I can report that there are fireflies in NYC. I often think that cities are an unexpected saving grace. We have less pesticide use and less monocrop areas. We've got some serious bees and wasps, all kinds of birds including herons, ospreys, hawks, and recently the crows have returned after a long absence. There's a project I follow on IG called the Billion Oyster Project. They've been working on restoring the oyster reefs in the harbor. They have been reporting success as well as other species returning, like sea horses. There is love and hope. And never count the Earth herself out of the story.
So true. The history of northern Pacific coast salmon is also instructive: fish weirs strung across stream mouths killed almost every salmon run and experts thought the fishery was dead. But a decade after the weirs were removed, the streams were filled with salmon again.
That is some good news Sybil!.... I agree and think you've made a great point - 'never count Earth herself out of the story'...... It is the same with us - we are in partnership with our planet and she is a conscious being.... invested in us and in her creation.
Truly beautiful! They are sacred. When I moved into my current home there was nothing in the front or back yard but concrete, a patch of forlorn looking grass, and a lilac tree that had been repeatedly strimmed. It had a single spire. The garden was barren apart from slugs. Three years later and it is filled with insects and butterflies (red admiral, cabbage white, fritillary etc.) and we've even had a hedgehog and a frog. Birds visit to eat the insects too. It's not a large garden, but I've filled it with flowers, dug up the concrete at the front, and put down large raised beds on the concrete at the side for vegetables. I can't change the world, but I can do something about my own space. Around us, land is being gobbled up for building gargantuan warehouses and residential estates - not brown land, but arable! It is a depressing, worrying sight.
Bravo! I turned my 5-acre property into a native plant haven for butterflies, birds, and bees. It took me a long time because I did all the work myself, but the results are SO worth it. And I learned so much doing it.
Oh good for you! I am turning little patches into milkweed garden. And as the milkweed seeds - replanting them. I saw a few more butterflies the following season. I hope more to come! Thanks for the inspiration!
That’s fantastic 🙌 we are lucky to have a 3 acre patch of wilderness in very rural coastal Donegal (NW of Ireland) - it was very overgrazed when we arrived in 2007 by the previous owners horses. We have planted about 1000 trees, (alder, rowan, silver birch, oak, hawthorn, blackthorn, hazel, Holly, plum hawthorn, ash, Scot’s pine, damson, apple, ), with mixed success as it is so windy and exposed, but we have learned what works best and now have some trees over 20’ - the noticeable difference is the huge increase in insects, ground cover and wild flowers and small birds. Lots of frogs in the two ponds. Of course we are very lucky to have such a large area to start with, but it feels great to make a difference
The solution is to literally stop doing anything about it. Governments need to stop looking at mosquitos as a problem.
In Mexico, they have a mosquito abatement program that consists of fliers posted around town indicating how to cut tires into thirds, lay each piece down to allow water to pool, then place pieces of paper on the water which mosquitos may then lay their eggs. Remove and replace the pieces of paper twice a week.
Mexico also has no forestry service to speak of, but when you fly over, you'll notice a patchwork which precludes the need for one. Each fire can only burn an acre or a few acres at the most before it hits last years, or the fire the year before. They practically burn out before anyone notices them.
About a dozen years ago I moved from California to a somewhat swampy area slightly inland from the gulf coast of Florida. There were no butterflies evident anywhere. My yard, like every yard in the neighborhood, consisted of grass and an old tree that had clogged my septic tank with its roots. After dispatching the tree and grinding the roots, I proceeded to haul in well over 40 truckloads of FREE mulch. While I was waiting for all that mulch to turn to compost, I searched online for a list of native species, invasive species (many which are edible as well, and yes, I broke the law. Call me crazy. Call me a radical, but I now have well over a few hundred pounds of food growing in my yard.) as well as anything else that would thrive in this climate zone.
I also carried a pair of clippers in the glove compartment of my car, and whenever I saw anything blooming on the side of a road, vacant lot, etc. I would stop and take a cutting or ten, plant them in anything that would hold dirt until they were ready to be transplanted into the compost.
Fastforward ten years and my yard is alive with caterpillars, butterflies of all shapes, colors, and sizes. There are cocoons popping up everywhere. along with frogs, mosquitos, lizards, snakes, armadillos, possums, raccoons, deer, foxes, etc. etc.
This year has been exceptionally hot, so half of my flowering plants are not flowering at all, but because I have such a wide variety of plants, I still have plenty of butterflies. One of my neighbors decided to do the same thing, and we've since begun swapping plants, seeds, cuttings etc.
I just discovered that the county has a program whereby I can call and request that the pond behind my property be stocked with "mosquito fish" which can eat their weight in mosquitos every day. Perhaps this may be enough for them to at least stop spraying around this area.
Thanks for the kind words, but honestly when I started hauling in one load of mulch after another, my main concern was to find a way to stop spending so much time mowing grass, and secondarily figure out an easy way to grow and store food. The more food I grow, the less Big Ag needs to grow. That's where I see the biggest benefits to the environment being realized. Put the Rockefellers, Big Ag, and Big Pharma out of business.
The butterflies along with all the other wildlife were just a bonus. I sit in my living room sometimes and just stare out at all the butterflies flitting from one flower to another. Quite often while I'm working in the yard, they will stop and land on me. People think this is unusual, but when they're literally everywhere, it's not that unusual at all. I've had lizards, frogs, and dragonflies jump on me as well.
I would conservatively estimate that there is well over 500 pounds of tubers buried in my back yard alone. I have three varieties of sweet potato and five different varieties of yams which I've never harvested. They just keep growing bigger and heavier every year. I have seven different varieties of spinach, two of which are poisonous if not cooked properly. Quite often while I'm strolling through the garden I will snack on the tomatoes, ivy gourd cucumbers, peppers lettuce and spinach. it's like eating a salad without having to make any preparations. There are no dishes to wash either. I'm growing my own ginger, sassafras, and sugar cane which allows me to make my own naturally carbonated ginger ale, and root beer. It's a probiotic which has been a godsend for me. I haven't been to a doctor in years, and I canceled my health insurance about three years ago.
Almost every time I go out into the yard, I end up covered in dirt. You can't see any skin on my hands or forearms or my legs. I've heard it isn't healthy to have all that dirt on my skin, but I've always had skin problems, but even that seems to be going away as well.
Your garden sounds like paradise!! How satisfying it must be to have created such an oasis.... so much life where there was once, not so long ago (how long was it?) none....
I wish I lived somewhere warmer - with such natural abundance. Wow. Beautiful.
I LOVE that - put 'that lot' out of business !!!!! Here's to that !
I used to love going to the Pacific Islands (it's been 3 years now, sadly) - butterflies aplenty...
Life thrives in the warmth so much more....
Enjoy the fruits of your labours... Mother Earth is giving back tenfold by the sound of it....
We all need to be in partnership with her in this way. It will be our way out of this insanity.
I always wanted to hit the Pacific islands, but ended up spending my time down in Central America and the Caribbean instead. As much as I enjoy this little piece of paradise, there are a few drawbacks. I never get used to the snakes, and some of the neighbors don't like the looks of it and have taken to tossing their garbage into it due to the fact that it is easy to make it disappear into the thick foliage. I just noticed a stiff possum tossed into my driveway yesterday.
If you look at a lot of people who are doing this, especially when looking at "before" and "after" pictures, quite often the before is neat and clean while the after is basically an homage to Boo Radleys front yard. In my case it now includes vultures roosting in the trees.
When people see the vultures roosting in the trees, or feasting on God knows what in the driveway, they're going to start seeing these as unwelcome omens of things to come. That's just the way people are. Although even though it looks creepy to me, it also looks kinda cool as well. It really gives my yard this wild dangerous appearance.
Haha - nothing is every without a 'con' side is it. Vultures!! Wow. We don't have those birds in this country. Possums, yes. Snakes no. I think I chose to incarnate in this country for just that reason - no snakes. Your abundant food supply however, is enviable.... And so wonderful you have all those beautiful butterflies. We went to a butterfly 'farm' (or whatever they call them) in Florida a few years ago, when on a cruise. Those amazing blue ones! You're lucky....!
They are trying to kill you - depop. So don't count on them stopping the spraying. But hey - good ideas on planting more things. I'll follow your lead.
This county already dropped it due to their inability to procure the chemicals to spray. Now they're not even funding it anymore, but this is just with regards to this county. it's already a small county so those in charge of depop aren't all that concerned with us to begin with. The low hanging fruit is in the big cities.
One of the tricks to propagating more is to start as close as possible to the door to your yard ,and then expand from there along whatever boundary line you can see, e.g. along the house, a fence line, tree line, etc. tall stuff in back, short stuff in front, etc. The yard will practically landscape itself.
When I walk every morning, I pick up garbage. It makes me sad that people throw their garbage on the ground without a thought. But the garbage is very illuminating as well: soda cans, beer cans, plastic bottles, Styrofoam to-go cups and containers, straws, candy wrappers, fast food bags, etc. Our values are completely upside down and backwards. We value the most vapid and empty things and give no thought to the things that are the most valuable, like all of the wondrous life and beauty of this planet. All of the money in the world will not buy us beauty, meaning, or fulfillment. Our current way of life is bankrupt. May we find the way back to beauty and the sacredness of life.
I found an abandoned tomato cage poking out of a trash can yesterday. I go out for a morning walk most days and check the alleys for useful stuff. I've noticed that lots of people drive up and down the alleys here and collect things their neighbors have put out. The local custom seems to be to put things right next to your trash can so others can take what they want. I got four discarded lawn chairs - old and beat up, but great for repurposing in the garden. It's a bit cooler today and the sky was beautiful. The hummers were visiting the feeder. I heard a red-headed woodpecker and a Carolina wren.
Yes, people can and do throw out things that other people can use as well. Occasionally I find some little trinket or other on my walks. I have been trying to reduce the amount of trash I make by buying used and making some of my own natural care products. I am not perfect, but as I feel more connected to myself, others, and life, I want to be and do from a place of relationship and interbeingness.
There have been fewer Monarchs in my yard this summer. The Milkweed is thriving, but no eggs or caterpillars to give it that value or make it part of the cycle of life. I wonder at times, do we have the potential to wake up and take action, what can our brain handle with so many stimuli coming at us on a daily basis, and can we care about these sacred things when we rarely stop and notice them? On a more positive note, the lightening bugs were dancing all over my yard this summer and I danced with them, with awe and astonishment and wonder. I stop. I notice. I belong. Thank you for acknowledging all the living beings with wings and lights and mystery.
The Monarch butterfly uses the plant as a host for its eggs, and the caterpillars eat the Milkweed until they're ready to chrysalize. The caterpillars move away from the Milkweed when they are going to chrysalize so it makes sense that you're finding them in other places.
This gets to the heart of one of the most common failings of mankind--that "someone must do something about it." Unfortunately, what this means is that SOMEONE ELSE must do something.
The problem mentioned in the article cannot be solved by waiting for the world to recognize it and take action against it. It cannot be cured by collective force. Instead the healing must begin with the understanding of individuals that they must take action ON THEIR OWN without waiting for others to move and even if no one else participates.
"If you know what is right to do and you do not do it, to you it is sin." -- James 4: 17
Personally, this means that while my neighbors spray their yards with all kinds of herbicides and pesticides to grow nice-looking lawns, I refuse to do so. Visually, my yard cannot compete with theirs, but I can go into it (and my garden) and find butterflies, ladybugs, toads, preying mantises, etc., which live there because I refuse to use chemicals to control my local environment. I prefer a sea of bright yellow dandelion blooms growing in profusion naturally over a sterile expanse of grass which cannot exist without unnatural manipulation to the detriment of everything else.
Everyone can act proactively and preemptively in this manner.
I’ve realized the madness of all the mowing. I’ve been leaving my pet a patch of long grass and she loves it. I’m planning on less lawn and more native plants.
Agreed. I do not concern myself with what my neighbors do on their property. That's their business. I moved into my house late last year and I've started the slow process of removing a lot of the grass and replacing it with fruits, vegetables, and plants for wildlife. "Someone needs to do something about that" is said too often. Just figure out what to do for yourself, do it, and stop worrying about other people.
like the quote from the film 'aluna' as the kogi protest the destruction of yet another sacred river mouth: "if you knew she could feel, you would not be doing it."
Just remember that the aholes that are pushing change for carbon reductions have regularly ignored other pollution, like glysophate, other pesticides, and industrial run off.
But you won't open your eyes to see that this carbon obsession and global warming is the thing that they use to distract us while they allow for real pollution.
I just spent three weeks in my childhood home of Appalachia where I remember spending every evening catching lightning bugs (maybe I was too good at it!) And honeysuckle is the scent of my childhood, that pervaded PawPaw alley behind my house where bats circled the streetlights for a quick bite. I saw one this time, driving at night on a deserted road.
I have a milkweed thicket in my Santa Cruz home where, after 30 months of divorce negotiations, it was down to the last week. At the same time, 40 blue chrysalis were hanging from the ridges of the house I'd bought and hoped to keep for our daughters. Too distracted to do anything else, I spent hours watching the Monarchs emerge, wet and vibrant, patiently dry and take their first flights.
I'm still thinking to get my first tatoo, at 65, of a monarch. I hear they're coming back in the Western migration! I'd also like a lightning bug and maybe a dandelion seed blowing in the wind. These are all my icons of hope.
I, too, saw monarch this morning. Luckily, there have been a few visiting throughout the summer (which started in May here). Fireflies, are a rare thing. In the 43 years since I arrived here (Minnesota) at the age of 17, I have seen only 3.
I have a very poor view of our species. Virtue is far less present than virulence. But I take hope that nature will outlast us. This hope was boosted when, at the outset of Covid, the lions came into the streets in Africa and lay down without fear. And when the dolphins swam through the canals of Venice because the polluted waters had turned to clear.
Call me cruel, but I hope that nature keeps taking us down until we, as a species, learn that our place is not at the top. Except in hubris.
There is no possible case to be made that industrial modernity is worth the loss of the monarch butterfly. None. It's a stain on this culture which can never be erased no matter how brief or long is the time it has remaining.
That said, none of us are prescient. One way to look at the mass extinction event we are within is that all these beautiful creatures—monarchs and fireflies and rosebushes and rainbow trout and snow leopards and on and on—are only here because previous mass extinctions overturned the biological order and set the stage for them. Extinctions on earth are a kind of reshuffling of the biological deck. It may be there are creatures even more beautiful than the ones we know waiting beyond all this ruin, and in some real sense requiring it.
So mourn this, but know you will not live to see the full story. Earth has been wounded before, even seemingly mortally wounded, yet she does not die. These losses may yet be the seed of something greater still.
I read recently that the monarchs are back in larger numbers than ever on the West Coast along with different hypotheses about why that is. Totally unexpected. Nature is sacred and also so much smarter than we are!
When I was 12 or 13, living in rural Minnesota, a pair of bald eagles flew over me, just above the ground. It was a mating dance, and seeing it was among the most spectacular moments of my life. I was running behind them at full speed, and they were out of sight in seconds. But somehow never out of my heart.
That would be wonderful! You were quite lucky! --- There were 2 pair of eagles living within 5 miles of where I live, the last I knew. I haven't heard anyone speak of them for a year or so.
Acorns in CA were extremely abundant last fall, more so than the usual on and then not producing cycles of the trees. And this burst of creation is seen in many other species. As said, nature has her ways. And we know this one, If there is little chance of survival, the renewal effort is far greater.
In May my mother would take her six children to a woods near to our farm in Wisconsin. It was carpeted with spring ephemerals - various flowers that bloomed a few weeks in May along with morel mushrooms. The transcendent beauty would place us in a hush us as we walked. This was over fifty years ago. My brother who still lives nearby informs me the flowers are no more, replaced by a green uniform carpet of garlic mustard an invasive species from Europe that is nearly universal in the woods of that area. I will ask my brother if summer lightning bugs are still happening.
Hi Jeff. Wisconsin? If you haven't yet discovered Aldo Leopold's 'A Sand County Almanac', you are in for a real treat. Wisconsin. Here in my tiny apartment in Japan, I am a bit jealous of those memories, even of garlic mustard.
Hi, Steven, I am familiar with A Sand County Almanac. The area spoken of in it is about an hour or so from the part of Wisconsin I lived in. I now live in a very different part of the United States south of Fresno in the California Central,Valley not far from the Sierra Nevada giant sequoia realm. No lightning bugs here!
Hi Jeff. Just headed for bed, pushing 1:30 in Japan . Having grown up in rural North Carolina, either of those two places you mentioned is infinitely preferable to the concrete jungle of a Tokyo commuter town in which I live. I know that 'happiness' is what you make of it, but being close to wilderness sure helps. Both of us having read Leopold, I can imagine standing back to back, and looking at the land in affirmation. Thanks for writing back!
I took on a derelict homestead in Nova Scotia in 2010, and the day I got the garden started I stayed digging til after dark...
As I was persuading myself to stop, a flash! around my knees, again another flash
A firefly! it circled me - I was filled with delight. It really felt sacred, the acknowledgement.
Just one firefly though?
I read up about the firefly life cycle
And their reduction across North America
Due to habitat loss
Then I did my best to create habitat for them. They need undisturbed mulched grassy areas and trees to lay their glow eggs. These become glow worms - and stay that way for one to two years. Finally they take off as fireflies just for one short summer, in which they need to find a partner and a good place to lay the next generation.
The other big problem for fireflies is outdoor electrical lighting - it messes up their courtship and makes it hard to find a mate.
So I only had dim timed lights to show stairs, otherwise kept the property dark, only star and moonlight.
And it seemed like it worked!
As they definitely did increase
The first year I was there I only saw the ONE. Next year FOUR. Then Sixteen
In the last years when Covid kept me locked down elsewhere, tenants said they are all over the hill, forest and garden...
"There were a lot - first we saw one and very soon another and another and then there were MANY it was like stars in the sky, so beautiful.
Now I'll have to research the firefly habitat and how to create one on our property; we have a few but it seems more like they are passing through than staying .. so glad you brought this up. A great project for the girls and I."
So now they are creating habitat at their place across the county. It works.
I had to sell the acreage -
I hope the new owners leave the plants. All that bee and butterfly food, and that those who are there cherish the fireflies.
I can report that there are fireflies in NYC. I often think that cities are an unexpected saving grace. We have less pesticide use and less monocrop areas. We've got some serious bees and wasps, all kinds of birds including herons, ospreys, hawks, and recently the crows have returned after a long absence. There's a project I follow on IG called the Billion Oyster Project. They've been working on restoring the oyster reefs in the harbor. They have been reporting success as well as other species returning, like sea horses. There is love and hope. And never count the Earth herself out of the story.
So true. The history of northern Pacific coast salmon is also instructive: fish weirs strung across stream mouths killed almost every salmon run and experts thought the fishery was dead. But a decade after the weirs were removed, the streams were filled with salmon again.
Nature recovers if we cease attacking.
Thank you for the good news👏
That is some good news Sybil!.... I agree and think you've made a great point - 'never count Earth herself out of the story'...... It is the same with us - we are in partnership with our planet and she is a conscious being.... invested in us and in her creation.
Truly beautiful! They are sacred. When I moved into my current home there was nothing in the front or back yard but concrete, a patch of forlorn looking grass, and a lilac tree that had been repeatedly strimmed. It had a single spire. The garden was barren apart from slugs. Three years later and it is filled with insects and butterflies (red admiral, cabbage white, fritillary etc.) and we've even had a hedgehog and a frog. Birds visit to eat the insects too. It's not a large garden, but I've filled it with flowers, dug up the concrete at the front, and put down large raised beds on the concrete at the side for vegetables. I can't change the world, but I can do something about my own space. Around us, land is being gobbled up for building gargantuan warehouses and residential estates - not brown land, but arable! It is a depressing, worrying sight.
Bravo! I turned my 5-acre property into a native plant haven for butterflies, birds, and bees. It took me a long time because I did all the work myself, but the results are SO worth it. And I learned so much doing it.
Oh good for you! I am turning little patches into milkweed garden. And as the milkweed seeds - replanting them. I saw a few more butterflies the following season. I hope more to come! Thanks for the inspiration!
That’s fantastic 🙌 we are lucky to have a 3 acre patch of wilderness in very rural coastal Donegal (NW of Ireland) - it was very overgrazed when we arrived in 2007 by the previous owners horses. We have planted about 1000 trees, (alder, rowan, silver birch, oak, hawthorn, blackthorn, hazel, Holly, plum hawthorn, ash, Scot’s pine, damson, apple, ), with mixed success as it is so windy and exposed, but we have learned what works best and now have some trees over 20’ - the noticeable difference is the huge increase in insects, ground cover and wild flowers and small birds. Lots of frogs in the two ponds. Of course we are very lucky to have such a large area to start with, but it feels great to make a difference
The solution is to literally stop doing anything about it. Governments need to stop looking at mosquitos as a problem.
In Mexico, they have a mosquito abatement program that consists of fliers posted around town indicating how to cut tires into thirds, lay each piece down to allow water to pool, then place pieces of paper on the water which mosquitos may then lay their eggs. Remove and replace the pieces of paper twice a week.
Mexico also has no forestry service to speak of, but when you fly over, you'll notice a patchwork which precludes the need for one. Each fire can only burn an acre or a few acres at the most before it hits last years, or the fire the year before. They practically burn out before anyone notices them.
About a dozen years ago I moved from California to a somewhat swampy area slightly inland from the gulf coast of Florida. There were no butterflies evident anywhere. My yard, like every yard in the neighborhood, consisted of grass and an old tree that had clogged my septic tank with its roots. After dispatching the tree and grinding the roots, I proceeded to haul in well over 40 truckloads of FREE mulch. While I was waiting for all that mulch to turn to compost, I searched online for a list of native species, invasive species (many which are edible as well, and yes, I broke the law. Call me crazy. Call me a radical, but I now have well over a few hundred pounds of food growing in my yard.) as well as anything else that would thrive in this climate zone.
I also carried a pair of clippers in the glove compartment of my car, and whenever I saw anything blooming on the side of a road, vacant lot, etc. I would stop and take a cutting or ten, plant them in anything that would hold dirt until they were ready to be transplanted into the compost.
Fastforward ten years and my yard is alive with caterpillars, butterflies of all shapes, colors, and sizes. There are cocoons popping up everywhere. along with frogs, mosquitos, lizards, snakes, armadillos, possums, raccoons, deer, foxes, etc. etc.
This year has been exceptionally hot, so half of my flowering plants are not flowering at all, but because I have such a wide variety of plants, I still have plenty of butterflies. One of my neighbors decided to do the same thing, and we've since begun swapping plants, seeds, cuttings etc.
I just discovered that the county has a program whereby I can call and request that the pond behind my property be stocked with "mosquito fish" which can eat their weight in mosquitos every day. Perhaps this may be enough for them to at least stop spraying around this area.
Wonderful!!! Good on you - what a fantastic Earth citizen you are. And an inspiration for all of us!
Thanks for the kind words, but honestly when I started hauling in one load of mulch after another, my main concern was to find a way to stop spending so much time mowing grass, and secondarily figure out an easy way to grow and store food. The more food I grow, the less Big Ag needs to grow. That's where I see the biggest benefits to the environment being realized. Put the Rockefellers, Big Ag, and Big Pharma out of business.
The butterflies along with all the other wildlife were just a bonus. I sit in my living room sometimes and just stare out at all the butterflies flitting from one flower to another. Quite often while I'm working in the yard, they will stop and land on me. People think this is unusual, but when they're literally everywhere, it's not that unusual at all. I've had lizards, frogs, and dragonflies jump on me as well.
I would conservatively estimate that there is well over 500 pounds of tubers buried in my back yard alone. I have three varieties of sweet potato and five different varieties of yams which I've never harvested. They just keep growing bigger and heavier every year. I have seven different varieties of spinach, two of which are poisonous if not cooked properly. Quite often while I'm strolling through the garden I will snack on the tomatoes, ivy gourd cucumbers, peppers lettuce and spinach. it's like eating a salad without having to make any preparations. There are no dishes to wash either. I'm growing my own ginger, sassafras, and sugar cane which allows me to make my own naturally carbonated ginger ale, and root beer. It's a probiotic which has been a godsend for me. I haven't been to a doctor in years, and I canceled my health insurance about three years ago.
Almost every time I go out into the yard, I end up covered in dirt. You can't see any skin on my hands or forearms or my legs. I've heard it isn't healthy to have all that dirt on my skin, but I've always had skin problems, but even that seems to be going away as well.
Your garden sounds like paradise!! How satisfying it must be to have created such an oasis.... so much life where there was once, not so long ago (how long was it?) none....
I wish I lived somewhere warmer - with such natural abundance. Wow. Beautiful.
I LOVE that - put 'that lot' out of business !!!!! Here's to that !
I used to love going to the Pacific Islands (it's been 3 years now, sadly) - butterflies aplenty...
Life thrives in the warmth so much more....
Enjoy the fruits of your labours... Mother Earth is giving back tenfold by the sound of it....
We all need to be in partnership with her in this way. It will be our way out of this insanity.
All the best Shnarkle.
I always wanted to hit the Pacific islands, but ended up spending my time down in Central America and the Caribbean instead. As much as I enjoy this little piece of paradise, there are a few drawbacks. I never get used to the snakes, and some of the neighbors don't like the looks of it and have taken to tossing their garbage into it due to the fact that it is easy to make it disappear into the thick foliage. I just noticed a stiff possum tossed into my driveway yesterday.
If you look at a lot of people who are doing this, especially when looking at "before" and "after" pictures, quite often the before is neat and clean while the after is basically an homage to Boo Radleys front yard. In my case it now includes vultures roosting in the trees.
When people see the vultures roosting in the trees, or feasting on God knows what in the driveway, they're going to start seeing these as unwelcome omens of things to come. That's just the way people are. Although even though it looks creepy to me, it also looks kinda cool as well. It really gives my yard this wild dangerous appearance.
Haha - nothing is every without a 'con' side is it. Vultures!! Wow. We don't have those birds in this country. Possums, yes. Snakes no. I think I chose to incarnate in this country for just that reason - no snakes. Your abundant food supply however, is enviable.... And so wonderful you have all those beautiful butterflies. We went to a butterfly 'farm' (or whatever they call them) in Florida a few years ago, when on a cruise. Those amazing blue ones! You're lucky....!
They are trying to kill you - depop. So don't count on them stopping the spraying. But hey - good ideas on planting more things. I'll follow your lead.
This county already dropped it due to their inability to procure the chemicals to spray. Now they're not even funding it anymore, but this is just with regards to this county. it's already a small county so those in charge of depop aren't all that concerned with us to begin with. The low hanging fruit is in the big cities.
One of the tricks to propagating more is to start as close as possible to the door to your yard ,and then expand from there along whatever boundary line you can see, e.g. along the house, a fence line, tree line, etc. tall stuff in back, short stuff in front, etc. The yard will practically landscape itself.
When I walk every morning, I pick up garbage. It makes me sad that people throw their garbage on the ground without a thought. But the garbage is very illuminating as well: soda cans, beer cans, plastic bottles, Styrofoam to-go cups and containers, straws, candy wrappers, fast food bags, etc. Our values are completely upside down and backwards. We value the most vapid and empty things and give no thought to the things that are the most valuable, like all of the wondrous life and beauty of this planet. All of the money in the world will not buy us beauty, meaning, or fulfillment. Our current way of life is bankrupt. May we find the way back to beauty and the sacredness of life.
I found an abandoned tomato cage poking out of a trash can yesterday. I go out for a morning walk most days and check the alleys for useful stuff. I've noticed that lots of people drive up and down the alleys here and collect things their neighbors have put out. The local custom seems to be to put things right next to your trash can so others can take what they want. I got four discarded lawn chairs - old and beat up, but great for repurposing in the garden. It's a bit cooler today and the sky was beautiful. The hummers were visiting the feeder. I heard a red-headed woodpecker and a Carolina wren.
Yes, people can and do throw out things that other people can use as well. Occasionally I find some little trinket or other on my walks. I have been trying to reduce the amount of trash I make by buying used and making some of my own natural care products. I am not perfect, but as I feel more connected to myself, others, and life, I want to be and do from a place of relationship and interbeingness.
There have been fewer Monarchs in my yard this summer. The Milkweed is thriving, but no eggs or caterpillars to give it that value or make it part of the cycle of life. I wonder at times, do we have the potential to wake up and take action, what can our brain handle with so many stimuli coming at us on a daily basis, and can we care about these sacred things when we rarely stop and notice them? On a more positive note, the lightening bugs were dancing all over my yard this summer and I danced with them, with awe and astonishment and wonder. I stop. I notice. I belong. Thank you for acknowledging all the living beings with wings and lights and mystery.
I planted some milkweed, but oddly enough, the two cocoons I saw were not on the plants, but on the house. Weird.
The Monarch butterfly uses the plant as a host for its eggs, and the caterpillars eat the Milkweed until they're ready to chrysalize. The caterpillars move away from the Milkweed when they are going to chrysalize so it makes sense that you're finding them in other places.
This gets to the heart of one of the most common failings of mankind--that "someone must do something about it." Unfortunately, what this means is that SOMEONE ELSE must do something.
The problem mentioned in the article cannot be solved by waiting for the world to recognize it and take action against it. It cannot be cured by collective force. Instead the healing must begin with the understanding of individuals that they must take action ON THEIR OWN without waiting for others to move and even if no one else participates.
"If you know what is right to do and you do not do it, to you it is sin." -- James 4: 17
Personally, this means that while my neighbors spray their yards with all kinds of herbicides and pesticides to grow nice-looking lawns, I refuse to do so. Visually, my yard cannot compete with theirs, but I can go into it (and my garden) and find butterflies, ladybugs, toads, preying mantises, etc., which live there because I refuse to use chemicals to control my local environment. I prefer a sea of bright yellow dandelion blooms growing in profusion naturally over a sterile expanse of grass which cannot exist without unnatural manipulation to the detriment of everything else.
Everyone can act proactively and preemptively in this manner.
I only mow a tiny space of land for my dog to play in, on my acre of land in a wilderness area. My neighbors hate me for it, I do not care.
I’ve realized the madness of all the mowing. I’ve been leaving my pet a patch of long grass and she loves it. I’m planning on less lawn and more native plants.
But your dog loves you all the more for it. What could be better than even more love from a dog?
Agreed. I do not concern myself with what my neighbors do on their property. That's their business. I moved into my house late last year and I've started the slow process of removing a lot of the grass and replacing it with fruits, vegetables, and plants for wildlife. "Someone needs to do something about that" is said too often. Just figure out what to do for yourself, do it, and stop worrying about other people.
like the quote from the film 'aluna' as the kogi protest the destruction of yet another sacred river mouth: "if you knew she could feel, you would not be doing it."
Just remember that the aholes that are pushing change for carbon reductions have regularly ignored other pollution, like glysophate, other pesticides, and industrial run off.
But you won't open your eyes to see that this carbon obsession and global warming is the thing that they use to distract us while they allow for real pollution.
Yeah I wrote a whole book on that.
It does seem odd that all the previous discussions of loss of biodiversity seem to have been drowned out by the relentless drumbeat of CO2.
It is deliberate. I have a video essay on this on YouTube called virtous and non virtous environmentalism:
https://youtu.be/b9ThZu0QN8A
Yup. Carbon credits is a global green washing campaign.
I just spent three weeks in my childhood home of Appalachia where I remember spending every evening catching lightning bugs (maybe I was too good at it!) And honeysuckle is the scent of my childhood, that pervaded PawPaw alley behind my house where bats circled the streetlights for a quick bite. I saw one this time, driving at night on a deserted road.
I have a milkweed thicket in my Santa Cruz home where, after 30 months of divorce negotiations, it was down to the last week. At the same time, 40 blue chrysalis were hanging from the ridges of the house I'd bought and hoped to keep for our daughters. Too distracted to do anything else, I spent hours watching the Monarchs emerge, wet and vibrant, patiently dry and take their first flights.
I'm still thinking to get my first tatoo, at 65, of a monarch. I hear they're coming back in the Western migration! I'd also like a lightning bug and maybe a dandelion seed blowing in the wind. These are all my icons of hope.
I, too, saw monarch this morning. Luckily, there have been a few visiting throughout the summer (which started in May here). Fireflies, are a rare thing. In the 43 years since I arrived here (Minnesota) at the age of 17, I have seen only 3.
I have a very poor view of our species. Virtue is far less present than virulence. But I take hope that nature will outlast us. This hope was boosted when, at the outset of Covid, the lions came into the streets in Africa and lay down without fear. And when the dolphins swam through the canals of Venice because the polluted waters had turned to clear.
Call me cruel, but I hope that nature keeps taking us down until we, as a species, learn that our place is not at the top. Except in hubris.
I agree like Uncle Ted I am misanthrope, if that makes me a sinner well that is my cross to bear.
There is no possible case to be made that industrial modernity is worth the loss of the monarch butterfly. None. It's a stain on this culture which can never be erased no matter how brief or long is the time it has remaining.
That said, none of us are prescient. One way to look at the mass extinction event we are within is that all these beautiful creatures—monarchs and fireflies and rosebushes and rainbow trout and snow leopards and on and on—are only here because previous mass extinctions overturned the biological order and set the stage for them. Extinctions on earth are a kind of reshuffling of the biological deck. It may be there are creatures even more beautiful than the ones we know waiting beyond all this ruin, and in some real sense requiring it.
So mourn this, but know you will not live to see the full story. Earth has been wounded before, even seemingly mortally wounded, yet she does not die. These losses may yet be the seed of something greater still.
I read recently that the monarchs are back in larger numbers than ever on the West Coast along with different hypotheses about why that is. Totally unexpected. Nature is sacred and also so much smarter than we are!
And creatures ebb and flow. I was reminded about the bald eagles today. They were endangered way back when by DDT. Now they're all over their range.
They're even in ranges that make no sense to me, but oh how glorious to see them fly above me.
When I was 12 or 13, living in rural Minnesota, a pair of bald eagles flew over me, just above the ground. It was a mating dance, and seeing it was among the most spectacular moments of my life. I was running behind them at full speed, and they were out of sight in seconds. But somehow never out of my heart.
Oh! How wonderful! 😯🤗
I was once lucky enough to see a young bald eagle just coming out of the nest with its parent. Beautiful creatures.
That would be wonderful! You were quite lucky! --- There were 2 pair of eagles living within 5 miles of where I live, the last I knew. I haven't heard anyone speak of them for a year or so.
I was living in the DC metro area when I saw them. I think it was at Great Falls. Over 25 years ago, but still a strong memory.
The ones I'm talking about are in Indiana. Bald Eagles! I didn't think we had trees tall enough to suit them.
Acorns in CA were extremely abundant last fall, more so than the usual on and then not producing cycles of the trees. And this burst of creation is seen in many other species. As said, nature has her ways. And we know this one, If there is little chance of survival, the renewal effort is far greater.
In May my mother would take her six children to a woods near to our farm in Wisconsin. It was carpeted with spring ephemerals - various flowers that bloomed a few weeks in May along with morel mushrooms. The transcendent beauty would place us in a hush us as we walked. This was over fifty years ago. My brother who still lives nearby informs me the flowers are no more, replaced by a green uniform carpet of garlic mustard an invasive species from Europe that is nearly universal in the woods of that area. I will ask my brother if summer lightning bugs are still happening.
Hi Jeff. Wisconsin? If you haven't yet discovered Aldo Leopold's 'A Sand County Almanac', you are in for a real treat. Wisconsin. Here in my tiny apartment in Japan, I am a bit jealous of those memories, even of garlic mustard.
Hi, Steven, I am familiar with A Sand County Almanac. The area spoken of in it is about an hour or so from the part of Wisconsin I lived in. I now live in a very different part of the United States south of Fresno in the California Central,Valley not far from the Sierra Nevada giant sequoia realm. No lightning bugs here!
Hi Jeff. Just headed for bed, pushing 1:30 in Japan . Having grown up in rural North Carolina, either of those two places you mentioned is infinitely preferable to the concrete jungle of a Tokyo commuter town in which I live. I know that 'happiness' is what you make of it, but being close to wilderness sure helps. Both of us having read Leopold, I can imagine standing back to back, and looking at the land in affirmation. Thanks for writing back!
I took on a derelict homestead in Nova Scotia in 2010, and the day I got the garden started I stayed digging til after dark...
As I was persuading myself to stop, a flash! around my knees, again another flash
A firefly! it circled me - I was filled with delight. It really felt sacred, the acknowledgement.
Just one firefly though?
I read up about the firefly life cycle
And their reduction across North America
Due to habitat loss
Then I did my best to create habitat for them. They need undisturbed mulched grassy areas and trees to lay their glow eggs. These become glow worms - and stay that way for one to two years. Finally they take off as fireflies just for one short summer, in which they need to find a partner and a good place to lay the next generation.
The other big problem for fireflies is outdoor electrical lighting - it messes up their courtship and makes it hard to find a mate.
So I only had dim timed lights to show stairs, otherwise kept the property dark, only star and moonlight.
And it seemed like it worked!
As they definitely did increase
The first year I was there I only saw the ONE. Next year FOUR. Then Sixteen
In the last years when Covid kept me locked down elsewhere, tenants said they are all over the hill, forest and garden...
"There were a lot - first we saw one and very soon another and another and then there were MANY it was like stars in the sky, so beautiful.
Now I'll have to research the firefly habitat and how to create one on our property; we have a few but it seems more like they are passing through than staying .. so glad you brought this up. A great project for the girls and I."
So now they are creating habitat at their place across the county. It works.
I had to sell the acreage -
I hope the new owners leave the plants. All that bee and butterfly food, and that those who are there cherish the fireflies.
Lots of lightning bugs and occasional monarchs in my garden in NJ. :)