Examination

Weighing wild chicks in La Mosquita - Photo by Hector Portillo Reyes

Being in La Mosquitia,
Honduras one cannot but help examine the state of one’s inner life and the
state of the world. As biologists, conservationists, and people of the land
(Los Misquitos) much of our time is spent examining the ecology around us which
centers on the Guara (Macaw) nests and chicks. 
We seek to know the health of this species by collecting all the data we
can and then looking at the relationships within the whole.

What we found, with
only a handful of nests active with chicks, is that the chicks are thin, many
of the nests still have eggs (which appears late in the season to those who
know the land), and much human activity around the nests showing how they chop
into the trees to extract the chicks.

 

Piscacio high in pine tree examining macaw nest with machete/hatchet cuts

We also spent time
learning about the health of the human communities.  What are the forces causing the violent
conflicts and death threats, land stolen, forests leveled, and people and
parrots displaced? The list of causes is long. 
Thinking of the powerful influences here, including international
petroleum extraction companies and narco drug lords, we cannot fathom what stratagies will
best work together to keep parrots and people in their homes, but we can
witness, testify, and stand in solidarity with those who have been  torn from their way of life.

Interviewing Tomas Manzanares under a macaw nest - photo by Hector Portillo Reyes

Last year´s confiscated birds now permanantely housed at zoo in Tegucigalpa

How exactly does one
stand or fly with other beings as one? 
For my part it comes from examining my own life in relationship to the
whole, in concrete situations such as here in Honduras.  I find my identity and way of life slipping
away into the flow of such beauty and tragedy, and then I listen to the call of
my wild heart, and listen to the call to union with others.   As we
hold one another, and lift one another up on wings of hopes, I hear the
whispered dream and cry to freedom - we are Seres Unidos – Beings United.  Is it such a wild dream to think that we can welcome all beings home to this planet?

 

This year´s surviving confiscated birds, babies who will never know a wild home

Sunday Morning Coming Down (from Rus Rus, La Mosqutia, Honduras)

(Scarlet Macaw Flying By A Carribean Pine in La Mosquitia)

 

On Sunday, April 18, we
came down the long road out of Rus Rus into Puerto Lempira. We had been staying
overnight in the abandoned home of Tomas Manzanares and Alicia Lacuth  for the last several days  as we journeyed out each day to study wild
Scarlet Macaws. 

(Road out of Rus Rus - my feet showing my comfortable position riding in the pick up truck with the soldier)

 Rus Rus is a small
pueblo in the area known as La Mosquitia and has indigenous people, los Misquitos, who have their own language and their own culture.  Their lands and way of life is severely
threatened, as are their very lives. 
Tomas, as the leader of his community, tried to stop some “invaders” from
taking over their land.  These men waited
in ambush for him one day in December, 2009 and he was shot 4 times.  

(Tomas showing me the scars of his 4 bullet wounds) 

Today he has mostly recovered and his biggest
regret seems to be that his camera was broken during the shooting.  Against advice, Tomas journeyed with us back
to his town of Rus Rus, where most of the people had to flee for fear of their
lives after the incident with Tomas.  He
told me, as did several of the Misquitos, that they are willing to risk their
lives to keep their wondrous pine savannah and forests from further
destruction, and to protect their Guara Rojas (Scarlet Macaws). But already the
rivers are beginning to dry up and most macaw nests that we saw have evidence
of chicks being poached.

Half way back to Puerto
Lempira we stopped at the army base to return the soldiers we had hired to
protect us while we researched macaws. 
There the commander of the base gathered his men and then I was invited
to give a talk to the soliders.  Before I
began, a prayer was said, asking God to help the men listen to me so that we
could all work together for the people and the parrots.  With such honor and respect, offered to me, I
thought that I could only return the same to them.   I told them  of how I had been moved by their people, the
Misquitos, who had courage, strength, passion, and heart to love their land and
to protect it.  I told them of the power
they had in their relationship with the land and with each other.  I told them that it would take everything
they’ve got to keep their land and Guaras from being “ desaparecidos” (disappeared).
I then asked them how I could stand in solidarity with them and what they might
say to the world. One solider stood up and told you, my one wild and precious world,
to help them do what they must do to keep their land safe, and to keep it
beautiful.

(Talking with the Soldiers at the Base) 

Though I was not back
in my home congregation on this Sunday morning, I got to preach and in turn, am
being saved by the gathered. My deepest thanks to these Hondurans who are
helping me savor and save the world.

 

(Field Research Group Showing Their "Fly Free" Macaw Wrist Bands)