Message-ID: <alpine.NEB.2.20.1611222249510.21390@panix3.panix.com>
From: Alan Sondheim <sondheim@panix.com>
To: Cyb <cybermind@listserv.wvu.edu>, Wryting-L <WRYTING-L@listserv.wvu.edu>
Subject: Birding headaches
Date: Tue, 22 Nov 2016 22:52:10 -0500 (EST)
Birding headaches http://www.alansondheim.org/Brantacanadensisparvipes1148.jpg http://www.alansondheim.org/Brantacanadensisparvipes1149.jpg The Branta canadensis parvipes is the lesser Canada goose. We were at the Carter Center and I noticed the Canada geese were smaller and somewhat stockier in the bill than the geese we're used to seeing. Identification proves miserable; there are seven subspecies and it seems difficult to tell them apart. Certainly this flock (which was quite large) was sufficiently different than the usual. Should we report these? The lesser seem more "Canadian" than the usual Canada goose; perhaps they have illegally crossed the border. It's troubling. None of them were armed. They seemed, by the way, much less aggressive than the standard geese; even the guard geese were pretty laid back. Perhaps the Carter Center https://www.cartercenter.org/ has something to do with it? The place seems dedicated to calmness and meditation; there's a beautiful Japanese garden for example. There were also Eastern towhees and the usual bluebirds, robins, cardinals, etc. around. The sky was blue, the grass was green, there are hybrid American chestnuts everywhere, as the Center is concerned to bring these back from the blight that almost wiped them out. I don't want to spend the rest of my life birding, as opposed to my usual creative activities, but it's good to learn to see and listen; how else would the long-tailed duck calls have made it into my music? This doesn't mean either that I favor the instrumental over other forms of (non)reason, just that, given the political and ecological climate today, I'm trying to learn to tread more carefully.
