few boats messing about in the water. On the beach there are a couple of dogs and about a dozen people. In Tasmania that constitutes a crowd! There are also tyre tracks all over the sand: in short a pretty normal summer’s afternoon  at the beach.

But if you’re a little tern or a hooded plover, both birds which lay eggs straight on the sand above high tide, it’s perilous. At any time eggs or chicks are vulnerable to crushing, trampling or harassment by humans or their agents.

People, their feet, and their machines, can harm what lives on the shoreline 

As we watch a dog lollops up the beach doing what dogs do. It sniffs, runs, jumps about in the water, barks its happiness, turns to see where its humans are. Meanwhile it is getting nearer to three pelicans resting on the water. It doesn’t appear to have designs on the huge birds, but nonetheless its presence is too much for them. They lift off like lumbering, feathered float planes, and circle the estuary looking for somewhere safer to be. It’s an innocent enough scenario, but one that is repeated – and worsted – all over Australia’s accessible coastlines. And it’s avoidable.

A dog innocently scares off a group of pelicans 

Only the most severely eco-pathic individual would deliberately want to harm shorebirds. But through ignorance and an over-strong focus on only our own needs, we can still be responsible for putting fatal pressure on the birds that share the shore with us.

One simple action here would be to have dogs on leashes when there are birds on beaches. Another would be to keep vehicles off beaches, or where they’re loading/unloading boats, only access the water via a straight line perpendicular to the shore. And for people walking on shorelines, the simple rule is to stick to the wetter sand, so as to avoid the nesting sites that may be in the drier, higher sands.

I would add one other suggestion. Get a pair of binoculars and a bird book, and start getting to know who it is we share the shore with. I’ve yet to hear anyone say they regretted taking up bird-watching.

Dog and pelican: both delightful, but not comfortable together