Bird of Life, Bird of Death, Bird of Amazement

 

 (Scarlet Macaws - photo by University of Texas)

I am in
the north of this continent, not so very far, but far enough that the sun rises
much earlier and sets much later than usual. 
I awoke with a vision of amazement, the Scarlet Macaw of
Mesoamerica.  I cannot think of that bird
without thinking of death, and of loss. 
Reading yesterday in the book, “Seven Names for the Bellbird,” which is
a book about how people value birds in Honduras, I came across a section on the
Scarlet Macaw, the Guara Roja.  The
author found that the Hondurans speak of the Guara in terms of how much loss of
the natural world they have seen.  So the
Guara came to me today, a bird of life and a bird of death and a bird of
amazement.  I so strongly feel that to be
on a journey of amazement I must also set one foot in the door of death.  For this being present to what is, which stuns
me with the finality and infinity of my shared being.  So here I am at the annual gathering of
Unitarian Universalist ministers in Minneapolis, hearing the call to shared
ministry, which today I see as shared being.

Where
do you journey for amazement, and is death a part of this path?

Rescuing Birds is Useful

 

Rescuing
Birds is Useful

In the Gainesville Sun on June 11,  this headline read:  Scientists:  Rescuing Birds is Useless. As a scientist,
bird veterinarian, minister, and a consultant in the human dimensions of
conservation and wildlife, I found myself grateful that the ethical issues of
bird rescue made the front page. I myself wonder how I might spend my days as I
ask every morning, "Is what I do useless?"  or framed another way, "How can we as
individuals and as a society put our resources to the most use?" This
question is often framed as "charity versus justice" or "helping
the individual versus changing the system that got the individual into the mess
in the first place."  In respect to
the Deepwater Horizon Disaster and birds, we wonder whether to save the one
oiled pelican, or to save our energy, talent, and resources to provide habitat
for pelican rookeries or to lobby for stricter protection of the environment. At
one level, this is an individual’s choice.  What do you feel compelled to do - care for
suffering individuals or for a suffering society and environment?  After 24 years working in avian conservation
and medicine, as well as many years counseling humans in vocational
discernment, I suggest that we each give of ourselves to causes where our deep
joy and gifts intersect with the world’s great needs. If you receive joy and
satisfaction in washing oiled birds, do so. 
Mother Teresa often received criticism from her efforts to care for the
homeless and poor instead of using her power and charisma to change the
economic or political system in India.  Yet she did much to raise awareness and
compassion through her efforts.

Our human response to the suffering of others is an
interrelated whole.  It doesn’t matter so
much the particular of what we do, just as long as we do something, and keep in
mind to do no harm.  For the individual
pelican or tern mired in the oil, it surely matters to them that someone is
willing to ease their suffering, either through treatment or compassionate
euthanasia.  No one trained in avian
rescue wants to cause unnecessary suffering, so we have to be ready to make the
hard decision whether to put a bird through the stress of medical intervention
given the likelihood of recovery and release. 
For me this means we need to study the issues as completely as possible
so that we do the least harm. In the case of oiled birds, there are numerous
studies indicating that a high percentage of birds do survive and can return to
breeding.   The article in the Sun on
6/11 (online version has different title - Is Rescuing Birds Futile?) only referred to one study, which was 15 years old.  Since then our techniques for rehabilitation
have improved, as has our ability to understand the situation from the bird’s
point of view.  We ask, "If I were
this bird, would it be worth it to go through the stress of capture, captivity,
and treatment given the percent chance I will lead a satisfactory life in the
future?" Although no one can answer this question for another or with any
reliability, it doesn't diminish the importance of this question for every bird
under our care.  I know that I find the
pressure of “doing the right thing” nearly overwhelming when it comes to making
decisions with wild birds, but I do not want my uncertainty to stop me from
doing all I can. 

So what is stopping us as group of people from doing
all we can?  Perhaps we suspect that if
we spend time helping birds and not say some other group of suffering beings,
such as orphans in Central America of out-of-work fisherpeople in the Gulf, we
are somehow fundamentally flawed.  We
don’t want to be people who say that birds matter more than humans, or that one
kind of human or bird matters more than others. 
We need not judge ourselves or others based on how we care for
others.  When we help one being, we are
helping others.   If we are called to help humans, we are also helping
birds for they need us as individuals and as a species to be as healthy as we
can. In turn, we need birds and their environments to be as healthy as they can
for our own sake.  The fate of one is the
fate of all. The important question isn’t whether we spend BP’s resources on which
humans or which bird or animals, but how do we care for the interrelated
whole.  By asking that question, I
believe we move towards a future where we as a society can find a way to use
our resources wisely and compassionately. 
When we seek to help others and keep our hearts open to all beings, we
nurture and heal our own lives as we nurture and heal the world. Saving that
one oiled bird this week may not mean you can be sure she will pass on her
genes or live a long life, but maybe, just maybe, it will help heal the human
heart and condition, so that the days of all beings may be long on this earth.  And that's a useful thing.

(this article appeared in the Gainesville Sun June 12, 2010)

Bring Out Your Life

 
 

 Oiled Great Egret (Photo by Tom Mackenzie, USFWS)

Monitoring the Gulf Oil Spill Numbers of affected wildlife,
I recall the movie, "Monty Python and the Holy Grail." There is a
scene where the plague has come through old Europe.  Two men are pulling a cart heaped with
bodies, shouting, "Bring out yer dead!"  A body moves on the cart and says, "I'm
not dead yet."  One of the cart
pullers then whacks the man over the head.

As of yesterday, 859 birds and sea turtles have been
impacted, the majority have come in dead. 
As our rescuerers walk the beaches and motor through the oil coated
seas, they are heaping remains in coolers and laboratories around the
Gulf.  The news is dire, and it's almost
like many of us wish to say, "I told you so."  But the Gulf is not dead yet, nor are the key
stone species gone, yet.  I wonder if
there is something in our attitude and habits that is like whacking the sick
and ill over the head. What if we saw more beauty in the world, every day, in
each other and in our local communities of mixed species?  Would this give us more support, more
passion, and more fire to bring our relationships and communities into line
with our values and our dreams?

I want to shout to the world not to bring out the dead, but
bring out the life, the joy, the beauty in all we do, in every moment, in every
breath.

May it be so.

 

 

Great Egret (Photo by Mike Baird) 

Ponds of Oil

 

How beautiful this morning was Pasture Pond.

It had lain in the dark, all night,

catching the rain...

All day I hang out

over a desk

grinding my teeth

staring.

Then I sleep.

Then I come out of the house,

even before the sun is up,

and walk back through the pinewoods

to Pasture Pond. - Mary Oliver

 

In the nights long hours, we catch the beauty after the grind of the day.  What if we could wake to this dreamt beauty by a walk in the ponds, instead of the headlines of the gulf oil spill coming to shore upon the water edges of Louisiana?  What if we do, and we just don't know it?  What if all the elements in the world catch all the other elements - the rain, the oil, the birds, our stresses that lead to grinding of teeth?  Then we walk in beauty - to the pond, to the oiled beaches, to the memorial services, to life.

 

The Way of Beauty

 

Presentation "Avian Conservation in Guatemala:  The Intersection of veterinary medicine, biology, and human rights." (San Carlos University Master program in Conservation and Wildlife Management)

 

For nearly as long as I have been a veterinarian, I have been coming to Guatemala.  Over a span of 24 years I can tell a story of parrot conservation here in this land whose beauty, and the loss of it, hurts.  But it also a beauty that sustains. So I told a group of biologists and veterinarians studying for their Masters in Conservation and Wildlife Management at the University of San Carlos this past weekend.

Being with them was part of my conservation efforts in Guatemala, first in the north in El Peten with the Scarlet Macaw, and now in the South Coast with the threatened Yellow-naped Amazon . My plan has been to hold discussions with various groups in the hopes of building a coalition that would plan concrete steps to salvage what we may before we lose any more beauty from the world, resulting in only beauty behind us and not before us.

 

Yellow-naped Amazon at Los Tarrales (ecotourist reserve)

So that I could share more of the story I went with faculty and students of the School of Veterinary Medicine and Animal Husbandry to visit fincas that could serve as nuclei for avitourism, research, and conservation.  On the way into these isolated spots of flora and fauna, we could not avoid seeing the destruction of sugar cane.  One finca owner, Andy of Los Tarrales, reported to us that one sugar cane factory is not just burning cane, but also approximately 200 truckfulls of mature wood a day (felled trees).  He fears for what we might actually be able to accomplish here given the extensive infiltration of sugar cane economy in so many industries within Guatemala.

Sugar cane factory smoke stacks in background, with sugar cane crops lining the highways.

We have to try, try hard, and try now – so goes the sentiment that I am hearing across the groups I am have worked with this past month in Central America.  We cannot cease from the work before us, for we know not what may yet flower.

 

Field workers in Finca San Julien

 

So we work, for what else can we do?  Until 11 p.m. at night the students and professors catch bats in mist nests upon star graced hillsides, identifying the species amongst squeals and laughter. 

 Bat caught in mist nets in Los Tarrales

We get up early the next morning to walk the hillsides searching ever more diligently for parrot activity.  The next day begins early too, my final day here which starts at 4 a.m.  I journey to Guatemala City to catch my flight back to the United States, grateful for those that are willing to meet me at the airport to squeeze in one more meeting so that we might ponder the way forward, the way of beauty.

Los Tarrales Nature Reserve

Nourishing and Healing Our Spirits and the World

Me teaching about how to nourish wild macaw chicks 

In my last blog I spoke
of how the conservation team in the Mayan Biosphere Reserve is attempting to
augment the wild macaw population by incubating eggs and placing the hatched
chick into foster nests. This process entails being able to feed the chick once
s/he hatches up until it is accepted by his or her new parents.  Feeding parrot chicks may be routine in
captive, controlled situations, but how do you prepare and serve food in areas
with spotty electricity, long hours away from any kind of store?

To answer this
question, I gave a presentation on feeding wild chicks yesterday at the
Wildlife Conservation Society’s headquarters in Flores, El Peten,
Guatemala.  I reviewed concepts and
techniques of pediatric nutrition, and demonstrated how to use Nutristart.  Nutristart is a powder that you simply mix
with hot water to have a complete diet for parrot chicks, although adding 1/8^th
to 1 tsp of peanut butter might be needed for macaws. Lafeber Company donated
this food so that WCS may feed the chicks, which will nourish the wild macaw
population.  Following this I
demonstrated how to use Emeraid, also from Lafeber Company. This is a powdered
enteral diet for weak or debilitated chicks. They do see sick and malnourished chicks
in the wild, especially the 3^rd chick, and an easily prepared
emergency diet such as this might save future lives.

 

Chepe volunteering to be a chick so I could demonstrate tube feeding 

As a wrap up for out
time together, I asked a few questions to augment my ethnoornithology study,
which is focusing on how to support the human dimension of avian conservation
in Central America.  

Filming the presentation and ethnoornithological discussion 

I asked the conservation
team members what values were important to them that they got to live out in
their work.  They spoke of the importance
of their relationships with one another: that they are united, and value the
dedication, respect, humor, and creative interplay that fills their days and
nourishes their own spirits. Under it all is their love for conservation and to
be doing something positive, with others, that helps heal the world.  I then asked what they would ask of the world
and they replied to you. “Do something real, not just for show. Every person
can do something, and what you do, no matter where you are, will help us here.”

 I translate this
into:  If the situation of the world or
your community bugs you, do something about it. 
It matters what you do!

 

Bug seen from side of road on our way back to Flores (photo by Dr. Melvin Merida) 

 

Hatching Hope

 Adult Wild Scarlet Macaw

There was a time in my life when I lived egg
incubation and psittacine pediatrics.  I’ve
been responsible for thousands of eggs and chicks in “the days.”  Recently, the work in Guatemala reminds me
how much one embryo in one egg means to me, and to others.  It is a life full of possibility, and to lose
one egg, is to lose beauty and wonder.

 Here’s the theory why incubation and raising chicks
for a short time in captivity can be an important strategy for parrot
conservation. In Guatemala¸ wild parents frequently lay 3 eggs. The 3^rd
egg appears to have lower hatchability and the 3^rd chick definitely has
a much harder time surviving – they usually die.  The thinking is, if we can help hatch these 3^rd
eggs and raise the 3^rd chick until they are strong enough, these chicks
can then be placed into wild Scarlet macaw nests where there is only one chick.
This will raise the population numbers which are frighteningly low in the only remaining
area of Guatemala with macaws, El Peten. There is also the possibility of transferring
eggs from captive parents into the wild as well.

 

 Dr. Fernando Martinez   of ARCAS pulling two eggs out of a clutch of 4 to give to Dr. Melvin Merida of WCS to transport to Laguna del Tigre

This past week I got to witness the first experiment
in seeing if egg manipulation will help the macaws here.  CONAP, ARCAS, BALAAM, and WCS are all working
together to attempt to incubate eggs and raise chicks deep into the Mayan
Biosphere Reserve, Laguna del Tigre. 

Two eggs were removed from a captive pair of
breeding macaws at ARCAS and then transported very carefully up into the
reserve.  It is a very bumpy, rough road,
and this time of year the mud makes the going even slower.  What can be a 3 hour drive turned into over 5
hours because of a broken clutch in one of the trucks.  We were worried about transporting the eggs,
in part because of the rough road, and also because the eggs were young. The
two eggs showed an embryo that perhaps only had a day of incubation, and the other
with less than week old.  Eggs this young
are fragile, and need to be kept at 99 degrees. We learned that it is somewhat
easy to maintain the eggs at 99 if the outside temperature is around 100
degrees, which it was.

 Melvin and Challo looking for missing clutch piece in mud where were we got stuck

 

Once up at the station in the forest where the eggs
will be incubated, we held our breath while we candled the eggs, which means
shining a light into the egg in a dark room. Did they survive that long
ride?  Indeed they did!

 Live embryo in egg (notice the red blood vessels surrounding embryo)

 That night we drew lots to see who would check on
the eggs and incubator through the night. 
Eggs are sensitive and we needed to monitor carefully how stable the
temperature and humidly was or was not in the incubator.  My turn came at 2 a.m.  Stumbling into the dark under a starry sky, I
looked up and mused that the stars themselves are incubators of life .What
miracle of temperature and humidity/water led to life on this fertile
planet?  I dallied under the stars,
soaking in the peace when my meditation was shattered by a Howler Monkey in a
tree right over my head.  Maybe he too
was looking up at the stars, proclaiming this his proven territory.

 The next afternoon as we prepared to leave this area
after a morning of climbing nests, we candled the eggs once more. Were they
still alive?  Indeed they were, and
growing nicely.   Hope was hatched in the vigor of this species
at such a young age and in the strength of this egg/chick management project in
such a young stage of incubation.

 Happy incubator crew after installing live eggs in new incubator room

These eggs, this forest, this planet, all are our territory.  May we prove adequate to guard and to cherish
these treasures accordingly as we continue to howl our proclamation that every
egg has inherent worth and dignity, as does every being.